Alfred W. Blumrosen's Slave Nation

During the 1808-1861, the slavery in America is a really big issue that cause many problem that come afterward. I believed that every men and women are born equally from god. We should have our own life, liberties, and opportunities to live in a better life. However, when the slavery started to appear into our society, many controversy and conflict also come as a result of slavery. In the book, “The Neglected Period of Anti-Slavery in America” of Alice Dana Adams, he wrote an interesting quote from David Benedict, saying that “The existence of slavery in a country is calculated to awaken all the propensities of human nature, whether good or bad.”

The Atlantic Slave Trade was one of the largest and inhumane human slavery systems in history. William Wilberforce played a key part in its abolishment, however; he was not the sole person responsible for its downfall. William Wilberforce can be seen as the leader of the ‘abolitionist’s’, so it can be said that he had a large part to play in the slave trades abolition although there were other key people involved in its abolition like; Olaudah Equiano, John Newton, Thomas Fowell Buxton and Thomas Clarkson. There were also groups involved such as the Quakers and Women and Women’s groups. The abolishment of slavery was not due solely to the work of William Wilberforce because there were many people who aided him in his fight for its abolition

Barker, Joseph. Interesting Memoirs and Documents relating to American Slavery. London: Chapman, Brother, 1846. Reprinted from a copy in the Negro Collection of the Fisk University Library. Mnemosyne Publishing, Inc., Miami:

Slavery & Politics in the Early American Republic by Matthew Mason, gives a detailed analysis on the role slavery and slave representation played on sectionalism and politics in the Early American Republic. Mason writes about the growth in anti-slave efforts after the Quakers were the first and only organized anti-slave groups in colonial America. There had been no discontinuation in discussion about slavery from the revolution to the Civil War. Mason’s thesis states that the argument that the Missouri Crisis started the fight between the North and South on the issue of slavery. Mason believes that it started much longer before this with events like the American Revolution, the War of 1812, Constitutional Contentions, along with the Missouri

The issue of slavery was a significant “thorn in the side” of America from the very inception of our nation. Despite the fact that slavery was an accepted legal phenomenon in the eighteenth century, it also invoked significant controversy. Many Americans, typically those denizens of the southern states, felt that slavery was an indispensable economic necessity. Alternatively, others opined that slavery was an inherently immoral and unethical institution which denied certain races basic human rights, and as such warranted abolition, no matter the consequences. Although the Constitution never mentions the word “slave” once, slavery is referenced to in the Constitution several times, in three prominent compromises that our founding fathers were forced to make, for the sake of the establishment of a unified nation.

By using this reference, it illustrated the severity of the alienation of blacks in the Southern United States. In 1619, a Dutch ship “introduced the first captured Africans to America, planting the seeds of a slavery system that evolved into a nightmare of abuse and cruelty that would ultimately divide the nation”. The Africans were not treated humanely, but were treated as workers with no rights. Originally, they were to work for poor white families for seven years and receive land and freedom in return. As the colonies prospered, the colonists did not want to give up their workers and in 1641, slavery was legalized.

The third important topic is the African American and the American Revolution. During the Revolutionary War many slaved crossed to the British side while others contemplated whether or not they should stick with the American in hope of being looked at as being faithful. Some ponder the idea of just looking the other way until the storm clears. Ultimately, the driving force for their decision was the hope for freedom.

Beginning in 1607, slavery arose as indentured servitude ended, as it was full of too many complications. Bacon’s rebellion proved that free labor is successful, as long as I was purely free and not reliant on the promise of land in the end. The accessibility and legality of slavery made it the perfect economical move to maintain the prospering cash crops of the North American colonies. Slavery seemed like the best option for the colonies in the 17th century, but the issues of differing human morality will begin to rise and trigger the civil

From this, derives a bond with the reader that pushes their understanding of the evil nature of slavery that society deemed appropriate therefore enhancing their understanding of history. While only glossed over in most classroom settings of the twenty-first century, students often neglect the sad but true reality that the backbone of slavery, was the dehumanization of an entire race of people. To create a group of individuals known for their extreme oppression derived from slavery, required plantation owner’s of the South to constantly embedded certain values into the lives of their slaves. To talk back means to be whipped.

It is also interesting to read how the anti-and pro slavery camps argued for their beliefs, how politicians abandoned their old parties and formed the new ones based on their common beliefs or interests and how they fought for their political gains. The period of the antebellum America presents such a tumultuous one, yet it shows how the young republic struggled to find a path to a better union among those hungry for power and wealth. Above all, it does require wisdom, vision, courage, determination and political maneuvers

I find it very interesting that the southern colonies distinguished themselves from the New England colonies so early on. I never realized that the slave trade and the plantation class developed so early in American history and it’s fascinating that these differences eventually became large factors in the outbreak of the Civil War. The South’s cash crops required vast amounts of human labor and slavery was essential for the economic health of the southern colonies. Furthermore, this gives insight to the reason pre-Civil War era southern elites were so adamant that the South remain a slave society.

For example, the Massachusetts newspapers have been printing slave advertisements since 1704, and almost every article in The Boston-Gazette and Country Journal and The Boston Evening-Post were advertisements of runaways or who were selling slaves that day. These things were very common, and the newspapers would make a lot of money through these advertisements. Honestly, they newspapers made so much from slave trade, that they were in competition with one another to see who got the most ads. The point being made is that the entire country was selling and reselling slaves like horses until the next shipment came in. This practice had brainwashed society into thinking that was how it was and allowed slave trade to become the multi-billion business that controlled the economy of Massachusetts and many other colonies in that time as well.

Slavery has existed for thousands of years in various cultures from all parts of the world. Slavery in the United States lasted for 245 years and it was a brutal way of life for black African Americans, but it also built the foundation for America’s economy. There have been a number of arguments presented in an effort to justify slavery, as well as many advocating for the abolishment of it. The slave trade was tolerated and fought for in the United States for hundreds of years because without it, plantation owners would not have been able to produce crops as efficiently as they did without the cheap labor that the slave trade provided.

Slavery was a manner in which the which population were supervised and controlled; kept illiterate and unskilled as education meant that the black population could identify themselves as more than just cheap labour. White southerners were afraid that the black population would disrupt their social status and economy as the black population would be able to compete with poor whites for jobs and be on an equal base with them. The abolishment of slavery aroused a sense of fear amongst the white southerners as they were scared the black slaves would massacre their families, insurrection as seen in Richmond in the 1800 and eventually start a war . Another reason for the secession was not only motivated the belief that blacks wear inferior to the white race, the economy of the Deep South was also a huge

In this time period slavery was the biggest aspect in American (South) in its era. Due to the Spanish taking lands from the Native Americans to colonist and to build on the new land. Then enslaving