Week 14 Discussion — Who Made Freedom Real? — Traditional alternative (no AI)

Instructors: publish this instead of the adaptive version if you prefer, and unpublish or delete the adaptive one.

Hook

In 1863 Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation declared that the enslaved people in the areas then in rebellion "are, and henceforward shall be free". Later that year, at a cemetery for the Union dead, he closed a two-minute speech hoping that "government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth". This week you learned who made each document, when, and what it says, and those facts are not in question; neither is the fact that enslaved people fled to Union lines from 1861 on, or that the 13th Amendment, ratified in 1865, abolished slavery throughout the United States. What careful readers still argue about is how to weigh the people and the measures that made freedom real, and what Lincoln's words were doing.

Your discussion question — choose Option A or Option B; they carry the same weight and the same rubric, and you say which you picked.

Option A: Between 1861 and 1865 enslaved people fled to Union lines, Congress passed the Confiscation Acts of 1861 and 1862, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 for the areas then in rebellion, and the 13th Amendment, ratified in 1865, abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime, throughout the United States. Historians still debate how to weigh these. Was emancipation won chiefly by enslaved people who freed themselves, or chiefly by the government's war measures and the amendment? Take a position, support it with the week's record and at least one pinned fragment, and state the strongest case for the other side as fairly as its best defender would.

Option B: The Gettysburg Address (1863), in the text the Avalon Project prints, never names slavery, yet it asks its listeners to give the nation a new birth of freedom and ends on the words "government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth". Lincoln gave it the same year he issued the Emancipation Proclamation. Did the speech announce a war for freedom, or did it restate the war for the Union in grander words? Take a position, ground it in sourcing and a close reading of the pinned fragment and of what the speech leaves unsaid, set it beside the Proclamation, and state the strongest case for the other reading fairly.

Neither option asks whether slavery was wrong, whether enslaved people fled to Union lines, or whether the Proclamation reached only the areas in rebellion; the course states those facts plainly. Each option asks a question of weight or judgment that careful readers of the same evidence still answer differently. Keep both options in the years from 1861 to 1865: neither is a question about present-day parties, politicians, monuments, or policy, and Reconstruction waits for Week 15. Pick the option you care about, and make your case.

Expectations

Activity format: one initial post followed by two substantive peer replies. Plan on about 45 minutes across the two deadlines; your instructor sets both due dates in Canvas.

Your initial post — by the first due date (early in the module week):

• Say which option you chose.
• For Option A, say whose actions you weigh most in ending slavery, support it with the week's record, and state the strongest case for the other side; for Option B, say how you read the Gettysburg Address, ground it in the pinned fragment and in what the speech leaves unsaid, and state the strongest case for the other reading.
• Use at least two of this week's terms (self-emancipation, contraband of war, Confiscation Acts, Emancipation Proclamation, preliminary proclamation, war measure, United States Colored Troops, Gettysburg Address, manuscript copy, total war, home front) correctly.
• Quote only the course's pinned fragments, word for word, with the document and its date.
• End with one plain sentence that names what your evidence shows and what it does not.
• Length: roughly 150–250 words if written. You may instead record your post as audio or video (about two minutes) and attach a transcript; both forms are scored by the same rubric.
• Write from your own reasoning, in your own words, and keep present-day parties, politicians, and controversies out of your examples.

Your replies — by the second due date (the end of the module week):

• Reply substantively to at least two classmates.
• A substantive reply does more than agree: state a stronger version of the reading the poster argued against, point to a place where the poster treated the Proclamation as ending slavery everywhere or gave the 1862 phrase to the 1863 order, or ask what the poster's claim would need from the evidence that this week's documents do not supply. "Nice point!" on its own does not count.

What a strong post looks like:

I chose Option A and argue that enslaved people did the most to make freedom real, though I see the case for the government's measures. People fled to Union lines from 1861 on, before any proclamation, and Congress's Confiscation Acts of 1861 and 1862 answered them. A reader on the other side would say that flight could free only the people who reached Union lines, and that only the 13th Amendment, ratified in 1865, abolished slavery throughout the United States; I concede that the amendment did what no single escape could. In one plain sentence: the evidence shows that enslaved people acted first and pushed the government to act; it does not show that their flight alone could have ended slavery everywhere.

Notice how it dates the flight before the Proclamation, keeps the Proclamation apart from the amendment, concedes part of the other side, and ends in one plain sentence. That is the bar.

Participation rubric

This discussion is worth 10 points. The three criteria below look at your initial post and your peer replies.

Post early if you can — the best threads happen when people have time to reply before the second due date.

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