Governor Jack Markell is set to sign a measure that apologizes for Delaware’s role in the institution of slavery.
The measure acknowledges the cruelty and brutality of not only slavery but the injustice of the Jim Crow laws that imposed segregation for the next hundred years.
On the 150 anniversary of the ratification of the 13th amendment that ended slavery Markell said it was essential that the state publicly acknowledge the everlasting damage of “those sins.”
The Wilmington News Journal reports that last year the governor posthumously pardoned the Delaware abolitionist Samuel Burris who was convicted of helping slaves escape to freedom through the Underground Railroad.
The ceremony takes place at 10 a.m. in Dover.
