Abolitionist publishing had to wait for a favorable institutional opening

Evidence

John Woolman bided his time before submitting his essay to the press of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting. Woolman knew the history of Quakers quarreling over slavery, of abolitionists disrupting meetings and being banished. He cared just as much about his Quaker ministry and Quaker unity as he did antislavery. In 1752, when abolitionist Anthony Benezet was elected to the press’s editorial board, Woolman knew the time was right to publish his eight-year-old essay. — Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning, 221

Categorization

• QUESTION: Does the timing of the essay’s publication matter for Kendi’s thesis? Woolman wrote it in the 1740s but published in 1754 — a lag of eight years.