Suffrage The Only Issue

The history of America is made of battles, conflicts and even wars in order to obtain and defend one of the most important principles, freedom. America, the land of the free, is today the home for a bit more than 300 millions of people with about 14% of immigrants, who have left their country to grab a piece of the American dream. From the early English travelers to the African slaves, and most recently the current immigrants, the American land has fulfilled most of its promises as demonstrated by the peaceful living of all the different races. However, the black history has a dark theme to it. First forcefully brought to this country as slaves, it took several laws, a secession of the confederate states, a civil war and three amendments before …show more content…
On the center of the image, is a picture of a group of Black people being restrained to enter a room labeled “Polls” by some White men complaining as indicate the captions. The last item at the bottom of the image is a text that is titled “The Radical Platform- Negro Suffrage The Only Issue” which sums up the overall idea expressed in the …show more content…
Although it took three amendments, the 13th, 14th and 15th, to recognize the black people as a legitimate part of the population, and grant them the right to vote, the white population in the southern states were still upset with these laws and kept fighting against their implementation. These amendments known as the “slaves amendments” began with the 13th amendment that abolished slavery in any state or territory under the government of the U.S.A. The abolition of slavery was raised for the first time in 1777 when the northern states inspired by the philosophy of the Declaration of independence provided for a gradual abolition of slavery. From 1777 to 1860, this issue has remained at the center of the political tension, which reached its peak at the election of pro-abolitionist Abraham Lincoln as the president of the United States. The southern states, economically threatened by the end of slavery seceded from the United States to create the Confederacy, which later declared war to the northern states (The Union). Lincoln was a very big actor in the freedom of the Black people. He first declared the Emancipation Proclamation during the war, which led to the first reconstruction amendment after the war. However the freedom of the black people raised more issues such as their civil rights, but especially their right to vote, which was still a very sensitive