Black trials : citizenship from the beginnings of slavery to the end of caste
Annotation "A sweeping history of American ideas of belonging and citizenship, told through the stories of 14 legal cases that helped to shape our nation. Spanning colonial times to the present, Black Trials tells how the place of blacks in American society evolved through the actions of our courts of law. Some of the cases discussed are legendary, such as the ordeal of John Brown, the fiery abolitionist who stood trial prostrate on a cot. Some are forgotten, such as that of the 18th-century free black Joseph Hanno, charged not only with the brutal murder of his wife but with having brought the pox to Boston. All of these cases compelled the legal system and the public to reconsider the place of blacks in America and, in so doing, to reconcile our founding ideals with the evolving realities of American life. Drawing on a wealth of new archival sources, Weiner gives us the essential dramas of American civic identity-illuminating where our sense of minority rights has come from and where it might go. Combining brilliant interdisciplinary analysis with riveting narrative, Black Trials offers a new way of thinking about inclusion in America-the issue underlying all our social cleavages."
Print Book, English, ©2004
1st ed
Alfred A. Knopf ; Distributed by Random House, New York, New York, ©2004