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How Did Frederick Douglass Encourage Slaves Learn How To Read And Write

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Before Fredrick Douglass started his journey to stop slavery, and create equality, African Americans weren’t able to read or write and were not given an opinion. Slaves were not able to learn to read or write and would get punished if they tried and speaking up about slavery was way against the law. According to the Civil Rights Museum “Fearing that black literacy would prove a threat to the slave system -- which relied on slaves' dependence on masters -- whites in many colonies instituted laws forbidding slaves to learn to read or write and making it a crime for others to teach them.”This supports my claim because it shows how the thought of letting slaves learn how to read and write would cause problems for the slave owners and could cause …show more content…

Secondly, Frederick Douglass was a game changer in his own right due to him being one of the first ever slaves to rise up and speak out about what it was like being a slave and helped many other slaves gain more confidence in the future. Frederick Douglass was able to get people to listen to him due to him being able to read and write as well as being able to speak out According to NPS.Gov “In his narratives, the depiction of his early recognition and general recognition among blacks and some whites of the injustice, unnaturalness, and cruelty of slavery was a significant element of his argument”. This shows that Frederick Douglass knew how to get to other African Americans and many others due to him living through slavery and using that to gain leverage and show how much unequal rights slaves had compared to owners. Furthermore, Frederick Douglass was the first slave to ever become a politician or even a well known writer that published many books. According to the Library of Congress “He became known as a voice against slavery, but that also brought to light his status as an escaped

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