Who are the characters in The Story of American Freedom by Eric Foner?

The characters in The Story of American Freedom by Eric Foner are figures in world history, primarily American history. His book traces American history from the American Revolution until modern times and mentions people like George Washington, Thomas Hutchinson, and James Henry Hammond. 

Thomas Hutchinson, the royal governor of Massachusetts during the Revolutionary Era, is mentioned by Foner as questioning the American ideal of freedom. Since black people weren't given freedom, he asked, how was...

The characters in The Story of American Freedom by Eric Foner are figures in world history, primarily American history. His book traces American history from the American Revolution until modern times and mentions people like George Washington, Thomas Hutchinson, and James Henry Hammond. 

Thomas Hutchinson, the royal governor of Massachusetts during the Revolutionary Era, is mentioned by Foner as questioning the American ideal of freedom. Since black people weren't given freedom, he asked, how was it possible for Americans to consider the right to freedom inalienable? This reflects an ideological problem that many had during the Revolution; it was strange that the colonists could fight for freedom while denying that to others.

George Washington is mentioned throughout the Revolution and during the early years of America. He also comes up again in discussing slaves that ran away; apparently, seventeen of Washington's slaves fled to British ships. The British were offering freedom to slaves who ran away. Foner also mentions how a portrait of Washington was removed from Philadelphia Hall before it was burned down in 1838. This was an anti-abolition attack, performed because the antislavery movement in Philadelphia had built the hall. 

James Henry Hammond, a Southern planter, is referenced as saying that "human equality [is] ridiculously absurd" (64).

Foner discusses Ronald Reagan at length, saying that policies under Reagan damaged the poor while benefiting the rich. He says that Reagan didn't believe in behavior motivated by self-interest, except when it came to the economy. He references unemployment and economically depressed communities that resulted from Reagan's policies. 

Martin Luther King, Jr. and his work to gain freedom and equality for black Americans are discussed at length in Chapter 12. Foner explains that the civil rights era required people to rethink the very definition of freedom. He says that "it was in the soaring oratory of Martin Luther King, Jr., who more than any single individual came to lead and symbolize the movement, that the protestors' many understandings of freedom fused into a coherent whole" (279).

Elizabeth Cady Stanton is one person who Foner cites as essential to the struggle for equal rights for women. He writes: "To the end of her long life, [she] maintained that woman, like man, was ultimately the 'arbiter of her own destiny,' and must rely on her own inner resources for self-realization" (81). He includes the struggle for equality between the sexes in America as another way that freedom has influenced the course of American history.