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Tocqueville  understood  then that  the  condition  of slavery  would have  lasting  detrimental  effects  on the relationship  of the races  in America.    He offered no solution then.    As neither a social historian nor a psychologist, I  cannot offer an opinion on how  slavery has literally affected us as Americans.    What I can do is to use the Carroll Park Foundation'  research on Carroll's  Hundred  as  a lens through which the public will be able to see the past more clearly.    It is only in knowing where we came from that we can ever hope to know where we are going, and to avoid the future which de Tocqueville   predicted.
[Excerpt from Testimony of Mr. Lewis Fields, Executive Director, The Maryland  African  American  Tourism  Council]
With regard to what in my view were some of the most important special  characteristics  of slavery  in  Maryland,  Frederick  Douglas said it best:
A city slave is a sweet is a sweet citizen.    He enjoys privileges unknown to the whipped driven slave  on the plantation.    Life in Baltimore even when most oppressive  was   a  paradise  compared  to  plantation