Slavery and the American Founding: Hope and Hypocrisy in the Age of Enlightenment

Since 1776, the Founding generation has been portrayed as creators of a new world where liberty and freedom were the inherent birthright of all peoples. The Founders, although brilliant, were nonetheless human and fashioned a country conceived in liberty and freedom for themselves. The enslaved, women, and other minorities were not part of the original Founding documents. "All men created equal" was a political statement, not some ethereal message of Enlightenment understanding.

This book ...