The Slavery Experience
Prose Fiction
Uncle Toms Cabin
"My country again! Mr. Wilson, you have a country; but what country have I, or anyone like me, born of slave mothers? What laws are there for us? We don't make them, - we don't consent to them, - we have nothing to do with them; all they do for us is to crush us, and keep us down. Haven't I heard your Fourth-of-July speeches? Don't you tell us all, once a year, that governments derive their just power from the consent of the governed? Can't a fellow THINK, that hears such things? Can't he put this and that together, and see what it comes to?"
Why?
I choose this piece because it is a popular story and it truly shows the effects of slavery. I really liked this excerpt because it's just him trying to make Mr. Wilson realize that they're not being treated right. The author Harriet Beecher Stowe wanted people to understand what life was like for slaves. They had no rights and had to follow tons of rules. She was a white abolitionist that tried to depict life for African-Americans under slavery.