Freedom In African American Era

Throughout the eras, the values of society have been altered and developed to fit what is occurring in that time. People change what they believe in to accommodate the obstacles society is facing in that moment. The idea of “freedom” throughout the decades has been modified to shape to that individual’s conception of how the United States has treated them. In reading pieces of writing from the Revolutionary, Civil/Post Civil, and Early 20th century era, it becomes noticeable that during different centuries, society has turned its back on particular groups of people. The difficulties these persons faced throughout their life, helped shape their beliefs to how freedom is restricted or given in America. In the Revolutionary War Era, war had

Freedom is a natural right, but in the Civil/Post Civil era, not everyone can take advantage of it. A citizen’s skin color, would have a heavy impact on that person’s outlook on freedom. Society strived for a different view of freedom, some believed freedom was only meant for certain people, however, others would wait their whole life just to receive the opportunity to establish their rights. In “Stanzas on Freedom” by Russell Lowell, it describes a pain that slaves have felt. The law stated that everyone was equal, yet white men have not felt the pain that the black man has lived with their whole life. Lowell writes, “If there breathe on earth a slave, are ye truly free?” (Lowell 575). The author describes in this poem that if their is even one slave on this earth, society is not truly equal. The only way to achieve the equalization that the law says the citizens have, is to wholeheartedly engage in one’s freedoms. Freedom is not a gift, one is born with it, yet, society tried to strip the slaves and the black men from their right to live in

In the Revolutionary War era, a European immigrant comes to America, and finds what he has been looking for this whole time, a nation that exercises the freedoms to let a white man take advantage of the vastness of his nation. While white men are able to succeed more easily, the African Americans in the Civil/Post Civil era come across more struggles. The African Americans have difficulty understanding how a nation can be equal, yet have slavery. Freedom for African Americans, was not something they lived with, it was something they were stripped of. In the Early 20th century though, this nation would seek for change. Slavery was abolished, and this nation was ready to start new. More opportunities at a good life were handed to the minority, however, everyone was not yet happy. Even with the million different paths the Russian immigrant in “America and I” could have taken to succeed. She could not find the urge to do so, something was missing. She had the freedoms to pursue who she wanted to be, yet she struggled with the deeper meaning of things. Freedom has always been in the midst of America, it has become more available to all of society throughout the eras. Society finds out freedom is just an idea. For the white man, it has always been there, but for the black man freedom is something to behold and take pride in. The idea of freedom differs from person to person, it is