slave trade

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In Senegal, Yellen Recoils at the Business of Slave Trading

Treasury secretary says administration has not endorsed reparations

(Newser) - US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen paid a solemn visit Saturday to the salmon-colored house on an island off Senegal that is one of the most recognized symbols of the horrors of the Atlantic slave trade that trapped tens of millions of Africans in bondage for generations. Yellen, in Senegal as...

Dutch Royals Won't Use Controversial Golden Coach

At least for the time being, due to its ties to Netherlands' colonial past, slave trade

(Newser) - On Thursday the Dutch king ruled out using, for now at least, the royal family's "Golden Carriage." One side of the carriage bears a painting that critics say glorifies the Netherlands' colonial past, including its role in the global slave trade. The announcement was an acknowledgement of...

Museum Visitors Will Help Decide Fate of Statue

Likeness of slave trader Edward Colston was toppled last year in England

(Newser) - A statue of a 17th-century slave trader that was toppled during anti-racism protests in the English city of Bristol is being displayed in a museum, where visitors will be asked to help decide its fate, per the AP . The bronze likeness of Edward Colston was pulled from its pedestal and...

After 176 Years, City Removes Slave Auction Block

It sat on Fredericksburg corner for 176 years

(Newser) - A slave auction block has been removed from a street corner in downtown Fredericksburg, Va., some 158 years after the Emancipation Proclamation—and seven months after the city council voted 6-1 to remove it. The Washington Post reports that the 176-year-old block had been targeted during George Floyd protests, with...

Slave Descendants Go to Front of Georgetown Admissions Line

Slave descendants to receive preference

(Newser) - Georgetown University will give admissions preference to the descendants of slaves owned by the Maryland Jesuits as part of its effort to atone for profiting from the sale of enslaved people, the AP reports. Georgetown President John DeGioia told news outlets that the university in Washington, DC, will implement the...

Texas Textbook Describes African Slaves as 'Workers'

McGraw-Hill will make changes after mom's post goes viral

(Newser) - Roni Dean-Burren was incensed when she got a text message from son Coby of a page in his ninth-grade geography textbook. "The Atlantic Slave Trade between the 1500s and 1800s brought millions of workers from Africa to the southern United States to work on agricultural plantations," read a...

1st Sunken Slave Ship Found After 220 Years

212 slaves died on the Sao Jose-Paquete de Africa, en route to Brazil

(Newser) - The first-ever wreckage of a ship that went down with slaves on board has been found just 100 yards off the coast of South Africa where it sank in 1794. The Portuguese ship, Sao Jose-Paquete de Africa, set out from Mozambique Island with more than 400 slaves shackled in its...

Cops Raid 'Slave' Camp, Free Men Held 15 Years

24 men held against their will, some caged in dog kennels

(Newser) - Four men and a woman were arrested yesterday for holding 24 men as slaves in east England, some for as long as 15 years, reports the BBC . The victims—English, Polish, and Romanian men—were likely recruited from soup kitchens and welfare offices and promised jobs that paid around $125...

Why Haiti Is So Poor
 Why Haiti Is So Poor 
A COMPILATION OF HYPOTHESES
Jan 13, 2010 8:39 PM CST

Why Haiti Is So Poor

Early break with France, ruinous Duvaliers among theories

(Newser) - With bad news still pouring in from earthquake-ravaged Haiti, Tyler Cowen pulls together some hypotheses on why the nation is so poor (noting that he doesn’t endorse all):
  • Haiti gained independence from France too soon, in the early 1800s. Caribbean neighbors Guadeloupe and Martinique waited, and get a good
...

Obama: Slavery Monument 'Place of Profound Sadness'

(Newser) - President Obama toured the Cape Coast Castle in Ghana today, a shipping-off point for African slaves to America, Reuters reports. He saw the monument as a reminder. “As painful as it is,” the president said, “I think that it helps to teach all of us that we...

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