THE SYSTEM OF SLAVERY: HOW IT WORKED, WHY IT WORKED
The first question about slavery which comes to the mind -of-a-20th Century person living in a democracy Is: Why did it get started and how did it get started? Asking these kinds of questions is a good preface to the study of the legal and social realities of slavery. There seems to be a single and most Important reason why slavery was introduced into the early years of Colonial American life: money. A good look at that issue is found in a National Geographic article about the "Underground Railroad" which, in later years became a way of escape from slavery. The article (Blockson, 1984, pp. 3-5) talks about the fact that "profits did accumulate" even before the Mayflower came to the American shores:
... In 1619 Africans arrived as indentured ser vants at Jamestown. Gradually ship captains de veloped thriving businesses transporting Africans as slaves. In the South slavery took deepest root as gangs of the unpaid laborers turned vast tracts of cheap land into productive plantations of in digo, rice, cotton, and sugar...
The article quotes one planter as saying, "We teach them they are slaves... that to the white face belongs control, and to the black obedience." So we have a look at the mood of the young nation during the evil establishment of slavery.
What specific laws in the colonies applied to a white person's right to "own" a black person? And, what rights did a slave have in the early U.S. society? According to Adele Hast (Hast, 1969, pp. 217-222), when the blacks arrived in Virginia--mainly for purposes of working within the expanding tobacco Industry- a slave was "a person and a non-person simultaneously." That is, he was held criminally accountable for any specific un lawful acts, and he was expected to "tithe" (give roughly 10 per cent of his earnings to the government) In the same way his white owner was. And yet, he was also a non-person in the sen...