Final answer:
The Exodusters were African American migrants who left the South for Kansas to escape racial oppression and seek better economic opportunities, not to flee prosecution. They were part of a larger struggle for civil rights and were met with challenges both in the South and the West, leading to significant historical scrutiny and debate.
Step-by-step explanation:
False, the Exodusters were a group of African American migrants who left the Southern states for Kansas and other parts of the West with the hope of escaping racial oppression and finding economic opportunities after the Reconstruction era. They were seeking to achieve the political, legal, and economic freedom that was denied to them in the post-Civil War South. This movement was not about fleeing prosecution but rather seeking deliverance from racial discrimination and violence, as well as pursuing prospects for landownership and work. Their migration to Kansas and beyond brought about a congressional investigation and drew resistance from Southern whites who feared losing their workforce and Northern whites who opposed their migration.
The claim that Exodusters were fleeing yellow fever, as some contemporaneous accounts suggested, was a discredited excuse to minimize the political nature of the migration. The term Exoduster itself references the biblical Exodus, likening their migration to the Hebrews' escape from Egypt. The Exodusters set a precedent for African American migration westward, with many becoming farmers and some becoming known as 'Buffalo Soldiers.'