Slavery was a huge controversial issue up until the mid 1800s. James Monroe was the fifth president of the United States. His family owned slaves his whole life, and he took after that. He owned 30-40 slaves when he was old enough to operate his own plantation. By the age of 24, his plantation was already flourishing. Monroe was racist and treated the slaves that he owned very poorly and with no grace. He did, however, try to discover a gradual end to enslaved persons. He was very similar to president Andrew Jackson, who also owned slaves. Slavery was the source of Jackson’s wealth. He started off only owning nine enslaved African Americans, but after 25 years that number grew to over 100. “At the time of his death in 1845, Jackson owned approximately
