Posted on 12/18/2021 7:06:36 AM PST by SeekAndFind
For there to be slavery in any colony, laws had to be written making the practice legal. Prior to the slave laws, indentured servants were given the same contracts regardless of where they were from. Once the contracts were fulfilled, servants were free regardless of where they came from.
There is a stubborn myth in American history that claims Virginia was the first colony to legalize slavery. If not Virginia, then some other southern colony. It was as if the northern colonies were completely untouched by the horrors of owning a person.
The first colony to legalize slavery was not Virginia or some other southern colony, but Massachusetts in 1641. Virginia would not legalize slavery for just over two decades after Massachusetts.
Until 1641, no colony turned state had legalized slavery. It first happened under Governor John Winthrop, who was the first governor of Massachusetts and reelected twelve consecutive times from 1631 to 1648 through more than questionable means.
During his reign, he was a bit of a control freak who took it personally that people were fleeing Massachusetts for Connecticut.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
According to the article:
Anyone who left MA that Winthrop did not personally want to see removed from his colony was seen as a traitor.
Roger Williams was one of those Winthrop wanted gone. He was one of the founders of Rhode Island and a serious threat to Winthrop. He openly called for toleration of religious beliefs and was embraced by enough Massachusetts colonists to be seen as a threat to Winthrop’s power.
“Until 1641, no colony turned state had legalized slavery.”
Am I the only one seeing a problem with the facts right there?
A poorly written rambling article which relies on an obscure provision which seemed to be limiting slavery to war captives. The article tries to disprove the 1619 project by claiming Massachusetts legalized slavery before Virginia.
I’m not aware that Massachusetts has any significant history of legalized slavery and the article fails to give any historical overview.
This is a stupid article.
The real point about Massachusetts and slavery is that the state outlawed slavery. America never had slavery in the North.
I noticed that, too.
The only "stubborn myth" here would appear to be the claim that this is a stubborn myth. Every source you can find on this says it is Massachusetts and 1641 - as far as earliest codification.
The first adjudication in court did occur in Virginia - strangely enough, the first officially declared legal slave owner was himself black.
Well, this is the American “Non” Thinker, after all. Used to be a very decent publication...used to be.
The Importation and Sale of Enslaved People
No mention of MA off-loading troublesome Pequots, though.
Virginia did introduce slavery first, and the courts there upheld it. Massachusetts did write slavery into its laws, but the courts there later abolished it. One might often wish it to be otherwise, but courts do make law. In any event, slavery was abolished a long time ago and no living American is responsible for it, so the writer can FOAD painfully.
There were some times when slavery was legal in the North after the US was formed, but not for long, nor was it widely practiced as opposition to it was the greatest. Massachusetts’ Supreme Court actually banned it in the early 1780s declaring it unconstitutional under their state’s constitution.
The 1619 Project’s basic premise is that this country was built on slavery. That’s obviously false - slavery actually stifled economic progress where it was practiced. The North vastly outperformed the South in every economic aspect - including in agriculture - without slavery there was far more innovation and commerce in the North. The North was the country’s economic engine. That is a major reason the South was not able to prevail - it simply did not have the resources and the wealth of the North.
Re-elected 12 consecutive times.
So,the steal happened long before biden?
more correctly....no BRITISH COLONY.
“...an obscure provision which seemed to be limiting slavery to war captives.”
Since you don’t seem to be disputing the author’s writing - that the MA colony had a slavery provision in law before VA - apparently it existed. Your objection, the way I read it, is that despite said provision existing in 1641, its contribution/impact to slavery in the US was limited or not significant. But was still legal nonetheless, no?
While beyond the scope of author’s writing, it would be interesting to find out, if possible, if this law’s existence was considered by subsequent colonies that subsequently became slave states.
“America never had slavery in the North”.
Untrue, as a quick web search shows.
Example:
The northern states largely abolished slavery by 1804, but the practice clearly existed in the north before independence and for a generation after.
They were British at the time. America didn’t become independent until the surrender of King George III.
Yale and Brown Universities were named after their great, initial benefactors, who both made their fortunes in the slave trade.
Not a single peep from the race hustlers.
Most of the “slaves” in MA were “manservants” or indentured hands.
Agriculture in MA at the time was not big enough to feed abundant slaves. Any industry was too small and highly skilled.
There were slaves, but not many.
No one else wanted the job. Governor in those days was a crap job.
Agreed. Reading Shelby Foote’s 3 volume Civil War set and I’m of the opinion that if the south had half the manufacturing that the north had, it may have been a different world.
It’s also what concerns me about all of our manufacturing moving overseas today.
Something about 1776 or 1789 I’m sure.
Take Georgia for example, when founded slavery was illegal.
The colony of the Province of Georgia under James Oglethorpe banned slavery in 1735, the only one of the thirteen colonies to have done so. However, it was legalized by royal decree in 1751.
My relatives and ancestors come from south coastal Georgia.
We dour Scots opposed slavery.
In 1739 eighteen of the most prominent members of the Darien colony signed the first petition against the introduction of slavery into Georgia, in response to pleas to Oglethorpe and the trustees by inhabitants of Savannah to lift the prohibition of slavery.[11] The Highlanders’ petition was successful, but slavery was introduced ten years later in 1749 because the proprietors could not attract enough laborers to make the colony profitable
In 1775 while the new state constitution and government was being formed during the revolution. Once again the town of Darien opposed slavery, using a moral argument that stands the test of time.
In January 1775, the city passed a resolution condemning slavery, saying:
To show the world that we are not influenced by any contracted or interested motives, but a general philanthropy for all mankind, of whatever climate, language, or complexion, we hereby declare our disapprobation and abhorrence of the unnatural practice of Slavery in America, (however the uncultivated state of our country, or other specious arguments may plead for it,) a practice founded in injustice and cruelty, and highly dangerous to our liberties, (as well as our lives,) debasing part of our fellow-creatures below men, and corrupting the virtue and morals of the rest; and is laying the basis of that liberty we contend for (and which we pray the Almighty to continue to the latest posterity) upon a very wrong foundation. We therefore resolve, at all times to use our utmost endevours for the manumission of Slaves...
— Darien Committee, Darien Resolutions, January 12, 1775[12]
I guarantee that most history books do not cover the fact that the small south georgia farmers opposed slavery when the rich English established the plantation system in North America. Of course the greatest horrors of slavery occurred in Mexico, Brazil, North Africa, and the Ottoman Empire. But lets not forget Africa, China, India, Egypt, and any other empire up to and including the slavery of communism and the use of slave labor by Nazi Germany.
Getting off my Calvinist soap box now.
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