So they're going to crucify a man for the legal actions of his great grandfather 157 years ago? This goes several steps beyond an expos-facto prosecution.
This 157 year number doesn't jive.
I had my daughter in my mid-20's. I have a picture taken with my daughter, myself, my mother (daughter's grand mother), and my grandmother (daughter's great grandmother) and we're talking an age range from 1-1/2 years old to 71 years old. A spread of what? 68 years or so?
A spread 157 would make this guy's slave owning ancestor something like his g-g-g-g-g-great grandfather or so?? And that fact that this 20 year old man owned a 60 year old female slaves tell me that:
1)He inherited this slave
2)That she was his "black mammy" who raised him and he did not wish to turn her out into the cold in her old age; OR, that she was such that he couldn't get rid of her, try as he might -- too old, too ill, too sour a disposition, who knows?
3) He had only one slave? And such an old one* to boot. Whether he worked in the town or country that doesn't reflex very good on him -- economically speaking!
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*We're talking mid-1800 here, where sixty was o-l-d.