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The Black Slave:

Three-Fifths the Man

If the abolitionists felt that the tide was turning their way, they were dealt a blow in 1787 with the passing of America’s Constitution. Congress argued at length as to whether slaves should be granted political rights. The Southern states found themselves caught in a dilemma – by constitutionally recognizing the blacks, the inflated population of the Southern states would have given them greater representation and hence greater power in Congress. But the downside was if the slaves were recognized as having constitutional rights then they had to pay tax, which, as they were slaves, their white owners would have to pay on their behalf.

The dilemma was solved by a compromise – the black man was given three-fifths the political rights of the white. Thus, enshrined from the beginning, the American Constitution viewed black as inferior to white.

Cotton picking, c.1870 Photograph courtesy of Keystone View Company

The use of slaves towards the end of the eighteenth century was on the decline until 1793, when Eli Whitney introduced his ‘cotton engine’ or cotton gin. By mechanically separating the cotton fibre from the seeds, it revolutionized the manufacturing process of cotton on an industrial scale. Responding to the demands of the expanding textile industry in Great Britain, the farming of cotton expanded across the Southern states. In 1790, the South had exported 3,000 bales of cotton. By 1810, with the cotton gin in place, this had increased to 180,000 bales, and half a century later, in 1860, to over 4.5 million bales. But it still needed the manpower to grow and pick the cotton, and so the need for slaves became ever more acute.

In Great Britain, black people congregated around the ports attached to the slave trade. In London, by about 1760, between 3 and 6 per cent or at least 20,000 London residents were black.

In 1772, lawyers representing James Somersett, an escaped slave, argued that his subsequent recapture and imprisonment was illegal. Lord Mansfield, presiding over the case, found in favour of Somersett, thereby abolishing slavery within England and Wales. Six years later, the ruling was extended to Scotland. Mansfield’s decision immediately freed about 15,000 slaves, mostly domestic servants, although many, without alternative means, remained with their masters as paid employees.

Olaudah Equiano, a former slave who had bought his freedom, settled in England, moved in influential circles, and in 1789 published his memories. Entitled The Interesting Narratives of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, the book and its harsh depictions of Equiano’s former life did much to advance the abolitionist cause in England.

Following the American Revolution, many Black Loyalists, the slave-soldiers who had fought on the side of the British, arrived in London, further increasing the black population within Britain. In 1786, a special ‘Committee for the Relief of the Black Poor’ laid plans for the resettlement of blacks to Sierra Leone in West Africa. Four hundred ‘Black Poor’ successfully made the trip, and once there, established a colony. The Creole people of Sierra Leone, an ethnic group whose culture is based on Western culture, are descendants of the Black Poor. But this attempt to restrict the number of blacks in Britain would not last long, and the aftermath of the Napoleonic wars of the early nineteenth century saw another influx of black soldiers and seamen settle in London.

In Britain, the Society for the Abolition of the Slave Trade was formed in 1787. It used, among its many forms of agitation, boycotts, petitions, leaflets and flyers. It would take twenty years but its efforts were duly rewarded when, in 1807, Parliament passed the Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade. British seamen who persisted with the trade were, if caught, liable to a fine of £100 for every slave found aboard ship. The Royal Navy set up a squadron whose task was to patrol the coast of West Africa capturing ships carrying slaves. Captains on the slave ships, realizing they were about to be caught, would throw slaves overboard to reduce the fines they had to pay. However, within half a century, the Royal Navy had captured 1,600 slave ships and freed 150,000 Africans in the process.

Great Britain, having abolished the slave trade in 1807, went further when, in August 1834, it abolished slavery altogether throughout the British Empire. The tireless William Wilberforce had been at the head of the twenty-year campaign and Britain became the third nation (after Denmark and Norway in 1803) to ban the slave trade outright. Slave owners were handsomely compensated (£20 million having been put aside for reparation) and were permitted to retain their former slaves as ‘apprentices’ for a further six years. The former slaves themselves, however, were offered no compensation.

Poster advertising the selling of ‘valuable young negroes’, c.1840

On 1 January 1808, a year after Britain had abolished the slave trade, the US followed suit. Cuba and Brazil were to continue importing slaves for another half-century, but in Britain and America, at least, the trade had come to an end.

But across the Atlantic in America, if the Northern states thought the act would ring the death knell for slavery, they were proved wrong. The Southern states had already reduced the number of slaves imported from the African continent in the belief that they brought in disease that could infect their existing slaves. Also, the South, by encouraging a greater birth rate, now had a steady supply of new slaves. Many died in infancy, but despite the abolition of the slave trade in 1808, the number of slaves in the US rose from 1 million in 1800 to 4 million in 1860. Slaves accounted for one-seventh of the national population, but made up a third of the population in many of the Southern states. Children born to a black mother and a white slave-owning father retained their mother’s status, so the South saw an increasing number of ‘mulatto’ slaves. The act had the unfortunate side effect of rendering the existing slaves that much more valuable. A slave that could be bought for $50 in 1800 cost $1,000 in 1850. The increasing value of slaves also meant that old slaves that may have been retired were made to work longer.

In 1822, an organization called the American Colonization Society founded a new colony, Liberia, on the west coast of Africa. Colonized by freed American slaves and declared independent in 1847, Liberia means liberty, and the country’s motto is ‘The love of liberty brought us here’. The flag is a one-star variation on the stars and stripes and the capital, Monrovia, was named after James Monroe, president of the United States between 1817 and 1825. Liberia, it was felt, offered a safer option for the freed slave than remaining in America. But for many born in the US, they preferred to run the gauntlet of discrimination and remain in the nation of their birth.