Just want to let u know (in your very well held bafflement of how long the US "was" a slave state) that the official abolition of slavery in the United States wasn't until 1863 (!!!). This wasn't fully implemented across the union until june of 1865 and wasn't codified into our constitution until the very very end of 1865 (December 6). Even then it contained loopholes still present today through allowing slavery as a punishment for a crime. The United States is still a slave state. All they have to do is prove you're a criminal, and due process here is a fucking joke.
https://www.npr.org/2023/11/13/1210564359/slavery-prison-forced-labor-movement
Haha fun fact I just looked up the last survivor of chattel slavery in the USA was a woman called Elizabeth Cash Green who died in 1975.
You know. The year Jaws came out.
