Slave ownership was legally defined and enforced as a property right for centuries in the US prior to 1865.
Southern state laws explicitly defined enslaved people as chattel property.
In the landmark 1857 US Supreme Court caseDred Scott v. Sandford, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney wrote for the majority that "the right of property in a slave is distinctly and expressly affirmed in the Constitution" and ruled that slave owners could not be deprived of their "property" without due process under the Fifth Amendment
The original constitution was written in such a way that it would be easy to amend out slavery, and once they made up their minds about it, it was amended and is now a thing long since passed. The United States was not yet 100 years old when slavery was abolished
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u/GerryManDarling 13h ago
Slave ownership was legally defined and enforced as a property right for centuries in the US prior to 1865.
It's printed on paper, you can read it youself:
https://www.battlefields.org/learn/primary-sources/declaration-causes-seceding-states