Detroit has followed the lead of two other large cities -- Los Angeles and Chicago -- in enacting legislation that requires companies seeking contracts with the city to disclose any profits they received from slavery.

The ordinance passed last week by the Detroit City Council came after one was approved in May 2003 by the Los Angeles City Council, and another in October 2002 in Chicago.

Under these measures, companies with ties to slavery would not be barred from receiving municipal contracts. But any firm found to have falsified its slave history would have its contracts voided.

"The purpose of this ordinance is to set the groundwork for [slavery] reparations. First, you have to get the information and show the companies that benefited from the slave trade," Detroit City Councilwoman Barbara-Rose Collins, a former Democratic congresswoman from Michigan and sponsor of the Detroit ordinance, said Tuesday.

The black lawmaker put it this way last week in an interview with the Detroit News: "It has been quite a long time since African Americans were promised 40 acres and a mule. This ordinance only provides for the beginning of the process by requiring full disclosure."