History Memes

Didn’t Washington stalk and harass his half-sister-in-law (who was a slave who escaped him) till his deathbed…

As far as I know, he didn't have any 'half-sister-in-law' who was a slave. You may be thinking of Oney Judge, whom he did not hold full legal rights to.

Ig tbf coulda just been gender slavery rather than race slavery, but idk I’d say he was against people as property.

I never mean (unless some particular circumstance should compel me to it) to possess another slave by purchase: it being among my first wishes to see some plan adopted by the legislature by which slavery in the Country may be abolished by slow, sure, & imperceptible degrees.

There is not a man living who wishes more sincerely than I do, to see a plan adopted for this abolition of [slavery] but there is only one proper and effectual mode by which it can be accomplished, & that is by Legislative authority.

Were it not then, that I am principled agt. [sic] selling Negroes, as you would Cattle in the market, I would not, in twelve months from this date, be possessed of one as a slave.

He was not the most radical of men on the issue - he was a stodgy old patrician who believed in doing things the 'right' way, even if the 'right' way was morally abhorrent and tediously slow. Even his participation in the American Revolution was only the result of decades of failure to negotiate on the part of the British government. But ultimately, by the end of the Revolutionary War, he was not a supporter of slavery, and he was a private opponent of slavery.