How a Founding Father and His Family Went From Slave Owners to Radical Abolitionists

History Unplugged Podcast · Nov 22, 2022 · 1h 8m

John Jay was a giant in the Founding Fathers generation. He was a diplomat, Supreme Court justice, coauthor of the Federalist Papers, and key negotiator at the Treaty of Paris, which ended the American Revolutionary War. His children and grandchildren were also key players in the Early American Republic. They pushed changes in public opinion about slavery, moving the Overtone window on slavery from support to begrudging acceptance to calls for abolition.

The changes played out over the generations in the family. Jay’s Huguenot grandfather, Augustus Jay, arrived in New York in the 1680s…