Slavery In America
by
R.E. Prindle
Let’s get
something straight about the different forms of slavery that have existed in
the United States. In the first place no
one has clean hands, just as in Africa, even Negroes had slaves in the US and elsewhere
in the New World, even in Haiti. Whites
owned chattels in the South, Northern Whites mined Europe to work in their
factories as wage slaves to keep labor costs minimal.
Slavery in
the US, other than sex slavery that is still tolerated today, had three
forms: chattel slavery, indentured
slavery and wage slavery.
Indentured
slavery was part and parcel of US history from its very beginning. Indentured slavery was White men ‘owning’
White people according to contract. A
person for whatever reason indentured himself for a period of years after which
he was supposed to be freed. There were
many ways for his master to increase the period. During the period of his indenture he was
another man’s slave. At the same time
adults and children were shanghaied from the streets of London and England for
sale in the colonies.
These Whites
usually described as indentured ‘servants’ were slaves in fact. Many, many indentured ‘servants’ worked
cheek by jowl with the Negro chattel slaves in the fields. In that manner White women bore many Negro
children thus diluting the African blood.
Chattel
slavery of Negroes was legal in every English colony, there were no exceptions. In certain States such as Massachusetts and
Connecticut chattel slavery was not commercially viable and it fell into
disuse. After 1812 Chattel slavery was
discontinued at varying times by the various States. Chattel slavery existed in Northern States
nearly to the beginning of the Civil War.
Nor did the Emancipation Proclamation pertain to any chattel slaves in
slave holding States that were not in rebellion. Thus, only Negro slaves in the deep South
were affected by Emancipation.
Now, just as
chattel slavery was not viable in States like Massachusetts and Connecticut it
did not suit the manufacturing economy of the North otherwise chattel slavery
would have existed North of the Mason-Dixon line.
The basis of
slavery was providing the producers with labor.
Slavery was a labor problem. In
the agricultural South, especially in the cotton belt, slavery was the best
labor mode possible because the laborers were tied to the land and couldn’t migrate.
Providing
for the slaves was the Producers responsibility, hence food, clothing and
shelter was provided as a cost of doing business. There were no Negro chattel slaves that went
hungry. Conditions might vary but the
slaves had to be cared for. If you read
in the Negro slave narratives, available on the Internet, you will be amazed at
what you find.
One ex-slave
didn’t regret slavery that much because he said the you never went hungry in
those days. If wanted food you culled a
hog from herd, killed it, roasted it and ate it. Whether that was universal or not the chattel
slaves did not go hungry or unclothed.
In the North
where producers wanted labor at the lowest possible cost they had to resort to
wage slavery. The industrialists worked
their wage slavery. The industrialists
worked their wage slave harder than any chattel slave. The wage slaves worked in horrible conditions
for twelve hour a day seven day a week for a pittance. The wage slavers provided nothing but that
pittance. Where possible they resorted
to using children, young children, and women and paid them even less than a
pittance.
The wage
slaves then were on their own lookout for food, clothing and shelter. All those indefensible shanty towns. In all cases they were less well off than the
Agricultural slaves. The Negroes
definitely had it better.
While the
chattel slaves were required by law to a certain level of benevolence, the wage
slave had no protections whatever. If in desperation they resisted exploitation
by trying to organize they were shot down dead.
They were blacklisted and were unemployable. Hence a reason for armies of hoboes roaming
the land.
The ‘Saints’
from New England, the Holy Abolitionists whose sea captains bought in Africa
and sold in the New World, that is North and South America and the Caribbean were
also those who sought cheap White labor from European countries. The principle was to have as many different nationalities
and languages as possible in order to make it difficult to combine for better
wages and working conditions. Slavery
was slavery and conditions were harsher for wage slaves than for chattel
slaves.
Thus Negroes
have no more to complain about than Whites.
Slavery was part of the woof and warp of the fabric of American society.
Lincoln
freed certain of the slaves in 1860 and then came Henry Ford to ameliorate the
conditions of the wage slaves. Lincoln
was murdered for his role in ending chattel slavery and Henry Ford has been a
victim of horrible character assassination for his role in ameliorating wage
slavery. Most likely the reason that
good men are hard to find.
