Law school project finds slavery citations still being used today

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March 3, 2025

By Corey Williams, AFRO

A postcard immortalizes activist singer Nina Simone’s analysis of how slavery continues to impact modern-day American life at a time when the 47th president and his compatriots are seeking to rewrite African-American–and thus, American–history. (Credit: Library of Congress/ Kennedy, Amos Paul, Jr., artist)

EAST LANSING, Mich. (AP) — An 1842 U.S. Supreme Court ruling overturning the kidnapping conviction of a White man who seized a Black family and forced them into slavery south of the Mason-Dixon line is still being cited in American jurisprudence, 160 years after enslaved people throughout the U.S. were freed.

Prigg v. Pennsylvania has been cited in 274 other rulings since then, according to the Citing Slavery Project at Michigan State University. They are among more than 7,000 direct citations of slavery-law precedents that continue to guide lawyers and judges, said the project’s director, law professor Justin Simard.

This research into the lasting impact of legal principles related to the ownership of other humans is a counterpoint to efforts by the Trump administration and elected officials in Republican-led states to remove references to America’s racial history and dictate what teachers can discuss in classrooms.

Explore the full story in the Afro article.

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