The Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves of 1807 (2 Stat. 426, enacted March 2, 1807) is a United States federal law that stated that no new slaves were permitted to be imported into the United States. It took effect in 1808, the earliest date permitted by the United States Constitution.
This act, a part of the general trend toward abolishing the slave trade (led by Great Britain), ended the legality of the U.S.-based transatlantic slave trade. However, it was not always well enforced, and slavery itself continued in the United States until the end of the Civil War and the adoption of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution.
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—Virginia Woolf (1882–1941)