Lesson Plan Frederick Douglass: What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? 7, 8, 9, 10 Click to download this five-lesson unit :
Essay "Your Late Lamented Husband": A Letter from Frederick Douglass to Mary Todd Lincoln David W. Blight 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+ On March 4, 1865, Frederick Douglass attended President Abraham Lincoln’s second inauguration. Standing in the crowd, Douglass heard Lincoln declare slavery the "cause" and emancipation the "result" of the Civil War. Over the crisp...
Essay Lincoln Allen C. Guelzo 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+ No one seemed less well-cast for the role of reformer, in an age of reform, than Abraham Lincoln. To begin with, he was a stranger, emotionally and intellectually, to evangelical Christianity, the great engine of reform in the...
Essay The Road to War Chandra M. Manning Economics, Government and Civics 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+ ‘A house divided against itself can not stand’ I believe this government can not endure permanently, half slave, and half free . . . I do not expect the Union to be dissolved - I do not expect the house to fall; but I do expect it...
Essay The First Age of Reform Ronald G. Walters Government and Civics, Religion and Philosophy 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+ "In the history of the world," Ralph Waldo Emerson declared in 1841, "the doctrine of Reform had never such scope as at the present hour." [1] Not much a joiner of causes himself, Emerson had in mind a remarkable flowering of reform...
Essay Admiration and Ambivalence: Frederick Douglass and John Brown David W. Blight Government and Civics 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+ John Brown did not make it easy for people to love him—until he died on the gallows. Frederick Douglass, from his first meeting with Brown in 1847, through a testy but important relationship in the late 1850s, had long viewed the...
Lesson Plan Woman Abolitionists Government and Civics 9, 10, 11, 12 Background Women always played a significant role in the struggle against slavery and discrimination. White and black Quaker women and female slaves took a strong moral stand against slavery. As abolitionists, they circulated...
Lesson Plan Militancy and the Abolitionist Movement 9, 10, 11, 12 Essential Question Did militancy help or hinder the abolitionist movement? Materials Abolition Excerpts (PDF) Timeline of the Abolitionist Movement (PDF) Background Although the original Constitution of the United States did not...
Lesson Plan A Different Perspective on Slavery: Writing the History of African American Enslaved Women 9, 10, 11, 12 Introduction The accounts of African American slavery in textbooks routinely conflate the story of enslaved men and women into one history. Textbooks rarely enable students to grapple with the lives and challenges of women constrained...
Lesson Plan Enslaved African Americans and Expressions of Freedom Art, Literature 9, 10, 11, 12 Overview Students will examine African American slave spirituals, a painting, and a personal narrative to analyze the underlying messages of these materials. Materials The Old Plantation (painting) can be seen at: http://www.history...
Lesson Plan Abraham Lincoln on Slavery and Race 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+ Background Slavery played a prominent role in America’s political, social, and economic history in the antebellum era. The "peculiar institution" was at the forefront of discussions ranging from the future of the nation’s economy to...