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Northam hasn't gotten to the slavery parts of Roots yet.
What's most interesting to me about this quote is what it reveals about how Northam has been trained over a lifetime to talk about America's racial history, and how difficult it's going to be for him to make the kind of pivot he's imagining.
"Indentured servants from Africa" didn't come out of nowhere. It wasn't a slip of the tongue.
Slavery as a legal institution in what would become the United States wasn't fully elaborated until well after 1619, so the legal status of the slaves (yes, slaves) who were brought from Africa that year is the subject of considerable historical discussion.
And yes, the use of laws governing indentured servitude was part of the process of constructing a legal apparatus of race-based enslavement in Virginia in the 17th century.
But no, "indentured servants from Africa" didn't land "on [Virginia's] shores" in 1619, despite the various reasons why such a phrasing would hold an appeal for some white Virginians today.
"Indentured servants from Africa" is the kind of casual gobbledygook that white politicians can get away with when they don't have a spotlight on them. I'd be shocked if this were the first time Northam had used the phrase.
And of course it's precisely because Northam has never had to talk about this stuff in a serious and coherent and thoughtful way in the past that he can imagine that it's going to be a simple process to learn how to do so now.
It's not just a matter of learning. It's also—and in many respects much more—a matter of unlearning. And unlearning is harder than learning, because adding stuff to your brain is easier than figuring out what's already there that you need to get rid of.
