America was founded on the principles of freedom. Some of the first settlers came for religious freedom, and people today still immigrate for various types of freedom not present in other countries. But back in the 18th and 19th centuries, not everyone was free. Slavery had existed in America since the founding of the country. The South mainly used them for work on plantations, and the North used them for various things, like housekeeping and working in factories. Many people in the North became against slavery, and by the late 1700’s many states in the North had outlawed it. Slavery went on in the South for almost another century until it was finally banned. This did not make free Blacks free to live like everybody else, though. Free Blacks in the North were not very free because of their limited freedoms in politics, economics, and in their social lives.
In Charles Mackay’s Life and Liberty in America: or Sketches of a Tour in the United States and Canada in 1857-1858, he wrote, “…he [blacks] shall not be free to dine and drink at our board [table]… to mingle with us in the concert-room, the lecture-room, the theatre, or the church…” (Doc B). Blacks were very isolated in this society. The could not interact with whites at all. Whites restricted Blacks from doing much at all in society. They could not eat at the same table as whites or even associate with them. Whites would not even let them attend the same churches. This led Blacks to create their own Church to worship in and be involved in community politics (Doc D). Though many Blacks may have had the same beliefs as whites, but still they were not allowed to be in white churches. Blacks were forced to make their own churches to practice their religion. Most religions teach that all people are created equal, yet most whites seemed to be ignoring that. Overall Blacks did not have much social freedom at