Frances Wright: American Owenite Utopian
Frances Wright, often referred to as Fanny Wright, was born in Dundee. Brought up in a radical family, she visited America in 1818-9 and then France to meet her friend, the Marquise de Lafayette, but emigrated to America, becoming a US citizen in 1825. She stayed with former president Thomas Jefferson and at Robert Owen’s settlement at New Harmony. Wright then established a utopian community, buying 320 acres near Memphis in Tennessee, naming the community “Nashoba”, buying 30 slaves who would earn their freedom through working in the community. By 1830, the community collapsed, with Wright escorting the survivors to the independent republic of Haiti. She then returned to New Harmony to co-edit the New Harmony journal with Robert Dale Owen, the son of Robert Owen. In 1829, Wright and the younger Owen moved to New York city to establish the Free Enquirer.
Beginning in the late 1820s and early 1830s, Wright spoke publicly in favour of the abolition of slavery and lectured to support women’s suffrage. She also campaigned for reforms to marriage and property laws. While residing in New York City, she purchased a former church in the Bowery area and converted it into a “Hall of Science” as a lecture hall. From 1833 to 1836, her lectures on slavery and other social institutions attracted large and enthusiastic audiences of men and women in the eastern United States and the Midwest, leading to the establishment of what were called Fanny Wright societies. Although her lecture tours extended to the principal cities of the United States, the enunciation of her views and publication of a collection of speeches in her book, Course of Popular Lectures (1829 and 1836), met with opposition. The clergy and the press were critical of Wright and her opinions on religion and social reform. As Wright’s philosophy became even more radical, in 1829, she left the Democratic Party to join the New York based Working Men’s Party, where her influence was so strong that its opponents called its slate of candidates “the Fanny Wright ticket”. She later supported President Andrew Jackson.
In 1850, Wright divorced her husband, the French physician, Guillaume d’Arusmont, whom she had met at Nashoba in 1831. She died in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1852.
“ It is for Americans, more especially, to nourish a nobler sentiment; one more consistent with their origin, and more conducive to their future improvement. It is for them more especially to know why they love their country, not because it is their country, but because it is the palladium of human liberty — the favoured scene of human improvement. It is for them more especially to know why they honour their institutions, and feel that they honour them because they are based on just principles. It is for them, more especially, to examine their institutions, because they have the means of improving them; to examine their laws, because at will they can alter them. It is for them to lay aside luxury, whose wealth is in industry; idle parade, whose strength is in knowledge; ambitious distinction, whose principle is equality. It is for them not to rest satisfied with words, who can seize upon things; and to remember, that equality means, not the mere equality of political rights, however valuable, but equality of instruction, and equality in virtue; and that liberty means, not the mere voting at elections, but the free and fearless exercise of the mental faculties, and that self-possession which springs out of well-reasoned opinions and consistent practice. It is for them to honour principles rather than men— to commemorate events rather than days; when they rejoice, to know for what they rejoice, and to rejoice only for what has brought, and what brings, peace and happiness to men. The event we commemorate this day has procured much of both, and shall procure, in the onward course of human improvement, more than we can now conceive of. For this — for the good obtained, and yet in store for our race — let us rejoice! But let us rejoice as men, not as children, as human beings, rather than as Americans —as reasoning beings, not as ignorants. So shall we rejoice to good purpose and in good feeling; so shall we improve the victory once on this day achieved, until all mankind hold with us the jubilee of independence.”
Further Reading:
Perkins, A and Wolfson T Frances Wright. Free Enquirer (Porcupine Press, Philadelphia 1972)
Eckhart, Celia Fanny Wright: Rebel in America Harvard University Press 1984)
Wilentz, Sean Chants Democratic: New York City and the Rise of the American Working Class (Oxford University Press 1984)
Leopold, R W Robert Dale Owen (New York 1969 reprint of 1940)
Owen, Robert Dale Threading my Way: An Autobiography ( New York 1967 reprint of 1874)
Kolmerten, Carol Women in Utopia: The Ideology of Gender in the American Owenite Communities (Bloomington, Syracuse University Press 1990)