Читать книгу Anglo-American Cultural Studies - Jody Skinner - Страница 46

neither underground nor railroadThe Underground Railroad was neither literally underground nor a railroad but instead a metaphor for a network of abolitionistsabolitionist with the goal of freeing slaves by establishing escape routes from slave states to free states. The “conductors” were those abolitionists who helped the “passengers,” the runaway slaves, to escape to freedom. Those involved in the Underground Railroad could be imprisoned since they were in effect breaking the Fugitive Slave Law, which was passed as part of one of many compromises between the North and the South in the years leading up until the beginning of the Civil War. This strict law was supposed to help slave owners to more easily re-capture their “property” but in effect resulted in increased support on the part of Northerners opposed to slavery.