descendants of slaves

Alabama voters head to the polls for the November midterm election next month. One issue on the ballot would do away with slavery. It’s still allowed in the state constitution. Alabama Public Radio news spent nine months looking into one lingering aspect of the slave trade. APR’s focus is on finding and preserving slave cemeteries in the state. By the time of the Civil War, an estimated four hundred thousand people were held as slaves in Alabama. Some accounts put the number throughout the South at closer to four million. That would appear to make the issue of slave cemetery preservation a southern issue. But, that doesn't appear to be the case.

Before the Civil War, the state of Alabama was home to an estimated thirty three thousand slave holders. Local historians say one of them was John Welch Prewitt. He set aside two acres that became known as the Old Prewitt Slave Cemetery. The site may hold up to two hundred unmarked graves. Former World Heavyweight Boxing Champion Deontay Wilder lives next door.

Part 1— "The 40 unmarked graves"Alabama voters head to the polls next month. One ballot item could end slavery in the state. Alabama’s constitution still allows forced labor, one hundred and fifty seven years after the thirteenth amendment abolished the practice. That’s not the only lasting impact of the slave trade in Alabama. APR spoke with the descendants of some of estimated four hundred thousand people enslaved here around the Civil War. Many say they can’t find the burial sites of their ancestors, due to unmarked graves or bad records kept by their white captors. Alabama Public Radio news spent nine months looking into efforts to find and preserve slave cemeteries in the state. Here's part one of our series we call “No Stone Unturned.”

Although reparations have been one of the main talking points in the current political climate, they’re a lot of misconceptions regarding the topic. On today’s edition of Crunk Culture, Robin Boylorn defines what reparations are – and what they are not – while calling for a change in government policies that will provide generational impacts for the descendants of slaves...