Experience the American dream with today’s Patriots of the Past interview. I’m your host, John Gillespie.
It’s July 17, 1776. I’m visiting with John and Abigail Adams in their Braintree, Massachusetts, home.
JG: “Mr. Adams, with all due respect, sir, how can America proclaim to defend liberty when you enslave one-fifth of your people?”
JA: “John, this is the great question of our day. I have never and will never own another human being. Slavery is a fowl contagion in the human character and an evil of colossal magnitude.”
AA: “I, too, feel as my husband does. In fact, sometimes I wonder if God will punish us someday for this evil institution.”
While not all founding fathers felt this way, many worked hard to end slavery in America.
In a letter to her husband, John Adams, written on September 22, 1774, Abigail Adams wrote the following concerning slavery, “I wish most sincerely there was not a slave in the province. It always appeared a most iniquitous scheme to me – fight ourselves for what we are daily robbing and plundering from those who have as good a right to freedom as we have. You know my mind upon this subject.”
John and Jan Gillespie are the founders of the Rawhide Boys’ Ranch; they have fostered 351 teenagers and wrote the book Our 351 Sons; they have also assisted numerous churches in developing youth programs and expanding their total church ministries. After running for U.S. Senate, John founded 1776 American Dream, which exists to demonstrate the vision of our founding fathers and help our generation of youth passionately embrace those values.
