history of black civil rights

... Explain the situation regarding equality for blacks by 1940 The first blacks came to America as slaves. Slavery in the United States had its origins with the first English colonization of North America in Virginia in 1607. A 1705 Virginia law stated slavery would apply to those peoples from nations that were not Christian. Most slaves were black and were held by whites, although some Native Americans and free blacks also held slaves; there were a small number of white slaves as well. The majority of slaveholders were in the southern United States, where most slaves were engaged in an efficient machine-like gang system of agriculture, with farms of fifteen or more slaves proving to be far more productive than farms without slaves. According to the 1860 U.S. census, nearly four million slaves were held in a total population of just over 12 million in the 15 states

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