Slow News Day? The AP Gets Hysterical About Study That Shows Slavery-Era Laws Are Still Cited Today

Amy Curtis | 6:00 PM on February 28, 2025

The Associated Press deserves to be iced out of the White House Press Pool, and not because of the 'Gulf of America' brouhaha.

Rather, they should be shunned and shamed for being blatant propagandists and troublemakers (there are countless examples, but this one about how Shiri, Ariel, and Kfir Bibas died is a good example of it).

They're back again to add another entry to the list of the reasons they suck:

Law school project finds slavery citations still being used today https://t.co/12NlzshWok
— The Associated Press (@AP) February 28, 2025

...okay?

The caselaw from the era of slavery is still caselaw and will still be cited.

Here's what the AP writes:

An 1842 U.S. Supreme Court ruling overturning the kidnapping conviction of a white man who seized a Black family and forced them into slavery south of the Mason-Dixon line is still being cited in American jurisprudence, 160 years after enslaved people throughout the U.S. were freed.
Prigg v. Pennsylvania has been cited in 274 other rulings since then, according to the Citing Slavery Project at Michigan State University. They are among more than 7,000 direct citations of slavery-law precedents that continue to guide lawyers and judges, said the project’s director, law professor Justin Simard.
This research into the lasting impact of legal principles related to the ownership of other humans is a counterpoint to efforts by the Trump administration and elected officials in Republican-led states to remove references to America’s racial history and dictate what teachers can discuss in classrooms.

You'll be (not) shocked to learn that supposedly racist caselaw isn't always racist, though:

Fun fact: Slave-era court rulings depriving Black people of gun rights are still being cited today to justify - you guessed it - more gun control directed primarily at Black people.
— Hostage Puppy (@Mike___Kilo) February 28, 2025