So will this be a remember how evil the US is day, or a remember how big the french slave trade was day?

If I remember the numbers correctly, 500,000 slaves went to the British North American colonies, 15 million went to the Caribbean (and possibly South America and/or its outlying islands), 6 million went to the Middle East, and 3 million went to Europe.

US/UK shipments during the middle passage - about 1,500.

French shipments -- about 4,200.

The issue of slavery is a wound for a large number of our fellow citizens, notably overseas

Yes, of course. Overseas. You know, over there.

They will ignore, of course, the Islamic slave trade.

You mean, of course, the still ongoing muzzie slave trade. Still practicing slavery and animal and human sacrifice in the name of religion.

There's double entente in the "overseas" reference. Don't forget the French West Indies, Martinique and Guadeloupe in the Carribbean. Vacationed there quite a few years ago and saw a lot of quiet resentment there.

-- Kathy K

It is the French method as much as hope to bury French history through brazenness.

Jack might have pointed out that France so hated slavery she abolished it twice. When abolition proved economically inconvenient, the lofty Republican Déclaration des Droits de l'Homme et du Citoyen was tossed and slavery re-instated. When France could no longer suppress black discontent, she abolished slavery a second time. This double abolition is by far the more noteworthy French distinction than France's empty pronouncement of slavery as a crime against humanity. We've never seen France in the lead in Darfur or elsewhere.

For a fuller discussion of the French crocodile tears shed over French slavery, click here and here.

There is also this instructive read on the persistence of French slave trade following the British ban of 1807:

Four nations objected strongly to surrendering their rights to trade slaves: Spain, Portugal, Brazil (after its independence), and France. Britain used every tool at its disposal to try to induce these nations to follow its lead. Portugal and Spain, which were indebted to Britain after the Napoleonic Wars, slowly agreed to accept large cash payments to first reduce and then eliminate the slave trade. By 1853 the British government had paid Portugal over three million pounds, and Spain over one million in order to end the slave trade. Brazil, however, did not agree to stop trading in slaves until Britain took military action against its coastal areas and threatened a permanent blockade of the nation's ports in 1852.

For France, the British first tried to impose a solution during the negotiations at the end of the Napoleonic Wars, but Russia and Austria did not agree. The French people and government had deep misgivings about conceding to Britain's demands. Not only did Britain demand that other nations ban the slave trade, but also demanded the right to police the ban. The Royal Navy had to be granted permission to search any suspicious ships and seize any found to be carrying slaves, or equipped for doing so. It is especially these conditions that kept France involved in the slave trade for so long. While France formally agreed to ban the trading of slaves in 1815, they did not allow Britain to police the ban, nor did they do much to enforce it themselves. Thus a large black market in slaves continued for many years. While the French people had originally been as opposed to the slave trade as the British, it became a matter of national pride that they not allow their policies to be dictated to them by Britain. Also such a reformist movement was viewed as tainted by the conservative backlash after the revolution. The French slave trade thus did not come to a complete halt until 1848.

Une Nation qui rayonne dans le monde. ...Pfft.

Just who does Jack think is lining up to admire France?

DGB