Illusions of Emancipation
An edition of Illusions of Emancipation (2019)
The Pursuit of Freedom and Equality in the Twilight of Slavery
By Joseph P. Reidy
Publish Date
2019
Publisher
University of North Carolina Press,The University of North Carolina Press
Language
eng
Pages
520
Description:
As students of the Civil War have long known, emancipation was not merely a product of Lincoln's proclamation or of Confederate defeat in April 1865. It was a process that required more than legal or military action. With enslaved people fully engaged as actors, emancipation necessitated a fundamental reordering of a way of life whose implications stretched well beyond the former slave states. Slavery did not die quietly or quickly, nor did freedom fulfill every dream of the enslaved or their allies. The process unfolded unevenly.