Free Republic

The Supreme Court delivered a stunning blow to President Trump's birthright citizenship executive order, which sought to declare that babies born in the U.S. to mothers unlawfully present or in the United States on temporary visas would no longer automatically receive U.S. citizenship. The ruling in Trump v. Barbara was 6-3, with Justices Kavanaugh, Amy Coney Barrett, and Chief Justice John Roberts joining the liberal justices in striking down the order. The ruling was exceptionally long, nearly 200 pages. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote a scathing dissent, grounding his reasoning in the view that the 14th Amendment was meant to apply...

How Sparta, the most powerful Greek city-state, collapsed in only 20 years. The Decline and Fall of Sparta | 11:02 toldinstone | 627K subscribers | 82,207 views | Febuary 25, 2026Chapters 0:00 Introduction 0:38 Classical Sparta 1:29 Spartan politics 2:22 Helots 3:24 Population decline 4:37 Hubris 5:25 The Battle of Leuctra 6:42 Messenia liberated 7:35 Enter Macedon 8:08 Attempts at reform 9:08 Irrelevance 9:37 Roman Sparta

Lefties and their media minions painted President Joe Biden’s border opening as humane and just, but it brought the largest child-trafficking operation in history. A quarter-million unaccompanied children, waved into the interior, simply disappeared because the Bidenites made no real provision for keeping track of them — with Xavier Becerra, now running to become California’s next governor, one of the chief culprits. US law requires the feds to carefully supervise and track unaccompanied minors they let enter the country, passing them only to vetted sponsors, ideally family or former neighbors, who agree to take good care of the kids, enroll...

BREWSTER COUNTY, Texas (KOSA) - A multi-agency operation in Pecos led to the rescue of seven human trafficking victims and the arrest of 24 people, according to the Reeves County Sheriff’s Office. Investigators said the discovery was made during a June 13 search warrant execution at El Ranchito Night Club, an adult entertainment establishment that had been operating out of compliance with a local ordinance. Authorities said residents began reporting suspected violations as El Ranchito continued operating. The Reeves County Sheriff’s Office then launched an investigation, which led to a search warrant. “That’s how we were able to develop our...

Abraham Lincoln’s perspective on slavery was not static. Initially, he viewed slavery primarily as a political and constitutional problem that threatened national unity. However, as the horrors of the Civil War progressed, his focus shifted toward a moral and spiritual imperative for total emancipation. As the war deepened, Lincoln began to immerse himself in the language and theology of the Bible, which profoundly shaped his evolving moral stance. He grew convinced that the nation’s survival was contingent upon its obedience to God’s standard of justice. He moved away from purely secular legalism to a worldview that saw the conflict as...

Yes, Elon Musk is richer than Mansa Musa by modern measurable standards. Current Wealth Figures Elon Musk (as of mid-2026): His net worth is estimated at around $1.2 trillion (Bloomberg, Forbes), driven largely by stakes in Tesla and SpaceX (which went public via IPO, pushing him past the trillion-dollar mark). This makes him the first confirmed trillionaire in modern records. Mansa Musa (r. ~1312–1337): Popular estimates put his wealth at roughly $400 billion (sometimes $300–500 billion) in today's dollars, based on his empire's control of gold and salt trade, and accounts of his lavish 1324 pilgrimage to Mecca that caused...

During his life, Franklin had many careers... In his later years he became vocal as an abolitionist and in 1787 began to serve as President of the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery. The Society was originally formed in Philadelphia, as The Society for the Relief of Free Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage... As a young man he owned slaves, and he carried advertisements for the sale of slaves in his newspaper, the Pennsylvania Gazette. At the same time, however, he published numerous Quaker pamphlets against slavery and condemned the practice of slavery in his private correspondence. It...

While many refer to June 19th as Juneteenth, it is also widely known as Jubilee Day in Southern states. Jubilee refers to an Old Testament celebration instituted in Leviticus 25 to occur every 50 years. The year began on the Day of Atonement when the priests blew the shofar (a ram’s horn). In the Year of Jubilee, God required the Israelites to forgive each other’s debts, return land to its original owners or families, and let the land rest. Israelite bond servants could buy their freedom from foreign masters in the land. The year was a reminder that God brought...

It’s abundantly clear that religion stood at the center of the Civil War for both sides. Both North and South looked to God for meaning, and each side believed—that God was on its side... The new Confederate Constitution, adopted on February 8, 1861, officially declared its Christian identity, “invoking the favor and guidance of Almighty God.” Southern leaders chose as their national motto Deo Vindice (“God will avenge”.) Confederate President Jefferson Davis proclaimed that the time had come “to recognize our dependence upon God … and supplicate his merciful protection.” This national acknowledgment of religious dependence, as the South frequently...

George Santayana famously said that those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it. The same is true for judicial overreach. Those judges who yield to the temptation to counter policies that are not to their liking are likely to repeat such excesses of power. That is why the recent decision of U.S. District Judge Angel Kelley in Boston is so concerning. While there are good-faith reasons why some have objected to the removal of slavery and climate change exhibits from national parks and monuments, this is not about the merits but the authority to make such changes. Kelley’s recent...

One of the WNBA’s most prominent voices wants her league to consider the place of women in America at the birth of the country before agreeing to wear a celebratory jersey patch. Aces forward Brianna Turner, the players association treasurer, balked at the idea that WNBA All-Stars should wear the “USA 250” patch on their jerseys that other professional sports leagues have adopted to celebrate America’s upcoming 250th birthday.

Pope Leo XIV made a historic apology on Monday for the Holy See's role in legitimizing slavery and for having failed to condemn it for centuries, calling the Vatican's record a "wound in Christian memory." Past popes have apologized for Christians' involvement in the trans-Atlantic slave trade. But no pope had ever publicly acknowledged, much less apologized for, the role that past popes played in giving European sovereigns explicit authority to subjugate and enslave "infidels." ... In 1452, for example, Pope Nicholas V issued the papal bull Dum Diversas, which gave the Portuguese king and his successors the right "to...

The left-wing Labour Party government in Britain has refused to confirm that it is not using slave labour in its publicly owned green energy project, despite having passed a law last year committing to do so. The push in the UK to eliminate the use of fossil fuels and replace them with supposedly cleaner forms of energy may be coming with a hefty human toll, with it being unclear if the state-funded Great British Energy (GBE) project is using forced labour in places like China to prop up its so-called renewable sector. Following pressure from campaigners, after initially baulking at...

Yes, the United States effectively inherited the existing institution of slavery in the territory acquired through the Louisiana Purchase of 1803 from France (which had briefly reacquired it from Spain in 1800). The U.S. did not introduce slavery there as a new practice; it was already well-established under prior colonial rule, and the transfer preserved the property rights of slaveholders. Historical Context of Slavery in the Louisiana Territory * French origins: France introduced chattel slavery to the Louisiana colony starting in the early 1700s, importing enslaved Africans (beginning around 1710) to support plantation agriculture, alongside some raids on Native American...

Despite being urged by President Trump to do away with the filibuster, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) is adamantly against doing it. "Look,' Trump said, "the filibuster is not a law. It is not in the Constitution. It is just a long standing tradition that helped Democrats resist efforts to end slavery. Right now it is being used to prevent efforts to reduce vote fraud. Neither of these purposes for which the filibuster has been or is being used is good for the country." Thune rebutted Trump's argument by pointing out "we Senators all respect each other. The filibuster...

Summary: During the period of the Revolution, slavery was much closer to being banned in America than most people realize.

One of the great strengths of Abraham Lincoln was his ability to take complicated concepts and boil them down into an easily digestible argument that even his most basic audience could understand. This was an invaluable resource for Lincoln whether addressing a jury or a gathering of potential voters and he used it frequently throughout his life. One of the best examples of this unique talent in his own handwriting comes to us from a document entitled “Pro-slavery Theology” here in the collections of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum. Undated, though likely written in October of 1858 during...

The papyrus, which contains 133 lines of preserved text, is the longest Greek papyrus ever uncovered in the Judean Desert, although for decades it had been misclassified as a Nabatean text and practically lost in the archives of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA)...Upon translation, the team that Cotton Paltiel put together realized the papyrus preserves an incredible snapshot into the Roman legal system and life between two Jewish revolts against the Romans: the Diaspora Revolt (c. 115–117 CE) and the Bar-Kokhba Revolt (c. 132–136 CE). The papyrus, which pertains to a legal case brought before a Roman court, contains the...

Full Grok question: "If the United States must be blamed for slavery before the U.S. did not even exist in the year 1776, don't Americans get the privilege of taking the credit for abolitionism that existed prior to 1776 since Britain did not do that?" --- Yes, by that exact same logic of retroactive national attribution, Americans (specifically, the colonists who formed the United States) get full credit for the early abolitionist movements that predated 1776—movements Britain itself did not pursue or enact at the time, and which Britain actively hindered in the colonies. The premise is straightforward and consistent:...

This week, the UN General Assembly voted to declare the transatlantic African slave trade as "the gravest crime against humanity." UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said "the transatlantic slave trade was a crime against humanity that struck at the core of personhood, broke up families and devastated communities." Ghana's President John Mahama praised the declaration, saying "we came together in solemn solidarity to affirm truth and pursue a route to healing and reparations. The adoption of this resolution serves as a safeguard against forgetting." US ambassador to the UN Dan Negrea objected "history is replete with crimes against humanity--genocides, massacres, torture,...