The Underground Railroad The Declaration Of Independence

The Underground Railroad The Declaration of Independence states all men are created equal, sadly in America that was not true. It was legal in America to own a person. In The Underground Railroad In American History, Kem Knapp Sawyer states that the number of slaves in the South had gone from 1,519,017 in 1820 to almost 4 million in 1860. Araminta Ross was one of those people. She was born a slave, beaten, abused and forced to work for her owners. Her life and her families’ life was extremely hard. The Fugitive Slave Act in America stated that a slave could be captured and returned from a free state and helping slaves escape was a crime. A History Of US War, Terrible War 1855-1865 tells us that Abraham Lincoln saw this as a moral issue and thought that black people were entitled to all the rights listed in the Declaration of Independence including right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. Marshall and Manuel point out in Sounding Forth The Trumpet that escapin g slaves had one thing working for them, brave men and women of different races who were willing to risk their own freedom for the sake of the runaways. Dred Scott, a slave, had lived several years in Wisconsin, a free state and sued his owner Irene Emerson, for his and his wife’s freedom. They were now in Missouri a slave state. He said that having lived in a free state made him a free man. A History Of Us Liberty For All we read what Chief Justice Roger Taney said in his majority opinion in theShow MoreRelatedEssay on Slavery, Womens Rights and Inequality in America1540 Words   |  7 PagesAmerica by far is the most diverse country on the face of the earth. America today is known for freedom, equality, democracy, and a defender against tyranny. The foundation of American values lay in a belief of independence, nationalism, capitalism, and religion. 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