Assembly Bill A8284

                             
                     S T A T E   O F   N E W   Y O R K
 ________________________________________________________________________
 
                                   8284
 
                        2025-2026 Regular Sessions
 
                           I N  A S S E M B L Y
 
                                May 8, 2025
                                ___________
 
 Introduced  by M. of A. LUCAS -- read once and referred to the Committee
   on Governmental Operations
 
 AN ACT to establish a New York State Freedmen's Bureau;  and  making  an
   appropriation therefor
 
   THE  PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, REPRESENTED IN SENATE AND ASSEM-
 BLY, DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:

   Section 1. This act shall be known and may be cited as the  "New  York
 State Freedmen's Bureau Act".
   §  2. Legislative intent. The legislature makes the following findings
 and declarations:
   (a) Approximately 450,000+ Africans were trafficked  and  enslaved  in
 the  United  States  and the colonies that became the United States from
 1619 to 1865, inclusive.  At  the  peak  of  slavery  their  descendants
 numbered 4,000,000.
   (b)  The  institution  of slavery was constitutionally and statutorily
 sanctioned by the United States from 1776 through 1865, inclusive.
   (c) The chattel slavery that flourished in the United  States  consti-
 tuted  an  immoral  and inhumane deprivation of Africans' life, liberty,
 citizenship rights, and cultural heritage and denied them the fruits  of
 their own labor.
   (d)  A  preponderance  of  scholarly, legal, and community evidentiary
 documentation, as well as popular culture markers, constitute the  basis
 for  inquiry  into the ongoing effects of the institution of slavery and
 its legacy embodied in persistent systemic structures of  discrimination
 on living descendants of persons enslaved in the United States, American
 Freedmen.
   (e)  Contrary  to  what  many  people  believe, slavery was not just a
 southern institution. Prior to the American Revolution, there were  more
 enslaved Africans in New York City than in any other city except Charle-
 ston,  South  Carolina.  During this period, slaves accounted for 20% of
 the population of New York and approximately 40% of  colonial  New  York
 households  owned  slaves. In 1799 the New York State Legislature passed
 "An Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery". This  legislation  was  a
 first  step in the direction of emancipation but did not have an immedi-
 
              

  EXPLANATION--Matter in ITALICS (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
                       [ ] is old law to be omitted.
                                                            LBD08267-03-5
 A. 8284                             2
 
 ate effect on or affect all enslaved people.  Rather,  it  provided  for
 gradual  manumission.  All children born to enslaved women after July 4,
 1799, would be freed, but only after their most productive years: age 28
 for  men  and  age  25  for women. Enslaved persons already in servitude
 before July 4, 1799, were reclassified as "indentured servants", but  in
 reality, remained enslaved for the duration of their lives. In 1817, the
 Legislature  enacted  a  statute  that gave freedom to New York enslaved
 people who had been born before July  4,  1799.  This  statute  did  not
 become  effective until July 4, 1827, however, despite these laws, there
 were exceptions under which certain  persons  could  still  own  slaves;
 non-residents  could  enter  New York with slaves for up to nine months,
 and part-time residents were allowed to  bring  their  slaves  into  the
 state  temporarily.  The  nine-month  exception  remained  law until its
 repeal in 1841 when the North was redefining itself as the "free" region
 in advance of the Civil War.
   (f) Following the abolition of slavery, the United  States  government
 at  the  federal,  state,  and  local  levels  continued  to perpetuate,
 condone, and often profit from practices that  maintained  brutalization
 and  disadvantage  for  descendants  of  persons  enslaved in the United
 States, American Freedmen, including but not  limited  to  Black  Codes,
 sharecropping,  convict  leasing,  Jim  Crow  laws, lynching, redlining,
 unequal education, etc.
   (g) As a result of the badges and incidents of slavery, Jim Crow,  and
 continued  targeted  discriminatory  policy,  the descendants of persons
 enslaved in the United States, American  Freedmen,  continue  to  suffer
 debilitating economic, educational, and health hardships.
   §  3.  Definition.  For  the  purposes of this act, the term "American
 Freedmen" shall mean those persons who have at least one  ancestor  that
 was  enslaved  in  the  United States of America, who was emancipated in
 1863 by way of the Emancipation Proclamation or in 1865 by  way  of  the
 13th Amendment to the Constitution, and have been despoiled their rights
 as citizens due to the badges, incidents and vestiges of slavery.
   §  4. Establishment, purpose, and duties of the bureau. (a) Establish-
 ment. There is hereby established the New York State Freedmen's  Bureau,
 which may be referred to in this act as the "bureau".
   (b) Duties. The bureau shall perform the following duties:
   (i)  Develop  programs  for American Freedmen which focus on community
 life, education, and workforce development.
   (ii) Connect  American  Freedmen  with  their  lineage  using  methods
 including, but not limited to, genealogical research.
   (iii)  Designate  individuals  who  are American Freedmen as the popu-
 lation that will be the focus and sole  beneficiaries  of  the  bureau's
 programs.
   (iv)  Be  the  central  administrator  of  programs recommended by the
 bureau which become law.
   § 5.  Appropriation. The sum of fifty million  dollars  ($50,000,000),
 or  so  much  thereof as may be necessary, is hereby appropriated to the
 New York State Freedmen's Bureau from any moneys in the  state  treasury
 in  the  general  fund  to  the credit of the state purposes account not
 otherwise appropriated for the purposes of carrying out  the  provisions
 of  this  act. Such sum shall be payable on the audit and warrant of the
 state comptroller on vouchers certified or approved by the  director  of
 the New York State Freedmen's Bureau, or their duly designated represen-
 tative in the manner provided by law.
   § 6. This act shall take effect immediately.