Underground Railroad

The year is 1850. U.S. Congress passes an act as a result of the Compromise of 1850. The Compromise of 1850 tries preventing the pro-slavery South from seceding from the United States. The Compromise requires any runaway slave to be captured and returned to their Southern owner. As abolition increases, the returning of runaway slaves decreases. The North’s allowance for freedom of slaves and Northern liberty laws enrages slave supporters from Southern states. These laws allow blacks to free themselves as long as they escape slave hunters. (deGregory). Slave catchers earned money each time they caught and returned a runaway (Peterson). Due to southern enragement, the southerners set into motion the Compromise of 1850. The Compromise of 1850 mandated that any citizen from the North or South return fugitive slaves. Added law enforcement ensures the Compromise and hinders the plans for freedom of blacks in the North. Due to the new laws, an estimated 20,000 blacks flee to Canada over the next decade. Using the “Underground Railroad” abolitionists respond by strengthening their resolve to end slavery and eventually both laws were repealed by Congress in 1864 (deGregory).

The Underground Railroad was not underground nor was it a railroad, but it did aid freeing thousands of slaves before the Civil War (Peterson). In their journey to Canada on the Underground Railroad, escapees were offered shelter in “safehouses.” Networks involved in the U.R. covered the northeast and spanned into Kansas and Nebraska (Peterson). On their journey north using the Underground Railroad, slaves shed the name “fugitives” and became “passengers.” Rather than highly systemized plan of routes to different houses to free slaves, the Underground Railroad consisted of spontaneous help when the slave appeared near the person’s home(“Underground”). Safehouses hid runaways and conductors led the runaways to each station until they reached freedom (Peterson). Most of the houses involved in the...