American_Slavery

American Slavery Slavery is the condition in which one person owns another, and the slave is deprived of the rights that are ordinarily held by free people (Slavery, 2009, para.1). Slavery has existed in many countries around the world for many years. There is not a specific time that slavery began because it has basically always been present in some form and in many parts of the world. Some people in this world believe that slavery was right and necessary, while others believe it was wrong and horrific. Slavery began in America in the early 1600’s and lasted until the middle 1800’s. American slavery consisted of : Africans being captured, brought to America, sold like property, stripped of all their rights, forced to live in terrible conditions, and abused all so that they could be used for free labor to benefit the American slave owners. Would America be what it is today if slavery had never existed' In the early 1600’s, Americans began to travel to Africa by ship to capture Africans to be used as slave labor in America. The Americans would try to pick the Africans that were the strongest and the healthiest to bring back to America. By picking the healthiest people, the slaves would be more likely to survive the voyage back to America. They chose the strongest Africans, so that they would be good candidates for labor and hard work once they were back in America. The Americans did not want to bring weak and ill Africans back to America if they could find better ones because they wanted to be able to get top dollar for the slaves when they sold them. After being captured, the slaves were then tightly packed onto the ships and sailed back to America. The voyage that the slaves and slave capturers made back to America was called the Trans Atlantic voyage. The voyage to bring the Africans back to America normally lasted between eight and 10 weeks unless there were bad weather conditions that slowed them down. Lodge said it was not uncommon for some of the slaves to jump ship to try to escape, and some of the slaves would even go mad due to the lack of space on the ship. He also said that some of the slaves that went mad murdered some of the other slaves to gain more space on the ships (Lodge, 1998, Sea Voyage, para. 1). The space on the ships was very tight because they packed as many Africans on the ships that they could possibly fit. The more slaves that they could bring back to America the more money they could make by selling them. The ships crew only fed the slaves enough to survive, and it was very unsanitary. Once the ships reached America, the slaves docked the ships and were held in pens where they waited to be auctioned off. They were cleaned and prepped so that they could be ready for the auctions that would sell them to their owners. The slaves were auctioned off like they were property instead of humans. Sometimes the slave families would be separated from each other because they were bought by different people. If slave family members were sold separately then it was very unlikely that they would ever see each other again. There were two types of auctions that were used to sell the slaves. They were called the highest bidder auctions, and the grab and go auctions. The highest bidder auctions put the slaves on a raised pedestal in front of the bidders so that they could be seen by the audience, and the potential buyers could inspect the slaves before bidding on them. They inspected the slaves so that they would know if they wanted to bid on those slaves or not. Each slave was then given to the buyer that offered the most money for that particular slave or slaves (The Slave Auction, 2007, para. 4). The grab and go auctions were auctions where the seller and the buyer had an agreed upon price for the slave ahead of time, and the seller would give the buyer a ticket after the purchase. That ticket would show that the buyer bought a specific slave, and it was used to check the slave or slaves out of the auction that they had purchased. (The Slave Auction, 2007, para. 6). Once the auctions were over the buyers then owned the slave or slaves that they had purchased, and could do what they wanted to with their slave. Slave auctions had to be a horrible event for the slaves because they had no idea what was happening to them because they could not understand or speak English. Once the slaves were bought and brought to their new homes, they did not have the same rights as their owners. They did not have any freedom to do anything that they wanted to do, and they also had to obey their master’s every command. The slaves were not able to get an education if they wanted to, and could be punished if their owners found out that they were trying to learn how to read. They did not even have the freedom to go doctor’s offices, stores, or anywhere else that they needed or wanted to go when they wanted to. The slaves did not have the right to vote for government offices, or give their own opinions on any matter or situation. Owning their own land and running their own businesses was not allowed as well. They could not make their own decisions or choices about anything. Freedom was something that the slaves longed for, and eventually received after many years of slavery and torture. While the slaves did eventually receive their freedom, they had to live in terrible conditions until that time came. The slave owners had living quarters for the slaves to live in that were usually located on their property. The living quarters that the slave families were given were normally wooden shacks or cabins, and they did not have very much living space for the slave families. Schwartz said that the quarters the slaves lived in was usually one or two rooms and was sometimes occupied by more than one slave family. She also said that the slave owners only allotted the slaves rations of food, and withholding food was sometimes used as a punishment (Schwartz, 2001, Family life in the slave quarters). The slave families did the best they could in order to make their living conditions work for them because they had no other choice. Living in terrible conditions was not all that the slaves had to endure. Slaves were punished and abused when they did not do what the slave owners wanted them to do, and sometimes they were punished without even being proved guilty of something. If the slaves were accused of any type of crime, they did not have the chance to defend themselves or have a trial. If one person thought that the slave was guilty then they would be punished without anyone trying to find out if it was true or not. Some would say that the people enjoyed seeing slaves get punished or killed. If the slave owners wanted to punish the slaves they would sometime make the slaves take their shirts off, and the owners would then slash them on their backs with whips causing cuts and gashes. These beatings sometimes led to death if the slave owner did not stop the whipping in time. On some occasions, depending on what the slave was accused of, the slave owners would hang the slaves in front of the town’s people, and sometime light them on fire and watch the slave burn. The hangings of the slaves were called lynching, and Britannica Online defines lynch as: to put to death by mob action without legal sanction (Lynch, 2009). The hangings of the slaves were not legally sanctioned and were very horrific. The following picture is a terrible picture of a slave that was whipped on his back by a slave master leaving him cut and scarred. The slaves had to endure all this inhumane treatment, just so they could be used as free labor to benefit the American slave owners and the slave owners businesses. Slaves were used to conduct any kind of labor that the slave owners wanted them to do without any pay. The slaves had no choice of whether or not they wanted to perform the work. They helped to do farm work, cotton picking, cleaning, cooking, etc. The slave owners and other businesses and industries were able to make money off the backs of many slaves for many years. Slave labor helped the owners to have successful businesses because the slave owners saved money by not having to pay for labor. Other companies and business profited from slavery as well. Nixon wrote that the insurance company Aetna made money during slavery by providing insurance on slaves for the slave owners. He also wrote that other industries such as railroad, coal, textiles, and tobacco, profited from slavery as well (Nixon, R. 2000, Peculiar Profits). There was a lot of profit made for a lot of businesses because of slavery, and there was no pay or thanks to the slaves for the labor that they provided. The slave owners eventually had to give up their free labor because slavery was finally abolished. Finkelman wrote that in 1807 the U.S. Congress passed legislation to end all importation of slaves into America. He also said that the law became effective on January 1, 1808, but the law was not very effective; so a handful of other laws were passed as well. After 1820, participation in the African slave trade was considered a heinous crime, and Finkelman wrote that it was punishable by death (Finkelman, 2008, Regulating the African slave trade). In 1863 President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, and this led to the thirteenth amendment that abolished slavery in 1865 (Timeline of slavery in America, 2008). Finally, all slaves received the freedom that they had so longed for and fought for. The following is a bar graph that shows the number of enslaved African Americans in 1800 and 1860 before slavery was abolished. American slavery took many Africans from their homeland, and held them in bondage for many years. They were tortured and forced to perform work for free so that the slave owners could benefit. So, to answer the question, would America be what it is today without slavery, the answer is no. Many corporations were built and began from the hard and free work of the slaves. America could not possibly be what it is today if slavery never had existed. American slavery is a sad and tragic story that should have never occurred, but it is a true American history story. America would not be the country that we know today without the horrible act of slavery. Because of Africans having been brought over to America for slavery we now have many exceptional African American citizens of this country today that were descendants of the African slaves many years ago. This country no longer has slavery and is a great place for all races and cultures to live. References Black peoples of America the slave auctions. (2007). Retrieved March 8, 2009, from http://www.historyonthenet.com/Slave_Trade/slave_auction.htm Finkelman, P. (2008). Regulating the African slave trade. Civil War History. Retrieved March 10, 2009, from http://swtuopproxy.museglobal.com/MuseSessionID=e5657717c31db665b8d39caf86ff92d0/MuseHost=find.galegroup.com/MusePath/itx/retrieve.do'contentSet=IAC-Documents&resultListType=RESULT_LIST&qrySerId=Locale%28en%2C%2C%29%3AFQE%3D%28ke%2CNone%2C34%29regulating+the+african+slave+trade%3AAnd%3ALQE%3D%28AC%2CNone%2C8%29fulltext%24&sgHitCountType=None&inPS=true&sort=DateDescend&searchType=AdvancedSearchForm&tabID=T002&prodId=ITOF&searchId=R2¤tPosition=1&userGroupName=uphoenix&docId=A190379240&docType=IAC Lodge, D. (1998). Black History. Retrieved March 8, 2009, from http://www.shelbycountyhistory.org/schs/blackhistory/mnlocalhistory.htm Lynch. (2009). In Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved March 10, 2009, from http://www.search.eb.com.ezproxy.apollolibrary.com/dictionary'va=lynching&query=lynching Nixon, R. (2000). Peculiar Profits: How corporate wealth was built on backs of actual slaves. Retrieved March 9, 2009, from http://www.worldfreeinternet.net/news/nws201.htm Schwartz, M.J. (2001). Family life in the slave quarters: Survival strategies. Retrieved March 9, 2009, from http://www.oah.org/pubs/magazine/family/schwartz.html Slavery. (2009). In Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved February 5, 2009, from Encyclopedia Britannica Online: http://www.search.eb.com.ezproxy.apollolibrary.com/eb/article-9109538 Timeline of Slavery in America. (2008). Retrieved February 5, 2009, from http://www.history.com/minisite.do'content_type=Minisite_Generic&content_type_id=583&display_order=7&sub_display_order=23&mini_id=1071