The development of our great country came at great costs for many. Lives were lost and may people were oppressed for the "greater good" of the county. This oppression is know now, and was then as well, as slavery. This single word, slavery, holds such meaning that the effects and conditions of this one word cannot be explained in words alone. Emotion and feeling are the only way to express such harshness and cruelty. Since so many did not experience slavery many will never feel those emotions or feelings that slavery expresses. But stories can, will and have been told in attempts to enlighten those who were so fortunate not to experience the turmoil and irrational horror many had to suffer during these oppressed times. Frederick Douglass is one man who overcame these horrors and lived to write about it. He has told his story to many in some hopes to express the abnormal brutality of this horrific practice.
             While pondering the existence of slavery, it is not uncommon to come across the question, "How is it possible to enslave an entire race of people and continue to enslave them for over one hundred years?" Answering this question may not be as obvious as many think. Yet, the answer to this question can be summed up in one word. Laws; slavery was an institution governed by laws. Many of these laws were written, and many of these laws were and remained unwritten, but all were understood. The brutality of these laws showed that participants in this practice were afraid. They were afraid of the equality of a presupposed inferior race. Douglass, in his book Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, made it obvious that these laws were assembled because of the fear that rustled in the minds and hearts of the slaveholders, as attempts to dehumanize the African race, and to strip the notion of belonging from an entire race of people. Many claim that these laws were to maintain structure and stability i...