Tag: abolition
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The forgotten story of abolition in revolutionary France – the first emancipation
When news of what Sonthonax and Polverel had done reached Paris at the beginning of 1794, France’s third revolutionary legislature, the National Convention, finally did what Mirabeau had urged their predecessors to do in 1789: It decreed the abolition of slavery in all the French colonies. The abolition decree passed on Feb. 4, 1794, was…
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Abolishing the United States’ empire of policing
As US imperialists succeeded in policing experiments on the other side of the world in the early 20th century, irrational hysteria gripped domestic elites that were threatened by a boiling US labor movement. Their fears of a militant left-wing insurrection were widespread, and in response, they sought support from the coercive state by applying repatriated…
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The Death of Slavery, The First Dawn of Freedom
An organized clandestine underground network to resist the slave state was not inevitable. The path of fatalism and despair, a pale specter that still haunts many would-be rebels today, was just as likely. In those days, given the seemingly low odds of success, an overwhelming feeling of helplessness doubtless consumed many hearts. Courageous people, most…
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George Jackson’s insightful analysis of America’s systemic fascism, and how to beat it
During his time in prison, Jackson developed and refined thoughtful analysis through voracious reading that informed his experience as a Black man growing up in a white-supremacist society. While he became known more for the violent incidents that were destined along his revolutionary path, Jackson was a prolific writer and theorist, particularly on the topics…
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