Dark Places of the Earth: The Voyage of the Slave Ship Antelope by Jonathan M. Bryant
Dark Places of the Earth: The Voyage of the Slave Ship Antelope by Jonathan M. Bryant PDF, ePub eBook D0wnl0ad
A dramatic work of historical detection illuminating one of the most significant―and long forgotten―Supreme Court cases in American history.
In 1820, a suspicious vessel was spotted lingering off the coast of northern Florida, the Spanish slave ship Antelope. Since the United States had outlawed its own participation in the international slave trade more than a decade before, the ship's almost 300 African captives were considered illegal cargo under American laws. But with slavery still a critical part of the American economy, it would eventually fall to the Supreme Court to determine whether or not they were slaves at all, and if so, what should be done with them.
Bryant describes the captives' harrowing voyage through waters rife with pirates and governed by an array of international treaties. By the time the Antelope arrived in Savannah, Georgia, the puzzle of how to determine the captives' fates was inextricably knotted. Set against the backdrop of a city in the grip of both the financial panic of 1819 and the lingering effects of an outbreak of yellow fever, Dark Places of the Earth vividly recounts the eight-year legal conflict that followed, during which time the Antelope's human cargo were mercilessly put to work on the plantations of Georgia, even as their freedom remained in limbo.
When at long last the Supreme Court heard the case, Francis Scott Key, the legendary Georgetown lawyer and author of "The Star Spangled Banner," represented the Antelope captives in an epic courtroom battle that identified the moral and legal implications of slavery for a generation. Four of the six justices who heard the case, including Chief Justice John Marshall, owned slaves. Despite this, Key insisted that "by the law of nature all men are free," and that the captives should by natural law be given their freedom. This argument was rejected. The court failed Key, the captives, and decades of American history, siding with the rights of property over liberty and setting the course of American jurisprudence on these issues for the next thirty-five years. The institution of slavery was given new legal cover, and another brick was laid on the road to the Civil War.
The stakes of the Antelope case hinged on nothing less than the central American conflict of the nineteenth century. Both disquieting and enlightening, Dark Places of the Earth restores the Antelope to its rightful place as one of the most tragic, influential, and unjustly forgotten episodes in American legal history.
8 pages of illustrationsFrom reader reviews:
Cindy Martin:
Typically the book Dark Places of the Earth: The Voyage of the Slave Ship Antelope has a lot associated with on it. So when you check out this book you can get a lot of gain. The book was compiled by the very famous author. The writer makes some research just before write this book. This book very easy to read you will get the point easily after scanning this book.
Terra Runyan:
This Dark Places of the Earth: The Voyage of the Slave Ship Antelope is great e-book for you because the content that is full of information for you who have always deal with world and also have to make decision every minute. This particular book reveal it data accurately using great arrange word or we can claim no rambling sentences within it. So if you are read that hurriedly you can have whole info in it. Doesn't mean it only provides straight forward sentences but hard core information with lovely delivering sentences. Having Dark Places of the Earth: The Voyage of the Slave Ship Antelope in your hand like getting the world in your arm, data in it is not ridiculous just one. We can say that no publication that offer you world in ten or fifteen tiny right but this guide already do that. So , this is certainly good reading book. Hey Mr. and Mrs. busy do you still doubt that will?
Christopher Morton:
A lot of e-book has printed but it is different. You can get it by internet on social media. You can choose the best book for you, science, witty, novel, or whatever by simply searching from it. It is called of book Dark Places of the Earth: The Voyage of the Slave Ship Antelope. You can add your knowledge by it. Without departing the printed book, it could add your knowledge and make you happier to read. It is most significant that, you must aware about e-book. It can bring you from one destination for a other place.
Read Dark Places of the Earth: The Voyage of the Slave Ship Antelope by Jonathan M. Bryant for online ebook
Dark Places of the Earth: The Voyage of the Slave Ship Antelope by Jonathan M. Bryant Free PDF d0wnl0ad, audio books, books to read, good books to read, cheap books, good books, online books, books online, book reviews epub, read books online, books to read online, online library, greatbooks to read, PDF best books to read, top books to read Dark Places of the Earth: The Voyage of the Slave Ship Antelope by Jonathan M. Bryant books to read online.
Tidak ada komentar:
Posting Komentar