8.9.6

Describe the lives of free blacks and the laws that limited their freedom and economic opportunities.
             In the first 1790 federal survey, nearly 60,000 free blacks were recorded, compared to more than 690,000 blacks who lived as slave. Although most African Americans lived in the South, 27,000 lived in the North. In the South and the North free blacks tended to gather in city areas because cities afforded employment opportunities, greater freedom of movement, and larger concentrations of people to support churches, schools, and other organizations. However, African Americans faced many obstacles and prejudices even in places where slavery was cancelled. The reason for such a condition was that the whites who did not really enjoy the Blacks being there. They were barred from most educational institutions, limited to the least desirable residential and farming areas, often prohibited from practicing trades and opening businesses, and generally segregated in public conveyances and public worship. Except in a few New England states where their numbers were small, black voting was restricted
             Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Iowa prohibited black immigration and Illinois threatened repression for blacks who attempted to move there permanently. In 1807, Ohio passed a series of “black codes” requiring free blacks to place a $500 bond assuring their good conduct and self-support before they could settle in thee state. Although these restrictive laws were irregularly enforced, free blacks lived under the constant threat of the whites. African Americans’ job opportunities were always restricted, and poverty was a continuing problem. Sarcastically, black skilled artisans were more likely to find employment in the South than in Northern cities because they would’ve faced competition from European immigrants. Most free black men in the North worked as servants and filled all other servant jobs, too. Black women most often worked as maids, laundresses, or cooks in homes, hotels, restaurants, or other businesses.
             In some places, there were free black communities. They had a church that African Americans were welcomed and they were the central institutions serving the community’s sacred, social, and political needs. Many black people went to such church and filled up the whole place. That really helped these black people to go through various hardships and difficult times caused by the whites and slavery!


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