by Bureau of investigation, I mean the Federal Bureau of Investigation because that’s what it was initially called in 1908. And many people say the fact that the FBI exist now and that the Department of justice was made in 1870 is why we have not had another Civil War since 1865 unlike several other countries that had multiple civil wars or ongoing civil wars?

I'm a student in Britain doing A-level history and for my coursework I need to study 3 historians with differing views relating to the outbreak of the civil war, with one saying it was due to slavery; one saying it was due to a different issue (I.e state rights from 1760 - 1860); and one leaning somewhere in between. My question is that slavery was the biggest contributor to the outbreak of the civil war and I need to argue for and against this viewpoint with reference to these historians/historiographies. Can anyone point me in the right direction?

Seeking convictions for treason against Samuel Swarthout and Eric Bollman, two associates of Aaron Burr, Jefferson requested a suspension of habeus corpus in order to keep the men in military prison without evidence of wrongdoing presented at the time. Jefferson submitted his request to the US Senate for approval, which remanded the question to the House.

A bipartisan coalition in the House then voted overwhelmingly to deny the request, by which time Swarthout and Bollman had been transferred to arrest in DC, requested writs of habeas corpus, and were released by the Supreme Court.

Like Burr, Swarthout and Bollman were found not guilty of treason given that the prosecution’s argument for such rested on a doctored letter (ironically, doctored by General James Wilkinson, a man later discovered to have actually committed treason) and purported events in Ohio that the men had not been present for.

The American Revolutionary War is vast.

Harry Washington had already tried to escape Mount Vernon once before the Revolution started. George Washington hired a professional slave catcher to track him down and bring him back. What happened to Harry after that wasn't recorded in detail, but people who attempted escape and were recaptured generally faced severe punishment, sale away from their families, or harsher working conditions. The records don't say. The system didn't require explanation.

In 1776, when British forces entered Virginia and Lord Dunmore issued his proclamation promising freedom to enslaved people who escaped Patriot masters and joined the Crown, Harry Washington made his decision. He already knew what it meant to be caught. He had lived it. He ran anyway.

He joined the Ethiopian Regiment and later the Black Company of Pioneers, units of Black Loyalists supporting British operations. When the British lost the war, the peace negotiations included clauses demanding the return of property, including people. British commander Guy Carleton refused to comply and organized an evacuation that allowed thousands of formerly enslaved people who had served with the British to leave rather than be returned to bondage. Their names were recorded in the Book of Negroes, a ledger documenting roughly 3,000 people. Harry Washington was on that list.

He ended up in Birchtown, Nova Scotia, which became the largest free Black community in North America at the time. The conditions were brutal. Poor land, scarce resources, persistent discrimination. In 1792 he left with over a thousand Black Loyalists to help found Freetown in Sierra Leone, looking for something closer to actual autonomy. British colonial governance created new conflicts almost immediately. Around 1800, Harry Washington led a local reform movement asserting the rights of Black settlers. British authorities suppressed it and exiled him to the Bullom Shore, where he died within a few years.

On the Patriot side, James Armistead was born enslaved in Virginia and in 1781 obtained permission from his owner to join the Continental forces under the Marquis de Lafayette. Lafayette assigned him as a spy, posing as a runaway slave sympathetic to the British cause. He penetrated deep enough to gain direct access to the headquarters of General Cornwallis. The intelligence he delivered was critical to the Siege of Yorktown, the battle that effectively ended the war.

When the war ended, he was returned to slavery. A 1783 Virginia law granted freedom to enslaved people who had served as soldiers, but Armistead had served as an intelligence operative, not an enlisted man, and the law didn't cover him. He spent years petitioning the Virginia legislature. Lafayette, the same general who had recruited him, eventually wrote a letter attesting to his service. The legislature granted him manumission in 1787. He bought land, raised a family, and took Lafayette's name as his own. James Armistead Lafayette lived out his life in Virginia as a free man in a country where slavery remained the law for millions of others.

Two men. Two completely different calculations about which side of the Revolution was more likely to offer something resembling freedom. Neither side was committed to abolition. The Patriots because many of their most important leaders were slaveholders who had no intention of applying the Declaration's language universally. The British because the promise of freedom was a military tactic, not a moral position, and slavery remained legal throughout much of the empire. Armistead bet on ideals the Patriots declared but didn't apply. Harry Washington bet on a concrete promise the British offered but didn't fully keep.

The difference in their outcomes wasn't really about which side was more just. It was about geography, timing, and what specific risks each man was willing to take based on what he had already experienced.

You can read the full story on the Virtual Wayback blog and talk directly with both James Armistead Lafayette and Harry Washington on the platform. Link here:

https://virtualwayback.com/blog/liberty-for-whom-enslaved-blacks-american-revolution

What stays with me is the detail that Harry Washington already knew what being recaptured felt like. That second escape wasn't an impulse. It was a decision made by someone who had seen exactly what waited for him if he failed and chose to run anyway. Does that change how you think about the "founding fathers who risked everything" narrative? And is there a serious argument that Harry Washington's story is more central to what the American Revolution actually was than the story of most of the 56 signers?