Zinn Chapter 9

Zinn Chapter 9

In Zinn’s article I believe the thesis would be “With slavery abolished by order of the government-true, a government pushed hard to do so, by blacks, free and slave, and by white abolitionists-its end could be orchestrated so as to set limits to emancipation” (129). Which I believe he is saying that with slavery abolished the governments have to work hard to get both sides expectations met.
In Zinn’s article he stars talking about slavery and how it benefits many different groups of people. White and black people would sometimes work together. For example “This helps explain the stern police measures against whites who fraternized with blacks. In return, blacks helped whites in need. One black runaway told of a slave woman who had received fifty lashes of the whip for giving food to a white neighbor who was poor and sick” (132). This explains how black and white people can and sometimes work together. Zinn also talks about how slaves tried many times to change the system and rise up against the government. He argues how slavery destroyed black families and they would do anything to try to stop it in some cases. In the article Zinn stated “Blacks had to struggle constantly with the unconscious racism of white abolitionists” (137). Then he talks about how they had to use their own independent voice. Zinn states how he thought that free blacks were the ones who started the abolition movement.
In the article Zinn states “Certain black women faced the triple hurdle of being abolitionists in a slave society, of being black among white reformers, and of being women in a reform movement dominated by men” (138). That is an example of the abolition movement. The union eventually gave slaves the freedom to fight on their side of the battles that took place, and they became a part of something important. Zinn stated, “The importance of the new capitalism in overturning what black power existed in the postwar South is affirmed by Horace Mann Bond’s study of Alabama Reconstruction. It was an age of coal and power, and northern Alabama had both. “The bankers in Philadelphia and New York and even London and Paris, had known this for almost two decades” (152). State how blacks had stared to gain some power. In the article it went back and forth with going abolishing slavery and keeping slavery, defending blacks and supporting blacks. There are many opinions and arguments but in the end it the government decided to go against slavery, “The culmination of this mood came in the decision of 1896, when the Court ruled that a railroad could segregate black and white if the segregated facilities were equal. Slavery was being put away and the people were trying to compromise and the Court was trying to enforce equality.
I thought this reading was interesting and provided me with a lot of information that I did not know about. The abolishment movement and the different sides of slavery. I still believe that people are always going to have their opinions no matter what and how ever we try to inforce something there will always be people who disagree.