Summary

With the start of the 1790s, abolitionist movements rise again with Benjamin Franklin and the Quaker community taking the lead. The debate raged in Congress and culminated in the first Naturalization Act in 1790 which "limited citizenship to 'free white persons' of 'good character'" (121). More exhibits of "extraordinary Negros" are used by assimilationist abolitionists to demonstrate "Black capability for equality" (121).

In response to a major slave revolt in Haiti in 1791, US Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 to further penalize any dissenting African American slaves. As American abolitionist movements grew, so did the population of free Black people. In response, the racial debate begins to shift "from the problems of enslavement to the condition and capabilities of free Blacks" (124). An assimilationist strategy called uplift suasion developed. Uplift suasion "was based on the idea that White people could be...