Mennonites didn’t want to leave behind one place of oppression to build another in America, so they circulated an antislavery petition on April 18, 1688, denouncing oppression due to skin color by equating it with oppression due to religion. Both oppressions were wrong. This petition—the 1688 Germantown Petition Against Slavery—was the first piece of writing that was antiracist (word check!) among European settlers in colonial America.
