[Non-Sequitur]

No, I'm talking about a South Carolina where blacks and whites where not legally allowed to look out the same window, a Virginia where freed slaves had 12 months to leave the state or be sold back into slavery, an Alabama where the Supreme Court ruled that a slave could not be freed under any circumstances because freedom was a gift and the slave lacked the legal standing to accept such a gift. A south were not a single state allowed a free black to move in and not a single state allowed them to vote. That south.

[4CJ]

Consider that bastion of purity - Ohio. In 1829 almost half the blacks in Cincinnati were forcibly deported. Around 1841 white rioters fired cannons into black neighborhoods. Free blacks had to post a $500 bond to live in the state, still couln't testify in court or attand public schools.

Oregon had this provision in it's Constitution:

"No free Negro, or mulatto, not residing in this state at the time of adoption of this constitution, shall ever come, reside, or be within this state, or hold any real estate, or make any contract, or maintain any suit therein; and the legislative assembly shall provide by penal laws for the removal by public officers of all such free negroes who shall bring them into the state, or employ or harbor them therein.

In 1814 the Illinois legislature authorized the use of slaves in the salt mine. Free blacks migrating to Illinois after 1829 had to post a $1000 bond to prevent their being a "charge to the county", and Illinois in 1848 changed it's Constitution to prohibit the entrance of blacks. The "Black Law" of 1853 provided for the arrest of blacks staying more than 10 days in the state, along with a $50 fine, and their sale into indentured service (slavery) if they did not pay the fine. The law also prohibited the intermarriage of whites and blacks. Illinois has a database of slave records at "Illinois State Archives: Servitude and Emancipation Records"

The 1862 Revised Code of Indiana outlawed immigration of negroes and mulattos into the state, prevented blacks from entering contractual obligations, fined anyone employing a black $500, forbade interracial marriage, and prevented blacks from testifying in court against whites.

It wasn't just a southern thing.

[wasp69]

Good morning, Commander. I hope this day finds you well and preparing for a great holiday season.

A south were not a single state allowed a free black to move in...

I think the following runs contrary to that.

William Ellison is believed to have been the wealthiest black slave master in the antebellum South, owning more slaves than all but the richest white planters.

Memoirs from the time suggest that he did not treat his slaves well. William Ellison's slaves were said to be the most overworked, underfed, and illclothed in the district.

William Ellison was born April Ellison, a slave. His mother was a slave, his father was probably a white planter. Instead of working in the South Carolina fields, April Ellison learned how to build cotton gins. He became the best gin-maker in the district. That made him rich, and he bought his freedom. He even bought the home of a former governor of South Carolina.

The Ellisons were not the only black masters in the antebellum South. Census records in 1860 show that there were 122 free blacks in Charleston who owned slaves. Most of them owned one or two slaves; none owned as many as William Ellison.

It would seem, sir, that your statement is not entirely accurate.