The HIstory of Slavery - Essay Example

In history, slavery and war have both been considered inevitable consequences of human nature. Yet slavery has been abolished, and moral progress has significantly contributed to slavery's disappearance. Despite the disappearance of slavery in Great Britain, in the American and West Indian colonies of the British Empire, slavery was a way of life and for some reason, it was easier to abolish slavery in Great Britain than it was in the United States. Although slavery ended in the United States more than a century ago, its legacy continues to be a matter of dispute among scholars and the basis for contemporary debates about public policy. This is because slavery is considered the classic expression of American racism, and its effects are still perceived as the roots of the problems faced by blacks in the United States. Slavery seems to be the wound that never healed that has become the moral core of the oppression story so fundamental to the identity of blacks today. It is not surprising that the bitterness generated by recollections of slavery has turned a generation of black scholars and activists against the nation's Founding which in turn is against identification with America itself. The first group to initiate an organized campaign against slavery was the Society of Friends, the Quakers which started first in Europe in the second half of the 17th century and then in the United States. In l772, Lord Mansfield issued a landmark policy in Britain that abolished slavery on English soil. In l833, the abolition campaign of Granville Sharp, Thomas Clarkson, and especially William Wilberforce resulted in abolishment of slavery throughout the British Empire. Economic motives were a source of contribution without doubt, but scholars now agree that religious and political principles were indispensable in achieving the abolition of servitude. Antislavery campaigns soon spread to France, which made slavery illegal in its territories in l848, and to other European nations as well. The British set an example which was backed by diplomatic and even military measures and helped in eradicated slavery in all foreign areas of influence. In America, although there were many among them who shared prevailing prejudices against blacks, the abolitionist movement contained the first antiracists. Prominent abolitionists agreed that blacks were civilizationally inferior and incapable of ruling themselves. But they agreed that black inferiority is no justification for slavery; rather, it is the product of slavery itself. Some abolitionists propagated the idea of helping blacks to resettle in Africa, but those who recognized the implausibility of such schemes opined that blacks were capable of living as free people. In order to directly rebut the Southern argument that blacks were better off being ruled by a "superior" race, abolitionists began an inconspicuous quest for intelligent blacks who would be standing refutations of theories of intrinsic inferiority. Although the issue of diminishing manpower arose along with anti-slavery campaigns, yet at one point, some 400,000 Britons were refusing to eat slave-grown sugar. There were antislavery committees in practically every town in the British Isles. In 1792, 390,000 people signed protest petitions to Parliament on the subject. And the House of Commons unanimously voted to abolish the slave trade. Unfortunately, The House of Lords refused, and British slave ships continued to cross the Atlantic. Nevertheless, a great movement was under way, and ultimately with the powerful help of huge slave rebellions in the West Indies, slavery came to a stop in the British Empire a full quarter century before it did in the United States. The British antislavery movement not only initiated with astounding suddenness, it pioneered virtually every major technique of political organization used even to this date like consumer boycott, answer a direct mail appeal, put up a political poster, paste the logo of an environmental group on transport vehicles, or join a national lobbying organization with local chapters . In the United States, although there were several groups that opposed slavery (such as The Society for the Relief of Free American Black People Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage), at the time of the founding of the Republic, there were few states which prohibited slavery outright. The Constitution actually had provisions which accommodated slavery, although none used the word. Abolitionism as a principle was much more than just a wish to limit the extent of slavery. Many North Americans recognized that slavery existed in the South and the Constitution did not allow the federal government to intervene in these areas. They favored a policy of gradual and compensated emancipation. After 1849 abolitionists rejected this and demanded that it ended immediately and everywhere.. The abolitionist movement was strengthened by the activities of free African-Americans, especially in the black church, who argued that the old Biblical justifications for slavery went against the New Testament. African-American activists and their writings were rarely heard outside the black community; however, they had tremendous influence on some sympathetic whites. In the early 1850s, the American abolitionist movement split into two camps over the issue of the United States Constitution. This issue originated in the late 1840s after the publication of The Unconstitutionality of Slavery by Lysander Spooner. The Garrisonians, publicly burned copies of the Constitution, called it a pact with slavery, and demanded its abolition and replacement. Another camp, considered the Constitution to be an antislavery document. Using an argument based upon Natural Law and a form of social contract theory, they said that slavery existed outside of the Constitution's scope of legitimate authority and therefore should be abolished. Another split in the abolitionist movement was along class lines. The artisan republicanism of Robert Dale Owen and Frances Wright stood in contrast to the politics of prominent elite abolitionists such as industrialist Arthur Tappan and his evangelist brother Lewis. While the former pair opposed slavery on a basis of solidarity of "wage slaves" with "chattel slaves", the Whiggish Tappans strongly rejected this view, opposing the characterization of Northern workers as "slaves" in any sense. (Lott, 129-130) Many American abolitionists played a prominent role in opposing slavery by supporting the Underground Railroad. This was made illegal by the federal Fugitive Slave Law of 1850, but participants like Harriet Tubman, Henry Highland Garnet, Alexander Crummell, Amos No Freeman and others continued regardless with the final destination for slaves moved to Canada. Two landmark events for the movement were the Oberlin-Wellington Rescue and John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry. After the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, abolitionists continued to pursue the freedom of slaves in the remaining slave states, and to better the conditions of black Americans generally. The passage of the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865 officially ended slavery. This amendment completed the abolition of slavery, which had begun with President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. The Emancipation Proclamation had only applied to slaves being held in areas that were in rebellion against the United States at the time of the Proclamation. Slaves in areas then controlled by the Union were not freed until this amendment took effect. The Supreme Court has ruled that the Thirteenth Amendment does not prohibit mandatory military service in the United States. Interestingly enough, the 13th Amendment makes the use of the "chain gang" or other methods of involuntary servitude by convicted criminals constitutional in the United States, as long as the methods of enforcing the servitude are not "cruel and unusual" which included flogging and beatings. The Thirteenth Amendment also prohibits specific performance as a judicial remedy for violations of contracts for personal services such as employment contracts. The thirteenth amendment to the Constitution of the United States was proposed to the legislatures of the several states by the Thirty-eighth Congress, on January 31, 1865. The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is one of the post-Civil War amendments and includes the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses. It was proposed on June 13, 1866, and ratified on July 28, 1868. The amendment provides a broad definition of national citizenship, overturning a central holding of the Dred Scott case. It requires the states to provide equal protection under the law to all persons (not only to citizens) within their jurisdictions. Current Supreme Court Justice David Souter has called this amendment "the most significant structural provision adopted since the original Framing". (McCreary County v. ACLU of Kentucky (2005)), although the true significance of the Amendment was not realized until the 1950s and 1960s, when it was interpreted to prohibit racial segregation in public schools and other facilities in Brown v. Board of Education. Suggestions for Further Reading Students may deepen their understanding of the Afro-Americans' revolution by reading Benjamin Quarles, The Negro in the American Revolution (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1961), Ira Berlin, "The Revolution in Black Life," in Alfred F. Young, ed., The American Revolution: Explorations in the History of American Radicalism (DeKalb, Ill., 1976), pp. 349-82, and Sidney Kaplan, The Black Presence in the Era of the American Revolution, 1770-1800 (Greenwich, Conn., 1973). For the postwar experience, Robin Winks, The Blacks in Canada: A History (New Haven, Conn., 1971) is valuable, as are Ira Berlin, Slaves Without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South (New York, 1974) and Leon F. Litwack, North of Slavery: The Negro in the Free States, 1790-1860 (Chicago, 1961). Bibliography: Alan Farmer, The origins of The American Civil War 1846-1861, (London 1996) Paul Johnson, A History of the American People (London 1998) J.R. Oldfield, Popular Politics and British Anti-Slavery (London, 1998) Eric Williams, Capitalism and Slavery, (1964) David Brion Davis, The Problem of Slavery in the Age of Revolution, (New York 1975) Roger Anstey, 'The Abolition of The Slave trade', English Historical Review, (1972) Roger Anstey, 'Capitalism and Slavery: A Critique', English Historical Review, (1968) Louis Filler, The Crusade Against Slavery, 1830-1860, NY 1960 E449 F48 James Brewer Stewart, Holy Warriors, The Abolitionists and American Slavery, NY 1976 E446 E81 R Coupland, The British Anti-Slavery Movement, London, 1933 HT1161 C85 James Walvin (ed), Slavery and British Society, 1776-1846, London 1982 HT1163 S63 Christine Bolt, The Anti-Slavery Movement and Reconstruction. A Study of Anglo-American Co-operation, 1833-1877, London 1969 E668 B69 Martin Duberman, (ed), The Anti-slavery Vanguard. New Essays on the Abolitionists, Princeton, 1965 E449 D81 Edith F. Hurwitz, Politics and the Public Conscience. Slave Emancipation and the Abolitionist Movement in Britain, London 1973 HT1163 H96 John Pollock, Wilberforce, London 1977 HT1029 P77 LaWanda Cox, Lincoln and Black Freedom. A Study in Presidential Leadership, Chicago 1985 E457.2 C87 Mark E Neely Jr., The Last Best Hope on Earth. Abraham Lincoln and the Promise of America, Cambridge MA, 1993 E457 N37 James M McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom. The Civil War Era, NY 1988 E468 M17 David Brian Davis, 'The Emancipation Movement', in G S Boritt (ed) Lincoln The War President. The Gettysburg Lectures, NY, 1992 E457 L73 Read More