Reply of Messieurs Agenor de Gasparin, Edouard Laboulaye, Henri Martin, Augustin Cochin, and other friends of America in France, to the Loyal National League of New York.

The origin of the Statue of Liberty can be traced back to Édouard René de Laboulaye, a French politician and anti-slavery activist. This publication translates correspondence between French abolitionists and their counterparts in New York City. Before and during the American Civil War, civic groups advocating for the emancipation of enslaved people sprung up across the country, including The Union League of Philadelphia and the Loyal National League of New York, which published this work. Laboulaye is just one of the correspondents in this work, but he would later propose an international gift celebrating the abolition of American slavery and the Union’s victory in the Civil War. This concept inspired sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi to travel to America in 1871 and pitch his idea of a monumental statue to be situated on Bedloe’s Island in New York Harbor.

Agénor Comte de Gasparin (1810-1871).
Reply of Messieurs Agenor de Gasparin, Edouard Laboulaye, Henri Martin, Augustin Cochin, and other Friends of America in France, to the Loyal National League of New York. Liverpool: D. Marples, [1864?].

Lehigh University Catalog Record: https://asa.lib.lehigh.edu/asa/Record/277446