Blog Prompt 3: Underground Railroad

One major movement that was discussed by Salmon in his book Roots of Justice was the Underground Railroad. At a time when slavery was as bad as ever, slaves came together to create a network of secret routes and safe houses to help them escape to freedom. African Americans were trapped in an unjust system where they had no rights and were enslaved by whites. The Underground Railroad gave them a way to get away from this life a slavery and create a new one. By doing this they were challenging authority in a huge way. If they were caught trying to escape, there were major consequences for their actions. If you decided to run and try to get to freedom, you were risking your life and it was not easy for blacks to decide whether they should take that chance or not.

Abolitionists, both black and white helped to further this movement by working with the slaves and helping them to get to the Underground Railroad and escape to freedom. These routes would lead you from where you were in the South all the way until you reached freedom in the North. This was one of the first movements where blacks came together and created a plan that successfully helped them escape from the hard life they had to endure as a slave. Close to 100,000 blacks that were enslaved used the Underground Railroad to lead them to freedom.

All though I already knew about the Underground Railroad and what it entailed, Salmon helped illustrate it a little better for me. I wasn’t actually sure how it began in the first place and all the different ways they communicated with each other in order to get from the south to the north. The escape routes were also something that I did not fully know about before reading this book. It was very inspiring to hear how slaves came together and challenged authority in order to fight for what was rightfully theirs, freedom. They showed a lot of courage and by doing this, left a huge impact on our society. It was a rebellious act that showed people you can fight back against authorities and things can change. This was a movement that impacted many people’s lives and showed them that they are able to stand up for what they believe in and for their right to be free.