The Detroit City Council has passed a largely symbolic ordinance that would require contractors who want to do business with the city to disclose whether their companies profited from slavery. Chicago, Los Angeles and Wayne County have enacted similar laws. Detroit's ordinance says contractors must search their backgrounds, and then sign an affidavit divulging investments and income from the slave industry ...

Click to read more ...

For the second time in a month, Bank One has filed an amended slavery disclosure affidavit with City Hall -- this time revealing fresh new details of its search for skeletons in the closets of its Louisiana predecessors. Determined to avoid a repeat of the slave disclosure controversy that has embroiled its merger partner, J.P. Morgan Chase, Bank One states in the new affidavit that Citizens Bank, formed in 1833, and Canal and Banking Co., formed in 1831, "did business in Louisiana during this era and probably did business with persons or entities that employed slaves." ...

Click to read more ...

Bank One has filed an affidavit with City Hall warning that it "owns subsidiaries that conduct business in states where slavery was practiced" and that predecessors of some of those companies may have had ties to slavery. Although Bank One checked the box that says it has "found records relating to investments or profits from slavery," the carefully worded disclosure statement filed by Bank One Capital Markets in connection with a water bond issue makes no such claim. ...

Click to read more ...