{"product_id":"a-question-of-freedom-the-families-who-challenged-slavery-from-the-nations-founding-to-the-civil-war-paperback","title":"A Question of Freedom: The Families Who Challenged Slavery from the Nation's Founding to the Civil War - Paperback","description":"\u003cp\u003eby \u003cb\u003eWilliam G. Thomas\u003c\/b\u003e (Author)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eWinner of the Mark Lynton Prize in History--the story of the longest and most complex legal challenge to slavery in American history\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"A rich, roiling history that Thomas recounts with eloquence and skill. . . . The very existence of freedom suits assumed that slavery could only be circumscribed and local; what Thomas shows in his illuminating book is how this view was eventually turned upside down in decisions like Dred Scott. 'Freedom was local, ' Thomas writes. 'Slavery was national.'\"--Jennifer Szalai, \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"Gripping. . . . Profound and prodigiously researched.\"--Alison L. LaCroix, \u003ci\u003eWashington Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e For over seventy years and five generations, the enslaved families of Prince George's County, Maryland, filed hundreds of suits for their freedom against a powerful circle of slaveholders, taking their cause all the way to the Supreme Court. Between 1787 and 1861, these lawsuits challenged the legitimacy of slavery in American law and put slavery on trial in the nation's capital. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Piecing together evidence once dismissed in court and buried in the archives, William Thomas tells an intricate and intensely human story of the enslaved families (the Butlers, Queens, Mahoneys, and others), their lawyers (among them a young Francis Scott Key), and the slaveholders who fought to defend slavery, beginning with the Jesuit priests who held some of the largest plantations in the nation and founded a college at Georgetown. \u003ci\u003eA Question of Freedom\u003c\/i\u003e asks us to reckon with the moral problem of slavery and its legacies in the present day.\u003ch3\u003eAuthor Biography\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eWilliam G. Thomas III\u003c\/b\u003e is the John and Catherine Angle Chair in the Humanities and Professor of History at the University of Nebraska. He is co-founder and was director of the Virginia Center for Digital History at the University of Virginia.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eNumber of Pages:\u003c\/strong\u003e 432\u003c\/div\u003e\u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eDimensions:\u003c\/strong\u003e 1.3 x 9.2 x 6.1 IN\u003c\/div\u003e\u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePublication Date:\u003c\/strong\u003e January 11, 2022\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Books by splitShops","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51767562305824,"sku":"9780300261509","price":25.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0974\/9764\/5344\/files\/081af35dbddff071b1c7dc48ede78436.webp?v=1780313239","url":"https:\/\/ebocreations.com\/products\/a-question-of-freedom-the-families-who-challenged-slavery-from-the-nations-founding-to-the-civil-war-paperback","provider":"The E-Book Oasis LLC","version":"1.0","type":"link"}