Freedom from Where?

This lesson, we were presented with the essential question " Who 'gave' freedom to enslaved  Americans? Did freedom come from above or below? To what extent were Abraham Lincoln's actions influenced by the actions of enslaved Americans? To begin, we needed to know the difference between freedom from above and freedom from below. Freedom from above is when someone of a higher class or someone with power is giving the freedom to the people or someone from a lower social status. Freedom from below is the people in the lower class gaining their own freedom without the help of a greater power. Next, we looked at two images and decided if they were freedom from above or below. The images are shown below. 


The first picture looks like Abraham Lincoln is lifting up and freeing the person. Since Abraham. Lincoln has a social status that is above the slaves, and he is doing the freeing, it is considered freedom from above. The second image is the opposite. It looks as if the slave has picked himself up and given himself freedom without any help from someone who has more power in which case it would be freedom from below. 

Next, we analyzed documents from Abraham Lincoln and tried to figure out if they were examples of freedom from above or freedom from below. The documents we looked at were excerpts The Emancipation Proclamation, The Gettysburg Address, Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address, and his reply to an open letter from Horace Greeley in the New York Tribune. The excerpts can be found here. The quote that really capture Lincoln's opinions toward slavery at the time is as follows, "My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union and is not either to save or to destroy slavery." . Lincoln wasn't so much as concerned about slavery as he was the Union staying in tact. We also took a look at two other documents. Document Y showed how the South was outraged and didn't acknowledge Lincoln as their President. Document x shows an example of freedom from below because the slaves are pouring into cities and towns to make their cause known which is upsetting the people in the cities.  Lastly, we took a look at the Thirteenth Amendment which is created to abolish slavery.

I think that in the end, freedom came from above just as much as it came from below. Even though it was formally abolished by the man who had the most power in the nation at the time, without the slaves making it known what they wanted, Lincoln may have never thought to end slavery considering he was a slave owner himself!

Two years ago Jason Collins became the first player of a US mainstream sport to announce that he was homosexual. The NBA player was taking a big chance by coming out because he knew he was going to be all the media was talking about, and he didn't know how his teammates and coaches would now think of him. There is a lot of debate on equality and marriage for gay individuals over the last couple of years and I think this is an example of freedom from above because you now have this well known sports figure who can help other sports players and individuals everywhere make the decision to come out, live the way they want to, and fight for their equality. To view more see the video below.