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see chains on another person and be glad they are not your own--such was the good fortune permitted colored people, defined by how much worse it could...more

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From the trunk of their scheme, choices and decisions sprouted like branches and shoots.

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Now that she had run away and seen a bit of the country, Cora wasn't sure the document described anything real at all. America was a ghost in the dark...more

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White man trying to kill you slow every day, and sometimes trying to kill you fast. Why make it easy for him? That was one kind of work you could say ...more

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Slavery is a sin when whites were put to the yoke, but not the African. All men are created equal, unless we decide you are not a man.

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it means what it say," Ethel said. "It means that a Hebrew may not enslave a Hebrew. But the sons of Ham are not of that tribe. The were cursed, with ...more

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What a world it is, Cora thought, that makes a living prison into your only haven. Was she out of bondage or in its web: how to describe the status of...more

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my father liked his Indian talk about the Great Spirit," Ridgeway said. "All these years late, I prefer the American spirit, the one that called us fr...more

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Cora had heard Michael recite the Declaration of Independence back on the Randall plantation many times, his voice drifting through the village like a...more

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But nobody wanted to speak on the true disposition of the world. And no one wanted to hear it...The whites came to this land for a fresh start and to ...more

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And America, too, is a delusion, the grandest one of all. The white race believes--believes with all its heart--that it is their right to take the lan...more

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The land she tilled and worked had been Indian land. She knew the white men bragged about the efficiency of the massacres, where they killed women and...more

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Stolen bodies working stolen land. It was an engine that did not stop, its hungry boiler fed with blood.

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If niggers were supposed to have their freedom, they wouldn't be in chains. If the red man was supposed to keep hold of his land, it'd still be his. I...more