Quote of the Day: The Hartford Courant Journalists on the North's Involvement in Slavery

Several years ago, Aetna Insurance Company issued a public statement saying that they regretted having insured slaves in the antebellum period.  The Hartford Courant published a story about it, and three journalists from The Hartford Courant became interested in the North's involvement in American slavery.  They did some research, and were shocked to learn that the North's involvement was substantial.  They wrote a book entitled Complicity:  How the North Promoted, Prolonged, and Profited from Slavery. (In truth, the North was a lot more than merely complicit in slavery.  They were foundational.)

In the preface to their book, the three journalists wrote:

     What was true of Connecticut turned out to be overwhelmingly true of the entire North.  Most of what you'll read here was gleaned from older, often out-of-print texts, and from period newspapers, largely in Connecticut, New York and Massachusetts.
     We are Journalists, not scholars, and want to share what surprised, and even shocked, the three of us.  We have all grown up, attended schools, and worked in Northern states, from Maine to Maryland.  We thought we knew our home.  We thought we knew our country.
      We were wrong.

As quoted by Gene Kizer, Jr., Slavery Was Not the Cause of the War Between the States, page 257.