Slavery And The Civil Rights Movement

For over 2,000 years, slavery has been conducted in various parts of the world. From year 1500 to year 1900, Europeans stole individuals from West Africa, West Central Africa, and Southeast Africa and shipped them to the different parts of the Atlantic. This process dehumanized them of their identity. Europeans stole husbands, wives, merchants, blacksmiths, farmers, and even children. They removed them from their homelands and gave them new names: slaves. European slaveholders never thought to take ownership of their actions by killing humans with brutality and degradation. Slave trade was considered popular in England and soon after more countries began the process of taking slaves to newly claimed territories. These countries include

Throughout the 1800s in America, slavery was a controversy between the north and the south. A Slave was one who was the property of another human being under law and was forced to obey them. The North felt that slavery was unfair and inhumane, whereas in the South, they felt as though slavery was crucial to their success. African American slaves were not allowed many rights: they were not allowed to testify in court against a white person, could not receive an education, or even sign contracts. Due to the brutality they faced each day, many slaves escaped with hopes to find freedom. The Underground Railroad, a system utilized by many runaway slaves to help them escape from the South to Canada, played a large role in the downfall of slavery and eventual abolition in the United States following the Civil War.

The American Civil War is also referred to as the war between the Northern and Southern States or the Rebellion War that began in 1861. Slavery was regarded as the main cause leading to the start of the war, as a high level of discrimination against the African Americans existed upon their arrival in the United States. The African Americans were either sold and traded by the elders in their villages or plucked from their native countries for a sometimes deadly transatlantic journey to serve wealthy southern families. They were not viewed as peers but as laborers and farmers. Americans who were rich and owned large plantations took the African Americans as their slaves. They suffered as if they were not worthy of compensation including working without pay and the standard consequence was lynching. During the period, they fought for their freedom, which was not given to them until the Civil War was fought. Consequently, they aligned themselves with the white men who were also soldiers in fighting for their freedom.

Cotton was the king of the South. It was bringing in large amounts of money as the textile industry in the North grew. Slavery was vital to the economic well-being of the South, and when the North began to question the “peculiar institution” of the South the wall of civility between the two sectionalized areas began to crumble. Due to the growing issue of slavery in the 1850s, the United States of America was in a state of total disarray and turmoil. The tension that had always existed between the North and South over the matter of slavery was no longer ignorable. As the United States expanded to the West, the status of slavery in the new states erupted in a violence that could no longer be controlled by sectionalism. The peace treaties that had worked in the past became Band-Aids over stab wounds. Southern states began to leave the United States of America to form the Confederate States of America and war was declared as the South fired onto the forts of the North. The Civil War was caused directly by the issue of slavery; the fugitive slave act in the Compromise of 1850, Dred Scott v. Sandford, and Bleeding Kansas prove that slavery was the key factor in the eruption of the nation.

The Civil War, occurring between the years 1861 and 1865, was a devastating effect of sectionalism caused by the division of the country on the topic of slavery. Slavery impacted every aspect of the country, whether in the North or the South, though primarily in the South; major impacts were in the politics and economy of the early country ways which inevitably caused the Civil War.

Slavery in America started in 1619 when settlers brought over African Americans to Jamestown, Virginia. The slaves came to Jamestown to work on the tobacco plantations. The slaves were also sent to other colonies such as South Carolina to work on the cotton plantations. Slaves were people who worked for no pay. This caused the land owners to make more profit from their plantations because they didn’t have to pay their workers. Southern slave owners, specifically in South Carolina, relied on slavery as a major part of their economy.

The question of slavery and the rights of states to decide on the matter for themselves completely controlled politics in the years prior to the Civil War. Laws were passed, such as the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which made it so any slaves that escaped were to be sent back to their owners. Not only would these runaway slaves be punished severely, but anybody who aided them in escape would also be subject to harsh punishment. These desperate men, women, and children had no protection in the legal system and were left with no options in life other than escape. Many of these escapees had to watch friends and family be beaten, sold, or even killed and were expected to work just as hard, like nothing had happened. After losing everything, it

The institution of slavery dates back before written records. The term slave was originally a derivative from the historical French and Latin medieval word for Slavic people of central and Eastern Europe. [ (wikipedia, 2010) ] In North America, the class system is systematically at the root of every socioeconomic and political issue resulting in Super companies, multibillionaires and the formation of lobbyists and special interest groups; there always has and always will be the have and have-nots. Unfortunately, for African Americans who have historically been the have-nots, that does not seem to have changed as evidenced by recent events like the Jenna 6. African Americans have a history uniquely

The Civil War contributed to the enslaved period being terminated. The union allowed slaves to fight for them and this imposed on the slave masters throughout the south. During this period the slaves were very rebellious and violent towards their masters. They beat them, tortured them, and some even killed some of the slave masters. They all truly deserved it after the treatment that had been rendered towards the African Americans when they first arrived from the West Indies to the United States. So, fighting was in the Civil War became an honor for some and a way out for other slaves as they fought for equality and justice for all.

Aphra Behn was an extremely significant and influential English writer in the 1600s. One of her more famous works, Oroonoko, discusses the issues of slavery and racism in the Americas. Many people believe that slavery and racism go hand in hand. In fact, these two ideologies are awfully different. Slavery is the act of forcing humans to be treated property whereas racism is the belief that discrimination based on inherently different traits is justifiable. Behn, in Oroonoko, makes the fundamental differences between slavery and racism apparent. With the philosophical views of Rousseau and Trouillot’s

Slave Societies in this chapter includes people with similar characteristics who lived together in a well or less organized community. Slave societies in eighteenth -century were common in North America in New England, the Mid-Atlantic and the Lower Mississippi Valley. The black slavery experience was not unique, that is not the same in these areas, was influenced by local conditions, nation of the colonizers, composition of men and women, statistical characteristics of a population, such as age and income, places where black people came from, nature of the slave market in the Atlantic World or methods of production of economic activities. The majority of slaves who came from Africa were more

Segregation was a cruel act committed only to the black people after the Civil War. Everything occurred in the whole United States, which was meant to be “reconstructed.”

Through slavery, segregation, and discrimination, history coded the worst word : the N word. However, banning this most heinous abomination of speech, used throughout history to oppress and dehumanize black people, in fact only perpetuates the trend of removing power from those whose voices society silences. Utilizing the N word gives black people a measure of control over their identities that history stole. Reclamation remembers the odious history of the word and honors the people who lived it, while giving the black community autonomy over their language, history, and selfhood.

Slavery was one of the most inhuman trade activity which is against the rights of men and women whom God destined to live in liberty on this earth. Slaves were in bondage and were regarded as property were not human people, they were brutally treated, worked long hours, no interest in slaves’ welfare. In Chapter 7 of the book titled From Slavery to Freedom, the story begins by reiterating the thirsty for labor in the South Central states, Lower South and the Gulf Coast region during the nineteenth century where New Orleans became the major entry port and largest slave trading center. Increased wealth in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama created demand for slave labor in cotton and sugarcane plantations. Slaves labored in cotton and sugar plantations as the main cash crops in the Southern parts including other agricultural crops. The result was the movement of slaves westward which accelerated interstate slave trade. Slaves were sold by business firms, through lottery and by slave trading firms until it was ended by Congress in 1850. Slave trade constantly separated families as it was driven by profit reason. Although Atlantic slave trade was illegal it continued from 1808-1860 because its commercial value to traders and owners of slaves. Slave codes were introduced for the benefit of slave owners and traders, sometimes they were unwilling to put slaves in prison because this action could result in loose of labor and affect investment. Slaves were talented in many

In order to talk about the abolition of slavery it is necessary to know the meaning of slavery and abolition. According to Dictionary.com the word “Slave means: a person entirely under the domination of some influence or person and abolition means: “the legal prohibition and ending of slavery, especially of slavery of blacks in the U.S.” Now that both words were defined we can begin. “It is said that the first African slaves were brought to the United States near the English Colony back in 1619 to Jamestown, Virginia by some Dutch traders. If we were to discuss the origins of slavery we would have to start not in the United States, but we would have to shift gears to Brazil were they were the biggest slaves traders of all times” according to History.net