There is a humorous scene in Daniel Kehlmann's entertaining novel Die Vermessung der Welt (Measuring the World) where Alexander von Humboldt is speaking at a state dinner at Thomas Jefferson's White House and inadvertently puts his foot in his mouth by speaking out against the scourge of slavery (Alpdruck der Sklaverei). James Madison kicks Humboldt under the table.
"Jefferson habe Ländereien" flüsterte Madison. "Mit allem, was dazugehöre."
(Jefferson is a landowner, whispered Madison. With everything that comes with it.)
Kehlmann may have been taking some liberties as a writer of (highly enjoyable) fiction. But it is likely that the outspoken Humboldt might have been open about his passionate rejection of slavery to his good friend Jefferson. Humboldt's condemnation of slavery was made public with his book Essai politique sur l'île de Cuba published in Paris in 1826. An English translation along with Humboldt's letters on the subject in German were widely circulated among German immigrants in America and influenced the public debate about slavery in the 1850s.
The New York Times allows readers to search the archives online back to 1851, and I found this piece written by the historian Amos Perry:
"I shall never forget a conversation I had with Alexander Humboldt at Potsdam in 1852. I was a great traveler in those days, adn on passing through the old Prussian capital thought it fit to pay my respects to that illustrious man. He received me with infinite kindness, and began to talk about the the United States, its institutions, and especially the slavery question. I can repeat almost verbatim what Humboldt said: "You are trying an experiment in America such as has never before been attempted by any nationality - the experiment of freedom and slavery side by side. It will end in failure. The two cannot coexist in the same government. They are as antagonistic as water and oil. A gigantic war will be the certain result, and I do not think that war can be postponed longer than eight years." I was so impressed with these words that on my return home I caused them to be printed in a local paper. Every syllable of the utterance came true."
Alexander von Humboldt died in 1859, and so did not live to see Lincoln win the presidency or the beginning of the Civil War. Before his death he initiated a law through which any slave was set free by stepping on Prussian soil.
Great Web resource on Humboldt's visit to Philadelphia and his fascination with the United States.
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