Chapter 9 Zinn

Ricky Woodie
Ethics
Chapter 9
14 October 2007

Zinn Chapter 9


Zinn argues in chapter 9 that blacks really weren’t free after slavery was abolished. The chapter starts out talking about how slavery produced millions of tons cottons and other things produced, and that the slave numbers kept increasing. As more slaves came in more rebellions took place but they were still rare. Those who rebelled were normally shot and hung and to stop these rebellions the South made a militia to control slaves and usually hired poor whites to be slave overseers. It talks about how when slave families were broken apart, that all slaves took care of each other and adults would look over any child as if they were their own. It talks about more rebellions like one on a ship where the slaves killed the crew and sailed to the West Indies. It talks about how the north was racist as well and the blacks had to insist on their own independent. It eventually talks about Abraham Lincoln and how he wanted to abolish slavery and it eventually led to the civil war. It mentions how he felt the whites were superior to the blacks. When he was assassinated it mentions how Andrew Johnson became president and didn’t treat blacks equally, and didn’t give those equal rights. It later talks about civil rights and how blacks were given equal rights, but were still held down by white privileges.
The question here is were blacks really free after slavery was abolished? The answer is no and the Zinn mentions how blacks were not given lands after and even still worked on plantations. They were not aloud to vote at first and the government did nothing to stop white violence against them. He mentions how there were the black codes, which made the free slaves like serfs. When they could eventually vote and hold office, their votes could have been bought or taken away by threat of force. The average wage of the south was only 50cents for Negro farm laborers.
In my opinion I agree with Zinn. They were free on paper, but blacks did not get equal rights as whites and were oppressed greatly to the point where they could not better themselves. Just because the North was free, it didn’t mean that it was not racist. Whites would threaten and kill blacks in the north as well.