Genius of Universal Emancipation
From Ohio History Central
 Quaker Meeting House Partition |
Benjamin Lundy founded the newspaper The Genius of Universal Emancipation in 1821. Lundy was a member of the Society of Friends and one of the leading anti-slavery advocates in Ohio during the first half of the nineteenth century. In 1815, Lundy began his crusade against slavery by forming Ohio's first abolitionist organization. Charles Osborn's The Philanthropist had preceded Lundy's newspaper by four years. Like the Philanthropist, The Genius of Universal Emancipation grew slowly. Lundy, Osborn, and other Ohioans hoped to overcome indifference or inaction about slavery by educating people about its injustices.