How did early americans legitamate slavery?

Question

What happened? Did they all of a sudden wake up one day and decided to make slaves of all the Africans that were promised to be free after serving a few years as servants? I'm a little fussy but I think they started to put down more and more restrictions (laws) on them until oneday they decided to make them slave. If thats so then what were the laws that started it all. What were their reasoning? What was each law and date that they were approved?

Answer 1

I found an excellent article which traces the history of slave laws in Virginia and Maryland between 1625 and 1790. Very well documented with many citations:
http://www.earlyamerica.com/review/winter96/slavery.html

The first African slaves were in the Caribbean, not in the American colonies. And most of the early indentured servants were white, primarily Irish, who were freed after their service.

As to the Africans, there were a variety of reasons that slaveholders justified their "peculiar institution."
One was the civilization argument, that blacks in Africa were heathens and you were saving their souls by bringing them to America and exposing them to Christianity.
There were also racial arguments, that blacks were naturally inferior and therefore were "designed by God" for menial labor.
There were also arguments based on the Bible in which slavery supporters argued that God approved of slavery.

Answer 2

Slavery had been long established before 1620. There weren't many wide-open spaces in Europe, so there were not huge plantations worked by slaves. After the Europeans came here they started importing slaves, especially in the south, where they could use them on - huge plantations.

They didn't promise to make them free. You are thinking of indentured servants, who were white. The slave owners knew the slaves would be slaves from the day they were born to the day they died. They were of the opinion that the Africans, being an inferior race, needed a gentle, firm guiding hand or they would starve to death. They had the same attitude toward white women, too. (Note that isn't my opinion - THEIRS.)

So, they bought slaves from the slave traders in Africa, shipped them over here and sold them to plantation owners, who put them to work.

There are old laws about slaves, but most of them outline punishments for running away.

Answer 3

Who Cares???? There are no slaves alive now well except for some Africans in Africia. The reason for all slavery is cheap labor bottom line. That is why Bush wants the Mexicans in the USA so Union workers and Americans are cheated and Companies make billions. The Dems want the Mexicans here for more votes,,bottom line,,,,if you are an average American you are screwed....

Answer 4

Why does everyone forget that the South was originally populated by pirates who were formerly privateers commissioned by the Queen of England to attack the Spanish fleet for gold and slow down their colonization efforts of the Americas? After she told them to stop, they didn't want to and set up camp in the territory now known as the southern united states. Pirates keep slaves and they don't even care what color they are. The color thing became an marker, like when guys are either the shirts or skins in an amateur basketball game. Sick, I know. But that's how it really started.

Answer 5

Okay if you know history. They came over by ship. They were already slaves. People who owned farms owned slaves. they were property. Then in 1865 President Lincoln did his thing and made it illegal to own slaves. But the southerners didn't like that. So they made laws to segregate the blacks from the whites. so Just pick up a history book and get your facts straight. there were no laws about slavery to make it slavery. They were brought over as slaves and there were laws to break the slavery.

Answer 6

well they initially where not brought over with any intention of release. slavery began in europe not america - it was not new to the people coming over. initally there were indentured servants & slaves - indentured servants gained thier freedom by working off thier debts.
slavery was brought to american colonies from other colonies. the south was settled in large part by settlers who had already been in the carribean with slaves there, who came over to america and brought thier slaves with them.
to work the sugar cotton and tobacco fields it required more people then the owners could supply it was not profitable to pay people to work.
the untied states was actually more humane to the slaves if one can believe there is any humanity in slavery. in areas such as brazil they imported more then 50 times as many slaves. in america we allowed slaves to set up house and procreate - although we then enslaved the children - in areas such as brazil they were kept seperated and when they were togetehr they could not have children if they wanted to - because they were so malnourished that they could not get pregnant or sustain a pregnancy. they literally worked them to death and then simply imported more.

Answer 7

just as the egyptians did, and african tribes, and almost every other great civilization before them.


most slaves are not considered people, just humans. they are work horses, mules who pull a cart, or dogs that herd sheep.

others are prisoners. War slaves are an example of this.

an invading country takes prisoners and makes them work for nothing, like machines, like plunder, just another spoil that goes to the winner.

humans are animals, we have the ability to think cognitively, and remember and recall huge ammounts of data, but we are still just ants, and ants kill eachother when it is needed to be done.

Answer 8

Go way back in time, humans sold other humans, including their own[race/creed/gender/age], normality feels good to many masses, then things change. Rinse, repeat. Things happen, civilization is crushed, plants grow, evil withers, and sometimes good prevails. The past is sad, and the future is at hand. So do something about it.

Answer 9

By categorizing dark skinned people as sub-human. Colonists did the same thing to Native Americans. In war we make it easier to kill the enemy by using dehumanizing terms like Jap or chink. If you think of the person you are tring to enslave or kill as a human being like yourself, it makes it much harder.

Answer 10

they got it from spanish colonists, at first the spanish used native americans, then las casas suggested useing africas because they were used to the work so they would not die as much as the native americans. las casas was wrong, they died just as much, and then the practice just stuck.