You know, Toussaint Louverture was a man of his time, too, and yet the constitution he signed in 1801 said: "There can be NO SLAVES on this territory; servitude has been FOREVER abolished."

And just in case there was any room for misinterpretation, the next sentence, same clause, reads: "All men are born, live and die here* free and French."

*In 1801, St. Domingue was not yet Haiti, and remained a French colony until Dessalines declared independence in 1804.

Article two of the constitution that the Emperor Dessalines signed in 1805 reads: "Slavery is forever abolished."

As it turns out, he, too, was a man of his time.

But wait, there's more, here is Henry Christophe, signing the 1807 constitution for the State of Haiti, which reads: "Slavery in Haiti is forever abolished."

#ManofHisTime

Yes, yes, that's right, Alexandre Pétion, too, in 1806 and again in 1816: "There cannot exist any slaves in the territory of the Republic; slavery is forever abolished here."

What took the US so long to catch up with the times?

What took England so long? (1833/34)
What took France so long? (1848)
What took Spain so long? (1873 for Puerto Rico/1886 for Cuba)
What took Brazil so long? (1888)