Southerners since the time of Jefferson had frequently apologized that slavery was not a system of their own making, but one they had inherited and of which they could only make the best. Abolitionists regarded this line of defense as an evasion; in response, they insisted upon the moral responsibility of each individual under every circumstance to do right. The abolitionists strongly affirmed one of the basic premises of the American Renaissance: the power and trustworthiness of the human conscience.
