Polygenist science was launched amid the Fugitive Slave Act debate.

Evidence

Not coincidentally, Agassiz was invited that year to return to Charleston for a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He delivered a paper at the meeting in which he explained that racial groups, “viewed zoologically,” could not be considered part of the same species. … After hearing Agassiz’s lecture, a fellow polygenist wrote excitedly to Samuel Morton in Philadelphia: “With Agassiz in the war, the battle is ours.” — Tamara Lanier, From These Roots, 1059

Categorization

• SEED: Angle: science-as-propaganda — how a prominent researcher’s prestige was mobilized at a politically charged moment, as seen through a single contemporary letter.