A newspaper in the U.S. apologized profusely Friday for publishing a cartoon comparing "a slave ship packed tight with human beings brought to America for a life of forced servitude with the discomfort of airline seating."

In an editorial, Lancaster Online president John A. Kirkpatrick III and Barb Roda, the paper's executive editor, wrote, "To somehow link the inconveniences of air travel with slavery in general and the slave ships in particular was not only just plain wrong it was deeply hurtful to our African American community and all those who understand the horrors inflicted on the men and women forced into the slave trade.

"It both trivialized and demeaned their experience."

The paper said the cartoon was not drawn by someone on its staff, but took responsibility for deciding to run it.

One of the paper's readers lauded the paper's decision saying, "The apology Lancaster Newspapers published was the proper thing to do after publishing a stomach-turning cartoon — a picture that any first-year journalism student would have found improper and highly insulting to a race of people."