@esmicultura @historianegra365 - 🇵🇷 On March 22, 1873, slavery was "abolished" in Puerto Rico, BUT with one significant caveat. The slaves were not emancipated; they had to BUY their own freedom, at whatever price was set by their last masters. The law required that the former slaves work for another three years for their former masters, other people interested in their services, or for the "state" in order to pay some compensation. The former slaves earned money in a variety of ways: some by trades, for instance as shoemakers, or laundering clothes, or by selling the produce they were allowed to grow, in the small patches of land allotted to them by their former masters. In a sense, they resembled the black sharecroppers of the southern U.S. after the American Civil War, but the latter did not own their land. They simply farmed another's land, for a share of the crops raised. The government created the Protector's Office which was in charge of overseeing the transition. The Protector's Office was to pay any difference owed to the former master once the initial contract expired. The majority of the freed slaves continued to work for their former masters, but as free people, receiving wages for their labor. If the former slave decided not to work for his former master, the Protectors Office would pay the former master 23% of the former slave's estimated value, as a form of compensation. #afroboricua #blackhistory #aboliciondelaesclavitud #historianegra #emancipación #puertorico #afrodecendiente https://www.instagram.com/p/BvcX-anlo6B/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=suofd47iopwk