Editing Lane Seminary (section)

==After the debates==

===Activities in the black community===
"We believe faith without works is dead," Weld wrote to Arthur Tappan in 1834.<ref name=Tappan/> He, Augustus Wattles, and other students created a school out of three rooms, and raised hundreds of dollars to outfit a library and rent classrooms. Classes were run both days and evenings, and the school was soon at capacity. Inspired by [[Prudence Crandall]]'s example, he also set up a school for black women, and Arthur Tappan paid $1,000 ({{inflation|US|1000|1834|fmt=eq}}) for four female teachers to relocate from New York to Cincinnati.<ref name=Williams/>{{rp|170}} As Lewis Tappan put it in his biography of his brother, "[T]he anti-slavery students of Lane Seminary established evening-schools for the adults, and day-schools for the children of the three thousand colored of Cincinnati."<ref name=Arthur/>{{rp|236}}

Weld continued to Tappan:

{{blockquote|We have formed a large and efficient organization for elevating the colored people in Cincinnati—have established a [[Lyceum]] among them, and lecture three or four evenings a week on grammar, geography, arithmetic, natural philosophy, &c. Besides this, an evening free school, for teaching them to read, is in operation every week day evening; and we are about establishing one or two more. We are also getting up a library for circulation among those who can read, and are about establishing a reading room. In addition to this two of our students, one theological and one literary [Augustus Wattles and Marius Robinson<ref name=Abzug>{{cite book
|title=Passionate Liberator. Theodore Dwight Weld and the Dilemma of Reform
|first=Robert H.
|last=Abzug
|publisher=[[Oxford University Press]]
|year=1980
|isbn=019502771X}}</ref>{{rp|94}}], have felt so deeply their degradation, and have been so affected by the intense desire to acquire knowledge which they exhibit, that they have taken a dismission from the institution, and commenced a school among the blacks in the city. They expect to teach a year, and them take up their course in the seminary again, when others will no doubt be ready to take their places. The first went down and opened a school, and it was filled the first day, and that mainly with adults, and those nearly grown. For a number of days he rejected from ten to twenty daily, because he could not teach them. This induced the other dear brother to leave his studies and join him. Both are now incessantly occupied.<br /><br />Besides these two day schools, and the evening schools, and the lectures, we have three large Sabbath schools and Bible classes among the colored people. By sections in rotation, and teaching the evening reading schools in the same way, we can perform an immense amount of labor among them, without interference with our studies.<ref name=Tappan>{{cite news
|title=Letter to Arthur Tappan, March 18, 1834
|last=Weld
|via=[[newspapers.com]]
|first=Theodore D.
|authorlink=Theodore D. Weld
|date=April 12, 1834
|newspaper=[[The Liberator (newspaper)|The Liberator]]
|location=Boston, Massachusetts
|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/91083151/letter-from-theodore-weld-complete/
|access-date=December 24, 2021
|archive-date=December 24, 2021
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211224165425/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/91083151/letter-from-theodore-weld-complete/
|url-status=live
}}</ref>}}

===The threat of violence===
Cincinnati was convulsed as never before.<ref name=Mahan/>{{rp|175}} Rumors circulated during the summer of 1834 about mob violence against the Seminary; the threat of violence had caused [[Miami University of Ohio]] to ban the discussion of abolition.<ref name=Lesick/>{{rp|126}} Cincinnati, largely pro-Southern,<ref name=Lesick/>{{rp|4}} had already experienced the anti-black [[Cincinnati riot of 1829]]; and the huge [[New York anti-abolitionist riots (1834)|anti-abolition riots in New York in July 1834]], which specifically targeted the Tappans, were heavily reported in the Cincinnati newspapers.<ref name=Lesick/>{{rp|117}} In 1835, after the [[whipping of Amos Dresser]], a Lane student, in [[Nashville]], newspapers of that city "warn[ed] the leaders of that institution to be cautious how they proceed."<ref>{{cite news
|title=(Untitled)
|newspaper=[[The Tennessean|National Banner and Nashville Whig]] ([[Nashville, Tennessee]])
|date=19 Aug 1835
|page=3
|others=Reprinted from the ''Cincinnati Whig''
|via=[[newspapers.com]]
|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92810558/amos-dresser-various-things/
|access-date=January 17, 2022
|archive-date=January 18, 2022
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220118182626/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92810558/amos-dresser-various-things/
|url-status=live
}}</ref>

===Trustees ban the discussion of abolition===
As Cincinnati businessmen, the members of the school's board of trustees were quite concerned about being associated with such a radical expression of abolitionism, which could have led to a physical attack on the Seminary. "A riot was very [narrowly] averted, probably only because of Lane's summer vacation."<ref>{{cite book|title=The Origins of Knox College|first=Grant|last=Forssberg|url=https://www.knox.edu/about-knox/our-history/perspectives-on-knox-history/origins-of-knox-college|publisher=[[Knox College (Illinois)|Knox College]]|access-date=July 30, 2019|archive-date=July 13, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190713172216/https://www.knox.edu/about-knox/our-history/perspectives-on-knox-history/origins-of-knox-college|url-status=live}}</ref>

President Beecher did not want to escalate the matter by overreacting, but when the press began to turn public opinion against the students that summer, he was fundraising in Boston. In his absence, the executive committee of the trustees issued a report ordering the abolishment of the school's antislavery society, stating that "no associations or Societies among the students ought to be allowed in the Seminary except such as have for their immediate object improvement in the prescribed course of studies." They also declared that they had the right to dismiss any student "when they shall think it necessary to do so."<ref name=Vermont/> They further adopted a rule to "discourage...such discussions and conduct among the students as are calculated to divert their attention from their studies", meaning that students were not to discuss abolitionism even when dining<ref name=Statement/>{{rp|4}} (talking to students while they were eating was specifically prohibited in the Standing Rules enacted by the trustees on October 13, 1834.<ref name=Vermont>{{cite news
|title=Lane Seminary
|newspaper=[[Vermont Chronicle]] ([[Bellows Falls, Vermont]])
|date=November 7, 1834
|page=3
|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/39224438/activities_at_lane_theological_seminary/
|access-date=November 18, 2019
|archive-date=July 17, 2021
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210717103658/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/39224438/activities-at-lane-theological-seminary/
|url-status=live
}}</ref>) The committee underlined their position by dismissing professor [[John Morgan (professor)|John Morgan]] for taking the side of the students. In October, without waiting for Beecher to return, the board ratified the committee's resolutions.<ref name=Fletcher/>{{rp|158–161}}

On his return, Beecher and two professors issued a statement intended to assuage the anger of the students regarding the action of the trustees, but it was regarded by the students as a faculty endorsement of the trustees' action.

===The "Lane Rebels" resign===
On October 21, most of the students resigned,<ref name=Wooster>{{cite book|chapter=The Lane Rebels Dismissions|title=Cause for Freedom|first=Maddie|last=Smith|chapter-url=http://www.woosterdigital.org/causeforfreedom/exhibits/show/lane_rebels_dismissions/lane_rebels_dismissions|access-date=July 15, 2019|archive-date=July 28, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190728221951/http://www.woosterdigital.org/causeforfreedom/exhibits/show/lane_rebels_dismissions/lane_rebels_dismissions|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=Dumond>{{cite book
|title=Antislavery; the crusade for freedom in America
|last=Dumond
|first=Dwight Lowell
|year=1961
|oclc=1014527218
|location=[[Ann Arbor, Michigan]]
|publisher=[[University of Michigan Press]]
|url=https://archive.org/details/antislaverycrusa00dumo/page/n13}}</ref>{{rp|183}} as did trustee [[Asa Mahan]] (another member of Finney's contingent). (Technically, they requested dismissal from the school, which was granted.) In December they published a [[pamphlet]] of 28 pages, published anonymously but written by Weld,<ref name=Abzug/>{{rp|120}}<ref name=Lesick/>{{rp|135}} on "the reasons which induced the students of Lane Seminary, to dissolve their connection with that institution."<ref name=Statement>{{cite book|title=A statement of the reasons which induced the students of Lane Seminary, to dissolve their connection with that institution|date=December 15, 1834|url=https://archive.org/details/ASPC0001868700|location=Cincinnati}}</ref> The pamphlet received national attention, as it was reprinted in full in ''The Liberator''.<ref>{{cite news
|title=Defence of the students
|newspaper=[[The Liberator (newspaper)|The Liberator]]
|location=Boston, Massachusetts
|date=January 10, 1835
|pages=1
|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/39210988/the_liberator/
|via=[[newspapers.com]]
|access-date=November 18, 2019
|archive-date=July 17, 2021
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210717103648/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/39210988/the-liberator/
|url-status=live
}} Page 2 is at https://www.newspapers.com/clip/39211019/the_liberator/ {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220517123903/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/39211019/the-liberator/ |date=May 17, 2022 }}.</ref>

Hostile press reports turned this incorrectly into the expulsion of the students, "in consequence of the dangerous principles they held in relation to slavery."<ref>{{cite news
|title=Incendiarism (pt. 2 of 2)
|newspaper=[[Norwalk Reflector|Huron Reflector]] ([[Norwalk, Ohio]])
|date=1 Sep 1835
|page=2
|via=[[newspapers.com]]
|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/41393914/on-amos-dresser-2-of-2/
|access-date=January 18, 2022
|archive-date=January 18, 2022
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220118110230/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/41393914/on-amos-dresser-2-of-2/
|url-status=live
}}</ref>

The Rebels were a loosely defined group, and different sources give different names and figures. The ''Statement'' had 51 signatures, but it adds that "several of our brethren, who coincide with us in sentiment, are not able to affix their names to this document, in consequence of being several hundred miles from the Seminary."<ref name=Statement/>{{rp|28}} According to Lane, there were 40, including the entirety of Lane's first class, the class of 1836 (which began in 1833).<ref>{{cite book
|pages=[https://archive.org/details/generalcatalogue00lane/page/9 9]–12
|title=General Catalogue of Lane Theological Seminary, 1828-1881
|publisher=Lane Theological Seminary
|year=1881
|url=https://archive.org/details/generalcatalogue00lane}}</ref> There were also prospective students who declined to enroll.<ref name=Lesick/>{{rp|130}} Lawrence Lesick, author of the only book on the Lane Rebels, gives a figure of 75, but 19 more had left before the trustees took action, and only 8 students, out of 103, remained at Lane at the beginning of the next term.<ref name=Lesick>{{cite book|title=The Lane rebels : evangelicalism and antislavery in antebellum America
|last=Lesick|first=Lawrence Thomas|year=1980
|location=Metuchen, New Jersey
|url=https://archive.org/details/lanerebelsevange00lesi
|publisher=[[Scarecrow Press]]|isbn=9780810813724}}</ref>{{rp|131, 157–158}} According to Oberlin, 32 of them enrolled,<ref>{{cite web
|title=Lane Rebels Who Came to Oberlin
|publisher=Oberlin College
|access-date=November 5, 2019
|url=http://www2.oberlin.edu/external/EOG/LaneDebates/RebelTable.html
|archive-date=February 10, 2020
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200210220329/http://www2.oberlin.edu/external/EOG/LaneDebates/RebelTable.html
|url-status=live
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|year=2017|title=The Lane Rebels Gallery|url=https://sanctuary.oberlincollegelibrary.org/exhibits/show/the-lane-rebels/the-lane-rebels-gallery|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200210175253/ps://sanctuary.oberlincollegelibrary.org/exhibits/show/the-lane-rebels/the-lane-rebels-gallery|archive-date=2020-02-10|access-date=July 19, 2019|publisher=Oberlin College Libraries}}</ref> although some others who enrolled at the same time, though not students at Lane, are considered part of the Rebels.<ref name=Wooster/> A few enrolled at other schools, such as [[Auburn Theological Seminary]].

Weld and some other student leaders at Lane — [[William T. Allan]], Weld's collaborator and president of Lane's new anti-slavery society; [[James A. Thome]], a prominent speaker during the debates;<ref name=Letter/> and [[Henry B. Stanton]]<ref name=Letter/> — had been threatened with expulsion.<ref name=Lesick/>{{rp|129}} Weld did not withdraw until the motion to expel him, which would have been nationally publicized, had been defeated.<ref name=Lesick/>{{rp|130}}

===The "seminary" at Cumminsville===
About a dozen of the  [[Lane Rebels]], as they came to be called, established an informal seminary of their own in 1834–1835, in [[Cumminsville, Ohio]].<ref name=Lesick/>{{rp|132–133}} "We went out, not knowing whither we went. The Lord's hand was with us. Five miles from the seminary we found a deserted brick tavern, with many convenient rooms. Here we rallied. A gentleman of the vicinity offered us all necaessary fuel, a gentleman far off [Lewis Tappan] sent us a thousand dollars, and we set up a seminary of our own and became a law unto ourselves. George Whipple was competent in Hebrew, and William T. Allan in Greek. They were made professors in the intermediate state. It was desirable that we should remain near to Cincinnati for a season, as we were there teaching in evening schools for the colored people of that city."<ref name=Lyman>{{cite book
|last=Lyman
|first=H[untington]
|author-link=Huntington Lyman
|chapter='Lane Seminary Rebels'
|pages=60–69
|year=1883
|chapter-url=http://www2.oberlin.edu/external/EOG/LaneDebates/Lyman-Rebels.pdf
|title=The Oberlin Jubilee 1833–1883
|editor-last=Ballantine
|editor-first=W. G.
|location=[[Oberlin, Ohio]]
|publisher=E. J. Goodrich
|access-date=November 11, 2019
|archive-date=January 25, 2021
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210125034714/https://www2.oberlin.edu/external/EOG/LaneDebates/Lyman-Rebels.pdf
|url-status=live
}}</ref>{{rp|66–67}}

{{blockquote|A group of former students left Lane Seminary and lived four miles away in a village named Cumminsville. This group of students included William T. Allan, Huntington Lyman, John Tappan Pierce, Henry B. Stanton, and James A. Thome. These students lived, studied, and taught the local black community. The rebels also preached in local black and white churches. A few young men also joined the Cumminsville group who were prospective Lane students, but never attended the seminary. These three men that we know of are: Benjamin Foltz, Theodore J. Keep, and William Smith. They are considered by some scholars to be a part of the Lane rebels, though I do not formally include them in the group. Those individuals, along with the rest of the former Lane students at Cumminsville, attended Oberlin Collegiate Institute. Henry B. Stanton was one of the few at Cumminsville who did not attend Oberlin, instead, Stanton went to law school.<ref>{{cite book
|first=Maddie
|last=Smith
|chapter=The Lane Rebels' Dismissions
|title=A Cause for Freedom
|access-date=December 29, 2019
|url=http://www.woosterdigital.org/causeforfreedom/exhibits/show/lane_rebels_dismissions/lane_rebels_dismissions
|archive-date=July 28, 2019
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190728221951/http://www.woosterdigital.org/causeforfreedom/exhibits/show/lane_rebels_dismissions/lane_rebels_dismissions
|url-status=live
}}</ref>}}

At Cumminsville, "the students continued their work in the black community. William T. Allan, Andrew Benton, Marius R. Robinson, Henry B. Stanton, and George Whipple taught in the Sabbath schools. John W. Alvord, Huntington Lyman, Henry B. Stanton, James A. Thome, and Samuel Wells gave lectures twice a week in the black community. The students also alternated in preaching at eight different churches, including two black churches. They helped support Augustus Wattles' teachers in schools, enlisted the cooperation of local black ministers, and kept Weld, now an anti-slavery agent, and [[Joshua Leavitt]] informed of local events."<ref name=Lesick/>{{rp|132}}

This was the point at which the former Lane students came into contact with [[John J. Shipherd]], founder of the new [[Oberlin Collegiate Institute]], "a college in name only" that had been founded the previous year (1833). "The former Lane students literally took possession of the embryo institution."<ref name=Dumond/>{{rp|163}}

===The conditions of the Lane Rebels' enrollment at Oberlin===
The students negotiated with Shipherd the installation of Asa Mahan, the Lane trustee who resigned, as Oberlin's president. Oberlin also agreed to hire Morgan, the discharged professor. The trustees would not have the power, as they did at Lane, to meddle in the affairs of professors and students. The most controversial condition insisted on by the Rebels was that Oberlin commit itself to accepting African-American students in general, and the very popular [[James Bradley (former slave)|James Bradley]] in particular, equally. This was agreed to reluctantly, after a "dramatic" vote (4–4, tie broken by chair).<ref name=Lesick/>{{rp|170}}

The Lane Rebels, with Weld at their head, could insist on these conditions because funding from the Tappans came with them. If the trustees did not agree they would lose this crucial funding, as well as Mahan, Finney, and Shipherd, who threatened to quit.

The conditions of the Rebels set limits, for the first time, on an American college's authority over students and faculty. They also were part of the shift in American antislavery efforts from colonization to abolition; many of the Rebels would become part of Oberlin's cadre of minister–abolitionists.<ref name=Fletcher/>{{rp|164–166}}
[[File:Lane Seminary, Walnut Hills, Cincinnati.jpg|thumb|Postcard of Lane Seminary, Walnut Hills, Cincinnati. Late 19th century?]]