Wait, doesn't that actually support what I'm saying? I recall a shooting war in which a lot of people died as part of the process by which slavery stopped being a reality in the USA. Or is that your point?

Which kind of slavery? Wage slavery is alive and well. It is the slavery of the 21st century, and continues today. Or can you quit your job without going bankrupt due to debt unlike me and millions of others like me?

Hmm, perhaps you should consider a few differences between so called wage "slavery" and chattel slavery as practiced in pre-civil war US:

1) Modern workers are not owned from birth.

2) Debt is not forced upon you against your will, debt is a choice.

3) The alternative to choosing debt is not getting whipped nor killed.

4) Bankruptcy is neither getting whipped, nor killed.

One small note:

Debt for an individual is a choice. However our monetary system mandates that some people or entities must always be in debt. If there were no debt there would be almost no money in circulation.

So while you say that debt is a choice, it is impossible for everyone to be debt-free. If everyone stopped borrowing (consumers, industry and government) in this country, we would have a complete economic breakdown.

This is like saying smoking is a choice: from the perspective of the single potential smoker, it is. From the perspective of the marketer this is unimportant as they don't need you to smoke, they just need some people to smoke.

Not really. You're not accounting for technological progress. The "reach" of governments (and other entities that hold the power) has expanded due to the technology. Communication was a lot slower and a lot less reliable in the 19th century. So was transport, for that matter.