The enslavement of Africans in Boston began less than a decade after the city was founded. Beginning in 1638, the enslavement of Blacks in Boston began a legacy of social, political, economic and cultural injustice. At one point during the city history 1 in 10 Boston residents were enslaved people who were linked to the trans-Atlantic slave trade. In 1773 Belinda Sutton filed the earliest known petition for reparations in Boston. In 2018 the New Democracy Coalition initiated an effort to change the name of Faneuil Hall as a reparations project. In 2023, The New Democracy Coalition created the Boston Reparations Project. The project has initiated the Boston People's Commission for Reparations.