Free African Americans
By 1770, there may have been 40,000 or more free African Americans in the Thirteen colonies.Template:ColoCitation needed This number may have included runaway slaves, descendants of early indentured servants, and black immigrants from the West Indies.
The status of free black people in colonial America was one of uncertainty, one between a slave and a free white. He was faced with special legal, economic, and social restrictions.
Read more about this topic: African Americans In The American Revolution
Famous quotes containing the words african americans, free, african and/or americans:
“The confirmation of Clarence Thomas, one of the most conservative voices to be added to the [Supreme] Court in recent memory, carries a sobering message for the African- American community.... As he begins to make his mark upon the lives of African Americans, we must acknowledge that his successful nomination is due in no small measure to the support he received from black Americans.”
—Kimberly Crenshaw (b. 1959)
“But that I love the gentle Desdemona,
I would not my unhousèd free condition
Put into circumscription and confine
For the sea’s worth.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“I’ve never been afraid to step out and to reach out and to move out in order to make things happen.”
—Victoria Gray, African American civil rights activist. As quoted in This Little Light of Mine, ch. 3, by Hay Mills (1993)
“Southerners, whose ancestors a hundred years ago knew the horrors of a homeland devastated by war, are particularly determined that war shall never come to us again. All Americans understand the basic lessons of history: that we need to be resolute and able to protect ourselves, to prevent threats and domination by others.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)