Introduction
For a long time, slavery, in different parts of the world, in different Nations, was a completely natural form of social development. Slavery saw oriental despotic states like Babylon or Egypt, where the ruler was venerated as the earthly incarnation of God. A completely natural slavery was seen in ancient Greece, which is considered the cradle of the Sciences, knowledge, philosophy, morality, and even democracy.
But the fact of the emergence of the slave economy in the capitalist United States of America, as if, disturbs the harmony of the event sequence in the development of human civilization, which supposedly goes from simple (more primitive) to complex. Liberated by the Renaissance, Europe goes into a new time as a bearer of freedom of thought. It first puts the freedom of the human person, proclaimed at different times by different people, from the secret emissaries of the Masonic orders, to thinkers whose names are still relevant in our days - Immanuel Kant, John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau. The slave system seems like some incredibly rude and primitive archaism, which is completely deserved to be outlived because of its usefulness.
But who is willing to bet that the United States has been able to secure the position of the strongest to date superpower, having no economic impetus that was provided by the labor of plantation slaves?
Slavery
Slavery is one of the forms of dependence of one person from another, which in anthropology is called ‘rights-in-persons’. Such relationships are possible under a wide range of societies in any country and in any historical epoch. Their range is very wide: at one end, commitment before relatives, spouses and children, somewhere in the middle - relationships between supervisors and subordinates and, finally, on the other - the right to dispose of people as a commodity to sell, buy and exchange them.
United States from the very beginning appeared as a slave state. Slavery was an integral part of American life.
American slavery was not something like ancient slavery. It was formed in the bowels of capitalism and reflected the peculiarity of its formation in the agrarian economy of North America: American planters, because of the narrowness of the market of wage labor, were forced to resort to the labor of black slaves. But, the use of slave labor did not go unnoticed for plantation bourgeoisie, which turned into a special class, in which strange and at the same time naturally, traits typical of the capitalists and slave owners combine.
The first in the Western hemisphere independent state, United States of America, was formed as a result of the revolutionary war of the North American colonies of England for independence in 1775-1783. But despite the slogans that proclaimed that "all men are born equal", the first American revolution, the American war of independence 1775-1783., left intact the black slavery in the southern states. The second American revolution – the civil war (1861-1865) did not lead to a radical solution of this problem.
The problem of slavery in the U.S. is a complex set of socio-economic, socio-political, civil, racial issues, the roots of which go deep into American history.
Background and reasons for the development of slavery in the U.S.
United States for 170 years (1607-1776) of its early history were in colonial dependence on England.
The development of the New world was a matter of individuals and groups receiving the corresponding permission from the monarch of England. Differences in social appearance of these groups and individuals determined the difference in the trends of colonization. Among those who had mastered America, there can be distinguished three main groups: joint-stock companies of the bourgeois type, heading overseas in search of markets, profits, sources of raw materials; the Protestants, who had hoped to realize their religious and ethical principles on their new homeland; the aristocrats, who thought about extensive feudal possessions. The possibilities of these three groups were more or less equal.
In the seventeenth century in North America, the most common were so-called proprietary colonies created by English aristocrats on the basis of feudal grants of the Stuarts.
At first, it seemed there was no need for searching for markets of slave labor force. The Indians, half-savage native population of America, which the colonist had, not infrequently, with fights, to push farther inland, developing new land. The colonists saw a quite suitable method for solving this problem. Armed with this idea, the settlers began the systematic hunting of a living working material - Indians.
The redskin slaves were not easy and safe for European settlers. Increasingly, the colonists were washed by the blood, bumping into armed resistance. In addition, the Indians didn't have immunity from diseases that the settlers brought from the Old world and they become the real disaster for the indigenous population of America.
At first time, the colonies widely used labor of criminals, expelled from the motherland for various periods. However, the work of exiles did not solve the problem. With the increase of the slave population and the growing influx of voluntary immigrants, its value was noticeably dropping. During XVII century, the main workers were the servants. Mainly, these were immigrants from the UK, Ireland, Scotland, German States, that were ready to work for a certain time, usually from three to seven years as slaves for transportation to America.
In the XVII century, white slaves made up a significant portion of the population of the American colonies of England. In Virginia, in the 70-ies of the XVII century, from 70-80 thousand of the population, the share of white slaves accounted for about 15 thousand. In the late seventeenth century in Pennsylvania, every five free residents had two slaves. In the first half of the eighteenth century during four years, 25 thousand white servants arrived only to Philadelphia. One of the biggest problems of slaves was that they were prohibited to receive any type of education, and this left them no chances for proper life even after becoming free (Mahmood, 2013).
Black slavery as the main engine of plantation economy
The first mention of the appearance of Negro slaves imported to the lands of the New world from Africa, refers to 1526, when an enterprising and ambitious Spaniard Lucas Vasco de Eilon landed on the territory of modern South Carolina and founded his own colony, which numbered five hundred rightful inhabitants from Spain, and about one hundred slaves of African descent. But for the British colonies such an easy solution to the problem of availability of workers, was not so obvious. Only after nearly a hundred years, in the year of 1619 on the territory of Virginia, first slaves brought from the African continent appeared in the possession of the colonies belonging to the English monarchy. But the economic and production system, was still quite satisfied with bonded labor of immigrants from Europe, therefore, the number of black slaves was relatively small.
In 1625 in Virginia there were only 23 Africans. By the middle of XVII century there were already 300 people from 15300 inhabitants of the colony, and not all of them were slaves. The first African-Americans initially equated to contracted workers. Upon expiration of the term of service, they became free and could even purchase land. The majority of African servants was in the North. In Boston, by October 1, 1708, their number was 400 people, but only in New England, by that time there were about 550 black servants. Negro slavery developed until the end of the XVII century. Relatively slow, this was due to a number of circumstances: the colonies did not yet understand what economic effect does the labor of Africans; during the whole XVII century, trading of African slaves was a monopoly of the Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese merchants who maintained high prices for their goods.
African peoples have long known and practiced slavery, as a form of public relations, existing in various African tribes, in their native continent. Typical was the situation when one tribe winning the war, had forced the vanquished to work for themselves, the winners. Therefore, enslaved blacks were not as violent and dogmatic as subjected to the same fate native Americans. Even though the slavery has left a huge mark in the conscious of blacks and it affects the crime rate nowadays, at that time, most blacks were willing to tolerate their destined, slave fate (Gouda, 2013).
In the southern colonies, there was a huge demand for black slaves, but practically they were not in demand in northern.
The increase in the number of Africans put forward the task of developing rules governing their legal status. Up to 60-ies of the XVII century, the situation of black slaves was not specifically determined by colonial laws. Slavery, relating not only to them, was institutionalized in the several colonies of New England before: in Massachusetts in 1641.; in Connecticut in 1650.; in Rhode Island in 1652. In colonial New England, the law considered blacks as private property.
In 1661, the legislature of Virginia passed the first in American colonies act, according to which Africans were admitted lifelong slaves. Thus, the distinction between black and white servants was established. Then a number of laws about African slaves and their progeny was enacted. In 1680 a single code of slavery in Virginia was created. It included separate legislative decrees of the colony of slaves.
The slave owner considered their slaves as a commodity with a certain value.
The spread of slavery led to a sharp divide in economics between Northern and Southern States. Slavery served as a source of enrichment and strengthening of the political role of large plantation owners, slave owners. On the eve of the civil war, 92% of blacks lived in the South, 89% were slaves (Acharya, 2016). Plantation slavery in the United States was a commercial, profitable enterprise. Slaves produced goods for sale on the world market that brought in huge profits for slaveholders (Feagin, 2004).
The struggle for the abolition of slavery
Early in the second half of the nineteenth century, 4 million of the 19 million population of America were slaves. At that time, in 1860, Abraham Lincoln becomes the 16th President, a national American hero and the liberator of American slaves.
With his rise to power began an era of change. At this time, the peak voltage of the ideal relationship between the Northern and Southern States, which resulted in a four-year Civil war (1861-1865). The reason is the different development of the regions. Almost every state has conducted an independent policy. The North went the way of capitalism, and the South remained on the path of slavery and an agrarian economy.
The majority of immigrants and entrepreneurs sought to come to the North of the United States, because most of the factories were located there. The South got a huge free territory after the Mexican-American war, favorable for agriculture climate, which required free labor.
It is worth noting that the original purpose of the war was not the abolition of slavery, but the restoration of the Union of all the States. But by the end of the war, Lincoln understood that it was impossible without the abolition of slavery. And it should be done, not gradually, but by radical methods.
Preparation for the abolition of slavery was fought almost the entire 1862 and on December 30, the President signed the "Proclamation freeing the slaves", Africans living on the territories in state of rebellion, "now and forever" were free. This proclamation has served as a kind of impetus for the adoption of 13th amendment of the US Constitution, which completely abolished slavery in the United States. After that, more than 180 thousand freed slaves joined the troops in the North.
The 13th amendment to the Constitution was adopted on January 31, 1865, almost 60 years after the previous one. But finally it was adopted on December 18, 1865, after having passed the ratification by all States.
The amendment completely outlawed slavery. Also forced labor now could only be used as punishment for a crime.
Interestingly, not all States have accepted the amendment. For example, Kentucky has adopted an amendment only in 1976, and in Mississippi it was only ratified in 2013, after the release of the movie "Lincoln".
Conclusion
American slavery, originally created as a way of exploitation of labor under capitalism, has gradually formed and acquired the features of autonomous socio-economic and political structure based on a kind of different from the capitalist "political economy." Being originally an appendage of British capitalism, American slavery after the war for Independence, maintaining ties with the capitalist market, has become an "aristocratic" system, which determines the basis for which was not only private capitalist accumulation, but also of the slave method of exploitation of the Negro population of the Southern States.
Comparison of industrial capitalism and plantation slavery from the standpoint of historical science leaves no doubt that the market for wage labor, competition, and growing existing production and social relations (Economics, politics, and culture) have been historically more reliable and progressive, and is almost associated with the slave system.
The civil war in North America has destroyed slavery, but the ideological foundations of this institution still have an impact on the political life of the United States (Bertocchi, 2010). Having absorbed the experience of slave aspirations of the colonial period, southern society has generated a huge amount of different racial theories. These ideas were skillfully polished and used in the works of defenders of the slave system in the first half of the nineteenth century.
A great amount of arguments in defense of the slave system appeared in the years before the Civil war. The myth of the "curse of Ham" has given way to the theory of different origins of the races, based on the data of anthropology J. Knott, or S. Cartwright, proved the differences of the two races from a scientific point of view and recognized them ineradicable. After the occupation of the Southern States by the North, the Republican proclamation of the abolition of slavery, the American white population still could not accept the equality with blacks. Sometimes, this opposition took a very extremist forms, such as the Ku-Klux-Klan. Ku-Klux-Klan (KKK) is a secret society that emerged in the Southern States in the second half of the nineteenth century. The person entering the Clan, took an oath to do everything in his power to prevent equality of white and black, as well as "to save the country from the invasion of Negroes". The main method chosen was individual terror and the Lynch mob. All visible actions of the Clan were accompanied by the mystical atmosphere created by the illumination of crosses, vestments deaf in white robes and bladed weapons.
Racial war that erupted in the USA in the twentieth century was largely the consequence of these ideological concepts that were firmly entrenched in the mentality not only of southerners but also northerners. The reflection of these views can be found in American law: at the beginning of the twenty-first century "white" racism (when the white population of the United States has far fewer rights than "color") begins.
References
Acharya,A., Blackwell, M. and Sen, M. (2016) "The Political Legacy of American Slavery". Stanford Educational University. 2016. Retrieved 18 February 2016, from http://scholar.harvard.edu/files/msen/files/slavery.pdf
Bartochchi, Graziella. (2010) "The historical roots of inequality". VOX CEPR’s policy portal. Retrieved 18 February 2016, from http://www.voxeu.org/article/historical-roots-inequality-evidence-slavery-us
Gouda, Moamen. (2013) " The Long Term Effect of Slavery on Violent Crime: Evidence from US Counties". Job market paper. Philipps Universität Marburg, 2013. 1-23.
Feagin, Joe. (2004) "Documenting the Costs of Slavery, Segregation, and Contemporary Racism: Why Reparations Are in Order for African Americans". Harvard BlackLetter Law Journal. Volume.20, 2004.49-81.
Mahmood, Huzaifah. (2013) "Slavery’s Effects on Education: Parallelism in the United States and Benin". Vanderbilt University. Retrieved 18 February 2016, from https://my.vanderbilt.edu/f13afdevfilm/2013/09/slavery%E2%80%99s-effects-on-education-parallelism-in-the-united-states-and-benin/
