Differences Between Virginia And Virginia

The Virginia Slave Codes date all the way to early 1600s. During the 17th century, indentured servants, who decided to work for an affirmed amount of time in replace for their means of access to the "New World", were a handy resource of manual labor for the American colonies. Both blacks and whites served under the system (Goldenburg 1). White servants, after working out their time of agreement, often progressed to appreciated places in the society. On the other hand, their black correspondents, who totaled to about 2,000 in Virginia in 1670, were rarely given the same treatment. By the middle of the century, they were usually regarded as servants for life. In the late 1650s, laws referring to slaves started to

Other Europeans, Native Americans and West Africans were the groups thought to be most suitable for the economic demand of labor. Many of the early views of West Africans were received through the bible until written accounts of encounters with these people were made. These written accounts of the encounters of West Africans led to the idea West Africans could be brought over and sold in the Americas to work in chattel slavery. This in turn made them the ultimate choice for the labor force of the English. However the famous sale of twenty Africans to the colonists at Jamestown in 1619 by Dutch slave traders did not equate to the introduction of chattel slavery just yet. Many early African slaves were treated similarly to indentured servants brought in from England. They could work the land for a set number of years then after their term was up be freed and given a piece of land. Indentured servitude was not hereditary but their contract could be sold, bartered, given away or gambled away. These contracts gave away the servant’s labor but it did not give away the servant’s person. Despite this African presence, slavery was slow to arrive in Virginia because the mortality rate for indentured servants was so high during the first decades of the Virginia colony. Indentured servitude remained the primary source of labor in Virginia through the 1680s, until economic considerations made slaves the cheaper alternative.

2. Africans were considered better slaves than Indians in Virginia because the whites were outnumbered by Indians and faced retaliation if they were enslaved. Slaves were also resourceful on their indigenous lands while whites were not benefited at all.

In reviewing the book American Slavery, American Freedom, historian and author Edmund S. Morgan provides a chronological approach to the growth of slavery in North America. Morgan starts his journey with the first settlements in Virginia and continues until the start of the American Revolution. Morgan gives explanation of how ideals of freedom and English sense of superiority came to be a major stepping stone for independence and racism. Morgan’s question of how a country that proclaims liberty, equality and religious virtue can at the same time foster the opposing ideals of slavery and subjugation is the underlying question throughout the book. Morgan puts the critical issue on display, broken down into four areas or books, to guide our understanding of colonial Virginia, the development of slavery, and the link between racism and equality.

Virginia, in the southern region, was the first area colonized, named for Queen Elizabeth who was supposedly a virgin. It was intended to be a source of wealth for England by providing cash crops such as tobacco and, eventually, a new market for English goods.. The short winters and warm summers were ideal for growing cash crops such as cotton, tobacco, and rice, all of which were labor intensive. Most of the people who immigrated to these southern colonies were poor Englishmen who were part of the growing number of unemployed in their home country. They paid for their passage by becoming indentured servants, hoping to work off their servitude on the plantations and begin a new life in a new land. As economic conditions improved in England however, Virginia, as well as the other southern colonies, began to rely more and more on slave labor. Slaves became a better investment than in indentured servants, and the southern colonies soon transitioned to slave-based, agricultural economies. (Taylor)

In the New World, various resources, climates, and considerable amounts of land allowed numerous opportunities for settlers. Those who once yearned to climb the social ladder or gain the freedoms bestowed from land ownership flocked toward the newfound settlements. Colonization proved to be a grueling task; however, success was found after adapting to the new environment and facing many hardships. Two colonies established early in the seventeenth century included Virginia and New England. Both Virginia and New England were forerunning settlements that differed in the following senses: political, social, and economical.

Jamestown, Virginia was America’s first founded permanent English colony. It was founded on May 14, 1607 when the first English colonists arrived and discovered the land. The Virginia Company settlers landed on Jamestown looking to create a colony about 60 miles from the Chesapeake Bay. The settlement of Jamestown was one of the first cultural encounters that planted the seeds of what would eventually become the nation America is today .

In 1619, Virginia was an isolated British settlement on the Chesapeake Bay. It was sparsely populated by men trying to make the colony profitable for England. But the colonists were devastated by hunger, disease, and raids by Native Americans. So when the White Lion, a badly damaged Dutch slave ship arrived, carrying 20 kidnapped black Africans, the colonists bartered food and services for the human cargo. The Africans started working for the colonists. They would work 7 years of hard labor in exchange for land and freedom. But when colonies started to prosper, the colonists were reluctant to lose their labor. Since the Africans did not have citizenship, they were not subject to English common law. They were workers with no rights.

Massachusetts and Virginia were the first to colonies to be founded. They were both founded to expand English settlement in the New World. Over the years of the new settlement, both colonies had to find ways to begin their new lives, in the new world, on this new land. They had to create a new form government, to well balanced and equal colony. New economic developments in the colonies, helped to create these forms of government and affect the politics. Massachusetts and Virginia used cash crops and joint stock companies to make money to help create these governments. Virginia was a higher class so they ended up using the higher class to create a form of aristocracy. Massachusetts has more religious beliefs and freedoms, they formed a theocracy.

Breen and Innes do a great job suggesting that a person’s conduct, not necessarily their race, played the major role in early Virginia. They make an inadvertent argument that dominance and submission were the real issue when it came to owning property at the time, not race. The large plantation owners intimidated the smaller farmers and landowners. Blacks were on the same playing field when compared along with the small farmers and landowners. Sadly, this did not last with the entrance of racial mindsets as aforementioned. There is also an argument that even though the hardest working blacks could work their way out of slavery and into freedom, they could maintain the wealth it took to perpetuate that freedom. The growing plantation system and the growing black population is what brought an end to the equal status of the free, black

Tobacco was the first profitable crop in the new colony, and it encouraged tobacco planters to move farther and farther into the inland, intruding more and more into the native farmlands. (Brinkley, pg. 29) Tobacco created a great need for laborers. New workers to the colony were offered land, depending on the size of their family. This was the beginning of the concept of plantations. In 1619, 100 women were sent to the colony to become wives of the male settlers. This “promised the male colonists the full rights of Englishmen, an end to strict and arbitrary rule, and even a share in self-government. (Brinkley, pg. 29) July 30, 1619 the first elected legislature, the House of Burgesses was created. Also in 1619, a Dutch ship brought over the first shipment of African slaves. The slaves were forced into ships, shackled in the bottom of the ship, barely fed and were brought to Virginia. If a slave died during the voyage, their body was thrown overboard. “From mid-1670 to 1700, Virginia and Maryland imported about 6,000 slaves direct from Africa, most arriving the 1690’s.”(Morgan)

The citizens of the New England colonies rarely affected slaves compared to the settlers in Chesapeake, which

These colonists were motivated by greed and saw a better opportunity to become rich. Therefore the settlers came over from England. A Virginia ship list in 1625 reports the number of people to be transported to Virginia (Doc C). In comparison to New England, there were very few women or families. Most of the people were men of about 20-30 years of age. The ratios and ages suggest that these people were looking to make money over starting families. The Chesapeake colonies were mostly funded by England. The Governor of Virginia, William Berkeley, asked the King of England to help out (Doc G). These colonies maintained fairly close relations with England. They considered themselves part of and under England, and still owed allegiance to England. The Chesapeake region had a colonial assembly. These were mostly local people of the colony. There was also a governor who was appointed by the King of England. The local people of the colony - the colonial assembly- and the English appointed governor shared political power over the region. The House of Burgesses was established in 1619 and was the first representative government in the New World. Similar to the Chesapeake region, the Southern colonies were founded by the upper class and gentry of England. The reason for this was that there were vast areas of land available that were valuable for farming. The Carolinas were

Slavery had become a fundamental part of the social and the economic life in Chesapeake and the Southern Colonies. It is estimated that over 270,000 slaves lived and worked in Chesapeake in 1770 (Foner 2012, pg. 136). Blacks accounted for nearly half the population of Virginia by 1750 and in South Carolina they outnumbered whites two to one (Kennedy 2000, pg.

The limitation of this book is that this book could only dedicate about 10 pages in the slavery in Virginia. Since it covered so much time period, some details were overlooked.