Michelle Obama: 'It Is Our Responsibility As a Nation' to Remember the Slaves

[Sunshine]

First slaves in America were white children. Then came the whites that Cromwell wanted to rid Britain of ; "indentured servants" who rarely escaped their slavery to win the freedom promised them.

I wonder how many pages in history textbooks in American schools will be dedicated to that part of American history.

Great read:

They Were White and They Were Slaves: The Untold History of the Enslavement of Whites in Early America [Paperback]

They Were White and They Were Slaves: The Untold History of the Enslavement of Whites in Early America: Amazon.ca: Books

African slaves were not used much in the colonies until after Bacon's Rebellion. Prior to that they were white.

 

[Sunshine]

You're not allowed to talk about slavery that's racist...Not saying slavery was racist I mean people who bring it up are!!!

Deerrrp!

Remember the Alamo!

Slavery has had nothing to do with race. Ever.

Slavery has always been about labor thru the centuries.

Actually, it became about race with Bacon's Rebellion.

The alliance between former indentured servants and Africans disturbed the ruling class, who responded by hardening the racial caste of slavery.[5][6][4] While the farmers did not succeed in their goal of driving Native Americans from Virginia, the rebellion did result in Berkeley being recalled to England.

Bacon's Rebellion - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

They learned that white ald the few African slaves here in those days would form an alliance and rebel. Using African slaves was supposed to make it less likely another rebellion against the crown would occur.

 

[bornright]

How can someone remember someone they never met? I would wager she never met a slave either.

 

[Agit8r]

Absolutely. When people talk about what built the wealth of our financial markets, sometimes people forget whose labor built that.

 

[rightwinger]

How can someone remember someone they never met? I would wager she never met a slave either.

I believe she said remember slavery not remember a slave

Does that help?

 

[tinydancer]

You're not allowed to talk about slavery that's racist...Not saying slavery was racist I mean people who bring it up are!!!

Deerrrp!

Remember the Alamo!

Slavery has had nothing to do with race. Ever.

Slavery has always been about labor thru the centuries.

Actually, it became about race with Bacon's Rebellion.

The alliance between former indentured servants and Africans disturbed the ruling class, who responded by hardening the racial caste of slavery.[5][6][4] While the farmers did not succeed in their goal of driving Native Americans from Virginia, the rebellion did result in Berkeley being recalled to England.

Bacon's Rebellion - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

They learned that white ald the few African slaves here in those days would form an alliance and rebel. Using African slaves was supposed to make it less likely another rebellion against the crown would occur.

Understood in certain circumstances. And on the whole that was a fairly wise decision (if you were a slave owner).The only major black slave rebellion I can think of was the Cherokee Slave revolt.

My point was that race was not involved in slavery in the grander sense. Where one set of slave owners went "only Asian please" or "I only want Swedes" or "Bring me only Scots".

A perfect example of my point of race on the grander scale is the Caribbean slave trade. This involved the enslavement of both Irish and African peoples for labor on the islands.

The enslaved souls came in both white and black. Color was not an issue.

 

[OriginalShroom]

Does this include the slaves held by Egypt? How about the British slaves of the Romans? Don't they count? How about slavery TODAY, what's our obligation to those enslaved by muslims?

Big Moo should have another lobster tail, let the butter drip down her chin, it improves her appearance.

How about the indentured servants?

 

[Kondor3]

Absolutely. When people talk about what built the wealth of our financial markets, sometimes people forget whose labor built that.

It seems to me that the Black Slave Trade greatly benefited a handful of banks and other companies still on their feet today.

It seems to me that Black Slaves built a number of public buildings and dug several of the canals and such in the Southern States.

It seems to me that Black Slaves produced goods that filled the pockets of a handful of banks and other companies both here and in the U.K. that are still on their feet today.

And it seems to me that Black Slaves were instrumental in the agriculture of the Southern States, with respect to cotton and tobacco and local truck-farming growing operations.

But it also seems to me that White labor built most of the North (cities and infrastructure and agriculture) prior to the time of the Civil War.

And it also seems to me that most of what Black Saves built in the South was destroyed during and immediately after the Civil War so that many of their contributions vanished.

There can be little doubt but that Black Slave labor made some significant lasting contribution to the American financial marketplace.

But you might get some considerable argument over scale and scope and weight of any surviving marketplace entities that existed back then and still exist today, or that merged their wealth into companies that exist as their direct inheritors and successors today.

There was, indeed, some significant contribution, but its meaning fades with the passing of the centuries, and may be greatly exaggerated, in light of the far greater percentage of labor contributed by Whites both prior to and subsequent to the American Civil War, with respect to contributions that still survive to this day and that were not destroyed or broken-up during the War and the post-war Reconstruction period.

Blacks helped, but they weren't THE 'sweating back' upon which America was built.

I have no idea how others see this but - right or wrong - that's my own first pass on a reaction to such.

 

[Stephanie]

Gawd I'll be glad when these TWO hating people don't have that soapbox (the Presidency) and feel Entitled to PREACH their crap on US..

Yes, let the people with love in their hearts (like you?) run the country. Then the new conservative leaders can pretend that all the bad in the past never really happened. And undoubtedly they'll take the same view of the bad things happening in the present, as long as it's not happening to fellow conservatives, of course.

wtf?
I don't care to preached at by anybody, especially our President and his wife who can't ever stop doing it as if that is part of their JOB... if you do fine..

 

[rightwinger]

Does this include the slaves held by Egypt? How about the British slaves of the Romans? Don't they count? How about slavery TODAY, what's our obligation to those enslaved by muslims?

Big Moo should have another lobster tail, let the butter drip down her chin, it improves her appearance.

How about the indentured servants?

Who signed their indenture?

 

[Sunshine]

Absolutely. When people talk about what built the wealth of our financial markets, sometimes people forget whose labor built that.

It seems to me that the Black Slave Trade greatly benefited a handful of banks and other companies still on their feet today.

It seems to me that Black Slaves built a number of public buildings and dug several of the canals and such in the Southern States.

It seems to me that Black Slaves produced goods that filled the pockets of a handful of banks and other companies both here and in the U.K. that are still on their feet today.

And it seems to me that Black Slaves were instrumental in the agriculture of the Southern States, with respect to cotton and tobacco and local truck-farming growing operations.

But it also seems to me that White labor built most of the North (cities and infrastructure and agriculture) prior to the time of the Civil War.

And it also seems to me that most of what Black Saves built in the South was destroyed during and immediately after the Civil War so that many of their contributions vanished.

There can be little doubt but that Black Slave labor made some significant lasting contribution to the American financial marketplace.

But you might get some considerable argument over scale and scope and weight of any surviving marketplace entities that existed back then and still exist today, or that merged their wealth into companies that exist as their direct inheritors and successors today.

There was, indeed, some significant contribution, but its meaning fades with the passing of the centuries, and may be greatly exaggerated, in light of the far greater percentage of labor contributed by Whites both prior to and subsequent to the American Civil War, with respect to contributions that still survive to this day and that were not destroyed or broken-up during the War and the post-war Reconstruction period.

Blacks helped, but they weren't THE 'sweating back' upon which America was built.

I have no idea how others see this but - right or wrong - that's my own first pass on a reaction to such.

And there were significant contributions of child laborers. So, what day commemorates them?

 

[tinydancer]

Oh I should put up this link for those that don't know about how many Irish were enslaved by the British.


The Irish Slave Trade


The early slave trade in the 1600s is well documented with misery inflicted upon possibly up to 11 million people torn forcibly from West Africa to labour in appalling conditions in the the United States and the Caribbean.

History Journal has uncovered fascinating research into the role of Irish people exposed to the same suffering in the early

slave trade with Irish deportees and indentured servants sent to the same dreadful conditions initially in Antigua and Monserrat and later in Barbados and the United States.

From the early 1600s to 1800 many 1000s of Irish people were sent to slave conditions in the carribean and US as part of the trade in human labour that marked the start of the slave trade.

Irish and african people suffered under dreadful conditions in Barbados, Antigua, the southern states of the US and Brazil. The legacy of this trade in Irish people still remains today with a strong Irish mark left on the culture of the Carribean.

The Irish Slave Trade

 

[Sunshine]

Oh I should put up this link for those that don't know about how many Irish were enslave by the British.


The Irish Slave Trade


The early slave trade in the 1600s is well documented with misery inflicted upon possibly up to 11 million people torn forcibly from West Africa to labour in appalling conditions in the the United States and the Caribbean.

History Journal has uncovered fascinating research into the role of Irish people exposed to the same suffering in the early

slave trade with Irish deportees and indentured servants sent to the same dreadful conditions initially in Antigua and Monserrat and later in Barbados and the United States.

From the early 1600s to 1800 many 1000s of Irish people were sent to slave conditions in the carribean and US as part of the trade in human labour that marked the start of the slave trade.

Irish and african people suffered under dreadful conditions in Barbados, Antigua, the southern states of the US and Brazil. The legacy of this trade in Irish people still remains today with a strong Irish mark left on the culture of the Carribean.

The Irish Slave Trade

IOU + rep.

 

[Political Junky]

Michelle Obama: 'It Is Our Responsibility As a Nation' to Remember the Slaves

That title is misleading. Consider the source.

 

[rightwinger]

Oh I should put up this link for those that don't know about how many Irish were enslaved by the British.


The Irish Slave Trade


The early slave trade in the 1600s is well documented with misery inflicted upon possibly up to 11 million people torn forcibly from West Africa to labour in appalling conditions in the the United States and the Caribbean.

History Journal has uncovered fascinating research into the role of Irish people exposed to the same suffering in the early

slave trade with Irish deportees and indentured servants sent to the same dreadful conditions initially in Antigua and Monserrat and later in Barbados and the United States.

From the early 1600s to 1800 many 1000s of Irish people were sent to slave conditions in the carribean and US as part of the trade in human labour that marked the start of the slave trade.

Irish and african people suffered under dreadful conditions in Barbados, Antigua, the southern states of the US and Brazil. The legacy of this trade in Irish people still remains today with a strong Irish mark left on the culture of the Carribean.

The Irish Slave Trade

Which has what to do with the statements Michelle Obama made regarding the Emancipation Proclamation?

Are you claiming equivalence of tens of millions of black slaves in this country?

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

May 23, 2013, By Susan Jones @ Michelle Obama: 'It Is Our Responsibility As a Nation' to Remember the Slaves | CNS News

First Lady Michelle Obama joins children learning about the Emancipation Proclamation at historic Decatur House in Washington, D.C., on May 22, 2013. (AP Photo)

(CNSNews.com) - In remarks at the historic Decatur House in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, first lady Michelle Obama remembered the 20 slaves who toiled at the mansion around the corner from the White House, where "some of our nation's foremost leaders" lived and hosted parties.

The stories of those slaves "too often get lost," Mrs. Obama said.

Oh come on! Gimme a break Moochelle. It's been over a hundred years and nobody alive is responsible for it. You and your husband simply cannot stop playing the race card, can you?

It doesn’t take much of a non-issue to get the rightists in a snit.

 

[Rozman]

May 23, 2013, By Susan Jones @ Michelle Obama: 'It Is Our Responsibility As a Nation' to Remember the Slaves | CNS News

First Lady Michelle Obama joins children learning about the Emancipation Proclamation at historic Decatur House in Washington, D.C., on May 22, 2013. (AP Photo)

(CNSNews.com) - In remarks at the historic Decatur House in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, first lady Michelle Obama remembered the 20 slaves who toiled at the mansion around the corner from the White House, where "some of our nation's foremost leaders" lived and hosted parties.

The stories of those slaves "too often get lost," Mrs. Obama said.

Oh come on! Gimme a break Moochelle. It's been over a hundred years and nobody alive is responsible for it. You and your husband simply cannot stop playing the race card, can you?

If you are white it's your fault.
Today,tomorrow,the next day.
Until the end of time.All white people are guilty of slavery.

 

[tinydancer]

Absolutely. When people talk about what built the wealth of our financial markets, sometimes people forget whose labor built that.

It seems to me that the Black Slave Trade greatly benefited a handful of banks and other companies still on their feet today.

It seems to me that Black Slaves built a number of public buildings and dug several of the canals and such in the Southern States.

It seems to me that Black Slaves produced goods that filled the pockets of a handful of banks and other companies both here and in the U.K. that are still on their feet today.

And it seems to me that Black Slaves were instrumental in the agriculture of the Southern States, with respect to cotton and tobacco and local truck-farming growing operations.

But it also seems to me that White labor built most of the North (cities and infrastructure and agriculture) prior to the time of the Civil War.

And it also seems to me that most of what Black Saves built in the South was destroyed during and immediately after the Civil War so that many of their contributions vanished.

There can be little doubt but that Black Slave labor made some significant lasting contribution to the American financial marketplace.

But you might get some considerable argument over scale and scope and weight of any surviving marketplace entities that existed back then and still exist today, or that merged their wealth into companies that exist as their direct inheritors and successors today.

There was, indeed, some significant contribution, but its meaning fades with the passing of the centuries, and may be greatly exaggerated, in light of the far greater percentage of labor contributed by Whites both prior to and subsequent to the American Civil War, with respect to contributions that still survive to this day and that were not destroyed or broken-up during the War and the post-war Reconstruction period.

Blacks helped, but they weren't THE 'sweating back' upon which America was built.

I have no idea how others see this but - right or wrong - that's my own first pass on a reaction to such.

You kept bringing up the south in your post. The North was built by the slave trade as well.

We can't leave Yankee slave trading out of the discussion can we now? ETA: I'm not giving the south a pass here. I'm an "equal opportunity" basher when it comes to slavery. I still don't understand the mindset that would allow someone to think they can own another. Just so wrong.

Rhode Islanders had begun including slaves among their cargo in a small way as far back as 1709. But the trade began in earnest there in the 1730s.

Despite a late start, Rhode Island soon surpassed Massachusetts as the chief colonial carrier. After the Revolution, Rhode Island merchants had no serious American competitors.

They controlled between 60 and 90 percent of the U.S. trade in African slaves. Rhode Island had excellent harbors, poor soil, and it lacked easy access to the Newfoundland fisheries.

In slave trading, it found its natural calling. William Ellery, prominent Newport merchant, wrote in 1791, “An Ethiopian could as soon change his skin as a Newport merchant could be induced to change so lucrative a trade as that in slaves for the slow profits of any manufactory.”[1]

Boston and Newport were the chief slave ports, but nearly all the New England towns -- Salem, Providence, Middletown, New London – had a hand in it.

In 1740, slaving interests in Newport owned or managed 150 vessels engaged in all manner of trading. In Rhode Island colony, as much as two-thirds of the merchant fleet and a similar fraction of sailors were engaged in slave traffic.

The colonial governments of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania all, at various times, derived money from the slave trade by levying duties on black imports. Tariffs on slave import in Rhode Island in 1717 and 1729 were used to repair roads and bridges.

The 1750 revocation of the Assiento dramatically changed the slave trade yet again. The system that had been set up to stock Spanish America with thousands of Africans now needed another market. Slave ships began to steer northward.

From 1750 to 1770, African slaves flooded the Northern docks. Merchants from Philadelphia, New York, and Perth Amboy began to ship large lots (100 or more) in a single trip. As a result, wholesale prices of slaves in New York fell 50% in six years.

On the eve of the Revolution, the slave trade “formed the very basis of the economic life of New England.”[2]

It wove itself into the entire regional economy of New England. The Massachusetts slave trade gave work to coopers, tanners, sailmakers, and ropemakers.

Countless agents, insurers, lawyers, clerks, and scriveners handled the paperwork for slave merchants.

Upper New England loggers, Grand Banks fishermen, and livestock farmers provided the raw materials shipped to the West Indies on that leg of the slave trade.

Colonial newspapers drew much of their income from advertisements of slaves for sale or hire. New England-made rum, trinkets, and bar iron were exchanged for slaves.

When the British in 1763 proposed a tax on sugar and molasses, Massachusetts merchants pointed out that these were staples of the slave trade, and the loss of that would throw 5,000 seamen out of work in the colony and idle almost 700 ships. The connection between molasses and the slave trade was rum.

Millions of gallons of cheap rum, manufactured in New England, went to Africa and bought black people. Tiny Rhode Island had more than 30 distilleries, 22 of them in Newport.

In Massachusetts, 63 distilleries produced 2.7 million gallons of rum in 1774. Some was for local use: rum was ubiquitous in lumber camps and on fishing ships. “But primarily rum was linked with the Negro trade, and immense quantities of the raw liquor were sent to Africa and exchanged for slaves.

So important was rum on the Guinea Coast that by 1723 it had surpassed French and Holland brandy, English gin, trinkets and dry goods as a medium of barter.”[3] Slaves costing the equivalent of £4 or £5 in rum or bar iron in West Africa were sold in the West Indies in 1746 for £30 to £80.

New England thrift made the rum cheaply -- production cost was as low as 5½ pence a gallon -- and the same spirit of Yankee thrift discovered that the slave ships were most economical with only 3 feet 3 inches of vertical space to a deck and 13 inches of surface area per slave, the human cargo laid in carefully like spoons in a silverware case.

A list of the leading slave merchants is almost identical with a list of the region's prominent families: the Fanueils, Royalls, and Cabots of Massachusetts; the Wantons, Browns, and Champlins of Rhode Island; the Whipples of New Hampshire; the Eastons of Connecticut; Willing & Morris of Philadelphia.

To this day, it's difficult to find an old North institution of any antiquity that isn't tainted by slavery. Ezra Stiles imported slaves while president of Yale. Six slave merchants served as mayor of Philadelphia.

Even a liberal bastion like Brown University has the shameful blot on its escutcheon.

It is named for the Brown brothers, Nicholas, John, Joseph, and Moses, manufacturers and traders who shipped salt, lumber, meat -- and slaves.

And like many business families of the time, the Browns had indirect connections to slavery via rum distilling.

John Brown, who paid half the cost of the college's first library, became the first Rhode Islander prosecuted under the federal Slave Trade Act of 1794 and had to forfeit his slave ship.

Historical evidence also indicates that slaves were used at the family's candle factory in Providence, its ironworks in Scituate, and to build Brown's University Hall

More at link. Fabulous read.

Northern Profits from Slavery

 

[tinydancer]

Oh I should put up this link for those that don't know about how many Irish were enslaved by the British.


The Irish Slave Trade


The early slave trade in the 1600s is well documented with misery inflicted upon possibly up to 11 million people torn forcibly from West Africa to labour in appalling conditions in the the United States and the Caribbean.

History Journal has uncovered fascinating research into the role of Irish people exposed to the same suffering in the early

slave trade with Irish deportees and indentured servants sent to the same dreadful conditions initially in Antigua and Monserrat and later in Barbados and the United States.

From the early 1600s to 1800 many 1000s of Irish people were sent to slave conditions in the carribean and US as part of the trade in human labour that marked the start of the slave trade.

Irish and african people suffered under dreadful conditions in Barbados, Antigua, the southern states of the US and Brazil. The legacy of this trade in Irish people still remains today with a strong Irish mark left on the culture of the Carribean.

The Irish Slave Trade

Which has what to do with the statements Michelle Obama made regarding the Emancipation Proclamation?

Are you claiming equivalence of tens of millions of black slaves in this country?

First and foremost that was a post that I should have included with another when Sunshine and I were discussing "race" as an issue when it came to slavery.

ETA: And obviously I need to point this out to you again...a slave is a slave is a slave. Color doesn't matter when they were whipped because every one of them bled red.

But I have to ask where on earth are you getting your figure of "tens of millions of black slaves " specifically in America.

Seriously, where on earth do you come up with that? Or are you referring to maybe the total number of Africans enslaved in the New World?

 

[Agit8r]

Absolutely. When people talk about what built the wealth of our financial markets, sometimes people forget whose labor built that.

It seems to me that the Black Slave Trade greatly benefited a handful of banks and other companies still on their feet today.

It seems to me that Black Slaves built a number of public buildings and dug several of the canals and such in the Southern States.

It seems to me that Black Slaves produced goods that filled the pockets of a handful of banks and other companies both here and in the U.K. that are still on their feet today.

And it seems to me that Black Slaves were instrumental in the agriculture of the Southern States, with respect to cotton and tobacco and local truck-farming growing operations.

But it also seems to me that White labor built most of the North (cities and infrastructure and agriculture) prior to the time of the Civil War.

And it also seems to me that most of what Black Saves built in the South was destroyed during and immediately after the Civil War so that many of their contributions vanished.

There can be little doubt but that Black Slave labor made some significant lasting contribution to the American financial marketplace.

But you might get some considerable argument over scale and scope and weight of any surviving marketplace entities that existed back then and still exist today, or that merged their wealth into companies that exist as their direct inheritors and successors today.

There was, indeed, some significant contribution, but its meaning fades with the passing of the centuries, and may be greatly exaggerated, in light of the far greater percentage of labor contributed by Whites both prior to and subsequent to the American Civil War, with respect to contributions that still survive to this day and that were not destroyed or broken-up during the War and the post-war Reconstruction period.

Blacks helped, but they weren't THE 'sweating back' upon which America was built.

I have no idea how others see this but - right or wrong - that's my own first pass on a reaction to such.

You kept bringing up the south in your post. The North was built by the slave trade as well.

We can't leave Yankee slave trading out of the discussion can we now?

Rhode Islanders had begun including slaves among their cargo in a small way as far back as 1709. But the trade began in earnest there in the 1730s.

Despite a late start, Rhode Island soon surpassed Massachusetts as the chief colonial carrier. After the Revolution, Rhode Island merchants had no serious American competitors.

They controlled between 60 and 90 percent of the U.S. trade in African slaves. Rhode Island had excellent harbors, poor soil, and it lacked easy access to the Newfoundland fisheries.

In slave trading, it found its natural calling. William Ellery, prominent Newport merchant, wrote in 1791, “An Ethiopian could as soon change his skin as a Newport merchant could be induced to change so lucrative a trade as that in slaves for the slow profits of any manufactory.”[1]

Boston and Newport were the chief slave ports, but nearly all the New England towns -- Salem, Providence, Middletown, New London – had a hand in it.

In 1740, slaving interests in Newport owned or managed 150 vessels engaged in all manner of trading. In Rhode Island colony, as much as two-thirds of the merchant fleet and a similar fraction of sailors were engaged in slave traffic.

The colonial governments of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania all, at various times, derived money from the slave trade by levying duties on black imports. Tariffs on slave import in Rhode Island in 1717 and 1729 were used to repair roads and bridges.

The 1750 revocation of the Assiento dramatically changed the slave trade yet again. The system that had been set up to stock Spanish America with thousands of Africans now needed another market. Slave ships began to steer northward.

From 1750 to 1770, African slaves flooded the Northern docks. Merchants from Philadelphia, New York, and Perth Amboy began to ship large lots (100 or more) in a single trip. As a result, wholesale prices of slaves in New York fell 50% in six years.

On the eve of the Revolution, the slave trade “formed the very basis of the economic life of New England.”[2]

It wove itself into the entire regional economy of New England. The Massachusetts slave trade gave work to coopers, tanners, sailmakers, and ropemakers.

Countless agents, insurers, lawyers, clerks, and scriveners handled the paperwork for slave merchants.

Upper New England loggers, Grand Banks fishermen, and livestock farmers provided the raw materials shipped to the West Indies on that leg of the slave trade.

Colonial newspapers drew much of their income from advertisements of slaves for sale or hire. New England-made rum, trinkets, and bar iron were exchanged for slaves.

When the British in 1763 proposed a tax on sugar and molasses, Massachusetts merchants pointed out that these were staples of the slave trade, and the loss of that would throw 5,000 seamen out of work in the colony and idle almost 700 ships. The connection between molasses and the slave trade was rum.

Millions of gallons of cheap rum, manufactured in New England, went to Africa and bought black people. Tiny Rhode Island had more than 30 distilleries, 22 of them in Newport.

In Massachusetts, 63 distilleries produced 2.7 million gallons of rum in 1774. Some was for local use: rum was ubiquitous in lumber camps and on fishing ships. “But primarily rum was linked with the Negro trade, and immense quantities of the raw liquor were sent to Africa and exchanged for slaves.

So important was rum on the Guinea Coast that by 1723 it had surpassed French and Holland brandy, English gin, trinkets and dry goods as a medium of barter.”[3] Slaves costing the equivalent of £4 or £5 in rum or bar iron in West Africa were sold in the West Indies in 1746 for £30 to £80.

New England thrift made the rum cheaply -- production cost was as low as 5½ pence a gallon -- and the same spirit of Yankee thrift discovered that the slave ships were most economical with only 3 feet 3 inches of vertical space to a deck and 13 inches of surface area per slave, the human cargo laid in carefully like spoons in a silverware case.

A list of the leading slave merchants is almost identical with a list of the region's prominent families: the Fanueils, Royalls, and Cabots of Massachusetts; the Wantons, Browns, and Champlins of Rhode Island; the Whipples of New Hampshire; the Eastons of Connecticut; Willing & Morris of Philadelphia.

To this day, it's difficult to find an old North institution of any antiquity that isn't tainted by slavery. Ezra Stiles imported slaves while president of Yale. Six slave merchants served as mayor of Philadelphia.

Even a liberal bastion like Brown University has the shameful blot on its escutcheon.

It is named for the Brown brothers, Nicholas, John, Joseph, and Moses, manufacturers and traders who shipped salt, lumber, meat -- and slaves.

And like many business families of the time, the Browns had indirect connections to slavery via rum distilling.

John Brown, who paid half the cost of the college's first library, became the first Rhode Islander prosecuted under the federal Slave Trade Act of 1794 and had to forfeit his slave ship.

Historical evidence also indicates that slaves were used at the family's candle factory in Providence, its ironworks in Scituate, and to build Brown's University Hall

More at link. Fabulous read.

Northern Profits from Slavery

Absolutely. Wall Street attained a sizable amount of it's wealth from tobacco and cotton speculation.