White Baptist women felt a righteous indemnity was owed blacks for slavery

Evidence

At the heart of the northern Baptist women’s progressive humanitarian attitudes lay complex, even ambivalent motives. James McPherson’s characterization of the “abolitionist legacy” clearly captures an essential factor motivating their work. The women spoke repeatedly of the “righteous indemnity” due blacks for centuries of unrequited toil under slavery. — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 526

Categorization

• QUESTION: The coined phrase ‘righteous indemnity’ — worth tracing its exact circulation in WABHMS writing.
• XREF: connects to: Baptist women’s magazines rejected Social Darwinist claims of black inferiority — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 543; School reports publicized black families’ sacrifices to counter northern indolence stereotypes — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 515; Baptist historians denied slavery caused the 1845 split until the late 1900s — Robert P. Jones, White Too Long: The Legacy of White…, 27