>The DoI did not release slaves, which is fairly explicit statement that slaves are people. Of course Deciding that slaves were 3/5th of a person, and slavery w

>The DoI did not release slaves, which is fairly explicit statement that slaves are people. Of course Deciding that slaves were 3/5th of a person, and slavery was legal is an explicit statement the “all men are created equal” was not something believed by the signatories of the DoI. You're treating two different documents that were written 14 years apart by two diffent, though strongly overlapping, groups of people as if they were statements someone made back to back. Did Thomas Jefferson believe the words "All Men" included the slaves he owned when he penned those words? Fuck no! But he still wrote the words in a way that men who did believe that "All Men" meant ALL men could get behind it. Compare this to how he describes the Natives. "He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions." By examining the nuance, you can start to see a fuller shape of the society. Slavery was a hot button issue that was left unspoken until the moment it unquestionably has to be addressed. The Native Americans are considered savage and warlike, and that is an uncontroversial view. I understand the impulse to fight back against whitewashed history, but throwing out all nuance isn't helpful no matter what cause it is in service to.