Slavery

A "comfort women" monument is seen at St. Mary Square in San Francisco, the United States, on Sept. 22, 2017.

‘Comfort Women’ Statue Prompts Osaka to Cut Ties with San Francisco

The monument pays tribute to women who were forced to work in Japanese military brothels

A voting sign from the 2008 election.

For a Few Decades in the 18th Century, Women and African-Americans Could Vote in New Jersey

Then some politicians got angry

Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony
Date: c. 1870
Albumen silver print

Central Park Has No Monuments Dedicated to Real Women. That's About to Change

The future site was dedicated during the state's centennial of women's suffrage; the State of New York also will build two statues of suffrage leaders

Ships involved in the American slave trade before the Civil War.

When Enslaved People Commandeered a Ship and Hightailed it to Freedom in the Bahamas

It's been called the most successful slave rebellion in U.S. history

Harriet Tubman’s Canadian Church Is Struggling to Survive

The Salem Chapel in St. Catharines, Ontario, is in desperate need of repairs

Eeek!

Zombie Movies Are Never Really About Zombies

Zombies have offered a way to work out cultural fears about everything from race to climate change

The British Museum was the first free, public natural history museum in the world—but its creator, Hans Sloane, was intricately connected with the slave trade.

The British Museum Was a Wonder of Its Time—But Also a Product of Slavery

A new book explores the little-known life and career of Hans Sloane, whose collections led to the founding of the British Museum

Confederate Prisoners Being Conducted from Jonesborough to Atlanta by Kara Walker, 2005, 
from the portfolio Harper's Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated)

How Kara Walker Boldly Rewrote Civil War History

The artist gives 150-year-old illustrations a provocative update at the Smithsonian American Art Museum

The Contemplative Court at the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture

In This Quiet Space for Contemplation, a Fountain Rains Down Calming Waters

One year after the Nation’s first black president rang in the opening of the African American History Museum, visitors reflect on its impact

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APVA Jamestown Memorial Church, 1607 James Fort

The Misguided Focus on 1619 as the Beginning of Slavery in the U.S. Damages Our Understanding of American History

The year the first enslaved Africans were brought to Jamestown is drilled into students’ memories, but overemphasizing this date distorts history

Washington National Cathedral authorities announced Wednesday that windows depicting generals Robert E. Lee and Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson will be removed and stored pending a decision about their future.

Washington National Cathedral Will Remove Windows Honoring Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee

Officials said the windows are "an obstacle to worship in a sacred space"

Harvard Law School Marks Ties to Slavery in New Plaque

Isaac Royall, Jr., who helped found the school in 1817, was a prosperous slaveholder

Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Disassembled Childhood Home Is for Sale... on eBay

It has yet to receive any bids

New genealogical scholarship reveals more of the history of an enslaved man, named Chance Bradstreet, who once lived in this house in Ipswich, Massachusetts.

Newly Uncovered Documents Address the Mystery of One Slave’s Life

New details surrounding the identity of the enslaved man who once lived in the storied Ipswich house at the American History Museum

Looking at the east frieze of the Confederate Monument at Arlington National Cemtery in Arlington, Virginia, in the United States

The Pernicious Myth of the ‘Loyal Slave’ Lives on in Confederate Memorials

Statues don’t need to venerate military leaders of the Civil War to promulgate false narratives

A print from Harper’s showing Quantrill’s raid on Lawrence, Kansas, August 21, 1863

The Wealthy Activist Who Helped Turn “Bleeding Kansas” Free

Newly minted abolitionist Amos Adams Lawrence funneled much of his fortune into a battle he thought America couldn’t afford to lose

Benjamin Lay said he was “illiterate,” but his antislavery arguments were erudite. This portrait, commissioned by Lay’s friend Benjamin Franklin, shows him with a book.

The "Quaker Comet" Was the Greatest Abolitionist You've Never Heard Of

Overlooked by historians, Benjamin Lay was one of the nation's first radicals to argue for an end to slavery

While presidents have the power to pardon, their decision to use it isn't always popular. Just look at this anti-Ford button made in response to his pardoning of Richard Nixon.

A Brief History of Presidential Pardons

The power bestowed upon the chief executive to excuse past misdeeds has involved a number of famous Americans

Charlotte Woodward Pierce was just a teenager when she signed the pro-women's-rights "Declaration of Sentiments." She was the only signer of that document to live to see women get the vote.

Only One Woman Who Was at the Seneca Falls Women's Rights Convention Lived to See Women Win the Vote

Charlotte Woodward Pierce was a teenager at the Seneca Falls convention for women's rights. She was 91 when women finally went to vote in 1920

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