Summary
Slaves usually found mild comfort in the church and what had started almost three decades earlier by Absalom Jones and Richard Allen-the Free African Society-blossomed into the African Methodist Church (AME) led by "now" Bishop Richard Allen. Afterwards, he led the First National Negro Convention at Bethel Church in Philadelphia aimed at improving the social status of the "American Negro." (Throughout the history of Blacks in America, most protests - civil and otherwise - were started from the church/pulpit or by church ministers - from Bishop Allen, Denmark Vesey and Nat Turner to Rep. Adam Clayton Powell, the Honorable Elijah Muhammad and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.)
The Black press also had its origins during those tumultuous times. The mainstream media were adept at lampooning Black people in general. In 1827, Samuel Cornish and John Russ Wurm started "Freedom's Journal," the first publication by Blacks in New York City. It was not an accident that around the same time, New York State abolished slavery; Two years later, in nearby Boston, David Walker, a freed Black published an anti-slavery pamphlet, "An Appeal to the Colorced People of the World" which came to be known as David Walker's Appeal. He was inspired by Presser and Vesey, and aroused a furor among slaveholders.The unrest among slaves created a dissatisfaction throughout the Western Hemisphere and possibly lit the fuse for the revolt by a goup of Africans aboad the slave ship "Amistad." The young leader, Joseph Cinque, waled in the footsteps of [Prosser], Vesey and Turner. However, they fared better at their trials than the others. They were defended by former President John Quincy Adams all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and were freed to return to Africa. However, the next legal challenge before the U.S. Supreme Court, relative to Blacks, may have suffered a reversal of fortune on the coattails of the Cinque victory. What became the most pernicious decision in U.S. history was filed in 1847 in Missouri, a slave state. The Dred Scott decision, handed down in 1857, still reverberates 150 years later. The Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, a Maryland slaveholder, decided that Dred Scott, and indeed all Black people, as slaves, was not a citizen of the U.S. and had no rights that a White person had to respect.First was Gabriel Ptosser who planned and organized a revolt with the adept of an army-trained general. Since this occurred during the presidency of James Monroe, they named their country's capital Monrovia in his honor.See the full content of this document
Extract
Our Pioneering Legacy in America
(PART II)
The 19th CenturyAs the new century began, old customs and traditions prevailed. There were three major insurrections during the 1800s and each failed. First was Gabriel Ptosser who planned and organized a revolt with the adept of an army-trained general. His plans were reported; he was betrayed and he, along with 15 others implicated in the upheaval, was captured and hanged around 1800. This prompted stales to enac...See the full content of this document
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