Episode Details

The Declaration of Independence described “all men” as “created equal” when its authors knew they were not. So was the revolutionary idea of freedom dependent on slavery?

In this last episode of the Doing History: To the Revolution series we return to the place our series began: the world of Paul Revere. We speak with Christopher Cameron, an associate professor of history at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte, to discuss how Phillis Wheatley, Cesar Sarter and other black revolutionaries in Massachusetts grappled with the seeming paradox of American freedom as they fought to end slavery during the American Revolution.

Show Notes: https://www.benfranklinsworld.com/166

Sponsor Links

• Omohundro Institute
• OI Reader
• William and Mary Quarterly-Journal of the Early Republic joint issue on the American Revolution ($10 listener-only special)
• Doing History: To the Revolution series

Complementary Episodes

• Episode 025: Jessica Parr, Inventing George Whitefield
• Episode 083: Jared Hardesty, Unfreedom: Slavery in Colonial Boston
• Episode 118: Christy Clark-Pujara, The Business of Slavery in Rhode Island
• Episode 123: Revolutionary Allegiances
• Episode 133: Patrick Breen, The Nat Turner Revolt
• Episode 134: Spencer McBride, Pulpit and Nation
• Episode 137: Erica Dunbar, The Washington’s Runaway Slave, Ona Judge
• Episode 157: The Revolution's African American Soldiers

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