The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America: 1638-1870Du Bois, W. E. B. (William Edward Burghardt)
History
The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America: 1638-1870
Du Bois, W. E. B. (William Edward Burghardt)
Slave trade -- United States -- History
Many white servants were thus encouraged to settle in the colony; but so
much larger was the influx of black slaves that the colony, in 1760,
totally prohibited the slave-trade. This act was promptly disallowed by
the Privy Council and the governor reprimanded;[18] but the colony
declared that "an importation of negroes, equal in number to what have
been imported of late years, may prove of the most dangerous consequence
in many respects to this Province, and the best way to obviate such
danger will be by imposing such an additional duty upon them as may
totally prevent the evils."[19] A prohibitive duty of L100 was
accordingly imposed in 1764.[20] This duty probably continued until the
Revolution.
The war made a great change in the situation. It has been computed by
good judges that, between the years 1775 and 1783, the State of South
Carolina lost twenty-five thousand Negroes, by actual hostilities,
plunder of the British, runaways, etc. After the war the trade quickly
revived, and considerable revenue was raised from duty acts until 1787,
when by act and ordinance the slave-trade was totally prohibited.[21]
This prohibition, by renewals from time to time, lasted until 1803.
6. ~Restrictions in North Carolina.~ In early times there were few
slaves in North Carolina;[22] this fact, together with the troubled and
turbulent state of affairs during the early colonial period, did not
necessitate the adoption of any settled policy toward slavery or the
slave-trade. Later the slave-trade to the colony increased; but there is
no evidence of any effort to restrict or in any way regulate it before
1786, when it was declared that "the importation of slaves into this
State is productive of evil consequences and highly impolitic,"[23] and
a prohibitive duty was laid on them.
7. ~Restrictions in Virginia.~[24] Next to South Carolina, Virginia had
probably the largest slave-trade. Her situation, however, differed
considerably from that of her Southern neighbor. The climate, the staple
tobacco crop, and the society of Virginia were favorable to a system of
domestic slavery, but one which tended to develop into a patriarchal
serfdom rather than into a slave-consuming industrial hierarchy. The
labor required by the tobacco crop was less unhealthy than that
connected with the rice crop, and the Virginians were, perhaps, on a
somewhat higher moral plane than the Carolinians. There was consequently
no such insatiable demand for slaves in the larger colony. On the other
hand, the power of the Virginia executive was peculiarly strong, and it
was not possible here to thwart the slave-trade policy of the home
government as easily as elsewhere.
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