Slavery in Colonial America

Slavery in Colonial America
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Slavery
Slavery was and still is a practice where human beings are regarded as property that can be sold and be bought, afterwards, they are engaged in forced labor (Laura, 2004). For a practice to be considered as slavery, a person has to be held against his/her will from the moment they are captured, sold or purchased and subsequently denied their freedom of movement, forced to work with no compensation for their efforts. Throughout the history of civilization, many societies have acknowledged the use of slaves. To date slavery has not ceased. Instead it has taken many different forms than it did a couple of centuries back. While back in history it did take the form of forced labor, currently it takes the form of forced marriages, serfdom, debt bondage, child soldiers, indentured servitude, domestic servants, human trafficking, and sexual exploitation in the sex industry. Slaves were considered important during the pre-industrial period because of the labor they provided. Therefore they were important in the furtherance of economic stability of the societies they were located. However, with mechanization of agriculture coupled with other industrial innovation, the economic importance of slavery during the industrial period declined. There was decreased need for man power because the machines were much more effective and efficient compared to human labor.This paper is going to concern itself with discussion of the history of slave labor in the Colonial United States. It is going to consider the factors that made slave trade flourish in the colonial United States as well as the factors that led to the decline of slave trade in America during the period. It is expected that at the end of the paper, a more informed insight will have been gained concerning the history of Slave trade in United States of America.History of Slavery in Colonial United States of AmericaIn 1607 Jamestown was established by English Settlers as an English colony (Wilford, 1996). The colony engaged in agriculture with tobacco being the main crop cultivated. Due to the viability of the tobacco crop in the region, it became apparent for more production, more labor was necessary. To provide the labor initially, the owners of the farms used indentured servants (Barker, 2012). The arrangement for the labor services by the indentured servants was more elaborate; with the servants being asked to provide labor for a period of seven years before they were granted freedom and allowed to live as regular citizens in Jamestown. As time progressed however, the services of the indentured slaves proved costly. In 1619, African slaves were introduced by traders of Dutch origin into the colony of Jamestown (Introduction: American Slavery, 2010). The white immigrants into the North America colony of Jamestown during this period were all estimated to be indentured slaves. The Southern part however experienced a higher influx of slaves. The Colonist in Virginia began by treating pioneer African slaves as indentured slaves. They served their masters for a particular period of time before being set free and given land and other supplies necessary by their masters. These eventualities proved somewhat costly to the masters (Breen &Stephen, 1980). The indentured slaves were bound to be set free after a specific period of time. This meant that just when the indentured slave had become skilled in the job they were accustomed to, they left the hold of their master. Therefore, the masters suffered employee turnover which meant that they lost their most skilled employees frequently over a period of time. Additionally, the colony suffered setbacks especially with the improvement of the English economy which therefore meant that immigration to the new colony for indentured slaves from England declined. Therefore labor shortages were experienced. Consequently, the master in the colony started gradually transforming Africans from the status of indentured slaves into permanent slavery. Initially there was the absence of legislation in Virginia concerning the slavery issue. However, in 1940, the courts in Virginia set judicial precedent by committing to slavery the first black person, John Casor. He had earlier claimed that he was an indentured slave in his freedom suit and that he had been held way past the agreed time (Matthews, 1995). However, it was ruled by a Northampton County court that he was the property of his master and therefore he was ‘owned` or rather he was a life property by Anthony Johnson (Matthews, 1995). The court based its argument on the fact that the English Common Law was not applicable to persons of African origin. Therefore since he was not an English citizen by birth, he was beyond the protection of the Law. Elizabeth Key Grinsted, who was a woman of mixed-race, however was successful in negotiating for her freedom and that of her son in 1656 before the court in Virginia. She argued her case on the premise that she was a daughter of Thomas Key who was a free Englishman. In addition to this fact, she also relied on her religion and argued that she had been baptized into Christianity.
It is construed that she was able to secure her freedom because her husband who was an attorney who was also the father to her son] was an English subject (Banks, 2008). In 1662, the principle of partus sequitur was adopted by the Virginia court. The principle basically meant that the offspring of any mother who was enslaved would inherit the status of the mother and therefore be born into slavery. This principle however did not favor the children whose fathers were regarded as free Englishmen. This ruling and principle made the slaves even more enslaved because their sexual rights were extremely violated because the white men were not liable legally for maintenance of the children born by the slaves. In 1705, Virginia passed the Slave Codes which stated in part that a slave was a person who is imported from a foreign nation that does not embrace Christianity. Additionally a slave included a Native American who is sold by other Native Americans to the colonialists. With this in place, it broadened the net for slavery because any other foreigner that was not considered a Christian could be enslaved (...