One of the most long-lasting tenets of scientific racism was environmental or climate determinism. This theory sought to explain and apply broad, sweeping prejudices towards whole populations predicated solely on their regional climate and geography. This particular form of scientific racism continues to the modern day.

The theory of natural rights evolved from natural law and arose as a rejection of many of its principles, including the divine right to monarchies. As a product of the Enlightenment, natural rights theory became the cornerstone of the Founding doctrine. But what are natural rights, and how are they defined or understood?

Slavery was posited to a natural extension of the human condition, reflecting the heirarchial structures that governed animals and religious doctrines concerning Heavenly ranks. This argument was one of the principal justifications used by pro-slavery advocates in attempts to explain and support their preferred racial caste system, but like so many others, they selectively omitted the most vital elements of this theory, especially as it was communicated by Aristotle.

The final of the three slave-clauses in the Constitution, the Fugitive Slave Clause is a masterful display of wordcraft by the Framers that assuaged the Southern slave-states while providing no enforceable mechanisms to capture or return escaped slaves.

The Three-Fifths Compromise is often elevated as the most powerful evidence against the Constitution as a document for citizenship equality and restrictions on slavery. This position, however, is untenable with an examination of the clause itself.

The Slave Trade Clause was one of the three "slave clauses" in the Constitution. It allowed for a slave-only fee, a guarantee of Federal slave-trade prohibition by 1808, and worked synergistically with other clauses to disincentivize and damage the slave trade.

The Constitution is often harangued by historical revisionists as a tool of white supremacy and slavery. This broad overview examines this position, an analysis carried into the three "slave clauses" of the Constitution: The Slave Trade Clause, Three-Fifths Compromise, and Fugitive Slave Act.

The Declaration of Independence defined America as an exception to human historical experience: a nation founded on the understanding of human equality, defying social caste and monarchy. However, these ideals would be decred and berrated by Democrats who sought to expand and protect slavery. Later Democrats, namely Stephen Douglas, would attempt to pervert and distort the historical roots of the Founding in an attempt to support the pro-slavery position of himself and his party.

Many conversations concerning slavery in American history do not begin until 1776, selectively omitting over 250 years of transplanted, coerced slavery that predated the Declaration. This context is critical in understanding the Founding and establishing an informed understanding of the institution and its major players at the time. Ultimately, the colonies that would later form the United States were responsible for a tiny share of the larger slave trade, forced to maintain and support the slave-trade by its mother nation, the British empire.