 A Very Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies |
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Bartolomé de las Casas' assessment of genocide during the Spanish colonization of the Caribbean is an early reframing of the myth of empire, as well as a foundational reckoning with concepts related to human rights.
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| An Account of the Slave Trade on the Coast of Africa |
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A first-person account of what the slave trade looked like and the conditions on slave ships. The account demonstrates the cognitive dissonance between understanding that enslaved people are humans and the profit-centered ways they were treated.
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| I Did Not Want to Go: An Enslaved Woman's Leap into the Capital's Conscience |
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This essay details the ordeal of Anna, or Ann Williams, a victim of human trafficking in antebellum Washington, D.C. The essay also offers an analysis of the evolution of her narrative during the nineteenth century.
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| Oklahoma's Poor Rich Indians: An Orgy of Graft and Exploitation of the Five Civilized Tribes, Legalized Robbery |
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This excerpt from the introduction of Zitkala-Ša's groundbreaking report opened the scene on fraud facilitated by guardians, lawmakers, and county clerks at the expense of minors, heirs, and incompetents during early Oklahoma statehood, and focused on probate courts as a site of legal exploitation.
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| She's Been Her Own Mistress: The Long History of Charlotte Dupee v. Henry Clay, 1790-1840 |
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This essay refocuses the story of Charlotte Dupee v. Henry Clay on Charlotte herself, detailing her long struggle navigating the strategies and pathways to freedom.
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| The Cherokee Removal Through the Eyes of a Private Soldier |
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Burnett presents a first-hand account of Cherokee removal.
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| The Timing of Queen v. Hepburn: An exploration of African American Networks in the Early Republic |
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This essay explores the phenomenon of multigenerational networks of freedom-making through the petition for freedom cases of the Queen family in Washington, D.C.
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