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Quiz for Analyzing Historical Evidence: The Meaning of Freedom

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Analyzing Historical Evidence: The Meaning of Freedom

Choose the best answer to each question.

Question

1. In his July 1864 letter to Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, former slave John Dennis sought Stanton’s advice about which of the following issues?

Dennis’s civic responsibilities as a newly freed slave

The legal status of his children, who were living in slavery

How he could acquire the resources he needed to care for his children

Whether the government planned to help newly freed men like him

Correct. The answer is B. Dennis wrote to Stanton primarily to ask, “Is it possible for me to go & take my Children from those men that keep them in Savery if it is possible will you pleas give me a permit from your hand then I think they would let them go.”

Incorrect. The correct answer is B. Dennis wrote to Stanton primarily to ask, “Is it possible for me to go & take my Children from those men that keep them in Savery if it is possible will you pleas give me a permit from your hand then I think they would let them go.”

Question

2. Why might Dennis have chosen to confer with Edwin Stanton, rather than asking his question to the leaders of his own state of Maryland?

He did not trust the state’s Confederate leaders to tell him the truth.

He feared retribution from the state’s slave-owning politicians.

He did not know who else to ask because of wartime chaos.

He saw Union leaders as sympathetic and authoritative allies.

Correct. The answer is D. Maryland was a slave state that remained loyal to the Union during the Civil War; it was not a Confederate state. Dennis chose to seek advice from the presidential cabinet member Edwin Stanton because he believed that the Union was on his side and that Stanton could answer his question with authority.

Incorrect. The correct answer is D. Maryland was a slave state that remained loyal to the Union during the Civil War; it was not a Confederate state. Dennis chose to seek advice from the presidential cabinet member Edwin Stanton because he believed that the Union was on his side and that Stanton could answer his question with authority.

Question

3. The report written by the Reverend A. B. Randall in February of 1865 contains evidence that can be used to support which of the following historical arguments?

In 1865, African Americans welcomed both their freedom and their new access to the protections offered by American laws.

African Americans in 1865 wanted to be free but did not embrace the rights and responsibilities of citizenship.

Few whites in 1865 understood why African American couples wanted to gain legal recognition for their marriages.

The freed slaves who got married in 1865 had little idea about the implications of their decision to do so.

Correct. The answer is A. Randall’s report suggested that the newly freed African Americans embraced their emancipation from slavery, but that they were also eager to gain the rights associated with legal institutions such as marriage.

Incorrect. The correct answer is A. Randall’s report suggested that the newly freed African Americans embraced their emancipation from slavery, but that they were also eager to gain the rights associated with legal institutions such as marriage.

Question

4. Which of the following statements did the authors of the 1865 petition to the Union Convention of Tennessee mean to serve as a political argument in favor of their full access to suffrage?

“We would say that words are too weak to tell how profoundly grateful we are to the Federal Government for the good work of freedom which it is gradually carrying forward.”

“We claim freedom, as our natural right, and ask that you in harmony and cooperation with the nation at large, you should cut up by the roots the system of slavery.”

“This is not a Democratic Government if a numerous, law-abiding, industrious, and useful class of citizens . . . are to be treated as aliens and enemies, as an inferior degraded class.”

“The color of our skin does not lessen in the least degree, our love either for God or for the land of our birth.”

Correct. The answer is C. The authors are making a political argument in favor of black suffrage when they say that the United States cannot be a democracy unless it gives African Americans equal access to civil rights, including suffrage.

Incorrect. The correct answer is C. The authors are making a political argument in favor of black suffrage when they say that the United States cannot be a democracy unless it gives African Americans equal access to civil rights, including suffrage.

Question

5. Which of the following restates the main argument of the 1865 Petition “to the Union Convention of Tennessee Assembled in the Capitol at Nashville”?

The federal government should consider black suffering under slavery in its plans for the future of the Confederate states.

African Americans are fundamentally equal to whites and should have equal access to the rights and responsibilities of citizenship, including suffrage.

Demands for African American suffrage are too radical, and the federal government should wait to make sure blacks are really qualified to vote.

Because slavery was an evil institution that corrupted all Americans, only the freed slaves are qualified to run a new state government that institutes freedom.

Correct. The answer is B. This document was intended to convince the assembly in Tennessee that African Americans were fundamentally equal to whites in every respect and that, as equals, they should have full access to the rights and responsibilities of American citizenship, including the right to vote.

Incorrect. The correct answer is B. This document was intended to convince the assembly in Tennessee that African Americans were fundamentally equal to whites in every respect and that, as equals, they should have full access to the rights and responsibilities of American citizenship, including the right to vote.

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