A Fatal Contradiction

Streaming video - 2002

The Declaration of Independence stated "all men are created equal," but the nation's slaves were a glaring exception. The colonial slave trade and brutal life for African Americans on Southern plantations spark the abolition movement and the Underground Railroad. This episode explores the role of Frederick Douglass, and then looks at the impact of the Lincoln-Douglass debates on the westward expansion of slavery. It ends with Abraham Lincoln's election to the presidency.