6/6 AP United States History LEQ Essay Example #1

The Prompt

The Essay

After the American Revolution in 1783, Americans fell into a period of poverty, disjunction and chaos under documents such as the Articles of Confederation. The weakness of these articles caused America to be unable to pay war debts, pay their soldiers. Through this weak central government many citizens were unhappy leading to disputes between the wealthy and poor. Eventually the delegates in the Continental Congress agreed to overwrite the Articles of Confederation to create order and stability. The outcome of the American Revolution was not revolutionary as most believe, through continual racial discrimination, sexism, and hypocrisy with interactions with Native Americans, although some ideas revolutionized parts of American society. Women after the revolutionary war finally gained moral equality, not social or political equality. The only reason why men at this time allowed them to have this was because they wanted to have educated women to raise good Republican sons. While this technically was an advancement for American society, no real legal work was actually done to ensure the legitimacy of their equality. In other cases such as The Edenton Tea Party the women who participated were seen unladylike and were ridiculed and largely ignored by male leaders. An early women’s activist Abigail Adams wrote a letter to her husband called “ Remember the Ladies “ where she discusses how America’s government should step towards independence and not men's power. Further on telling how one day women would rebel, only to get a reply that Abigail’s letter was taken as a joke. If America’s revolution really was revolutionary the acts followed out by these women would have been praised. Abigail’s letter would have been taken to effect and women would have been able to vote and have the same standing as men did. Slaves and free blacks were still discriminated against, and in political events such as voting only some states allowed it. The majority of America saw blacks as inhuman and one of the only reasons why some were freed was to benefit America in trade for their lives. Alexander Hamilton proposed that in exchange for their freedom slaves would sign up to fight for American independence. Even though Hamilton was opposed to slavery, his support of abolition was for political and strategic reasons. If people like Hamilton wanted blacks freedom then they would have fought harder for their rights as people before promoting their use for the American cause. In 1787 the 3/5th compromise was signed, legally dehumanizing blacks, reducing them to a fraction of a person. Many politicians could have resisted this notion that a slave is less of a person, but decided to please and further prove the power white slave owners had over the slaves. If the government truly felt that blacks were just as human as whites were they would apply the ideals of liberty and equality rather than protect systems that create hierarchy. Women and blacks were not the only people who were also being discriminated against, Native Americans also were ignored and killed in the makings of America. After the Americans won, America and Britain signed the Treaty of Paris, and the U.S government hypocritically did not allow the Native Americans to have a say in what or how much land would be given up. In fact Native Americans were not even present during the delegation of the Treaty of Paris. Still the Natives accepted it but declared that any other land ceded would not apply. Then the Northwest Ordinance was created, promising peace but denying the Natives' voice. In retaliation many Natives tribes united to preserve their culture and protected their lands, and were killed in return, showing how America treated Natives exactly how Britain was before the revolution repeating the cycle.

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