SEGREGATION WEBQUEST

UNIT 4

SEGREGATION

Fighting for civil rights in the USA

1 / The origins of segregation in the USA From slavery to emancipation in the 19th century

Read the documents about slavery and emancipation and answer the questions on your worksheet.

From slavery...

When did slavery begin in the Americas? The first enslaved people in the American colonies arrived on a Dutch ship in Jamestown, Virginia in 1619. Over the next 200 years, around 600,000 more enslaved people were brought to the American colonies, most of them to work the tobacco and cotton fields. Where did the enslaved come from? Enslaved people were brought over from the continent of Africa. Most of them came from the west coast of Africa where the main ports for the trade of enslaved people existed. The conditions on the ships were terrible. Abolitionism After the American Revolution, many northern states outlawed slavery. By 1840 most of the enslaved who lived north of the Mason-Dixon Line were set free. Many people in the north felt that slavery should be illegal in all of the United States. These people were called abolitionists because they wanted to "abolish" slavery. Text adapted from ducksters.com

Slaves being sold at an auction block.

Antislavery/abolitionist figures of resistance

Frederick Douglass

Harriet Tubman

... to emancipation.

Abraham Lincoln

A map of the USA in 1861

The Thirteenth Amendment

The Thirteenth Amendment made slavery illegal in the United States. It was adopted as part of the Constitution on December 6, 1865.

Before that, Lincoln had issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. The Emancipation Proclamation freed slaves only in certain parts of the United States, but did not actually make slavery illegal.

Amendment XIII, from the National Archives

Sources:

Slavery : ducksters.com Harriet Tubman: E for English 3e Frederick Douglass: wikipedia.com Map of the USA in 1861: wikipedia.com The American Civil War: E for English 3e Abraham Lincoln: E for English 3e wikipedia.com The Thirteenth Amendment: ducksters.com wikipedia.com National Archives of the USA

The American Civil War (1861-1865) was fought between the Northern and Southern US States. The Northern States wanted to abolish slavery throughout the country, whereas the Southern States wanted to keep slavery as they relied on African slaves to farm their crops of tobacco and cotton. The war ended with a victory for the North.

Here is the text of the 13th amendment from The Constitution: Article XIIISection 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Abraham Lincoln (1809 – 1865) was an American politician. He was the 16th President of the United States. He was elected President in November 1860 and was President from 1861 to 1865, during the American Civil War.Lincoln was the first president of the United States to be assassinated. Lincoln has been remembered as the "Great Emancipator" because he worked to end slavery in the United States. He freed slaves with the passing of the Emancipation Proclamation (1863). At the end of the war, slavery was emancipated with the Thirteenth Amendment.

Harriet Tubman (1822 - 1913) was one of the most famous antislavery activists in American history. Born into slavery on a farm in Maryland, she escaped in 1849 to the free state of Pennsylvania thanks to a secret organization whose coded name was the "Underground Railroad". After gaining her own liberty, she devoted her life to freeing hundreds of other slaves.

Frederick Douglass (1817/18 - 1895) was one of the most important leader of the movement for African-American civil rights in the 19th century. He escaped from slavery in Maryland and became a national leader of the abolitionist movement in Massachusetts and New York. He was famous for his oratory skills and and his incisive antislavery writings.