The animating idea of The 1619 Project is that our national narrative is more accurately told if we begin not on July 4, 1776, but in late August of 1619, when a ship arrived in Jamestown bearing a cargo of twenty to thirty enslaved people from Africa. Their arrival inaugurated a barbaric and unprecedented system of chattel slavery that would last for the next 250 years. This is sometimes referred to as the country's original sin, but it is more than...

An analysis of how George Washington's life was impacted by slavery discusses his ties to the slave community, activities as a slave owner, realization of the evils of slavery, and political efforts on behalf of slaves.