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A firm majority of Princeton's founding trustees (sixteen out of twenty-three) bought, sold, traded, or inherited slaves during their lifetimes.

As the institution of slavery slowly declined in 18th and 19th-century New Jersey, the Trustees of 1820 reflected the changing face of pro- and antislavery thought in the state—variously owning slaves, supporting gradual emancipation or African colonization, and advocating for immediate abolition.