Decision
The decision was a major victory for the abolitionists in the state who had organized to ban slavery only seventeen years earlier. The result was that not just Polly but also all other slaves, including those held prior to Indiana statehood, were freed. There was some anger among the slaveholding community and violence was threatened against Osborn and Kinney, but no action was taken against them. The case also led to the impeachment of the Clark County Justice of the Peace for aiding slaveholders who refused to free their slaves. Many slaveholders, not wanting to lose their valuable slaves, left the state before their slaves could be taken from them.
The 1820 US census revealed that there were 190 slaves in Indiana and 1,200 free blacks, many of whom had been freed by the decision. The number of slaves dropped off dramatically and there were only three slaves in the state in both the 1830 and 1840 censuses.
Read more about this topic: Polly V. Lasselle
Famous quotes containing the word decision:
“I know my fate. One day my name will be tied to the memory of something monstrous—a crisis without equal on earth, the most profound collision of conscience, a decision invoked against everything that had previously been believed, demanded, sanctified. I am no man, I am dynamite!”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“Drug misuse is not a disease, it is a decision, like the decision to step out in front of a moving car. You would call that not a disease but an error of judgment.”
—Philip K. Dick (1928–1982)
“The women of my mother’s generation had, in the main, only one decision to make about their lives: who they would marry. From that, so much else followed: where they would live, in what sort of conditions, whether they would be happy or sad or, so often, a bit of both. There were roles and there were rules.”
—Anna Quindlen (20th century)