1784

America’s Congress ratifies the Treaty of Paris of 1783 on January 14, 1784 agreeing British colonial rule ends upon England’s ratification and all prisoners held in the United States would be released. Afterwards, the British ratifies the treaty on April 9, 1784. However, the United States violates treaty by refusing to release 500,000 Afro-Englishmen, relegates them to slavery claiming these British prisoners were slaves during colonial times and owned by Americans based upon “Colonial statutes” rendered void ab initio by the 1772 Somerset Decision and England’s Phillipsburg Proclamation of June 1779 during colonial times.

Rhode Island and Connecticut begin gradual emancipation.

North Carolina prohibits the importation of African slaves.

Jefferson’s proposal to restrict the westward expansion of slavery fails.

America’s Congress ratifies the Treaty of Paris of 1783, agreeing British colonial rule ends upon England’s ratification and all prisoners held in the United States would be released.

James Ramsay publishes An Essay on the Treatment and Conversion of African Slaves in the British Sugar Colonies which, although not condemning slavery outright, provokes a vicious response from West-Indian slaveholders, thereby opening a public debate about slavery and the slave trade.