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Recommended: Freedom and slavery

I. Introduction/Thesis: A number of slaves and other African-Americans formed coalition with the white abolitionists and Northern political figures to abolish slave labor, which would guarantee their freedom. Conversely, several other slaves and African-Americans chose to pursue individual freedom as opposed to becoming entangled in a group effort to abolish slave labor or running away. Multitude of strategies were used by these slaves to attain individual freedom; all of which convey that this specific number of slaves simply wanted equality to their white peers. These slaves were not necessarily successful in attaining long lasting freedom nor was it beneficial in their part.
II. A number of slaves chose to hire out of their slaver labor status, which would allow them to access individual freedom from their owners.
A. Hiring-out of slavery became common in slave states around the 1830s
1. customarily, hiring-out was limited to male slaves
B. A slave and his owner would negotiate on a fixed hiring-out price
1. the slave owner had an upper hand for they would make the final decision on whether the slave would be able to keep any of the individual income
a. there were situations where the slave would be allowed to keep a small percentage of his individual income
b. the jobs that were available for these slaves paid minimum wages
2. Hiring-out of slavery became a source of income for the slave-owners
C. Slaves would hire out of slavery for a specific number of days
1. Richard Allen, a slave, would only hire himself out for the weekend
D. These slaves were intending to save their income to purchase their freedom
1. along with the hiring-out policy, slaves and their owner would s...

... middle of paper ...

...rt.
A. The state government often pushed the slave-owners to grant freedom to their slaves through verbal statements instead of the traditional written document.
1. Slave owners could simply change their minds and they would have to become slaves again
2. if the slave owner died, then the heir could reclaim the slave
1. many free African American were kidnapped and re-enslaved with verbal statements
B. If an African-American is not able to pay off the installment payments for his family, they could all become re-slaved
C. Many women and children were listed as slaves of the free African American who purchased their freedom
D. A number of citizens who attired themselves as white man and woman were on the verge of being caught
1. Being a runaway simply meant that this individual has to spend the rest of his life running from capturers.

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