Slavery and sacred texts. The Bible, the constitution, and historical consciousness in antebellum America.

In the aftermath, anti-slavery constitutionalism (which used the Declaration of Independence as a lens through which to read the constitution) and Garrisonian anti-constitutionalism both contributed to the historicisation of founding-era documents. Key to Watkins's argument is "original expectations" - antebellum appeals from both pro-slavery and anti-slavery interpreters to era-specific intentions. This chapter is less about the historicisation of sacred texts and more about black people as historical actors - a vital and welcome contribution, though somewhat tangential to the argument Watkins has been developing. [Extracted from the article]