Summary Of Letter By Benjamin Banneker

Author, Benjamin Banneker, in his letter to Thomas Jefferson in 1791, attempts to make his point of the oppressive and outrageous nature of slavery. Banneker’s purpose is to persuade Jefferson to continue his efforts to fight for the emancipation of African Americans and to fight the prejudices that have grown around this race. He adopts a very sophisticated and sympathetic tone in order to convey Jefferson’s feelings toward the subject. Banneker opens his letter with a plea to Jefferson to help relieve the sufferings of those African Americans living under slavery. He appeals to ethos when he reminds Jefferson of by stating, “even hope and fortitude wore an aspect of inability to the conflict that he couldn’t be led to a serious and grateful sense of his miraculous and providential preservation” in trying to acquire freedom, at the same time also relating to his own struggle for the emancipation of slaves. Banneker reminds Jefferson in this time in order to

Banneker also uses religious appeal that calls out Jefferson’s pro-slavery stance, by saying “how pitiable is it to reflect that although you were so fully convinced of the benevolence of the Father of mankind and of his equal and impartial distribution of those rights and privileges which he has conferred upon them,”. This “counteracts his mercies” by tolerating slavery. By appealing to religion it shows Jefferson that Banneker is under the same God as him and that they share the same religious understandings, so there for saying that Jefferson is under the hand of wrong and should cleanse himself of his wrong by not being pro-slavery. That Jefferson should feel ashamed of his actions and should fix them for the