On Northern children working in mills: everyone today agrees that was unacceptable, and it was eventually outlawed.
But we should push-back against suggestions that African slaves were “no different” from Northern indentured servants — that just ain’t so.
Indentured servants voluntarily contracted to work off their debts over a specified period of time.
That was hugely different from Africans kidnapped and held in involuntary bondage, not only for their lifetimes, but also the lifetimes of their descendants.
African slavery is a peculiar institution vastly different from, and more unacceptable than, traditional indentured service.
The Massachusetts Supreme Court did not free them. It allowed them to sue for their freedom.
My statement said Massachusetts never enacted any laws to free the slaves. That is true.
African slavery was no different from nor worse than any other kind of slavery. There has been slavery all over the world for all time. The Muslims enslaved millions. They bought their slaves from blacks in Africa, they captured their victims at sea or they invaded countries in Europe for slaves. England enslaved tens of thousands of Irish and sent them to Australia. It’s been a human tradition to enslave others.
And many indentured servants were treated worse. Remember the first slave in this country was an indentured servant who was enslaved by a black man. He never signed up for slavery.
BTW most other groups of former slaves and even non-enslaved immigrants have been able to assimilate into the culture and have thrived. Blacks in this country seem unable to do that and want to blame it on something that happened over 150 years ago to people they never knew.