Key Takeaways

• California's Department of Insurance maintains an official Slavery Era Insurance Registry containing names of enslaved people, slaveholders and insurance records supplied by major insurers, including New York Life, Aetna and AIG.
• New York Life reported that 339 of the first 1,000 policies written by its predecessor, Nautilus Insurance Company, insured enslaved people, while Aetna reported finding seven policies, some covering multiple enslaved persons.
• Some of the corporate names have changed dramatically. Aetna is now part of CVS Health, while ACE — which identified slavery-era predecessors in its California submission — acquired Chubb and adopted the Chubb name in 2016.

By Samuel López | USA Herald

SACRAMENTO, Calif. - More than two decades after California ordered insurance companies to open their historical archives, an extraordinary government database remains online documenting an uncomfortable chapter in the American insurance industry's history: human beings held in slavery were once insured as property.

The California Department of Insurance's Slavery Era Insurance Registry was created following passage of SB 2199 in 2000. The Legislature declared that insurance policies discovered in company archives showed slaveholders purchasing coverage against the damage or death of enslaved people and said profits from slavery helped capitalize insurers whose successors remained in existence.

That finding was not merely historical commentary.

SB 2199 created California Insurance Code Sections 13810 through 13813 and required insurers doing business in California to research records concerning slaveholder insurance written by their predecessor corporations. California also required the names of enslaved people and slaveholders contained in those records to be made public.

California Department of Insurance Slavery Era Insurance Registry

One of the most significant disclosures came from New York Life Insurance Company.

New York Life informed California that its predecessor, Nautilus Insurance Company, began writing life insurance in 1845 and sold slaveholder policies for roughly two years before its trustees ended the practice in 1848.

According to the Department's 2002 report, 339 of Nautilus' first 1,000 policies were written on the lives of enslaved people. New York Life initially supplied California with 484 names of enslaved people and 233 slaveholders. The state's searchable registry continues to associate individual names and policy numbers with New York Life's submission.

New York Life later provided an important clarification concerning the economics of those policies. Its historical ledgers showed $7,485.24 in premiums collected on slave policies and $7,474 paid on 15 death claims — a difference of only $11.24 before expenses. The company argued that claims and administrative costs exceeded the premiums collected.

Aetna Life Insurance Company also appears prominently in California's investigation.

Aetna told regulators that Aetna Life was incorporated in Connecticut in 1853. Its investigation uncovered seven policies, some covering multiple enslaved people, and produced 16 first names from those policies. Aetna subsequently discovered a ledger containing additional names of enslaved people and slaveholders and provided those records to California.

The corporate lineage makes the disclosure particularly relevant today. Aetna remains one of America's most recognizable insurance brands and is now part of CVS Health, which reports that Aetna serves more than 26 million medical members.

American International Group, or AIG, made another significant disclosure after acquiring American General Corporation.

AIG identified United States Life Insurance Company in the City of New York as a company operating during the slavery era. Although its researchers did not locate an original policy, they found historical material reproducing a $550 policy covering the life of an enslaved man identified as "Charles." AIG also provided California names taken from U.S. Life registries.

California also received a substantive response from ACE USA.

ACE reported that it was successor to Insurance Company of North America and Aetna Fire, companies conducting business during the slavery era. Its investigation uncovered a copy of an 1855 Aetna Life policy covering an enslaved laborer named Peter.

That corporate trail now leads to another familiar insurance name.

ACE acquired Chubb in 2016 and then adopted the Chubb name. Chubb's own corporate history says Insurance Company of North America dates to 1792, was acquired by ACE in 1999, and became part of the company now operating as Chubb.

Penn Mutual, founded in 1847 and still operating today, also submitted records, but its case requires an important distinction. Penn Mutual told California that it did not write slave insurance because it was licensed only in Pennsylvania during the relevant period. It nevertheless discovered two documents in its archives concerning policies covering the deaths of enslaved people in Virginia. The documents did not identify which insurer issued them or explain how they entered Penn Mutual's archives.

California's records therefore should not be read as establishing that every company appearing in the report personally issued slave policies. The evidence varies substantially by insurer.

But in the strongest cases, the historical documentation is remarkably specific.

California's online databases identify enslaved people by name, their occupations, locations, slaveholders and, in many instances, policy numbers. Entries include people described as laborers, servants, carpenters, masons and other workers — reducing what might otherwise sound like abstract corporate history to identifiable human lives.

The California Legislature anticipated precisely that issue when it enacted SB 2199.

Insurance Code Section 13813 declares that descendants of enslaved people are entitled to "full disclosure" concerning insurance records involving ancestors who were treated as property while their owners could receive insurance compensation for their deaths or injuries.

More than 25 years after SB 2199 became law, the remarkable part of California's registry is not simply that these policies once existed.

It is that the corporate family trees did not necessarily disappear with them.

Some lead directly into major names still operating throughout America's insurance and financial-services industries today.