Why we should remember 1619
Amanda Brickell Bellows, August 18, 2019, The Washington Post
Four hundred years ago, the first Africans set foot on mainland
English America. Held as captives first on a Portuguese slave ship and
then an English privateer, they had endured a grueling journey across
the Atlantic Ocean during the summer of 1619. They traveled
from present-day Angola to Point Comfort, Va., where they were sold to
the colonists of Jamestown. The arrival of enslaved Africans in colonial
Virginia would shape not only the future of Jamestown, but also the
subsequent development of the United States.
On this anniversary, we should acknowledge slavery’s deep roots
and recognize the significant role that captive and free African
Americans have played in building the United States of today. During the
nation’s earliest days, economics and racism intersected
to launch the insidious institution that would bring fortune and
privilege to some and inequality, violence and death to others. As
enslaved laborers, African Americans’ backbreaking work supported
colonial economic growth and enriched slave traders, merchants
and their owners. Striving for freedom, African Americans fought for
emancipation and the abolition of slavery. During Reconstruction and the
civil rights movement, they secured significant constitutional and
legislative changes that expanded rights for all
Americans, a struggle that continues today.
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