There was a preliminary organization of an anti-slavery society in December, 1814, at the home of Elihu Swain, the father-in-law of Charles Osborn, who was the moving spirit of the organization. Rachel Swain, later Rachel Davis, a daughter of Elihu Swain, said she was present at the organizing of the society.[3] The temporary organization was made permanent at the first session of the society, held at Lost Creek meeting house, Jefferson County, Tennessee, February 25, 1815.[4] At this first meeting, the society was given the name of the Tennessee Society for Promoting the Manumission of Slaves, and a constitution was adopted. The constitution consisted of a preamble and four articles.[5] The motto of the society was, “That freedom is the natural right of all men,” and each member displayed a placard to this effect in some conspicuous place in his home. The society went at once into politics by pledging its members to vote for only those candidates for office in the state government who favored emancipation. There were several anti-slavery societies organized in Tennessee during this same year. They soon discovered the unity of their purpose and decided in 1815 to federate. For this purpose, these societies held a general convention at Lost Creek Meeting House of Friends[6] in Greene County, November 21, 1815, and organized the Tennessee Manumission Society on a federated basis. There were twenty-two branches of this society.[7] By 1827, there were twenty-five anti-slavery societies in Tennessee, and 130 in the United States. Of this number, one hundred and six were in the Southern States, Tennessee ranking second in the list.[8] The Tennessee society numbered one thousand members.[9] Its officers were a president, vice-president, secretary, and treasurer. At the suggestion of Mr. Elihu Embree, a committee of inspection was provided to censor the publications of the society.[10] The dues of this society were 12½ cents per year.[11] The qualifications for membership were republicanism, patriotism, abolitionism, and morality. The society held its annual meetings at Lost Creek Meeting House. Its work consisted in memorializing legislatures and congresses, protecting runaway negroes, fostering the spirit of manumission, addressing the churches on slaveholding and opposing the domestic and foreign slave trade.[12] The society repeatedly memorialized Congress on the subject of slavery. These memorials prayed the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, the prohibition of the interstate slave trade and separation of families, the proscription of slavery in the territories, and finally the abolition of slavery in the United States.[13] These petitions were presented by Tennessee congressmen, and referred to the judiciary committee, which never reported on them.[14]