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Claim that only 1.6% of Americans in 1860 owned slaves erases critical historical context

In early and mid-2025, a claim that "only 1.6% of US citizens owned slaves in 1860" resurfaced and circulated widely online, including on X, Reddit and Facebook. As we previously reported, this claim ...
PBS

Conditions of antebellum slavery

Though slavery had such a wide variety of faces, the underlying concepts were always the same. Slaves were considered property, and they were property because they were black. Their status as property ...