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Statement of the problem Essay As a prominent American historical figure, society’s opinion on John Brown is highly influenced by culture and value systems. However, it is a given that some of these values continuously fluctuate and some remain throughout time. With the changes in time and values from the time of John Brown’s active action and his death, how did public perception of him change? If so, what are the factors that affect these changes? Objectives This paper seeks to shed some light on how John Brown was viewed throughout history and time and what factors affected these perceptions of his character. An analysis of information regarding his portrayal in popular culture and a discussion on how these portrayals came about shall be included in this paper. Significance of the Study This study is geared towards looking at and analyzing John Brown’s life and seeing how society viewed him while he was alive and after his death. Since it has been established that there has been a conflicting public opinion regarding John Brown, this study will help shed some light on the reasons for this differing public opinion and analyze the factors that contribute to these differences. Using John Brown as a base, sociological dynamics can be more fully understood. Scope and Limitations This study shall only be using online articles, journals and some books as its reference. Data shall be gathered from these materials and a suitable data analysis by the author shall be the basis of the conclusions made in this paper. REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE A. Abolitionism and Slavery in the United States The Roots of Slavery Slavery in the United States involved the selling, purchase, ownership of African or even Native American slaves. It first began when the English built their community in Virginia in 1607 and ended up being widely-accepted tradition until 1865. Many of the slaves were gathered from pagan countries and this was written into law by 1705. In Columbia, a slave is defined in law as a human being who is â€Å"deprived of his or her liberty for life and is the property of another. † It was legal to own and keep slaves for as long as they were still alive from 1654 to 1865. By 1860, ownership of slaves has become so widespread that a fourth of the population during that time are comprised of slaves. Disease, famine and damages caused by the war against Native Americans have kept available labor down, and this made importation of slaves more palatable for many business men. The slaves were treated as capital for labor intensive commerce such as the cash crop industry of tobacco. They were considered as the life line of the south’s agricultural industry. A large proportion of the slaves were owned by farmers from the south, as a single farmer there owned an average of 20 slaves. Labor intensive commerce was mostly found in the south as these regions grew tobacco, cotton and sugar as primary exports. Many of the slaves were found in these farms, and here they contributed much to the economic welfare of the country. Racial basis of slavery were not only applied to Africans and Native Americans, but also to some members of the Caucasian race. Some Europeans were also utilized as slaves under a contract to pay debts. These white slaves were only held for a limited amount of time and not fully owned like African slaves.