Essay on Myths of Slavery

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There are many myths of slavery that most people believe because of what they have learned in history classes grades k-12. The truth was often withheld to make some things seem worse than they actually were, and others better than they actually were. Summaries from what was learned previously to college can be given of what happened, but true detail cannot. The truth came to light in history 201, surprising the class being that most people believed in the myths. Two common myths of slavery were slavery being a southern problem and abolitions hastening the end of slavery. Many people believed slavery was only a southern problem because it was taught that slavery was illegal starting in Pennsylvania and throughout the rest of the north. The north dominated the slave trade and many property owners in the North owned slaves. Many farmers switched from white indentured servants to black slaves. While northern states still owned slaves, they were different from the south because they did not want their slaves to mate, and when they did they did not want the families to be together. This was because they did not feel as if taking care of and sharing their space with slaves was worth the profit. While there could be free blacks in the north, legislators made laws strengthening the rights of slave owners, making it similar to those of the south. Learning that slavery was also in the North was a surprise to me. I have always learned that it was a southern problem and blacks who lived in the north were free. The fact that this is not all the way true has made me feel like pervious history teachers wanted students to think America was a better place than it actually was. What I did already know was that free slaves in the north were not completely free, being that they had to abide by laws that were basically made against them. Another common myth was that abolitions hastened the end of slavery. It is possible that slavery could have ended without the abolitionists of that time. The thought of antislavery was based on free labor, free land, and free men, which was not a concern for most whites. The real concern was middle-class whites not wanting slavery to expand because they did not want it to devalue work for white people. Slavery expanding where it already existed, and into the west would mean…
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