Origins of slavery in the US

[Hobbes42]

Almost 30 million slaves are in the world today. Your posit “a uniquely American tragedy” is way off the mark. Stop making it “bad” white Americans as the root for a view (progressive ideology) that capitalism and America must be lessened. I suspect the topic points to a redistribution for the errors of the past. If that is an intent, then to white and black northerners, have “to pay a fair share”.

How does it parallels modern society? Please elaborate, because I see no parallel and would like to see another POV. The Great Society and seeded by a New Deal created generations of mostly black raced people (just reporting facts based upon statistics) who are well below the “defined” poverty line.

So, if it doesn’t agree with your narrow world view, it’s an evil Progressive conspiracy?

This post has nothing to do with current policy. The poster said nothing about redistribution of anything. Please stop interjecting Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh talking points into what was meant to be a thoughtful historical discussion.

 

[Zoltan_Cobalt]

Don’t take it too personal. I don’t get the impression you are being blamed.

Thanks, Thinking. I feel a lot better now.

So why are we discussing this subject?

Black Americans enjoy the highest standard of living in the world today.

Slavery is not practiced in the United States. The muslim countries have cornered the market and remain the largest slave traders world wide…as they have for centuries.

Maybe it is time to move on…?

 

[tabycat]

So, if it doesn’t agree with your narrow world view, it’s an evil Progressive conspiracy?

This post has nothing to do with current policy. The poster said nothing about redistribution of anything. Please stop interjecting Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh talking points into what was meant to be a thoughtful historical discussion.

The omly one poster mentioned Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh and their “talking points”. I will let you (Hobbes42) figure out who it is.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I recall reading that there was a sort of deficit in English law regarding slavery. Slavery had a long history in the Mediterranean area, and a lot of Church influence on it. Among continental nations it was similar to indentured servitude, it always being understood that every slave would become a free person at some point. And intermarriage wasn’t considered impossible either, as the mixed ancestry of many in southern Louisiana would testify.

Britain had essentially no legal development in the area of slavery, so when it suddenly became a big part of English trade and plantation operation in the New World, they fell back on the “Law of Chattels”. Chattels, in English law, being essentially personal property as opposed to the law of real estate. The term is taken from the word “cattle”.

That’s why slavery in the U.S. is sometimes referred to as “Chattel slavery”. Unlike the Mediterranean notion, slaves in that system did not have human status, but the status of personal property like a horse, a cow, a pocket watch, a bin of corn.

So it was different here from what it was in, say, Louisiana. In fact, when Louisiana became a state there was a lot of argumentation about the status of slaves and who, exactly, was a slave and who was not.

But while chattel slavery could be, and was, cruel, it varied a great deal from place to place and depending on the nature of the slave. Young, physically capable male slaves were extremely expensive, and it would be incredibly stupid to abuse, kill or starve such a slave. The cost was roughly equivalent to that of a very large and expensive new tractor today. People don’t ordinarily buy a $90,000 tractor and immediately put sugar in the gas tank or set it afire. Old, physically weak or otherwise less than “prime” slaves went for less; sometimes a lot less, and were probably the ones most abused.

Some slaves lived little differently from the way the owners did. That was particularly true on small farms that maybe had one or two slaves who did the very same work the master did. Prior to the Civil War, most farms in a lot of the south were pretty small and raised staples. The big “agribusiness” plantations were few, required an immense amount of capital, and had a lot of slaves for high dollar cash crops like cotton, sugar or tobacco. Those were the worst places for a slave to be, because the owner likely didn’t know the slaves personally and might have turned the whole thing over to overseers anyway. The skill required was lower, and the slave less expensive as a result. That, in the Missippi Valley, for example, gave rise to the saying “selling someone down the river”. A slave in, say, Cape Girardeau, Missouri, didn’t have it all that bad, but being sold into some of the giant plantations in the Deep South was a terrible fate.

In the extreme eastern part of the south, but not only there, there were highly skilled slaves that were almost beyond price and were paid by their owners in order to keep them around and dedicated to what they were doing. Sometimes the price of service was eventual freedom.

So, it was a bad thing, but it varied a lot, and it really isn’t possible to characterize it accurately with sweeping generalizations.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I guess I didn’t address WHY there was slavery at all in the U.S. My impression is that it was economic. There was a lot of land to be had; some of it very fertile. Europe (as well as the U.S., but the European population was a lot bigger) had a nearly insatiable appetite for plantation crops like tobacco, cotton, and sugar. Those commodities brought a very good price. Lacking the harvesting machines that do the work now, it was planted by men behind mules or horses, weeded by hand, picked by hand and largely processed by hand.

So, people with a lot of money could buy big segments of land suited to those kinds of crops, but required a lot of hands to operate them. Nothing in English law forbade slavery. Other Africans were quite eager to get English gold and trade goods for captured people. Brit traders saw a big opportunity to make a profit, and it all just fell together.

But it still needs to be realized that big plantations were exceptional. Most people in the slave states didn’t own slaves and farmed small tracts themselves to feed their families and to sell a little surplus produce. Consequently, their products were almost always things like grain and livestock. Some few had a slave or two who was not terribly different from the “hired hand” that worked on some farms for bed and board and not much else.

Slavery didn’t work very well, though, on food-producing farms because they required too much skilled individual attention. And there were climatic influences as well. You can raise immense amounts of corn in my state (Missouri) and it’s well suited to livestock, but you can raise cotton only in the southernmost part, most of which is mountainous and not a good place to raise it anyway. Of possibly passing interest, Missouri was then the greatest producer of food products in the country, and second only to Virginia in industry. That’s why it was so important to the Union to interdict products from this state, and why it was so bitterly fought over, ultimately resulting in widespread guerilla warfare as well as some very large battles between regular armies. Wilson’s Creek was the largest battle of the war until Shiloh and Wesport was the largest cavalry engagement in the entire war.

 

[Catholic_farmer]

Thank you very much for your thoughtful replies. We just returned to a visit to Washington DC and I suppose it’s impossible to walk through our Capitol and enjoy the historical sites and museums without pondering who we are and how we got here. It was an interesting time of reflection and, also, explanation, because our six year old son was learning about some of our darkest periods in history.

A couple of interesting facts I learned. Yes, indeed, George Washington owned slaves. He inherited forty and there were more than two hundred at the time of his death. In his will, he directed that all slaves were to be freed upon Martha’s death. He had hoped other Virginia planters would follow his example. However, he had no heirs. A few others did free their slaves.

It is well-known that Thomas Jefferson struggled with slavery (even while fathering children with Sally Hemmings).

These men showed a level of discomfort with slavery, but failed to act on it. Would they have acted on it if they knew how much worse it would become?

There are many historical examples of cultures or societies that allowed themselves to be convinced that other humans were somehow unworthy of the same dignity and respect as themselves.

 

[Catholic_farmer]

Special thanks to Ridgerunner for providing so many clues to this puzzle. Also, thank you Carmel Jerome and Brass Ankles.

The dehumanization of others is a powerful way to justify brutality. Whether it’s done by white slave owners towards blacks, German Nazis towards Jews, or Al Qaeda towards the Western world.

 

[Joie_de_Vivre]

When considering the history of slavery in America it is important to note that the United States was the only country in the history of the world to fight a war to end slavery. Hundreds of thousands of white men died for that cause including my ancestors from New York.

To this date, no black person has ever thanked me. But, by the tone of your statements, I get the feeling I am somehow to blame for slavery.

The US did not fight a war to end slavery, it fought a war to crush traitors. The Emancipation Proclamation freed no Union slaves.

 

[Mickey_Finn]

Freedom, as we know it now was in short supply back then. Sailors were generally pressed into service as were soldiers. apprenticeship, and indentured servitude abounded. It’s really pointless for modern men, even those who have served, and seen the world at it’s worst, to try to wrap their minds around the early slave owners. I can’t myself imagine that slave ownership was the most efficient way to run a farming operation. So, there must have been some other motivation behind it. Cruelty, status, and a desire to be better are my best guesses.

Americans are a rough and tumble bunch not known for their refinement, or manners. So, it’s no wonder the early traveler found better treatment in Europe. Native Americans reported much the same.

The war between the state was about slavery, and that is how history will remember it.

It’s no wonder the attempts to use Irish slaves failed. You couldn’t get the Irish workers to do much besides Pray, Drink, and strike for better wages.

ATB

 

[Ridgerunner]

It’s no wonder the attempts to use Irish slaves failed. You couldn’t get the Irish workers to do much besides Pray, Drink, and strike for better wages.

ATB

I realize you’re being ironic, but the Irish “wage slaves” of the 19th Century were hardly better off than black slaves, and sometimes worse off. Injure a slave at work and you have sustained a severe economic setback. Injure an Irishman at work and you fire him and hire another.

It was not a lot better for Italians. My own great-grandfather could get no work other than in the deep coal mines in Kansas. There were no black workers doing it because they could get better work than that. Italians couldn’t.

And, of course, after the Civil War there were a lot of young men, particularly in the South, who were destitute and had no prospects whatever. That’s where the cowboys came from. Food, some equipment and a terrible wage if you made it to the railhead alive. That’s all there was for them.

It was a tough era. But it could be worse in Europe. My Irish ancestors fled the Famine. My Alsatian ancestors were tired of getting drafted first into this army, then into that one, and sent out to shoot at each other from 10 yards away.

Of possible interest, slavery probably would not have lasted ten years longer than it did even without the Civil War, as alternative sources for the “industrial cash crops” were developed. Prices collapsed for their products shortly after the war. The plantation system based on cotton, tobacco, rice and sugar was doomed. It just wasn’t known yet. And they never recovered their former profitability. It’s interesting that all of those crops are heavily subsidized in the U.S. today because they’re just not competitive with foreign producers.

 

[BrassAnkles]

The US did not fight a war to end slavery, it fought a war to crush traitors. The Emancipation Proclamation freed no Union slaves.

Tell that to blacks who’s ancestors were in shackles before the Civil War.

 

[Catholic_farmer]

Today’s gospel reading was timely. How could anyone read that and justify the way they treated black slaves in the US? It is very clear both slave and master were equal (plus, the Roman view of slaves was quite different).

 

[MomaMary8]

Thie book White Cargo is quite an interesting read to learn more about the beginnings of slavery in Northern America. After reading this, you will think differently about indentured servants. Many were never released. They were, in real terms, slaves.

amazon.com/White-Cargo-Forgotten-History-Britains/dp/0814742963

Another point to remember is that only a very small percentage of captured Africans were taken to North America to be sold into slavery. The vast majority went to the Caribbean and south America.

gilderlehrman.org/history-by-era/slavery-and-anti-slavery/resources/facts-about-slave-trade-and-slavery

 

[Catholic_farmer]

Thank you for the links. The story of Cromwell’s slaves was something not taught in history classes growing up. It was all about indentured servants, which were quite different and came by choice. Irish Catholic slaves were taken by force because they held positions in Ireland or were troublemakers. They were chained in the holds of ships under force and sold on the block in Williamsburg, Virginia and Barbados.

But, that was nothing compared to what the African slaves endured for over 200 years. Slavery officially ended about 150 years ago, but equality took another 100 years. Deep scars. Perhaps when enough generations pass that don’t remember what segregation was like, or when everyone feels that they have a chance at the good life, we will finally heal.

 

[Joie_de_Vivre]

Tell that to blacks who’s ancestors were in shackles before the Civil War.

Freeing of slaves was incidental to the Union fighting the Confederacy.

 

[exnihilo]

I hope there might be some folks on here that have studied colonial American and US history more than I have. There is a question that is bothering me. How did the American colonies develop such a brutal system of slavery? How did it change from the 1600s to the 1800s?..

How did it happen, then, that when the first slave ships arrived from Africa, the colonists somehow decided that these people could be treated much worse? How did they spiral into the thought process that degraded these people and, essentially, descend into the h-ll that became slavery in the early 1800s?..

This uniquely American tragedy played out over time and you can see that one justification led to the next, which led to the next, etc… Each time a new atrocity occurred, it was as if a little bit of time allowed it to become accepted and the downward spiral continued.

I think you have some incorrect beliefs. Slavery was not a uniquely American tragedy, if by America you mean the United States. In fact slavery in the United States was a much gentler form than in most times and places.

In history slaves often came from conquered peoples and man was constantly fighting. Acquiring slaves was common enough. Roman society was in many brutal for all sorts of people in different conditions. In Roman slavery the master actually owned the life of the slave. The master could kill his slave. It was not a crime. Of course a master is not likely to destroy valuable property, so this was not necessarily a common thing to do at any time during slavery. But in American slavery a master could not kill his slave without cause. That doesn’t mean there were not wrongful killings but there was a fundamentally different outlook.

Also the US took far less slaves from the slave trade than did the sugar islands (Cuba, Haiti etc). It also took far less slaves than Brazil. In fact as I recall at the end of the slave trade Brazil was taking 60% of slaves and the US something like 6%. Most people imagine the slave trade as mostly a US thing, but it was anything but. It is also important to distinguish the trade vs slavery itself. The slave trade had its own brutalities.

Conditions were much harder in the islands and Brazil and slaves had a much higher mortality rate. That is one reason they needed to be replenished by the slave trade whereas in the US many slaves were actually born of slave parents.

Also it is important to note that slavery ended in Cuba and Brazil about twenty years after it ended in the US.

How did it happen, then, that when the first slave ships arrived from Africa, the colonists somehow decided that these people could be treated much worse? How did they spiral into the thought process that degraded these people and, essentially, descend into the h-ll that became slavery in the early 1800s? Was it a particular generation that reacted to the arrival of Dutch ships selling these very different looking human beings? Was it the sales pitch made by the sellers? Was it a slow process of degradation…

That is a difficult subject but one aspect is that as the slave system grew masters began to fear slave revolts. After the Turner revolt in 1831 many of the laws people point as being particularly bad were passed. For instance many of the laws passed prohibiting teaching slaves to read were passed at this time. Laws restricting travel were passed. And in general people were motivated by greater fear.

Interesting some of the things people point to as being particular evils of slavery were not. For instance people will point to whippings. But until as I recall at least the 1880s whippings were still a form of discipline for the US military. Similarly desertion of your master or the US military was a capital crime.

Not all slaves were treated inhumanely. During Sherman’s March to the Sea, one of my ancestor’s plantation was burned. After the war, the slaves stuck around and even helped rebuild.

The common opinion is formed solely on the worst evidence. The rest of the story doesn’t make slavery good. But the way most people approach the subject shows a lack of interest in the whole truth.

A couple other examples. Stonewall Jackson lead a Sunday School class for slaves and taught them to read when it was illegal to do so. One of the most famous blacks from that time, George Washington Carver, was born into slavery and kidnapped at a young age. His master searched for and found him. Slavery was soon abolished and Moses Carver, his former master, raised him as he did his own children. They encouraged him on his path to becoming a great scientist.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Freeing of slaves was incidental to the Union fighting the Confederacy.

That’s true, at least in part. At the beginning of the Civil War, Missouri was a slave state. Its governor and legislature wanted to remain neutral in the war because the majority of Missourians at the time were originally from southern states, though there were increasing numbers of immigrants coming into the state from overseas. The governor foresaw a “civil war within the Civil War”, which did happen eventually, with savage guerilla warfare all over the state as well as set-piece battles.

The governor refused to allow the Union to draft Missourians for the Union army. So, the Union army in Illinois invaded the state. The legislature voted to secede, then, and the state was accepted into the Confederacy. But the Union never accepted that, took over the capitol and replaced the legislature and governor with Union men.

So, when the Emancipation Proclamation was declared, it did not apply to Missouri, because the Union did not recognize Missouri as being “in rebellion”. After the war, of course, slavery was abolished everywhere. Interestingly, Missouri was never obliged to pass reunion legislation as the “eleven” were. So, depending on one’s point of view, it may be the only Confederate state left.

Therefore, when it comes to Missouri, at least, it really wasn’t about slavery.

 

[exnihilo]

Catholic Farmer - good question. I am from South Carolina and the answer to your question is quite simple - racism. Unlike in other areas of the Americas the US was unique because it was mostly Protestant, which for the most part prohibited if not frowned on intermarry because of the beliefs that blacks were less than human. In fact this attitude remains to this day in the US, especially the Southeastern US and can easily be witnessed by the fact that there are many segregated Protestant churches in the South, if not the outright majority.

On the other hand since the Latin part of America was mostly Catholic there was no prohibition against intermarriage and thus there was little dehumanization due to racism of the Africans because the majority of the slave owners would have been mulatto. This is not to say there isn’t racism in Latin America, there is, but is definitely less in it’s degree of racism overall.

You seem to be making the case regarding slavery that Catholicism is better than Protestantism. How do you work in the facts that the biggest slave traders where Catholics, the places with the highest slave mortalities were Catholic, and the last countries in the West to end slavery were Catholic?

Regarding churches today, there is plenty of segregation. But there have been plenty of ethnic Catholic Churches in the US. Man tends to stick with those that he views as like him. That is not a Protestant or Catholic thing.

I realize you’re being ironic, but the Irish “wage slaves” of the 19th Century were hardly better off than black slaves, and sometimes worse off. Injure a slave at work and you have sustained a severe economic setback. Injure an Irishman at work and you fire him and hire another.

First off you added a lot of good points to this discussion.

The part about wage slaves is very important to a full understanding. I recollect a story from New Orleans. A foreign observer, as I recall, noticed that the Irish were working loading freight in the ship’s cargo hold. They had to stand underneath the cargo as it was lowered, which was dangerous. The slaves were not doing this work. The observer asked why that was and someone explained that they didn’t want to risk their property on such dangerous work when they could just pay a laborer.

The US did not fight a war to end slavery, it fought a war to crush traitors. The Emancipation Proclamation freed no Union slaves.

It is true enough, that according to Lincoln himself he did not fight to end slavery. It is also true the EP freed not Union slaves. It allowed slavery to remain in Maryland, West Virginia (created during the war and controlled by the Union), counties of VA controlled by the Union Army and parishes of LA controlled by the Union. The EP, an easy read, freed slaves everywhere the Union had no control and nowhere it did. Throughout history, including the Revolutionary War, warring parties ‘freed’ their opponents slaves in an attempt to cause a slave revolt. Finally, I do agree the purpose of the war was to crush, but the targets were not traitors but men merely seeking to exercise the right proclaimed in the Declaration of Independence to dissolve political bonds.

 

[Zoltan_Cobalt]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Joie de Vivre View Post
The US did not fight a war to end slavery, it fought a war to crush traitors. The Emancipation Proclamation freed no Union slaves.

It is true enough, that according to Lincoln himself he did not fight to end slavery. It is also true the EP freed not Union slaves. It allowed slavery to remain in Maryland, West Virginia (created during the war and controlled by the Union), counties of VA controlled by the Union Army and parishes of LA controlled by the Union. The EP, an easy read, freed slaves everywhere the Union had no control and nowhere it did. Throughout history, including the Revolutionary War, warring parties ‘freed’ their opponents slaves in an attempt to cause a slave revolt. Finally, I do agree the purpose of the war was to crush, but the targets were not traitors but men merely seeking to e.

The root cause and primary reason the Civil War was fought was SLAVERY. I refer you to the many Secessionist Documents or Orders presented by the southern slave states.

 

[CHRISTINE77]

Today’s gospel reading was timely. How could anyone read that and justify the way they treated black slaves in the US? It is very clear both slave and master were equal (plus, the Roman view of slaves was quite different).

The English somehow manage to come off squeaky clean in regards to slavery but they were the very ones responsible for the slave trade. Remember it was the Trianglular Trade that was responsible for American slaves. The English made vast fortunes off this.

The triangular trade routes were pivotal to the practise of Mercantilism by England by which colonies had one main purpose: to enrich the parent country (England). The premise of Trade was that the different regions would trade goods that they had in abundance in exchange for those goods which were needed but lacking in their own region. Money did not change hands.

Slavery had existed in Africa since ancient times. Enslaved Africans became part of the international trade network of the period used extensively by the Spanish and the Portuguese in the Americas. The English became involved with the Slave Trade and the pattern of Triangular Trade across the Atlantic was formed. Sir John Hawkins is often considered to be the pioneer of the British slave trade, because he was the first to run the Triangular trade route across the Atlantic, making a profit at every stop.

Leg 1: Ships from England would go to Africa carrying iron products, cloth, trinkets and beads, guns and ammunition. The ships traded these goods for slaves, gold and spices (pepper)
Leg 2: Ships from Africa would go to the American Colonies via the route known as the ‘Middle Passage’. The slaves were exchanged for goods from the Americas, destined for the Slave Plantations
Leg 3: Ships from the Americas would then take raw materials back to England. The English would use the raw materials to make ‘finished goods’
And the same process would start all over again…

Triangular Trade, coupled with the policy of Mercantilism, provided a “favorable balance of trade” so that gold and silver would not flow out of England to purchase raw materials and food from the colonies. Neither would gold and silver flow out of the colonies for much needed manufactured goods. However, Colonists brought in much more than they sent out so, the balance of trade was in England’s favor. England also prospered because the raw materials from the colonies were used to make different products in England - finished goods have a higher value than raw materials. Add to this the duties (taxes) collected by England on goods imposed by the Navigation Acts, the Sugar Act, the Townshend Acts and the Tea Act it becomes clear why the American Revolution was inevitable.

The Triangular Trade ended in the 1800’s. The reasons the Triangular Trade ended were:

The introduction of steam powered ships which meant Atlantic trade was not dependent on the trade winds
The American Revolution
The Abolition of Slavery