The one element that was missing for me however was a parallel understanding of what it means to have descended from those traded Africans. I would like to know how some of their descendants are doing today, and how their educational and economic outcomes compare to (even the poorest of) the DeWolf’s.

As far as compensation is concerned, I think it’s not individual families, but the American government’s debt to pay. (Although I do think the government could recoup some of what she pays in reparations from families/corporations who benefitted by restructuring the tax code)

The United States of America’s great wealth is directly attributable to the slave labor by which its coffers were filled to overflowing. I feel that every American whose ancestors were enslaved is owed a debt. I do believe in reparations, but I would like to see it delivered in the form of free education for the descendants of slaves. Reparations should exist for as many years as slavery did.

Fortunately, from our point of view, that fortune was squandered within a generation or two. Some branches of the family did end up marrying into money, through the social connections which the D’Wolf fortune had made possible, so there are some DeWolf descendants who are quite well off financially.

Does it make a difference? Should money that derives, two centuries ago, from the slave trade be given up? What about other money, if it’s held by the descendants of slave traders? Should that money be given up as compensation?

Found your blog on yahoo – thanks for the article but i still don’t get it….