In chattel slavery, the law treated people as goods. Enslavers could sell family members apart, use enslaved people as collateral for loans, and pass them down in wills. A 1662 Virginia law made a child's status follow the mother, which meant children born to enslaved women were enslaved for life, no matter who their father was.
The system was built on race. Colonial and state laws tied slavery to African descent, and slave codes barred enslaved people from learning to read, testifying against white people or gathering without permission. By the 1860 census, nearly 4 million people were enslaved in the United States. Their forced labor produced the cotton that was the country's leading export.
Chattel slavery matters now because its economics and laws shaped what came after. The Thirteenth Amendment ended it in 1865 but left an exception for punishment for a crime. The wealth enslaved people produced went to enslavers and their heirs, which is one root of today's racial wealth gap and the case for reparations.