Freedom From Above or Below

In this unit, our class dove into the topic of whether or not freedom of slavery come from influential forces from above (Caucasian ethnicity) or below (African American ethnicity). During class, we broke up into several smaller groups in order to identify and analyze certain documents that took place in the middle-late 1800's. Once our groups concluded analyzing the documents, we continued to further analyze these different events as a class by watching videos and taking notes in three major categories. There were a few categories that the responses fell into: the goals of war, the position of freeing slaves, and evidence of Lincoln's personal feelings of slavery. 

The image our class analyzed when discussing whether or not freedom comes from above or below

The most common thought throughout society is that Lincoln did the majority of freeing throughout the middle-late 1800's. This is partly true, however, the enslaved people held their own when it came to freedom themselves. For example, our class analyzed the document "Enslaved
People Force the Issue", in which slaves were proactive about forcing the Union soldiers attention upon them. They did this by flooding the town with fugitive people and causing a ruckus, thus bringing great anxiety upon the soldiers. The soldiers eventually brought this problem to higher power, which resulted in the fugitives protection using a system of guards and watchmen. This effectively shows the actions of the fugitives to gain the attention of the soldiers, further proving that there was freedom from below. On the contrary, this action could also be seen as freedom from above in the sense that

In my opinion, freedom can come from either above or below depending on the situation. For example, choosing to play a college sport for a team of your liking  typically requires "freedom from below" in the sense that one must be proactive in getting the desired team's attention. They must reach out, send highlight films, emails, and notes to grab the attention of coaches or scouts from that school. In contrast, freedom can come from above in the sense that the colleges can pick and choose who they want as a player or a student. The colleges, in the end, being the higher power, make the final choice as to whether or not a player will come and play for their team.

Freedom From Above or Below Document