Covenanters mounted a witness against the sin of slavery unlike any other. First, their antislavery ideals antedated even the Quaker abolitionist movement; Covenanters were some of the first people in Britain or America to take a public stand against the institution. Second, they created a unique biblical interpretation that reconciled biblical literalism, with its clear sanction of slavery, and abolitionism, with its emphasis on human liberty in a state of nature. Third, Covenanters in the South tested the limits of pro-slavery hegemony by publicly lauding the American Colonization Society as the nation’s best hope to end slavery. Ironically, for a people so steeped in religious radicalism, southern Covenanters became some of the leading moderate voices in states that tolerated few dissenting voices. Finally, Covenanters gave an unambiguous interpretation of the cause of the Civil War. They testified that the war was God’s conflict with America for the sin of slavery.