What if, let's say for example, the Underground Railroad consisted of slaves escaping from a state deep in the throws of slavery northward to a different state and that state had abolished slavery? Well of course the historian wants you to focus on the slave continuing their journey up to Canada, but the reality is that not all continued on their course.
What if many slaves stayed in northern states where slavery had been abolished? Well, they did.
Well who did that? Who abolished slavery in those northern states, or who wrote that Northwest Ordinance which secured to places such as Ohio, Illinois, Wisconsin, and many others, would be states born as free states?
Who was it in, say, New York, who wrote those abolitionist laws? Pennsylvania and Vermont and pick any of those states you want. It was the founding generation in general and the Founding Fathers in particular. That's who did that.
Let's explore it from the opposite side, because that's really where the truth will become apparent.
What if the Founders didn't push for abolition in those northern states? Or in Indiana and other states that were formed after the Northwest Ordinance, or in Connecticut or any of the others. What if the Northwest Ordinance would never have been written, would there have ever been an Underground Railroad, or at least would it have been as we know it today?
If these states hadn't become free states, then where would the runaway slaves have run? Well, the simple answer is to Canada but this isn't so simple. The fact is that many fleeing to freedom did stay and make homes in free states and the Founders DID engage in this abolitionist activity and DID pass abolitionist laws once they didn't have the king vetoing these laws.
Isn't it then fair to say that the Underground Railroad came into being _because_ of the Founders, and not despite them?
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