Justene Hill Edwards

The expansion of the U.S.,

investments in kind of land development, the cotton gin.

We also have, interestingly enough, in 1808, Congress decides to close American participation in the Atlantic slave trade, which means that no new enslaved Africans are being brought in from foreign sources.

And

And so it is this convergence of factors that makes cotton this very important product that kind of helps the American economy boom, but makes American slavery more entrenched and in more ways more violent for the enslaved.

Absolutely.

I mean, if we talk about the creation of modern day insurance, we actually have to look at this period of slavery's expansion.

There were entire financial products that were kind of based and grounded on the value of slave property.

There were hundreds of banks that were created in places like Louisiana and Mississippi just to serve the increasing numbers of

enslavers who were trying to kind of make money and profit off of the perceived value of their enslaved populations.

And so there is an entire side of this, the financial history side that is incredibly important to understand.

And some of us do.

Well, what I try to do is connect a lot of what we talk about to what we see and talk about today.

Whether it's like policy or economic justice or conversations about labor, incarceration.

I mean, I really do try to frame what we talk about in terms of the history of American slavery in terms of kind of everyday topics that we continue to grapple with.

And so I hope that what they learn about the history of American slavery kind of resonates with them.

So perhaps they may not be able to walk by the White House and not think about certain things or drive by a field and not wonder if that was a tobacco plantation.

I hope that they are kind of thinking along those lines.