Extension
Activities
Extension Activity #1: Chocolate on Trial
Chocolate on Trial: Slavery, Politics, & the Ethics of Business, By: Lowell J. Satre
In the early 1900’s, Cadbury Bros., Ltd, a London, England company known for its excellent chocolates and its worker-friendly policies, discovered that its cocoa beans were grown using slave labor in West Africa. Several newspapers published articles that said the company was not doing anything to address this issue and that it was hypocritical by not fixing the problem. Cadbury brought law suits against the newspaper saying it made damaging and untrue statements about the company. They won a minimal award. The company did not deny that slaves were being used to grow their cocoa. They won by successfully refuting they had not tried to do anything about it.
Suppose you own a company that imports food from a developing country, and you can get this type of food from no where else. One day you find out that children are being used as slaves to grow the food. What would you do? Why?
Extension Activity #2: The Wanderer
Bringing slaves into the U.S. was outlawed in 1808, but many people ignored the law and continued to profit from slavery. In 1857, The Wanderer ship was built in New York and outfitted for hauling slaves. Somehow it passed inspection to leave the port of New York as a regular cargo ship. It went to Africa and bought 500-600 slaves, many of whom died on the trip back to the U.S. The Wanderer delivered the remaining slaves to Georgia in 1858. When people found out about this, a law suit was brought against the ship’s owners, but the case was not well prosecuted and they were found not guilty. President James Buchanan (1791-1868) was upset about the arrival of The Wanderer so he sent a spy to travel around the South to confirm that no other slave ships had come to the U.S. The slaves who were on The Wanderer were the only group who became publicly identified with the ship. They became celebrities in the newspapers. The Wanderer was the last ship to ever deliver slaves to the United States.
Take on the role of one of the people involved – an authority who was supposed to prevent slave ships, a newspaper reporter, or one of the slave ship owners. Assuming the role you have chosen, how did you make your decision about the morality of your actions? What were your reasons? What could have changed or did change your ethical position?
Extension Activity #3: The Legacy of Slave States
Compare these maps of slave states before 1865 and red states in the 2004 presidential election. To read other people’s discussions and the paper one person gave about the issue, go to:
http://sensoryoverload.typepad.com/sensory_overload/2004/11/free_states_vs_.html
On the Pre-Civil War Map, the red areas were slave states and the brown areas were territories open to slavery, while the green areas were free states and territories. These distinctions seem to correspond to the red states vs. blue states on the 2004 Election Map ~~ i.e., the blue (Kerry) states correspond to the pre-civil-war free states and territories, while the red (Bush) states correspond to what were the slave states and territories.
Write a short position paper describing whether or not you agree with the conclusions other people have reached when comparing the two maps. You might want to do further research in order to prepare maps of “red and blue” states from previous presidential elections. How do the maps from other elections compare with the 2004 Election Map and with the map of the slave states before 1865?
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