Freedmen News

Systems Make Reparations Possible — and Sustain Them Reparations have never been paid in isolation. Historically, reparations succeed only when government payment is paired with a supported system that defines eligibility, verifies beneficiaries, and administers distribution. This is not a theoretical framework — it is how reparations have actually been implemented, including by the United States. What is often left out of the conversation is a second historical truth: many p

Today is January 1. While many people recognize this date as New Year’s Day, it also holds deep historical meaning in the story of emancipation in the United States. On January 1, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. This executive order declared that enslaved people held in Confederate-controlled states were legally free. While it did not immediately free every enslaved person, it fundamentally altered the legal status of slavery and reshaped

The American Freedmen Legal Fund (AFLF) has completed an enforcement action that resulted in the takedown and restriction of a website that was using the protected designation SOULAAN without authorization. The website presented SOULAAN as a race-based or African Diaspora identity and incorporated the designation into monetized content. This framing was unauthorized and materially inconsistent with the legal status, governance, and cultural protections that govern SOULAAN. SO