Document A: Textbook The textbook excerpt below comes from a chapter covering the development of Northern states in the decades before the Civil War. African Americans in the North Even more than immigrants, African Americans in the North faced discrimination. Discrimination is the denial of equal rights or equal treatment based on race, religion, culture, or nationality. Slavery had largely ended in the North by the early 1800s. Free African Americans there were joined by new arrivals from the South. Freedom, however, did not grant equal treatment. African Americans were often denied the right to vote. They were not allowed to work in factories or in skilled trades. Even when they sought the least desirable jobs, they were at a disadvantage. Many employers preferred to hire white immigrants rather than African Americans. Prejudice against African Americans led to the racial segregation of schools and public facilities. Turned away by white congregations, African Americans formed their own churches. For example, people who had been freed from slavery started the African Methodist Episcopal Church in Philadelphia in 1816. White newspapers often portrayed African Americans as inferior. African Americans responded by starting their own publications. The first newspaper owned and run by African Americans was Freedom’s Journal, which was established in 1827 in New York. Its editor, John B. Russworm, had been one of the first African Americans to graduate from an American college. Source: James W. Davidson and Michael Stoff, America: History of Our Nation (Prentice Hall: New Jersey, 2006).
Questions Related to Document A: According to the textbook, what were three examples of discrimination that free African Americans faced in the decades before the Civil War?