Sklaverei der USA

4 Antworten

Vom Fragesteller als hilfreich ausgezeichnet
heide2012
15.03.2011, 16:59

Hier ein Kapitel aus einer Arbeit, die ich geschrieben habe, aber klau nicht wörtlich raus so wie Guttenberg! Slavery - from colonial time until Civil War

In the year 1619 the first African slaves arrived on a Dutch ship being supposed to work in Jamestown, Virginia. The main reason why they had been taken to the English colony was that the English settlers urgently needed cheap workers for their “developing highly profitable plantations” In the first years of colonial time the slaves just acted as indentured servants having to serve their white masters for several years. During that time they had limited freedom as well as a limited right of owning properties and white workers as indentured servants from England were still cheaper than slaves the plantation owners had to buy. “The plantation system operated by servants worked. It made many Virginians rich and England’s merchants and kings richer. But it had one insuperable disadvantage. Every year it poured out a host of new freemen into society […]. The freedmen were Virginia’s dangerous men.” Other reasons were that “with slavery Virginians could exceed all their previous efforts to maximize productivity” as well as “slavery made possible the restoration and maintenance of a highly productive population” because slaves were thought to “be more reproductive than a free population […]. Slave women while employed […] could still raise children and thus contribute to the growth of the productive proportion of population” . In addition, the slave’s offspring belonged to the master. They were able to start work earlier than free children and “there was no need to keep them from work for purposes of education.” Besides, black slaves were thought to be resistant to European and of course tropical diseases. Moreover, the inhibition level to enslave people just because their skin was a different colour was much lower than to use people of the same race. When the colonists also realized that white indentured servants could easily escape and even incite rebellions and heard of the successful slave trade in the Caribbean, an almost 250 years lasting bondage began and the increasing number of slaves resulted in a lucrative slave trade network between the English colonies and West Africa and the West Indies. At a rough estimate there were about 2000 black slaves in Virginia in 1681 . As the first Federal US census was carried out in 1790 there hadn’t existed any exact figures before that year. The Africans were hunted or kidnapped often with the help from competing native tribes in their homeland, put on ships and taken to North America. In order to make a profit with slaves the owners of the slave ships tried to transport as many people as possible. It is very clear that the usually three months lasting journey took place under unthinkable unhygienic and therefore unhealthy conditions as well as a lack of food and water so that lots of people didn’t survive. After having arrived the slaves, men, women and even children were sold on auction blocs. Sometimes whole families were torn. Soon the economic system in the southern colonies depended on the work of slaves. Therefore laws were needed. Even in 1641 slavery had been legalized in Massachusetts followed by some northern colonies as well as southern ones until there were 15 slave states at the time of the civil war. These 15 states had a total population of about 12 million and nearly four million slaves were held at that time. The passed laws also defined the relationship between masters and slaves, for example slaves became their master’s real estate, could be bequeathed or killed in case of trying to run away. Not many slaves were treated humanely. Therefore it was only natural that several slave revolts followed as well as the first steps were taken to abolish slavery. For instance Pennsylvanian Quakers passed an anti-slavery resolution already in 1688 and prohibited their members from owning slaves 70 years later. During the War of Independence “African American - slave and free - served on both sides. Because of manpower shortages, George Washington lifted the ban on black enlistment in the Continental Army in January 1776. Small all-black units were formed in Rhode Island and Massachusetts; many were slaves promised freedom for serving”.
Between the War of Independence and the Civil War slavery was questioned by more and more white Americans and even famous slaveholders like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson “were profoundly troubled by slavery; leery of rash actions, they initiates a series of caution acts that they thought would lead to slavery’s gradual abolition”. On the one hand, it was the Quakers who had passed an anti-slavery resolution already in 1688 followed by a prohibition for their members of owning slaves 70 years later as well as in 1775 the first abolitionist society was organized. On the other hand, the impact of slavery accumulated and in 1787 almost in every colony slavery was legal. As a consequence a conflict between the North and the South arose that acuminated, when the slave state Missouri was meant to become part of the Union. Slave trade and suppression of the black people in general activated several people who wanted to achieve an equal status for this minority. Worth mentioning is the black slave Gabriel Prosser, who lead an extensive slave rebellion near Richmond in 1800 ending unsuccessfully. Gabriel and some of his followers were hanged. Furthermore, there was Nat Turner who and seven other slaves provoked a rebellion by killing his master and his family as well as about 50 whites. But not enough people followed him and his rebellion was ended by soldiers. Finally, even about one hundred innocent slaves died and Turner was executed in 1831. Also mentioned should be fugitive slave Harriet Tubman, who inter alia founded “The Underground Railroad”, an organization helping slaves to escape and bringing them on secret routes to slave-free states. Not only black people fought slavery. Journalist William Lloyd Garrison was an American advocate of abolition and editor of “The Liberator”, a newspaper defining slavery as sin. He argued the Christian way and therefore succeeded in shaking up the intellectual Protestants in the North and getting them on his side. Nonetheless, the hope of a slavery-free America decreased in 1850, when the “Fugitive Slave Laws” were passed a compromise between Northern anti-slavery proponents and Southern salve-holders. Four years later the United States Republican Party was founded aiming to modernize the state as well as aiming at limiting the expansion of slavery. Abraham Lincoln became its first leader and was elected president in 1860. However, he didn’t want to abolish slavery during the first years. But undoubtedly, slavery was one of the reasons for the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861.