[f. ABOLITION + -IST.] One who aims at or advocates the abolition of any institution or custom.
1836–7. Dickens, Sketches (1850), 144. The abolitionist of the national debt, the unflinching opponent of pensions.
1871. Daily News, Nov. 1. Who, indeed, among the abolitionists of Purchase has ever denied that English gentlemen … have served their country on the battle-field?
b. Applied specially, and probably originally, to persons seeking the abolition of negro slavery. Used also attrib.
1790. Clarkson, in Slave-trade, II. 212. Many looked upon the abolitionists as monsters.
1842. Dickens, Lett., I. 61 (ed. 2). I speak of … all parties—Slave Upholders and Abolitionists.
1859. Times, 28 Dec., 6/4. The vagaries of the Abolitionists would cause a revulsion of feeling in favour of the South. Ibid. The doings of their Abolitionist brethren.
