FBA Lineage Standard

Working Standard v1.0: Foundational Black American is a lineage-based identity describing a person who descends from the historic Black American population established in the United States during the era of American slavery.

FBA lineage includes a person who can establish descent from at least one documented ancestor who was enslaved in the United States and also includes descendants of the historic Free Black American population present in the United States during the slavery era.

Potential Historical Records

• Federal census records, especially 1870 and earlier contextual records
• Freedmen’s Bureau and Freedman’s Bank records
• Birth, marriage, and death records
• U.S. Colored Troops and pension records
• Probate records, wills, inventories, and estate files
• Manumission and emancipation records
• Plantation and business records
• Church, cemetery, newspaper, and family records
• Other corroborated genealogical and historical records

Historical record loss is itself part of the research problem. The final evidence standard must account for missing, destroyed, incomplete, and inconsistently created records rather than treating absence of one particular document as proof that a lineage did not exist.