bad ending in the series Snowfall

[turneywest]

I watched this series a year ago. And I remember that in the last episode, Franklin became poor, and his friend Leon went the other way, thereby achieving a happy life. Although they both had the same goals. If I'm not mistaken, Franklin wanted financial independence, and the independence of his people, but the object he used for this destroyed him. Leon wanted the same as his friend, but went his own way, let's say "natural, traditional". A day ago I remembered this series and wanted to shit on Franklin for wanting a lot of money with the help of drugs with the words "well3x". But only I remembered that he wanted to do better for his people. What do you think about Franklin? Did he deserve such a fate? Did he really want his people to be independent from whites?