Published: June 16, 2023
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This Monday, we celebrate the emancipation of enslaved African Americans on 18 June 1865, known today as Juneteenth.
In recognition of this national holiday, the BlackQuaker Project returns to a question in urgent need of further discussion and research: what was the true relationship between Quakers and legal chattel slavery in the USA? Was the Religious Society of Friends wholly committed to anti-slavery efforts as we are often told, or were there Quakers culpable in this great crime against humanity?
Drawing on past research from our 2020 Pendle Hill pamphlet, Race, Systemic Violence, and Retrospective Justice: An African American Quaker Scholar-Activist Challenges Conventional Narratives, we share examples of a more complicated history between Quakers and enslaved Africans.
from Dr. Harold Weaver, The Black Quaker Project (6/15/2023)