A few months ago, there was a thread about Michelle Obama visiting the restored plantation where her ancestors were slaves. The place was fully restored. The slave houses were bigger and better than the cabins that my ancestors lived in at that time, in central PA. My mother described the houses that her great grand parents owned as “shacks”.
Eva, that’s not really a great argument. I’d rather live in a shack as a free man, than in a palace as a slave.
That's b/c slaves -- as bought and paid for property -- were investments. The truly exploited person in the last 2/3 of 19th century American wasn't the Negro slave. It was the Irish immigrant. There were ten of thousands of them. He was free. He was easily replaced. He was nobody's investment.