A very rare and nicely preserved example of the full report of the May 1841anti-slavery meeting at one of the most consequential moments in the history of global abolitionism.

The British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society (BFASS0 was itself a radical departure from its predecessors, with a global ambition of the permanent extinction of slavery. To that end, they organized the first World Anti-Slavery Convention in London in 1840, that attracted delegates from around the world. The Second Annual Report therefore documents the Society's operations in the immediate aftermath of that landmark convention — making it the first full accounting of the post-Convention world.

The May 1841 meeting at Exeter Hall came at an extraordinary juncture. The 1840 Convention was both a triumph and and, at the same time, exposed significant fracture sin the movement. The exclusion of women from the convention gave a great impetus to the women's suffrage movement in the United States. And the moral suasion party’s resistance of Fowell Buxton’s enforced abolitionism also caused division. This Second Annual Report is the Society's own post-mortem on this world-historic gathering, documenting what resolutions had been taken and what had been done to carry them out in the intervening year.

Significantly, the report records the groundwork for first multilateral treaty for the suppression of the slave trade — the Treaty for the Suppression of the African Slave Trade — which was signed in London by the representatives of Austria, Britain, France, Prussia, and Russia.

The annual report also played a role in coordinating with American abolitionists. The American Anti-Slavery Society produced a detailed account of the slave trade within the United States in response to questions posed by the Committee of the British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society in 1841. The Second Annual Report therefore stands at the center of a transatlantic documentary exchange — the BFASS asked questions, American abolitionists answered them, and the results were folded back into the British public advocacy campaign, &c.

Allen, William. The Second Annual Report of the British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society, for the Abolition of Slavery and the Slave Trade throughout the World; Presented to the General Meeting Held in Exeter Hall, on Friday, May 14^th, 1841. With An Appendix, List of Contributions, &c. &c. London. 1841. 142pp. 

Good + to very good in original lithographed wraps, chip at base of spine, some light handling. Else near fine.