How to Use abolitionist in a Sentence

abolitionist

1 of 2 noun
  • At the time the abolitionist cause seemed lost.
    Sara Tenenbaum, CBS News, 18 June 2026
  • And at the end of his life, this man who had slaves becomes an abolitionist.
    Katie Kilkenny, The Hollywood Reporter, 4 Apr. 2022
  • Those white Christian abolitionists believed that one size fits all.
    Susan Raffo, Literary Hub, 18 Feb. 2026
  • And abolitionists, both Black and white helped finance her schooling.
    Dominique Janee, Scientific American, 2 Nov. 2023
  • Sojourner Truth is an icon for her work as both an abolitionist and a feminist.
    Los Angeles Times, 16 Jan. 2023
  • But prison hadn’t turned Friedmann into an abolitionist.
    James Verini, New Yorker, 2 Mar. 2026
  • What Lincoln was able to do was to manage martial abolitionist opinion.
    David Remnick, The New Yorker, 1 Apr. 2023
  • He was born into slavery and later escaped to become an abolitionist.
    Kevin Dayhoff, Baltimore Sun, 21 Jan. 2023
  • This project aims to reframe the narrative, to amplify the names and efforts of those who lived it and steer away from the lens of white abolitionists.
    Darcel Rockett, Chicago Tribune, 10 Sep. 2023
  • Wisconsin abolitionists went out of their way to help freedom seekers make their way to Canada.
    La Risa R. Lynch, jsonline.com, 17 Sep. 2025
  • To start things off, viewers can watch the biopic Harriet, which tells the story of the historic abolitionist.
    Okla Jones, Essence, 31 Oct. 2023
  • The abolitionist Sojourner Truth had once been enslaved by a church in the diocese.
    NBC News, 3 Apr. 2022
  • In this era, there was a sharp division between abolitionists and advocates of slavery.
    James Piazza, Twin Cities, 30 Apr. 2026
  • Hale Mason was an abolitionist.
    Susan Degrane, Chicago Tribune, 5 Feb. 2026
  • Heg was an abolitionist and Union Army colonel during the Civil War.
    From Usa Today Network and Wire Reports, USA TODAY, 28 Oct. 2022
  • This book charts the fascinating legal drama that turned a nascent abolitionist movement into front-page news.
    Lizz Schumer, People.com, 24 Aug. 2025
  • It is named in honor of the famous human rights activist and abolitionist of the 19th century.
    Camila Pedrosa, Sacbee.com, 14 Aug. 2025
  • The audience crowns an abolitionist the champion of each episode, to return and compete in the season finale.
    Jennifer Maas, Variety, 16 Jan. 2026
  • Still writes that the dangers of such journeys and the abolitionists’ limited funds meant no assistance could be given to Otho.
    Bitter Kalli august 19, Literary Hub, 19 Aug. 2025
  • The owners were part of the abolitionist movement, and the inn was most likely used as a stopover for the Underground Railroad.
    Sheryl Devore, Chicago Tribune, 8 June 2022
  • Both have long been aligned and celebrated in the Black communities for their efforts as abolitionists.
    Terri Huggins Hart, Parents, 3 Sep. 2023
  • The fasces became a symbol of the abolitionist movement, much to the annoyance of some Southerners.
    John Kelly, Washington Post, 1 Oct. 2022
  • An abolitionist 2050 can feel impossible from the vantage of the present.
    Victor Ray, The New Republic, 5 Dec. 2022
  • Eliza is a right-minded progressive who was active in the abolitionist movement in the 1830s.
    Adam Kirsch, Harper's Magazine, 14 Aug. 2023
  • Only those who decided to seek freedom would be given the information by the abolitionists.
    Carolyn Stein, Chicago Tribune, 5 Feb. 2026
  • There’s an amazing thinker and abolitionist named Mariame Kaba who is famous for saying that hope is a discipline.
    Maria Reva september 3, Literary Hub, 3 Sep. 2025
  • Both figures have long been aligned and celebrated in the Black communities for their efforts as abolitionists.
    Terri Huggins Hart, Parents, 28 Jan. 2026
  • Her biography of abolitionist Lydia Maria Child will be published in the fall.
    Lydia Moland, BostonGlobe.com, 3 Feb. 2022
  • That wasn’t the only time Codding pushed personal boundaries to drum up interest in the abolitionist movement.
    Susan Degrane, Chicago Tribune, 5 Feb. 2026
  • Douglass was one of the most famous abolitionists in American history.
    Christopher Rudolph, PEOPLE, 8 Nov. 2025

abolitionist

2 of 2 adjective
  • That is the optimism at the heart of the abolitionist project.
    Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, The New Yorker, 7 May 2021
  • In its early years, the school was a center of the abolitionist movement.
    Freep.com, 12 Feb. 2021
  • The abolitionist position forces us to reimagine what the world would look like without jails or prisons.
    Henry Gass, The Christian Science Monitor, 14 Sep. 2020
  • Religion played a large role in both Tubman's life and the abolitionist movement as a whole.
    Henry J. Morgan, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 6 July 2018
  • Angela supported the abolitionist movement as well, and held a series of odd jobs.
    Margaret Talbot, The New Yorker, 19 July 2021
  • Others are advanced by abolitionist groups who ultimately seek an end to the carceral state itself.
    Melissa Gira Grant, The New Republic, 9 June 2020
  • Many of these great early female reformers were abolitionist leaders.
    CBS News, 20 Feb. 2026
  • The abolitionist movements that erupted in 2020 are the movements that are dead set on ending fascism once and for all.
    Vinson Cunningham, Los Angeles Times, 17 Mar. 2021
  • There were dozens of versions of the lyrics, including a powerful parody by an abolitionist writer.
    Joss Fong, Vox, 4 July 2018
  • His urgings of insurrection before the war had frightened the mainstream of the abolitionist movement.
    Paul Ortiz, Time, 31 Jan. 2018
  • Charles Langston would go on to become very influential in Black and abolitionist politics.
    Andrew J. Tobias, cleveland, 11 Mar. 2022
  • At this time, the partisan press was the mainstream press of the nation, and its reaction to the abolitionist editors tended to be critical.
    Encyclopedia Britannica, 26 May 2026
  • Codding also worked with an abolitionist member of the Preston family.
    Susan Degrane, Chicago Tribune, 5 Feb. 2026
  • In one case, a District streetcar conductor tried to drag the renowned abolitionist Sojourner Truth off his car.
    Michael E. Ruane, Washington Post, 26 Mar. 2018
  • Quinn churchgoers and leaders were known for being involved in the abolitionist movement in the mid-1800s.
    Zahria Rogers, The Courier-Journal, 15 June 2018
  • The chapter neglects to offer any details about the trans-Atlantic slave trade, the abolitionist movement or the plantation system.
    Michael Harriot, The Root, 14 Mar. 2018
  • Williamson and Still were subsequently arrested, and news of their heroic actions helped stir up support for the abolitionist movement.
    Brigit Katz, Smithsonian, 23 Mar. 2018
  • And abolitionist materials produced in the North traveled south.
    Laurent Dubois, The Atlantic, 6 Jan. 2026
  • The history of Luiz Gama, the most important abolitionist leader in Brazil.
    Angelique Jackson, Variety, 26 Aug. 2021
  • There had been a slave market on Wall Street, abolitionist newspapers where Tribeca is, villages for free blacks in Brooklyn.
    Alexander Nazaryan, Newsweek, 15 Apr. 2015
  • These papers were essential to promoting the abolitionist cause, allowing free blacks to tell their own stories and to spread the stories of people still living in slavery.
    Casey Cep, The New Yorker, 18 Nov. 2019
  • Henson’s book garnered attention at the abolitionist reading room in Boston as well as in like-minded households throughout the North.
    Jared Brock, Smithsonian, 16 May 2018
  • Rather than a paraphrase of the much earlier and much less certain quote of abolitionist minster, Theordore Parker.
    Alexander Finlayson, Forbes, 7 Apr. 2021
  • The Freedom Neighborhood has been focused on educating the people about what an abolitionist society could look like that serves not just some of us, but all of us.
    Elly Belle, refinery29.com, 10 Dec. 2020
  • These states in the middle – caught on the line that separated slave states from free before the Civil War – were not staunchly abolitionist, like some of their more northern neighbors.
    Hannah Sparling, Cincinnati.com, 21 Mar. 2018
  • Published in 1852, it was barred by the Confederacy for its abolitionist agenda.
    Dorany Pineda Staff Writer, Los Angeles Times, 12 Nov. 2020
  • Franklin, on the other hand, had freed his house slaves by 1787 and presided over a Pennsylvanian abolitionist society.
    David Holahan, USA TODAY, 12 Feb. 2020
  • Just 161 of her letters exist today, Looser said, but one of them mentions her love of the work of Thomas Clarkson, an abolitionist author.
    Scottie Andrew, CNN, 16 June 2021
  • In the upcoming biopic Harriet, Erivo, 32, stars as Tubman in the story of her early years of abolitionist work.
    Justin Curto, PEOPLE.com, 23 July 2019
  • When the woman suffrage movement first began in the mid-19th century, its champions had all become human-rights activists in the searing fires of the abolitionist movement.
    Ellen Carol Dubois, Time, 20 Feb. 2020

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'abolitionist.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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