This pamphlet reproduces Schoelcher's introduction to the petition against slavery coordinated by the workers' journal L'Ouvrier. The petition, which was signed by almost 7000 people, was the first real attempt to mobilise public opinion against slavery in metropolitan France through petitioning. Schoelcher's introduction offers his support to this initiative, "the plea of European workers, who demand freedom for all the children of the great French family" (23). Official reports on the material conditions of the slaves in the French colonies and local newspaper reports are cited, as well as figures proving the success of abolition in the British Empire.