The Dirty Business of Slavery

The Dirty Business of Slavery. The President's House. , Slave Trade in the Americas , The trans-Atlantic slave trade began in the early 1500s with the arrival of Dutch and Portuguese explorers, and did not end until Brazil stopped importations in 1867. Chattel slavery, the legal ownership of men, women, and children by others who could sell them at will, existed throughout the Americas., Roughly 12.5 million Africans, principally from West and Central Africa, were purchased from African traders by European and American traders and brought to the Americas. After independence, many Americans, especially northerners, continued to be involved in slave-trading by outfitting and manning slave-trading ships., Britain outlawed its slave trade in 1808, and that year, by the terms of the U.S. Constitution, Congress made it illegal to import enslaved persons. However, the buying, selling, and ownership of them continued within the United States., After 1808, the population of enslaved people in the United States continued to grow primarily by natural increase, including births to enslaved women resulting from rape by white men and forced breeding. Also, there was a relatively low death rate due to a decline in disease, favorable climate, and adequate food supply., Constitutional Compromise , The men who wrote the U.S. Constitution created a document based on the ideal of liberty, but liberty and enslavement were bitterly entwined. The Constitution did not act against slavery. To appease slaveholders, the document allowed the slave trade to continue until 1808. Furthermore, the Constitution required the return of escaped enslaved persons to their owners. Northern delegates also compromised on the issue of congressional representation by allowing each enslaved person to be counted as 3/5 of an individual for population purposes., Slavery in a Growing Nation , Washington and Adams led a nation of almost four million according to the first federal census in 1790; the population grew to more than five million by 1800. As Washington and Adams governed the new nation, slavery continued to grow. By 1800, one out of every six people in the United States was enslaved., Total U.S. population: , 1790: 3,929,214 , 1800: 5,308,483, Free African-Americans: , 1790: 59,150 (1.51%) , 1800: 108,500 (2.04%), Enslaved Africans: , 1790: 694,280 (17.67%) , 1800: 893,602 (16.83%), The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 made the Ohio River the boundary between free and slave territory, though decades more were needed to end slavery in the old Northwest completely. In the 1790s, Congress admitted Kentucky and Tennessee as slave states and Vermont as a free state., Slavery in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania , Philadelphia's enslaved before and after the gradual abolition act of 1780., Enslaved Africans: , 1767: c. 1,400 , 1775: c. 690 , 1790: 301 , 1800 55, Slavery Timeline , 1619: Slaves were brought to Jamestown, Virginia. , 1641: Massachusetts legally recognized slavery. , 1662: Virginia law determined the status of all children born in this country to be the same as that of the mother. , 1684: Ship Isabella brought 150 enslaved Africans to Philadelphia. , 1705: Virginia law determined all servants important and brought into the country who were not Christians in their native country would be regarded as slaves. Slaves were chattel property, and could be disciplined or killed by their owners without penalty. , 1775-1776: The Pennsylvania Abolition Society was founded in Philadelphia, the first in the nation, and Philadelphia Quaker Meeting banned slavery for its membership. , 1780 Pennsylvania passed the first Gradual Abolition Act in the new nation. The act prohibited importation of enslaved Africans into the state and guaranteed future children of enslaved Pennsylvania mothers would be born free but indentured until age 28. An enslaved resident born before the act would not benefit from its provision and remain in perpetual slavery unless freed by his or her owner. , 1783: Massachusetts abolished slavery. , 1787: The Northwest Ordinance banned slavery and involuntary servitude in the territory north of the Ohio River, but ambiguities and conflicts within its provisions allowed bondage to continue in the area for more than fifty years. , 1787: The Constitution stated that Congress could not interfere with the slave trade until 1808. , 1788: The Pennsylvania legislature amended the 1780 Gradual Abolition Act. The amendment prohibited removal of a pregnant, enslaved woman out of state (so the child would be born enslaved) and the separation of enslaved family members by more than ten miles. It also required registration of the child of an enslaved mother within six months of birth. , 1793: The Fugitive Slave Act, passed by Congress, reinforced the constitutional right of a slaveholder to recover a runaway slave. Anyone who harbored or concealed a fugitive could be fined $500. Anyone convicted of having interfered with the return of a fugitive to another state by using force could be fined (not more than $500) and given a jail sentence not to exceed one year. , 1794: The Slave Trade Act, passed by Congress, made it illegal for American ships to engage in the international slave trade and to sell enslaved people abroad. , 1808: The first children born after 1780 to enslaved Pennsylvania mothers were freed of their indentures under the 1780 Gradual Abolition Act. , 1808: Congress banned international slave trade; smuggling continued. , 1820: The Missouri Compromise established boundaries of slavery in Louisiana Purchase territory, closing the area north of the 36° 30' latitude line to slavery. , 1847: The Pennsylvania legislature freed all remaining enslaved people in the state (fewer than 100). All of them would have been 67 or older. , 1850: The compromise of 1850 included a strong new fugitive slave law that made it easier for slaveholders to retrieve escapees and overrode states' rights to interfere with recovering such persons. , 1851: The largest trial for treason in U.S. history occurred in Philadelphia on the second floor of Independence Hall. Thirty-eight people, whites and people of African descent, stood trial for resisting the recovery of runaway enslaved persons near Christiana, Pennsylvania. One was found not guilty; charges against the rest were dismissed. , 1857: In the Dred Scott decision, the Supreme Court ruled that Congress could not ban slavery in the territories and that, in the words of Chief Justice Taney, "a person of African descent in the United States has not rights that a white person or government must respect." , 1860: The federal census counted almost four million enslaved people in the U.S. , 1863: President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. , 1865: The Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution abolished slavery in the U.S. The Juneteenth celebrations, held after the ratification of the amendment, commemorated to the date (June 19) on which the joyous news of the Emancipation Proclamation reached enslaved people in Texas. , 1942: Philadelphia Richard Robert Wright Sr., born into slavery in the South, organized the first National Freedom Day to commemorate the Thirteenth Amendment and call attention to continuing limitations on freedom. National Freedom Day is observed each February 1st at the Liberty Bell.