Assignment #12

Assignment: Due 12/17 Choose a passage from JFK, Reagan, or Obama, write it out and explain what it means.

I hope you all enjoyed the class. Thank you for your participation and your blog entries which were very interesting to read. The final exam will be posted on Blackboard 12/17. It will be an essay exam like the midterm.

"Of course, the answer to the slavery question was already embedded within our Constitution - a Constitution that had at its very core the ideal of equal citizenship under the law; a Constitution that promised its people liberty, and justice, and a union that could be and should be perfected over time.

And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part - through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk - to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time." (Barack Obama)

The passage above was from Barack Obama back in 2008. He was talking about slavery and how the constitution had its ideal citizenship set already, therefore promising liberty, and justice  to people. Obama feels though as there is no liberty or justice because inequality still exist amongst all today. Wether is about race or wealth something is needed to be don't to create the equality that people need. There shouldn't be any if's or but's in our constitution. I agree with Obama with his speech on inequality because most people who are wealthy talk about how some poor are poor because they don't want to work, and the  rather answer to that is that we don't have the necessary resources to go to school and actually get a good laid back working paying job.

Assignment #11

Assignment Due 12/10 : Choose a passage from Wilson, or Roosevelt, write out the passage and interpret it and explain why you chose this passage.

Go to the link for the The Great Depression. Choose a passage from this website and write it out and interpret it and explain why you chose this passage. Also choose a picture or painting and explain the content of piece and how it relates to class.

“Similarly, it was no business of the law in the time of Jefferson to come into my house and see how I kept house. But when my house, when my property, when my so-called private property became a great mine, and men went along dark corridors amidst every kind of danger to dig out of the bowels of the earth things necessary  for the industries of a whole nation and when it was known that no individual owned those mines, that they were owned  by great stock companies, then all the old analogies absolutely collapsed and it became the right of the government to go  down into those mines and see whether human beings were being properly treated in them or not…”(Woodrow Wilson)

The Great Depression

"In October 1929 the stock market crashed, wiping out 40 percent of the paper values of common stock. Even after the stock market collapse, however, politicians and industry leaders continued to issue optimistic predictions for the nation's economy. But the Depression deepened, confidence evaporated and many lost their life savings. By 1933 the value of stock on the New York Stock Exchange was less than a fifth of what it had been at its peak in 1929. Business houses closed their doors, factories shut down and banks failed. Farm income fell some 50 percent. By 1932 approximately one out of every four Americans was unemployed.The core of the problem was the immense disparity between the country's productive capacity and the ability of people to consume. Great innovations in productive techniques during and after the war raised the output of industry beyond the purchasing capacity of U.S. farmers and wage earners. The savings of the wealthy and middle class, increasing far beyond the possibilities of sound investment, had been drawn into frantic speculation in stocks or real estate. The stock market collapse, therefore, had been merely the first of several detonations in which a flimsy structure of speculation had been leveled to the ground.

The presidential campaign of 1932 was chiefly a debate over the causes and possible remedies of the Great Depression. Herbert Hoover, unlucky in entering The White House only eight months before the stock market crash, had struggled tirelessly, but ineffectively, to set the wheels of industry in motion again. His Democratic opponent, Franklin D. Roosevelt, already popular as the governor of New York during the developing crisis, argued that the Depression stemmed from the U.S. economy's underlying flaws, which had been aggravated by Republican policies during the 1920s. President Hoover replied that the economy was fundamentally sound, but had been shaken by the repercussions of a worldwide depression -- whose causes could be traced back to the war. Behind this argument lay a clear implication: Hoover had to depend largely on natural processes of recovery, while Roosevelt was prepared to use the federal government's authority for bold experimental remedies.The election resulted in a smashing victory for Roosevelt, who won 22,800,000 votes to Hoover's 15,700,000. The United States was about to enter a new era of economic and political change"

The passage above explains how the The Great Depression in the US started in 1929 with a collapse of the stock market. There were few rules and regulations that had to be obeyed by banks, lenders. As a result, many dangerous and shaky projects were going on, and the collapse of some led to the collapse of others. Businesses and industries folded. The result of this was massive unemployment. At a time when there was NO governmental safety net, like unemployment pay. But the Depression did not really lift until, in 1941, the US entered WW2. Immediately there was a rush to employ people to work in defense businesses and industries, and the Great Depression was over. 

This picture goes to show the segregation between power, money and race among st people. To the right you have the wealthy who is enjoying dinner and a show, while to the left you have colored people who working hard to make them food. Most likely not able to afford one minute of their lifestyle.

Assignment #10

Assignment Due 12/3: Choose a passage from the Gettysburg Address or the Second Inaugural Address. Write out the passage and interpret its meaning and explain why you chose it.

"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."

1776 the people who signed the declaration of independence put their life in line to create freedom and equality among-st everyone. I choose this passage because it relates to everything we been talking about in class. From slaves maltreatment to their liberty. Aside of them having liberty they still needed to be treated as equal no lesser value than any other color person on earth.

Assignment #9

Assignment Due 11/26: Choose a passage from Lincoln's speech on the Dred Scott case, interpret it and explain how it relates to class.

From the African-American Odyssey website, from the Civil War section, choose two parts, and summarize and explain them. If they include pictures, copy and paste the photo or image in your paper. 



"It is grossly incorrect to say or assume, that the public estimate of the negro is more favorable now than it was at the origin of the government."

The Dred Scott case was a decision by the US supreme court stating that African Americans free or not were unable to become American citizens. They basically did not have a word in suing the court. The above statement was part of Lincolns speech on the case. Stating that did not matter before the estimate of African Americans, is not going to matter now. Yes, they became free , but still weren't considered equal.

Freedom's Eve--Watch Night Meeting

Heard and Moseley. Waiting for the hour [Emancipation], December 31, 1862. Carte de visite. Washington, 1863. Prints and Photographs Division. Reproduction Number: LC-USZC4-6160 (4-21a)

On New Year's Eve many African American churches hold prayer and worship services from the late evening until midnight when they welcome the new year with praise, thanksgiving, prayer, and confession. These services are called watch night meetings. December 31, 1862, was a very special evening for the African American community, because it was the night before the Emancipation Proclamation took effect, freeing all the slaves in the Confederate states.

Watch night meetings were special events for the African Americans. It was a night before the Emancipation took effect which finally allowed slaves to be free. New Years is the beginning of a new year and many different things to come. For these people it was the best thing that could have happened on this night. After being abused and used they finally were going to be able to feel free and feel like a working dog.

"Contrabands" at the Nation's Capitol

Contrabands, Camp Brightwood. Washington, D.C., ca. 1863. Carte de visite. Gladstone Collection, Prints and Photographs Division. Reproduction Number: LC-USZC4-6158 (4-9)

Black slaves who fled to Union lines, or "contrabands," often proved themselves extremely useful, even before the government enlisted them into service. A group of "contrabands" appear on this calling card. Calling cards, or cartes de visite, with photographs were popular during this era partly because photography was relatively new and the cards provided a means of sharing likenesses with friends and relatives. This one includes images of white officers of the 2nd Rhode Island Camp at Camp Brightwood in the District of Columbia. On the left is Capt. B. S. Brown. In the center is Lt. John P. Shaw, killed in action at the Wilderness, Virginia, May 5, 1864, and on the right is Lt. T. Fry. The "contrabands" with them are not named.

Fleeing slaves who fled into contraband's and were later killed.

Assignment #8

Assignment Due (11/19): Choose a passage from Stanton or Anthony and one from Douglass. Write out the passage and explain what the author is saying and how it relates to the themes of the lecture, and then explain why you chose this quote.

Elizabeth Stanton
"He has never permitted her to exercise her inalienable right to the elective franchise.He has compelled her to submit to laws, in the formation of which she had no voice.He has withheld from her rights, which are given to the most ignorant and degraded men -- both natives and foreigners.Having deprived her of this first right of a citizen, the elective franchise, thereby leaving her without representation in the halls of legislation, he has oppressed her on all sides.He has made her, if married, in the eye of the law, civilly dead.He has taken from her all right in property, even to the wages she earns.He has made her, morally, an irresponsible being, as she can commit many crimes with impunity, provided they are done in the presence of her husband. In the covenant of marriage, she is compelled to promise obedience to her husband, he becoming, to all intents and purposes, her master -- the law giving him power to deprive her of her liberty, and to administer chastisement."


Stanton is explaining the beginning of the suffrage movement and the right to vote.She explains how women's weren't represented and they had no say or voice. She also states that even men immigrants have more rights then the women who are citizens here.When a woman has a voice, then laws are  created differently. If married you lose all the rights and your husband has a say for himself and on your behalf. Basically leaving you lifeless. Everything belongs to him that was once your in your head.To sum up he has been given the right to deprive her of her liberty. This relates to our lecture theme civil disobedience because is all about obeying the laws and following the rules. As a women these were the laws that were established. I chose this quote because you can clearly see how much inequality was occurring within gender.

Fredrick Douglas

“It was a long, lean, gaunt, shivelled looking creature, stretched out on two chairs, and his legs resting on the prostrate bust of Washington; projecting from behind was a cat o’ nine tails knotted at the ends; around his person he wore a belt in which were stuck those truly American implements, a bowie knife, dirk, and revolving pistol; behind him was a whipping post, with a naked woman tied to it, and a strong- armed American citizen in the act of scourging her livid flesh with a cowskin. At his feet was another group;—a sale going on, of human cattle, and around the auctioneer’s table were gathered therespectability,…”

Douglas is explaining the cruelty and the ignorance that was happening with slavery. How they weren't even considered humans they could be compared to animals.

Slavery and women s rights is a topic that has been fought for over years. Civil disobedience is more of fighting for those rights.

Assignment #7

Assignment (Due 11/12): Choose one passage from Thoreau write out the passage and interpret them and explain why you chose them.

Go to the link for African-American Odyssey and under the section Abolition choose two topics from part 1 and part 2, research these topics, and summarize them and explain how they relate to the readings by Thoreau.

"I heartily accept the motto, "That government is best which governs least"; and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe- "That government is best which governs not at all"; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have. Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient. The objections which have been brought against a standing army, and they are many and weighty, and deserve to prevail, may also at last be brought against a standing government. The standing army is only an arm of the standing government. The government itself, which is only the mode which the people have chosen to execute their will, is equally liable to be abused and perverted before the people can act through it. Witness the present Mexican war, the work of comparatively a few individuals using the standing government as their tool; for, in the outset, the people would not have consented to this measure"

Thoreau thinks a perfect government should leave the people alone to govern themselves individually. This isn't really something that can happen unless all individuals are willing to obey certain rules of social order without being forced.I chose this passage because i think in some ways people governing themselves would end in a disaster. The lack of agreement among st people would be the number one fail.

PART 1 Fear Of Slave Revolts In addition to numerous published accounts documenting white fear of slave uprisings, many private letters discuss problems brewing on individual plantations. In this letter, John Rutherford, an agent for Virginia plantation owner William B. Randolph, wrote to Randolph indicating that a concerned neighbor near Randolph's Chatworth plantation feared "fatal consequences" if the overseer did not cease his "brutality" toward the Chatworth slaves. After the Chatworth overseer received a demanding letter of inquiry from Randolph, he answered on September 14, 1833, stating that he had whipped some of the slaves because they were idle or had escaped. Although three escapees had not returned, the situation was under control and work was proceeding as usual. John Rutherford to William B. Randolph on the slave mutiny at Chatworth, Richmond, Virginia. September 1, 1833. Manuscript Division. (1-9)

PART 2 Humans For Sale To be sold. . .a cargo of 170 prime young likely healthy Guinea slaves. Savannah, July 25, 1774. Copyprint of a broadside. Prints and Photographs Division. Reproduction Number: LC-USZ62-16876 (1-2) Captured Africans were sold at auction as "chattel," like inanimate property or animals. Many literate ex-slaves discussed the degradation and humiliation they felt when they were treated like "cattle." This 1774 broadside, typical of the advertisements used in the North as well as the South before the Civil War, advertises the sale of slaves and land, the availability of employment for an overseer, a recall of debts, and a reward for anyone who captured two runaway slaves. The captors claim that the Angolan Africans, scheduled to be sold at auction in Savannah, Georgia, were "prime, young, likely healthy." The runaway advertisement on this same broadside gives specific information about two African-born male runaways which includes height, complexion, build, and clothing.

First, i would like to start by saying its incredible the type of things i just read about above. The sale of humans, or the maltreatment of the slaves. I now see the positives and negatives of being a self government. In a slave point of view he should definitely rebel and find a way of changing the world. What kind of humanity sells one another. Abuses and mistreat one another. I wouldn't want to only self govern i would want to rebel the world and try and get pay back. Slave owners don't know the pain they are causing these humans until they experience it themselves.

Assignment # 6

Assignment (Due 10/29): Choose a passage from one of the Anti-Federalist writers, write out the passage and give your interpretation of the passage, then explain what this passage means to you or why you chose it.
Anti federalist #14

"The recital, or premises on which the new form of government is erected, declares a consolidation or union of all the thirteen parts, or states, into one great whole, under the form of the United States, for all the various and important purposes therein set forth. But whoever seriously considers the immense extent of territory comprehended within the limits of the United States, together with the variety of its climates, productions, and commerce, the difference of extent, and number of inhabitants in all; the dissimilitude of interest, morals, and politics, in almost every one, will receive it as an intuitive truth, that a consolidated republican form of government therein, can never form a perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to you and your posterity, for to these objects it must be directed. This unkindred legislature therefore, composed of interests opposite and dissimilar in their nature, will in its exercise, emphatically be like a house divided against itself.”

 The passage above is stating that the United states has 15 states and every state has differences therefor, forming a perfect government that will direct this amount of people from separate climates, separate productions and commerce is nearly impossible. Trying to promote a government that will keep all  these states is insane. Everyone has a way of growing up,different opinions and ways of seen life. The way i see it is if 100 people make up the United States and 50 are anti immigration and the other 50 are pro, than what kind of government is going to be build to make everyone happy. Having to govern the United states with such a population density is more like dividing all cities and everyone deciding what best fits their society.


Go to the link for "American Politics." Look up the section "Federalism" and explain the differences between horizontal and vertical federalism. 

Horizontal federalism: this involves interactions and common programmes among the 50 states.

In other words horizontal federalism tries to cooperate with all governing of the 50 states to come to conclusions. If there is no agreement between each other than the government loses legitimacy when it comes to making a better living life for people.
Vertical federalism: this is viewed as the traditional form of federalism as it sees the actions of the national government as supreme within their constitutional sphere.The states without the government simply would not be able to function. They need to always interact with each other because thats the only way finances and many other resources are brought up.