Within Earnest J. Gaines’ novel A Lesson Before Dying, education was emphasized to be a source of hope and possibility to make a difference for the colored race. Grant, a teacher who has obtained a higher education, demonstrates an alternate tier in which he stands when compared with his equals. Upon leaving for the university, his aunt assured him that it was unnecessary for him to come through the back door of Henri Pichot’s house where the family served for the whites anymore (Gaines 18). Through these words, Grant’s aunt is portraying the notion that with an education, Grant will no longer be the same as those who stay back in the fields and can finally move on from the restrictions of a colored man. Education has granted him the ticket towards the freedom many others didn’t have the access to and the opportunities of. As Grant explains it, he was “too educated for [his white master] Henri Pichot” and so “he [Pichot] had no use for [him] at all anymore (Gaines 21). But even so, education is only a path towards, but not to, freedom and as described in the novel, “…it’ll take more than five and a half months to wipe away—peel—scrape away the blanket of ignorance that has been plastered and replastered over those brains in the past three hundred years…” because skin tone is binding and it will always serve as the root to discrimination and inferiority for colored men (Gaines 64).

In an alternate scenario, Emma’s somewhat indirect but similarly direct persistence to have Grant help her greatly exceeds just giving Jefferson back his innocence and is instead, an offensive move to defend their race. Emma states that she is not “begging for his life no more” but all she wants is for Jefferson to die a man (Gaines 22). This makes it clear that she is certain that no matter what evidence or truth arises, Jefferson is guilty regardless and nothing would reverse the predetermined verdict. The emphasis Emma tries to make that Jefferson is not a hog is essential to how colored men would be treated after Jefferson’s execution. It is apparent that she is trying to take the initial step to stand up for justice and the race of her people. If she successfully proves that Jefferson is not a hog but instead a man, colored men will essentially be treated more or less differently than before because they’ve made it clear that they are no longer going to remain submissive to the white race and is daring to speak up and have a stand in their position. Just like many other causes and movements, it always takes one courageous change to make a universal difference, and in this novel, Jefferson’s transformation from a hog to a man, is that ultimate turning point to a new chapter in the history of race.