There Is a Balm in Gilead

In the South, blacks were exposed to New Light Protestant ministers early. An understanding of God’s religious message of freedom and liberation for all men created common agreement among the enslaved and several disaffected evangelical New Lights. This shared sense of community was heightened during the Second Great Awakening, particularly in Kentucky, where camp meetings and itinerant ministers promoted antislavery views across a wide array of Protestant ministries. The interdenominationalism that was inspired by a waning antislavery doctrine opened new avenues of support and reshaped the American antislavery religious agenda. Fragments of Kentucky’s original antislavery associations combined their strength to