Documents from Reading the American Past

Chapter 14

Introduction to the Documents

Politicians defined the terms of the sectional crisis in speech after speech, grappling with the underlying question of what to do about slavery. Three of the most important answers to that question were presented by Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, and Jefferson Davis. Hearing and reading their speeches helped Americans to decide what they believed and, ultimately, to choose sides. Beneath the rhetoric and bluster of the politicians, the genuine, day-to-day character of freedom in American life was at stake. The experiences of fugitive slave Margaret Garner and antislavery activist and author Lydia Maria Child illustrate that sectional polarization over slavery and race reached far beyond the realm of electoral politics.