tates. By 1850, 92 percent of all American blacks were concentrated in the South, and of this group approximately 95 percent were slaves. Under the plantation system gang labour was the typical form of employment. Overseers were harsh as a matter of general practice, and brutality was common. Slaves could own no property unless sanctioned by a slave master, and rape of a female slave was not considered a crime except as it represented trespassing on another's property. Slaves could not present evidence in court against whites. In most of the South it was illegal to teach a black to read or write. Opposition by Blacks Blacks were forbidden to carry arms or to gather in numbers except in the presence of a white person. Free blacks, whether living in the North or South, were confronted with attitudes and actions that differed little from those facing Southern black slaves. Discrimination existed in most social and economic activities as well as in voting and education. In 1857 the DRED SCOTT V. SANDFORD case of the U.S. Supreme Court placed the authority of the Constitution behind decisions made by states in the treatment of blacks. The Dred Scott decision was that black Americans, even if they were free, were not intended to be included under the word citizen as defined in the Declaration of Independence and could claim none of the rights and privileges provided for in that document. Blacks responded to their treatment under slavery in a variety of ways. In addition to such persons as Prosser, Vesey, and Turner, who openly opposed the slave system, thousands of blacks escaped from slavery and moved to the northern United States or to Canada. Still others accepted the images of themselves that white America sought to project onto them. The result in some cases was the "Uncle Tom" or "Sambo" personality, the black who accepted his or her lowly position as evidence that whites were superior to blacks. Much religious activity among slaves ref...
