It was one of the compromises of the Constitution that the slave property in the Southern States should be recognized as property throughout the United States.
If anything is life-changing, being the descendant of a slave is.
I knew from reading about Sarah Grimke that she'd been given a handmaid to be her personal slave and that her name was Hetty. The only other fact I knew about her was that Sarah taught her to read: They conspired in a very subversive way, by locking the door and screening the keyhole.
It's funny: over time, if you're fortunate, you build a nice career, and you have these interesting moments, and I would not, looking back, trade any of them - 'Red Tails,' '12 Years a Slave' and 'Undercover Brother.'
I come from a family of servants. My father's father was a servant, and my father's father's father was a slave.
When people slave over those scripts and pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for them, they don't usually want you to add farts.
Most people say they're slaves, but in my opinion, to say that I am a slave is to take ownership of actually being a slave - to be a tool, be a thing. Basically cattle.
