The Case for Reparations Is Nothing New
In fact, Black activists and civil rights leaders have been advocating for compensation for the trauma and cost of slavery for centuries.
Were George Washington’s Teeth Taken from Enslaved People?
We know a surprising amount about the dental history of the nation’s first president.
Black Mexico and the War of Independence
The president of Mexico who finally issued the decree ending slavery was of African descent himself.
Bolívar in Haiti
Simón Bolívar was a man of contradiction. He was willing to set in motion the gradual abolition of slavery, but that would be as far as he would go.
The Saltwater Railroad
Throughout the 19th century, enslaved people attempted to escape from the U.S. to the Bahamas, across what became known as the "Saltwater Railroad."
Brazil’s Maroon State
For nearly a century, Quilombo of Palmares was an Afro-Brazilian state, populated and run by people who had freed themselves from slavery.
Did Black Rebellion Win the Civil War?
Historians are giving credence to W.E.B. DuBois's assertion that enslaved workers coordinated a general strike, which helped end the Civil War.
Grave Robbing, Black Cemeteries, and the American Medical School
In the 19th century, students at American medical schools stole the corpses of recently-buried African Americans to be used for dissection.
Did Venereal Disease Lead to Abolition?
Many abolitionists seeking to end slavery in the British West Indies were concerned less with human rights, more with the preponderance of what they saw as "interracial sex."
How Antebellum Christians Justified Slavery
After Emancipation, some Southern Protestants refused to revise their proslavery views. In their minds, slavery had been divinely sanctioned.