The number one freedom that African Americans admired the most was political freedom. According to Foner, “As Fredrick Douglass put it soon after the South’s surrender in 1865, ‘Slavery is not abolished until the black man has a ballot’ ”(570). What Douglas means by this statement is that African American men were not considered free if they did not have the right to vote. Black men saw voting as equality of their society and soon after the Civil War was over, they were apart of the public sphere. African Americans had the opportunity to come together in “conventions, parades, and petition drives” to fight for their right to vote (559).
