Society
changes so quickly, and as a poet I am hoping that I, Phillis Wheatley, can
help change society for the better. Yet another opportunity has arisen for us
to get a plan composed, our nation is commencing upon the process of writing
our Constitution. The problem to be solved in this era is one that many do not
want to solve, one that many do not even consider a problem. Our issue is
slavery. I myself am a slave, but I have it easy, my brother, my mother, and
sister cannot say so much. I was sold to a rich family in the north, they were
sold to a plantation owner in the south.
I
have seen how people treat slaves, but I don’t think those people realize that
they are not abusing animals, they are hurting human beings. People regardless
of skin color, are people and they should not be owned or treated like
possessions. We should get the privileges that so many white Americans take for
granted. As our pronounced founding father wrote in our Declaration of
Independence “All men are created equal.” He didn’t say ‘most men’ or even
‘some men’ he said all and I am confident he had a reason. Privileges like
making our own decisions, or owning our own property, even just getting to know
and care for our own children we would be so appreciative for at this point.
Selected
people of America are in the process of writing our Constitution. Now is our
chance to truly define what America stands for, we stand for freedom, equality,
liberty, and every person having a voice, slavery goes against every single one
of those. If we make slavery unconstitutional now, we can stop being so
contradictory, we can stop taking freedom from a large part of America’s
population. Slavery takes the element of equality away from our country. Every
man was created equal? Well, why can a white man kill a black man that he
“owns”? Why must we continue to beat down a whole race and take away their
voice? We need to act and stop these negative actions.
I
believe that if we end slavery now America would be able to start the process
of building a strong economy of our own, without slaves, sooner. We would be
able to either talk out our differences or start the war that’s bound to come
sooner or later, but we need to start the process of building a new economy. If
America stops investing in slavery sooner, than we won’t have lost as much when
we do end slavery. If we don’t keep getting farther into slavery, we won’t have
as much to dig ourselves out of. I’m not asking slave owners to free all of
their slaves at once. I realize slavery has become a huge part of the South’s
enterprise, but maybe we could grow out of it. Perhaps every slave owner could
only keep so many of the slaves born on the plantation. Another suggestion I
have is maybe every slave owner could free 25% of his slaves in the first ten
years, and another 25% the next ten years and so on. We need to end slavery now
so we can start building our own economy.
I
want to help make a difference and I can only hope my writing will assist and
inspire America in taking a step towards ending slavery. If slavery were to end
we would end our self contradiction and stand as whole for what we all believe
America stands for. People are people not assets, so we should take a stand and
make slavery unconstitutional.
Phillis, I understand your pain. Slavery is a devastating thing in any society. However, it dates back thousands of years. Joseph was sold into slavery and Paul talked about how slaves should conduct themselves. In the early years of our country, slavery was as you described it. For the most part, it was brutal and horrific. Slaves were often treated worse than animals and families were sometimes separated. I’m glad to tell you that our country eventually abolished the slavery you described and made it unconstitutional. The African American is free today, but is still fighting for his true equality.
ReplyDeleteJoanna, I have a book you might enjoy reading. It’s called “The Runaway Quilt” by Jennifer Chiaverini. It’s in her Elm Creek Quilts series. There is a theory that quilts guided the escaped slaves to safe houses and eventually freedom. Although there is controversy surrounding the Underground Railroad quilts, the book brings out some of the trials and fears of the slaves as they try to escape and tells of the help they got from people along the way. I’ll show it to you at Christmas and you can see if it interests you. I enjoyed it.