“Condemning Webster: Judgment and audience in Emerson's ‘fugitive slave law’ “

Abstract

Emerson's example as a reformer invites continued disagreement. Few studies, however, have offered sustained rhetorical investigations of his antislavery speeches and writings, and extant scholarship has generally slighted the significance of audience to these persuasive efforts. Edwin Black's “The Second Persona” provides the orientation that guides efforts to locate the audience in Emerson's 7 March 1854 “Fugitive Slave Law” in order to demonstrate how the speech constructs a distinct mode of rhetorical judgment. The assumptions of Black's landmark essay and their utility to contemporary criticism are then assessed.