Imperfect equality

"In Imperfect Equality, Richard Paul Fuke explores the immediate aftermath of slavery in Maryland, which differed in important ways from the slaveholding states of the South: Maryland never left the Union; white radicals had a period of access to power; and even prior to legal emancipation, a large free black population resided there. Moreover, the presence of Baltimore, a major city and port, provided abundant evidence with which to compare the rural and the urban experience of black Marylanders. This state study is therefore uniquely revealing of the successes and failures of the…