Discussion_ U.S. Founding Through Progressive Movement
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Jan 9, 2024
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Chapter 11 Question 4: Why were anti-literacy laws passed in the South?
During the Colonial and Early Republic periods, teaching Black people to read and write did not
present much of a threat to White society. Quakers were well-known in the late eighteenth
century because they opened Black schools in Norfolk and when the Sunday school government
expanded to Virginia, churches regularly taught literacy to both White and Black children in
separate classes. However, these literacy campaigns faced greater doubt after the 1831 Nat
Turner Rebellion because White people feared that literate Blacks would incite slave revolts
similar to Nat Turner. Because of this fear, the General Assembly of the Commonwealth of
Virginia passed several anti-literacy laws in 1849 that outlined that any White person who had
been caught instructing Blacks to read and write would be put in jail and fined. After the anti
literacy laws were put into place, Sunday schools were only to present biblical and moral lessons
to Black children orally. Some churches still continued to provide children with the written
format like they used to. Even though there were many violators to the laws, Whites were rarely
ever brought to trial and most violators were handled outside the judicial system or with
intimidation and social pressures. Margaret Duouglass was the only known prosecution.
Douglass offered tutoring to a freed Black barber and his five children through Rosa, Margaret’s
daughter. Rosa thought that the anti-literacy laws only applied to slaves. After tutoring for a
while, Douglass worked with the
barber to open up schools to teach freed Black children in their
home. The school was open for 11 months when a law-enforcement officer came into the school
and took them to meet the mayor. The case was presented to the grand jury for review after she
told the mayor she thought the laws only applied to freed Black children and that she would
close the school. Rosa was a minor at the time so all the charges that were presented two months
later were given to Margaret. At the conclusion of the trial, the jury decided that Margret was
guilty and would be fined one dollar.
Reference:
Smith, S. J.
(
2020
). Windows into the history and philosophy of education.
Kendall Hunt
Publishing.
https://online.vitalsource.com/books/9781792424625
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