ABSTRACT
Public status shapes private ordering. Personhood status, conferred or acknowledged by the state, determines whether one is a party to or the object of a contract. For much of our nation’s history the law deemed all persons of African descent to have a limited status, if given personhood at all. The property and partial personhood status of African-Americans, combined with standards developed to facilitate the growth of the international commodities market for products including cotton, contributed to the current beliefs of business investors and even how communities of color are still governed and supported. The impact of that shift in status persists today. The commodities markets and the nations that rose and prospered would not be possible without the slave trade, and that trade would not be possible without the legal, business, and social norms in place to facilitate private ordering and growth while reinforcing the subjugation of African-Americans. Yet, many business and commercial law professors devote class time to teaching foundational and historical material, without any consideration of the impact of slavery. To avoid slavery in business and commercial law courses is to ignore an institution that plays a pivotal role in much of what we do today. Slavery is not a frolic, it is foundational …
Chatman, Carliss, Teaching Slavery in Commercial Law, (2023) 28 Michigan Journal of Race and Law 1 (2023), SMU Dedman School of Law Legal Studies Research Paper No 611.
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