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http://omekahst251.jenniferandrella.com/admin/items/show/26
- For my visual resource, I added a picture of a celebration parade that occurred when the 15th Amendment was passed. I found this source on the Smithsonian website and found it particularly interesting in relation to our class and current election. I was able to find pretty much everything for this source, which made it pretty easy! The parade lasted about five hours and was about a mile long. In the middle of the picture, there are 16 people depicted that were fundamental in passing the 15th Amendment. Pictured are Abraham Lincoln, President Ulysses S. Grant, John Brown, Grant’s Vice President Schuyler S. Colfax, D.C. US Marshall Frederick Douglas, Mississippi Senator Hiram Rhodes Revels, and Martin Robison Delany. A question that I might raise is what protests to this amendment looked like.
- For my textual resource, I chose a manuscript written by Thomas Jefferson regarding enslaved people who escaped. I was not able to download the written version of this text for some reason, so I uploaded the paper attached to it. I really wanted to use this source despite my downloading issue because it made me think about our conversation the other day about how Thomas Jefferson is idolized in American history, and how we don’t talk about all of the tragedy he caused. I was able to fill in most of the necessary Omeka items for this source. In this article, Thomas Jefferson expresses his legal opinions on an escaped group of enslaved people being recaptured. I really found this interesting, because Thomas Jefferson is idolized in textbooks, yet we don’t talk about how he had a plantation filled with enslaved people and also perpetuated racist ideologies through documents like this one. I again raise the research question I brought up last week: Why are some people able to justify pivotal figures’ disturbing actions in history by the good things they did, even though those good things came at the cost of many lives?
These are excellent historical sources and I really enjoyed reading about your analysis and questions they raised. I always find historical sources surrounding the 15th Amendment really interesting, particularly because this was the last of the three major “Reconstruction Amendments” and expanded the right to vote to people without discrimination of race or background of servitude. Some people, even abolitionists, were fervently opposed to such an amendment, which makes its passage all the more important.
Your second source is equally intriguing, and definitely builds from the conversations we had in class. Jefferson had a background in law as well, which makes his perspective on slavery and freedom (for some) all the more fascinating.