"No person held to service or labour in 1 state, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation..., be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labour may be due." https://twitter.com/TomCottonAR/status/1285351458116960256

That quote is Article IV Section 2 Clause 3 of the US Constitution from 1787. Otherwise known as the fugitive slave clause, it was a portion of the Constitution that the Southern states were quite pleased with, and to which the Northern delegates assented.

"The Migration or Importation of such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the Year 1808, but a Tax or duty may be imposed on such Importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each Person."

That is Article 1, Section 9, Clause 1 of the US Constitution, 1787. This provision was a promise that the Northern states made to the Southern states that they would not outlaw the trans-Atlantic slave trade for 20 years. The South insisted upon the inclusion of that clause.

Between the ratification of the Constitution in 1789 and the abolition of the trans-Atlantic slave trade in 1808, over 100,000 enslaved people were forcibly brought to the US. The entire population of the US in 1790 was 4 million.

The majority of those 100,000 enslaved people who entered the US between 1790 and 1808 were brought to South Carolina. In 1790 SC had a total population of 249,000, 43% of whom were enslaved. By 1810 the enslaved population of SC had nearly doubled, to 196,000, 47% of the total.

By 1820, the majority of humans in South Carolina were enslaved people of African descent, 51.4% of the total.
VA-40% enslaved
GA-44% enslaved
LA-45% enslaved
MS-44% enslaved
AL-33% enslaved
NC-32% enslaved

The large numbers of enslaved people in these Southern states translated into significant political power for enslavers at the federal level, thanks to the 3/5 clause. https://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?smtID=3&psid=163

By the time of the Civil War, the monetary value of enslaved people in the US was approximately $3.5 billion, which was more than all of the nation's railroads and factories combined.

But Senator Cotton, I'm sure a Harvard educated man like yourself knows this history. You don't need me to tell you these very basic facts. But the least you could do is stop being willfully misleading about the history of the nation you claim to love so much.

As someone who loves liberty, Sen. Cotton, might I recommend this book to you about Ona Judge, a woman enslaved by the Washingtons who escaped from them when he was President, evaded his efforts to get her back, & lived as a fugitive the rest of her life? https://www.amrevmuseum.org/read-the-revolution/history/never-caught-washingtons-relentless-pursuit-their-runaway-slave-ona

Or maybe you'd be interested to learn about Hercules, one of the most talented chefs in all of the US who was enslaved by George Washington until he escaped to find his own freedom, never to return? https://www.mountvernon.org/library/digitalhistory/digital-encyclopedia/article/hercules/

Or maybe you'd be taken by the story of the great founder, Harry Washington, who was enslaved by George but then fled during the revolution and became a founder of sorts of Sierra Leone. https://www.pbs.org/wnet/african-americans-many-rivers-to-cross/history/george-washingtons-runaway-slave-harry/

Because surely, Senator Cotton, you'd never say that the *only* people who did or said things that relate to the theme of "freedom in America" were the enslavers who comprised a large portion of the people who wrote our Constitution, now would you?

I mean maybe, just maybe, black Americans both in our past and in our present have insight into the meaning of freedom in the US, past and present, that others, like yourself, could learn from. I dunno, might be worth a try not being such a snowflake sometimes.