<P> Another split in the abolitionist movement was along class lines . The artisan republicanism of Robert Dale Owen and Frances Wright stood in stark contrast to the politics of prominent elite abolitionists such as industrialist Arthur Tappan and his evangelist brother Lewis . While the former pair opposed slavery on a basis of solidarity of "wage slaves" with "chattel slaves", the Whiggish Tappans strongly rejected this view, opposing the characterization of Northern workers as "slaves" in any sense . (Lott, 129--30) </P> <P> Many American abolitionists took an active role in opposing slavery by supporting the Underground Railroad . This was made illegal by the federal Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 . Nevertheless, participants like Harriet Tubman, Henry Highland Garnet, Alexander Crummell, Amos Noë Freeman and others continued with their work . Abolitionists were particularly active in Ohio, where some worked directly in the Underground Railroad . Since the state shared a border with slave states, it was a popular place for slaves escaping across the Ohio River and up its tributaries, where they sought shelter among supporters who would help them move north to freedom . Two significant events in the struggle to destroy slavery were the Oberlin - Wellington Rescue and John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry . In the South, members of the abolitionist movement or other people opposing slavery were often targets of lynch mob violence before the American Civil War . </P> <P> Numerous known abolitionists lived, worked, and worshipped in downtown Brooklyn, from Henry Ward Beecher, who auctioned slaves into freedom from the pulpit of Plymouth Church, to Nathan Egelston, a leader of the African and Foreign Antislavery Society, who also preached at Bridge Street AME and lived on Duffield Street . His fellow Duffield Street residents, Thomas and Harriet Truesdell were leading members of the Abolitionist movement . Mr. Truesdell was a founding member of the Providence Anti-slavery Society before moving to Brooklyn in 1851 . Harriet Truesdell was also very active in the movement, organizing an antislavery convention in Pennsylvania Hall in Philadelphia . The Tuesdell's lived at 227 Duffield Street . Another prominent Brooklyn - based abolitionist was Rev. Joshua Leavitt, trained as a lawyer at Yale who stopped practicing law in order to attend Yale Divinity School, and subsequently edited the abolitionist newspaper The Emancipator and campaigned against slavery, as well as advocating other social reforms . In 1841, Leavitt published his The Financial Power of Slavery, which argued that the South was draining the national economy due to its reliance on slavery . </P> <P> In the 1850s, slavery remained legal in the 15 states of the American South . While it was fading away in the cities and border states, it remained strong in plantation areas that grew cash crops such as cotton, sugar, rice, tobacco or hemp . By the 1860 United States Census, the slave population in the United States had grown to four million . American abolitionism was based in the North, and white Southerners alleged it fostered slave rebellion . </P>

Which of these beliefs did the majority of americans hold at the end of the 1800s