Preview

History: Slavery

Powerful Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1251 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
History: Slavery
Before the Civil War, slaves and indentured servants were considered personal property, and they or their descendants could be sold or inherited like any other personality. Like other property, human chattel was governed largely by laws of individual states. Generally, these laws concerning indentured servants and slaves did not differentiate between the sexes. Some, however, addressed only women. Regardless of their country of origin, many early immigrants were indentured servants, people who sold their labor in exchange for passage to the New World and housing on their arrival. Initially, most laws passed concerned indentured servants, but around the middle of the seventeenth century, colonial laws began to reflect differences between indentured servants and slaves.
Now that they actually started thinking twice between slaves and what they stand for. Soon the laws began to differentiate between races: the association of “servitude for natural life” with people of African descent became common.
So now that there was a ground stand between slaves and servants actually a big difference. Indentured Servants were temporarily and slaves were permanent . Servants could pay off their labor and slaves could not, they had no choice but to work their life off. Servants had rights, they Could sue in court, they Could own property, they Could appeal to court for mistreatment. Slaves still had right but not like the indentured servants they could get there education, they could get married, and raise kids as long as the work. If the servants kept breaking the law they could be enslaved and pay off a crime they did. Basically after 1660 the lives of the poor African people changed. Obviously slaves were mess treated and harshly punished more than the servants. There was some punishments for the white servants like if they tried to run away with a black slave the white servants had to serve more double the amount of his labor. There was a case that lead to that law. There

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    Apush Unit1 #4

    • 752 Words
    • 4 Pages

    2. Originally Africans were treated as indentured servants; But by 1700, slavery was a racial norm…

    • 752 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Indentured servitude and slavery existed in the ‘New World’ primarily for economic and population growth. In the book, Going to the Source, Slavery was defined as “hereditary” and “a lifetime status” and the slave must serve for life, however, on the other hand indentured servitude was “contractual” and “voluntary” although the servant is forced to serve for a fixed amount of years. Indentured servitude and slavery are strikingly parallel to each other from the fact that both parties participate in physically demanding labor and endure severe punishments induced by their master, nevertheless, the contractual agreement to each party is quite different, plus the primary skin color of the of party heavily impacts the treatment and escape punishments…

    • 269 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Money and Power are the two main factors towards the transformation indentured servants to slaves in Early the United States. Slaves were cheaper and easier to “take care of” compared to having an indentured servant. The growth of agriculture at this time had a good deal of farmland/plantation owners wanting to become the best; The one that makes the most money or the one that has the most powers. From 1603 to 1740, within the time span of 137 years change has started laws being created, the labor forces started to shift and a rebellion was forming.…

    • 270 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Slave Code Dbq

    • 550 Words
    • 3 Pages

    In the Slave Sale of 1846 multiple laws were being put to use such as slaves are property, indenture servants became slaves, imported non-Christians servants will be slaves(mixed race), and slaves needed written permission to leave their estate. The first major event that had an effect was indentured servants becoming slaves. It states, “ The black indentured servant, with his hope of freedom, was increasingly being replaced by the black slave.” This…

    • 550 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Who Is De Tocqueville?

    • 678 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Some of the first Africans to come to the New World had either been captured in wars or by raids done by enemy tribes, and then sold to English settlers (Takaki 51). The Puritans had used the Africans and other whites as indentured slaves but over time it slowly morphed into slavery (Takaki). When both white and black indentured servants would run away, the blacks would more likely receive a punishment of “servitude of life” while a white run away would receive more time added to their service (Takaki 55-56). This “servitude of life” soon became a dejure in 1661 and slavery was born (Takaki). Due to slavery de Tocqueville states that “the Negro has no family: woman is merely the temporary com- panion of his pleasures, and his children are on an equality with himself from the moment of their birth (de Tocqueville 2).…

    • 678 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Tobacco/Cotton Slavery FRQ

    • 1684 Words
    • 7 Pages

    When approaching slavery from a historical standpoint, it is a tendency to generalize the experience of slaves. However, slavery differs per region and time period. The differing climates of the Chesapeake region and Deep South determined the crops that would be grown and consequently the severity of slave labor. Likewise, over time slavery evolved from a class based system (poor indentured servants working alongside blacks) to a racially based system, creating an identity within the slave community. However, not only the slave experience differed, the institution itself transformed. The transition from class-based slavery to racial slavery, accompanied by new technologies that made the industry more profitable, changed how the institution was run. Thus, despite a general continuity in the institution of slavery, such as it being agrarian-based and involving black subordinates, many forces changed the institution like the installment of slave codes in 1670s, making it a legal and racial practice, and the development of the cotton gin and other technological advances in the 1790s. Whilst seventeenth century slavery was characterized by smaller tobacco plantations, racially-mixed servitude, and somewhat less-demanding labor, nineteenth century slavery was characterized by large-scale cotton plantations, solely black slavery, harsh and dangerous working conditions, and syncretic slave societies within plantations. This essay will approach identifying factors of change through the general categories of beginning, middle, and end of American slavery. It will also directly compare and contrast the institutions of early Chesapeake and later Deep South slavery.…

    • 1684 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    Where all slaves became distinctly equivalent and free, simply like every other person. Few were not thrilled about this. However, numerous were and looked forward to some new changes on the…

    • 1375 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    In the 1600s black and white people related to each other by the first African indentured servants arrived in the Virginia Colony of the United States of America in 1619. They were indentured servants and not slaves because the Spanish had baptized them and the English believed that baptized people could not be enslaved. This era was truly the beginning of white opinions dominating Black lives across continents. However, blacks and white worked side by side, married each other freely, ran away from their masters together and even rose up against the rich together, guns were drawn. Blacks had the same rights as whites of the same social status. From 1640 to 1723 the American colonies, particularly in the South, passed laws that ate away…

    • 164 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The beginning of the 18th centuries there were an augment in pleas to abolish slavery in the United States of America. At the time, there were two sides, northern, and southern debating against, and in favor of slavery respectively. The northerners’ states where slavery was legal, but not economically important and the southerners’ states whose economies were heavily dependent on slavery. According to most northerners, they became to dislike slavery and distrust southern political power. Some became active and organized opponents of slavery and worked for its abolition nationwide. For the abolitionists, it was degrading to the Negros’ intellectual capacity not to mention their humanity, for them to be viewed as an inferior race to that of the…

    • 824 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the Colonial America slavery rapidly increased over time. Starting in the 1600s slavery was legal in the first thirteen colonies, but it was more common in the south. Many africans were brought over and began to be enslaved.…

    • 387 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Although Indentured servitude and slavery have similarities they are also quite different. Indentured servants were young men looking to work in exchange for land or money in America. Slaves were brought to America and forced to work for the colonists receiving nothing in return. Indentured servants and slavery were both groups that were involved in America’s first colonization and although they were frequently taken advantage of, they were very important in building this new nation’s…

    • 456 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The Indentured Servitude is very different from slavery. The reason was that for Indentured Servitude, was where you had to choose to work for a employer if required, you had to sign a contract and you would work for a certain amount of time. While the slavery is where you have been born to work your whole life and so are your kids and their kids, etc.…

    • 459 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    In the American South slavery was very hard on people and families. In the American South, families were split up and friendships were too. Slave families were split up. Families were split up by their kids and spouse getting sold and sent very far away. It was very hard to keep families together. People that were free from slavery came back to help their friends escape. Slavery was very hurtful and slaves were not treated nicely.…

    • 225 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Historiography Of Slavery

    • 773 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Historian Peter Kolchin, writing in 1993, noted that until recently historians of slavery concentrated more on the behavior of slaveholders than on slaves. Part of this was related to the fact that most slaveholders were literate and able to leave behind a written record of their perspective. Most slaves were illiterate and unable to create a written record. There were differences among scholars as to whether slavery should be considered a benign or a “harshly exploitive” institution.…

    • 773 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Slavery Apush

    • 814 Words
    • 3 Pages

    With the beginning of the revolutionary war in 1775, slaves were not given weapons or permitted to fight because their owners feared organized rebellions. However, several “Negro battalions” were created by Alexander Hamilton. He knew that if slaves weren’t offered freedom in America, they surely would be in Britain. To keep the large number of slaves on the rebel’s side, he granted them the opportunity to fight for their “freedom”. At the end of the war and with the signing of the Declaration of Independence, many slaves were inspired by the passionate words spoken by founding fathers and their views on equality and freedom. The revolution created a dramatic divide between the north and south. Slaves in the south were property, and slaves in the north took the role of second class intelligent servants.…

    • 814 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays