Explanation:The first formal protests against slavery in the colonies of North America were heard in the late seventeenth century, at the same time that the system was taking root along the continent's eastern seaboard. In 1688, a handful of German Quakers in Germantown, Pennsylvania, published a petition condemning the trading and owning of black slaves. They characterized enslavement as unlawful kidnapping and defended the seized Africans' right to armed rebellion. They asserted further that slavery was contrary to the golden rule of treating others as one would wish to be treated. In 1693, another Pennsylvania Quaker named George Keith (1639-1716) published an exhortation to his co-religionists urging them to cleanse themselves of the sin of slave holding. In making these arguments, Quakers in Pennsylvania echoed their fellow members of the Society of Friends in England and the Caribbean.
