Tag Archives: race

The Origins of American Slavery

In 1619 twenty Africans landed in Jamestown, Virginia, a budding British colony of the Americas focused on the growing and exporting of tobacco. Tobacco plantations required labour and until 1700, white indentured servants, mainly from Britain, provided most of the work. But various factors would lead plantation owners to replace indentured servitude with slavery and by the American Revolution (1776), all the British colonies practiced permanent chattel slavery. How and why did this transition happen? 

Colonial Plantations and Labour. Historian Peter Kolchin writes, “Almost from the beginning, America was heavily dependent on coerced labour… (3) Before slavery, British colonists utilized two other sources of unfree labour – Native American slavery and Indentured Servants. Native American slavery comprised a relatively small portion of colonial workers. Historians point to various reasons for this. First, diseases had severely decimated the Native American population since Europeans arrived in the late 1400s. Estimates vary, but there is a growing consensus that between 70 and 90 percent of indigenous Americans (North, Central and South America) died from European-borne diseases such as smallpox and measles. A decimated population could not meet growing plantation labour demands.   Also, familiar with local environments, Native Americans could escape, survive, and rejoin their communities.  

Indentured Servitude. Indentured servitude provided a better option and became the primary source of unfree labour during the 17th century. The arrangement ostensibly met the needs of both the servant and plantation owner. Indentured servants often left England to escape poverty, persecution and political instability. Without resources to traverse the Atlantic, they “sold themselves into temporary slavery in exchange for free transatlantic transportation… (Kolkin, 8). A steady supply of indentured servants pre-empted the need to seek alternative sources of labour – including slavery. As Kolkin writes,

…so long as a ready supply of indentured labor continued to exist, colonists saw little reason to go to the expense of importing large numbers of Africans, who, unlike English labourers, had to undergo prolonged adjustment to alien conditions – strange masters had unusual customs, spoke an unintelligible language before becoming productive members of the workforce. (11)

Various factors made slavery less viable during most of the 17th century. Slavery at this time involved more risk and expense. Especially during the early 17th century, plantation labourer life expectancy was low. James Oakes estimates that “90% of those who migrated to the Chesapeake in the seventeenth century came as servants, and half died before completing the term of service.” (68). Plantation working conditions were brutal, and workers had less protection than in England. As Oakes points out, “As long as life expectancy was low, it was generally more profitable for a planter to purchase an indentured servant for seven years than a slave for life.” (10) Also, the immense crossing distance from Africa to North America – much further than Africa to Brazil, for instance) led to high slave fatalities and reduced profitability. 

The Transition to Slavery.  An interplay of factors encouraged the transition from indentured servitude to slavery. First, colonial demand for labour began outpacing the labour supply of indentured servants. Virginia’s growing tobacco plantations required more work, and from the 1690s, Carolina evolved into a significant producer and exporter of labour-intensive crops, rice and indigo. (Black,88) Carolina planters would benefit from enslaved Africans already well-versed in rice production. 

Factors on the supply side also encouraged the transition to slavery. Kolchin points out that “at the same time that colonial demand for labor was surging, a sharp decrease occurred in the number of English migrants arriving in America under indenture.” (11) Various factors contributed to this decrease. The monarchy’s restoration in England facilitated “both political stabilization and an economic upturn” that encouraged labourers to stay in Europe. (Kolchin, 12). Also, less arduous opportunities in American colonies like New York and Pennsylvania attracted immigrants, effectively siphoning potential plantation labourers.  

Essentially, the indentured labour supply could not keep up with the growing demand for labour. Slavery became an increasingly viable choice. 

Slavery Becomes More Viable.  Various factors mitigated the high initial costs of slavery for wealthy planters who benefitted from slavery as a long-term investment. In the 1680s, England’s Royal African Company broke the Dutch monopoly on the slave trade, significantly reducing the cost of slave transport. Also, enslaved Africans proved very capable and resilient. Many had engaged in agricultural labour and, unlike Native Americans, had been exposed to European diseases, developing immune systems more adept to colonial life. 

Unlike indentured servants, Africans remained slaves for life. In 1662, Virginia made slavery a hereditary condition by declaring that “all children born in this country shall be held bond or free according to the conditions of the mother.” (Berkin, 70) In other words, permanent slave status passed from the mother to her children. This law drastically favoured plantation owners. As Kolchin writes, “…whereas in the seventeenth century the slave population failed to reproduce itself and had to be replenished in much the same way the servant population did, in the eighteenth century, it became a self-perpetuating labor force.” (13)

Native Americans and English indentured servants also presented higher flight risks from the brutal conditions of plantation labour. European indentured servants could leave and readily blend into other communities. Native Americans often knew the environment and could escape and even return to their people. On the other hand, enslaved Africans landed in a foreign setting that offered no friendly escape destinations. Moreover, due to skin colour, Africans fleeing a plantation were more visible and less able to blend into free communities. As Kolchin writes, “Racial distinction, in short, facilitated enslavement. (13).

Slave Codes. Plantation owners also benefitted from slave codes. As Carol Berkin points out, the “legal difference between black and white servants was vague until the 1660s. As previously mentioned, in 1662, Virginia legislated that all children of slave mothers inherited her slave status. Other colonies followed suit. Slave codes legally entrenched racial differences while imposing various restrictions such as banning enslaved people from holding meetings, owning property, getting married, possessing guns or inflammatory literature. 

Conclusion. The transition to slavery happened relatively quickly – less than one hundred years. The estimates vary, but according to James Oakes, the number of African or African-descended inhabitants of the mainland colonies” increased from 2920 in 1660 to more than 300, 000 a century later. (126).  By this time slavery had become the labour system of the Southern colonies and was legally recognized in the Northern colonies.  

Slavery had been firmly entrenched in American society by the middle of the 18th century.    

Bibliography.

Berkin, Carol. Making America. A History of the United States. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2001. 

Black, Jeremy. A Brief History of Slavery: A New Global History. London: Constable and Robinson, 2011.

Foner, Eric. Give Me Liberty: An American History. Volume 1. New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 2017

Hine, Darlene and William C. Hine.  African Americans: A Concise History. New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc. 2014.

Kolchin, Peter. American Slavery. 1619-1877.  New York: Hill and Wang, 1993.

Oakes, James. Of the People. A History of the United States. Volume 1: To 1877. New York: Oxford University Press, 2017.

Eugenics: An Introduction

Eugenics. The science of improving the population by controlled breeding for desirable inherited traits. From the Greek eugenes, meaning well-born.

Animal Husbandry.  The science of breeding.

In 1883, Francis Galton, first cousin to Charles Darwin, coined “eugenics”, a pseudoscience that advocated controlled reproduction to ensure the healthy evolution of human societies.  Eugenics became increasingly popular in the early 20th century, solidifying racial hierarchies and categories of the unfit – criminals, the mentally ill, and the feebleminded.  Programs in various countries encouraged the “fit” to reproduce while discouraging the unfit through measures ranging from segregation to elimination.

Francis Galton (1822-1911) Francis Galton grew up in England and inherited a significant fortune after his father died.  His extensive travels to places like Africa reinforced his sense of a rigid hierarchy of human categories.  He was not alone in this thinking as racial and ethnic determinism pervaded Western thought during the 19th century.  Darwin’s publication of the Origin of Species (1859) further inspired Galton to pursue social betterment through selective breeding. Galton believed that humans evolved through the natural selection of inborn traits, and parents transmitted intellectual and moral qualities to their children. He acknowledged social factors but insisted that inherited talent (or lack of) persevered.  

Turn of the Century:  Eugenics takes off. Various factors played into eugenics growing popularity into the 20th century.  The “rediscovery” of Gregor Mendel’s claims of heredity as the dominant determinant in human life bolstered eugenic claims of biological determinism.  Visible signs of poverty, crime, and mental illness accompanied urban growth evoked concerns about societal “degeneration” – an oft-used term at the time.  As Diane B. Paul writes, “Middle-class people of every political persuasion – conservatives, liberals, and socialists, were alarmed by the apparent profligate breeding of what in Britain was called the “social residue.” (Paul, 235)

Alarmed by these developments and confident in their theories of selective reproduction, eugenics advocates began implementing practices to realize their visions.  Scholars have identified these practices as “positive” and “negative” eugenics. 

Positive Eugenics. Positive eugenics involved the promotion and practice of the selective breeding of the “fit.”  He pointed to the example of animal husbandry as a model to follow.  “If a twentieth part of the cost and pains,” he said, “were spent in measures for the improvement of the human race that is spent on the improvement of the breeding of horses and cattle, what a galaxy of geniuses might we create!  (Larson 180).

Negative Eugenics in Practice. The early focus on positive eugenics would give way to prohibitive measures in the twentieth century.  In the United States, Canada, and much of Northern Europe, as well as Britain, the central question was how best to discourage breeding by moral and mental defectives.” (Crook, 235)  The practice of eugenics ranged from segregation to extermination.  Practices also varied over time and from country to country.  Generally, the initial approach involved the segregation of male and female “defectives”. Some feared another option, sterilization, would promote images of extremism—however, institutional expenses coupled with improved sterilization technology made this alternative a more popular choice.  Accordingly, governments legalized the practice. Sterilization laws, for instance, had been passed in 30 American states and 3 Canadian provinces. (Paul, 236) 

Not surprisingly, the worst expression of eugenics occurred in Nazi Germany.  The Aktion T-4 programme and subsequent programs “euthanized” up to 200,000 of the country’s institutionalized mentally and physically disabled, some with the tacit consent of the families. (Paul, 236)  

Opposition.  Predicably, eugenics attracted virulent opposition from the Catholic Church, labour groups, liberal politicians, and scientific community members. The Catholic Church, already opposed to abortion and contraception, vehemently opposed sterilization. Labour groups spoke out against eugenics, knowing that many working and lower classes, especially immigrants, fell into eugenic categories of unfit.  Scientists readily challenged eugenic claims and the Mendelian foundation by highlighting the nurture side of the nature vs nurture debates of the time. 

Conclusion.  Blatant Nazi atrocities in the name of racial hygiene, coupled with scientific exposures of its falsities, undermined eugenic claims.  However, it did become one of the most influential and devastating of the broader social Darwinist movement.

This blog offers a rudimentary introduction to eugenics.  Future blogs will address more specific aspects of this topic.

Selected Bibliography

Cowan, Ruth Schwartz. Francis Galton and the Study of Heredity in the Nineteenth Century. New York: Garland, 1985.

Crook, Paul. Darwin’s Coat-Tails: Essays on Social Darwinism.  New York: Peter Lang Publishing Inc., 2007.

Larson, Edward J.  Evolution: The Remarkable History of a Scientific Theory.  New York: Modern Library, 2006. .

Paul, Diane B. “Darwin, Social Darwinism, and Eugenics.”  Jonathan Hodge and Gregory Radick eds.  The Cambridge Companion to Darwin.  New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009