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What Role Did Basketball Play In American History

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When one considers historical development from 1607 through 1865 in what eventually would become the United States of America, it is though a game of basketball was being played with the lives of the people. In the first quarter the slaves are playing against the indentured servants, England owning both teams. The second quarter entails the French, colonists and slaves in the American Revolution versus the European powerhouse England. The third quarter parallels the United States purchase of 828,000 square miles of Louisiana from France. The fourth quarter encompasses colonization and abolitionism, activity centered on expelling free blacks from the United States, or ending slavery across the board. England equals the owner of the franchise. The 13 colonies along the eastern Atlantic seaboard in North America is the court. The slave owners comprise the coaches. The economy is the ball. The blacks are the point guard, and the whites are the shooting guard. Women are the cheerleaders. The Native Americans, relegated to the reservations, are …show more content…

The advantage is clearly with the colonists, French, and slaves. Not only are they fighting a war but they have a labor force, the slaves, doing all the agricultural work to put the basketball in the hoop and run up the score on England. The French gladly help the colonists team so that when the war is over they could trade with the colonists. The English, despite being the major European team of the time, were in control in the first few minutes of the quarter but abruptly began to lose the lead ultimately being forced to forfeit the game by the end of the quarter. The colonists winning the quarter threw England out of the picture and appointed them owner of the team. This now made them self sufficient for the first time and gave them the ability to enjoy the fruits of their slave 's

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To finance the wars Britain raised taxes immensely sparking upset in both the colonies and in England (pg. 169) England wanting to expand their empire in the colonies wanted French posts out of Pennsylvania sparking the Seven Year’s War. (170) Colonists fought against French and Native forces until the war was won by the British in 1759(170). Northern colonists who fought in the war left with a sense of nationality towards England. Not only had the war left a patriotic feeling with Britain but also brought the colonies closer together.

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From 1600 through 1800 the new world experienced a time period in which America does not like to remember. During this time slavery grew and transformed to something we've never seen before. Atlantic slave trade changed the lives of millions of Africans, ripping them from their home like rag dolls and bringing them to a strange foreign land they would call home and being forced to work as slaves, in hot, miserable conditions with little food, and water as a result the lives of Africans would never be same and the Atlantic slave trade would wet the pallet for slavery throughout America's History. In the new found land named the Americas, Europeans were colonizing and were taking the land from the Natives and using it for themselves to

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