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TASK FORCE TO STUDY THE HISTORY AND LEGACY OF SLAVERY IN MARYLAND (Final Report) 1999/12/31 MdHR 991422 MdHR 991422, Image No: 293 Print image (39K) |
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TASK FORCE TO STUDY THE HISTORY AND LEGACY OF SLAVERY IN MARYLAND (Final Report) 1999/12/31 MdHR 991422 MdHR 991422, Image No: 293 Print image (39K) |
| assistance of even the most ardent supporters of expanded civil rights.3 Essentially, in an era wedded to the efficacy of self-help and laissez-faire, white radicals collaborated with conservatives—often unintentionally—to fashion a postwar society which left blacks very much to their own devices. For example, although determined to win them fair working conditions for remunerative wages, radicals nonetheless stopped well-short of the "forty acres and a mule" so ardently sought by a virtually landless black population. As much as they might applaud land ownership in principle, most radicals agreed that ex-slaves should begin their tutelage as free laborers under contract to fair employers. Only with such training and the accumulation of modest capital could they expect to acquire land and the responsibilities that went with it.4 Whether they liked it or not, the success of black Marylanders depended on this combination of white attitudes. When they could compel conservatives to recognize their priorities or when radicals lent their support, they found room to maneuver. When the former rejected their efforts and the latter refused to support them wholeheartedly, they did not. In the end, the newfound mobility of the |