Answer:
"political" or "Parliament" are most likely the correct answer, but it could quite possibly be "government" or even "public".
Free blacks in the antebellum period—those years from the formation of the Union until the Civil War—were quite outspoken about the injustice of slavery. Their ability to express themselves, however, was determined by whether they lived in the North or the South. Free Southern blacks continued to live under the shadow of slavery, unable to travel or assemble as freely as those in the North. It was also more difficult for them to organize and sustain churches, schools, or fraternal orders such as the Masons.
Although their lives were circumscribed by numerous discriminatory laws even in the colonial period, freed African Americans, especially in the North, were active participants in American society. Black men enlisted as soldiers and fought in the American Revolution and the War of 1812. Some owned land, homes, businesses, and paid taxes. In some Northern cities, for brief periods of time, black property owners voted. A very small number of free blacks owned slaves. The slaves that most free blacks purchased were relatives whom they later manumitted. A few free blacks also owned slave holding plantations in Louisiana, Virginia, and South Carolina.
Free African American Christians founded their own churches which became the hub of the economic, social, and intellectual lives of blacks in many areas of the fledgling nation. Blacks were also outspoken in print. Freedom's Journal, the first black-owned newspaper
The correct answer to this open question is the following.
Do we have it all wrong about "civilization" being desirable versus "barbarian" society that often resides in the hills being regarded as "uncivilized"?
No. What happens is that in modern times, we find people in societies that behave in the most stranges ways. We can think that people that live in modern societies have a certain degree of formal education, behave themselves according to social patterns and traditions that are expected by other members of society, and show respect and tolerance to other people that think and act differently.
However, as we see it on the news, barbaric conducts are common in modern societies. Even worse than the barbaric behaviors we could expect to see from "uncivilized" people. They have to survive in the wild, that is why they seem to act "uncivilized." But educated or modern people, well, they are supposed to be the educated ones. And many times we are not seeing that by the way they act or react to confront daily situations.
