American Slavery, American Freedom

The paradox at the country's root, told without flinching. How did the colony that produced the most eloquent defenders of liberty also build one of the most thorough systems of bondage? Morgan's answer is that the two grew together, that the freedom of some was underwritten by the enslavement of others, each making the other possible. It is the hardest fact in the American founding, and this is the book that states it most clearly and most fairly.

The historian who stated the central paradox of the American founding as plainly as anyone has dared. American Slavery, American Freedom asks how the colony that produced the most eloquent defenders of liberty also built one of the most thorough systems of bondage, and answers that the two grew together, each making the other possible. He wrote without flinching and without despair.