John Brown is Not a Terrorist by Stephen Agnatovech

Stephen Agnatovech

Global Politics of Terrorism

Professor Shirk

February 25, 2017

John Brown is not a Terrorist

A recent class discussion that I had found interesting was talking about the legacy of John Brown and how his actions had been recently portrayed as terrorism. This is important because until recently John Brown was remembered as an American hero, and now he is not. I do not necessarily agree with these attacks on John Brown for a numerous amount of reasons. I think the time period plays an important role in this discussion as well as looking at what John Brown was fighting against which were basic human rights. I also agree with Etcheson in her article that John Brown’s attacks resembled guerrilla warfare rather than terrorism.

        The time period is a significant part in this argument for me. It wasn’t until after 9/11 that John Brown started to get examined under the lens of a terrorist. Brown’s attacks were considered guerrilla strikes against slavery and not terrorism. Brown never openly embraced violence, or intended to instill fear in anyone he came across. Brown’s reasons behind what he did were to gain justice and human rights for the African American. Therefore I don’t agree at all that John Brown should be considered a terrorist. Guerrilla warfare is defined by irregular forces fighting small-scale, limited actions, generally in conjunction with a larger political-military strategy, against orthodox military forces (Etcheson 31). In John Brown’s case the fight against slavery was his motive that had a larger goal then just immediate attacks. It was John Brown’s actions that led up to the civil war. Any act of violence can’t be considered terrorism because violence can be what it takes to make a change especially in John Brown’s situation. John Brown was well aware of slavery in the past, and knew that nothing was going to get accomplished in the right direction if it weren’t for violence. Violence is justified in this particular case because of guerrilla warfare consisting of raids, extortion, destruction, and massacre all acts committed by John Brown and his followers.

        In class we had talked about how some of the acts John Brown did were classified as terrorism such as the attack at Harper's Ferry or the Pottawatomie massacre because of the fear it struck into the settlers. Again I feel these acts weren’t intended to strike fear into the settlers, John Brown had specifically targeted men that were pro-slavery. His acts also had mostly consisted of freeing slaves rather than causing fear. Brown had never specifically targeted regular civilians without justification. In class we had also discussed that violence shouldn’t have been the solution to abolishing slavery when in fact it did cause a war. John Brown was essentially doing the same thing which was to fight against slavery. Lincoln had said that violence had to be committed in order to end the war to abolish slavery and he wasn’t accused of terrorism. If John Brown had done guerrilla warfare while the war was happening his acts wouldn’t have been considered terrorism at all. It is important to let the past stay in the past. If before 9/11 his acts weren’t considered terrorism then it should remain that way. Yes, some of the events that took place were controversial, but it is important to realize the time that those events took place. We live in a time now that we can look back on history and question certain events, but to John Brown he was concerned about his human rights and the freedom of African Americans at the time. Lutz argued that Brown’s tactics were unconstitutional and unconventional, but so was the concept of slavery.