Dai fatti alla Storia - volume 2

The American Revolution CIVICS Slavery and Abolitionism in the USA An issue that divided the North and the South of the US during the 19th century was the question of slavery. Hundreds of thousands of Africans were enslaved in Northern America, where they worked mainly on the tobacco, rice and cotton plantations. For the Southern States of the Union slaves were vital for the agrarian economy. They could be bought and sold like animals and were completely submitted to their masters. Slave owners justified their position with a paternalistic approach. Black people were primitive and incapable of living by themselves. To grant them some freedom was very dangerous, because they could have risen against their masters. In the Northern States of the Union, on the contrary, slavery was never widespread. There the development of industry, the great number of European immigrants and the growth of a mobile society supported the abolitionist movement. Abolitionists thought that slavery was wrong for humanitarian, moral and religious reasons and wanted to abolish it throughout the USA. A slave trader in Lexington, Kentucky, offers between 1200 and 1250 dollars for each young black man. The Thirteenth Amendment All forms of slavery were officially abolished in the United States in the 1865 at the conclusion of the Civil War (1861-1865). During this very bloody conflict President Abraham Lincoln had made it clear that one of the major objective was to abolish slavery in the South. In 1865 the Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution was ratified by the Congress: SECTION 1 Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for a crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in Paris on 10 December 1948. It is a milestone document in the history of human rights. Human rights are rights inherent to all human beings, regardless of race, sex, nationality, ethnicity, language, religion, or any other status. Human rights include the right to life and liberty, freedom from slavery and torture, freedom of opinion and expression, the right to work and education, and many more. ACTIVITY 6.A Pair work 1. Go to the following website https://www.un.org/en and search the text of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. 2. Read Article 1, Article 3 and Article 4. Use a dictionary to translate them. ACTIVITY 6.B Individual research 1. Go to the following website: https://www.un.org/en/observances/slavery-abolition-day that deal with the abolition of slavery. 2. Choose one of the videos or articles from the website and prepare a PowerPoint presentation for your classmates. 3. In the presentation you must: illustrate three meaningful images including a caption for each one; communicate two important concepts about the problem of slavery; explain the meaning of specific words or expressions from the videos or articles (e.g. human trafficking, forced marriage, emancipation, amendment, etc.). 557