In its support of the slavery system, the government of the United States utilized the law. In other words, the federal government either passed legislations to thwart any threats made against the institution of slavery or persecuted individuals for failing to adhere to the same. A perfect illustration of the given claims revolves around the actions of political leaders and the States’ harsh responses to calls for liberation during the Antebellum Era. In Howard Zinn’s words, the government allowed whites to use “the laws, courts, [and] armed forces” to restrict persons of African descent to the lowest class in the social hierarchy (171). Extensively, in an open display of the mentioned tactics, there was the execution of John Brown in 1859 after his failed attempt to steal from the “federal arsenal” at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (Zinn 185). Local militia and marines captured Brown and his followers, after killing others, and the courts presided over his trial before conceding to his execution. Notably, John Brown was a white man and if his ability to organize insurgents is anything to go by then he was of a high social standing. In that sense, the American government was ready to protect slavery no matter the threat; even whites were not safe. Brown’s execution was harsh, and so was the punishments rendered on slaves who were daring enough to attempt such an act. In fact, when Nat Turner’s efforts in 1831 did not end with the execution of the guilty party; on the contrary, the rebellion "threw the slaveholding South into a panic” and prompted harsher laws to prevent a repeat of the same (Zinn 174).
Perhaps the most relevant law that the federal government endorsed for slave owners was the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. As per the terms of the legislation, all runaway slaves remained the property of their master and as a result, the Free States had no rights to harbor slaves escaping from the slaveholding regions. Consequently, on one hand, the law required even the abolitionist Northerners to recapture and return ex-slaves to their rightful owners. On the contrary, the same law benefited the pro-slavery forces as they could “pick up blacks they claimed had run away” (Zinn 181). The appeal that the Fugitive Slave Act had among the Southerners created the foundations on which the government created a concession that allowed the admission of Mexican territories into the Union. Naturally, amid the debates on slavery, the United States witnessed the rise of two factions: the pro-slavery and the anti-slavery States. Any region that sided with one of the given groups strengthened the same at the expense of the other. The Fugitive Slave Act was a component of the Compromise of 1850, which paved the way for the admission of California as a non-slave State; extensively, the legislation means slave-owners could breach borders and hunt for runaway slaves in the whole country.
The Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution abolished slavery, gave birthright citizenships to all persons born in the country, and declared blacks as legal citizens respectively (Zinn 192-198). Hence, after the American Civil War, the Thirteenth Amendment made slavery illegal in the United States and for that reason, reinstated the terms of the Emancipation Proclamation that had only liberated slaves residing in the Confederate States. As one would expect, the mentioned changes to the Constitution changed the lives of blacks by uplifting them from the condition of human chattels to one in which they had the law recognize them as persons with rights. Subsequently, both the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments enfranchised blacks. Initially, the government existed for the Caucasians only; however, by recognizing African Americans as nationals of the State, the situation changed. With the given facts in mind, the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments were a transition for blacks: from slavery to freedom.
Lincoln’s position on slavery did not qualify him as an abolitionist and at the same time, did not render him unsympathetic to the plight of the men and women held in bondage. Zinn manages to capture the entity that was Abraham Lincoln by asserting that the man combined “the needs of business [and] the political ambition of the new Republican party” (Zinn 187). The man’s arguments are right when one considers the fact that the then president of the United States never intended to abolish slavery, especially in the South. The Emancipation Proclamation was merely a tactic that the man used in his attempt to end the Civil War and reconstruct the Union. The Confederacy’s refusal to heed his warning escalated to the eventual liberation of the men and women held in bondage. Consequently, it was no wonder he publicly spoke against slavery yet sympathized with the Southern slave owners in private; Lincoln was practical as he sought to reconstruct a divided country.
Works Cited
Zinn, Howard. A People's History of the United States . New York: Harper Perennial Modern Classics, 2005. Print.
