Slavery Argumentative Essay

In the United States there was a heated debate about the morality of slavery. Supporters of slavery in the 18th century used legal, economic, and religious arguments to defend slavery. They were able to do so effectively because all three of these reasons provide ample support of the peculiar institution that was so vital to the South.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the issue of African slavery in America in the antebellum by late eighteenth century and before the antebellum crisis as discussed in Paul Finkelman’s book: Defending Slavery.

Slave as defined by the dictionary means that a slave is a person who is the property of and wholly subject to another; a bond servant. So why is it that every time you go and visit a historical place like the Hampton-Preston mansion in Columbia South Carolina, the Lowell Factory where the mill girls work in Massachusetts or the Old town of Williamsburg Virginia they only talk about the good things that happened at these place, like such things as who owned them, who worked them, how they were financed and what life was like for the owners. They never talk about the background information of the lower level people like the slaves or servants who helped take care and run these places behind the scenes.

Black people in the U.S have been fighting for themselves since the birth of America. Many today say that it will never stop. They may say that the challenges they face will never disappear. During the 1800s Blacks went through extreme hardships. Most of which were regarding slavery and the many attempts to put an end to it. The title of Howard Zinn’s Chapter Nine in A people’s History of the U.S represents much more than a typical reader would presume. The title has a meaning that represents a bulk of black history in the United States of America. The chapter title “Slavery Without Submission, Emancipation Without Freedom” represents the everlasting fight that black people in the United States of America have had to put up for their own rights and freedom because blacks fought during the time of slavery and didn’t give up, the time period spent fighting to end slavery, and even after Slaves were freed they have had to continue fighting for the reason that they weren’t given true freedom.

     Slavery caused a great impact in the evolution of history. Slavery was the cause of many wars and disruptions along the time line that dates to the present twenty--first century. People of color were deprived of having a life of their own and going about normal ways because of the greed that consumed society. The role of slavery in society attributed to the desperation and anger the slaves felt and lead them to strike against their owners in many occasions. Despite the threats and the unfair treatment, many people of color retaliated and firmly stood up for their rights as equal human beings. It was absurd how society based their government on religion at one point and still managed to dispossess people of

Slavery was not fully addressed in the Constitution, in fact the word slavery was not mentioned in the constitution. There different sections in the constitution that prevent the government's involvement with slavery. Some may say that if government had the power to ban slavery the Southern states would refuse unite with the Northern states. It seems that the framers of the Constitution were trying to keep the South happy in order to keep the country United. The framers had no way to avoid slavery at that time, they did what they needed to do in order to keep the country together.

Europeans, after the rise of the trans-Atlantic slave trade, vindicated the enslaving of Africans by depending on religious authority because they supposedly followed God’s will (notes). According to Pope Nicholas V, the African enslavement has helped the Catholic Church (source A). In a 1455 letter, he wrote, “... A large number of these have been converted to the Catholic faith…” (source A). The quote suggests the pontiff held a positive outlook on slavery, but he only supported it for the conversion of the slaves (notes). Over 100 years later, a letter surfaced from Jesuit Brother Luis Bandaon to Father Sandoval that read he and other educated Fathers from Brazil support slavery for the purpose of more conversions and labor (source B and

There were many things that were going on during the seventeen century. That was also one major thing that had shaped the aspect of the south and the southern colonies. The major thing was slavery. Slavery was work being done by not getting paid, and being forced to do the work. Slaves where being miss treated and it was unfair, it made the population sky raise, and it cause there to be two different agricultural zones.

Slavery has a lot of effects on African Americans today. History of slavery is marked for civil rights. Indeed, slavery began with civilization. With farming’s development, war could be taken as slavery. Slavery that lives in Western go back 10,000 years to Mesopotamia. Today, most of them move to Iraq, where a male slave had to focus on cultivation. Female slaves were as sexual services for white people also their masters at that time, having freedom only when their masters died.

Slavery, especially in America, has been an age old topic of riveting discussions. Specialist and other researchers have been digging around for countless years looking for answers to the many questions that such an activity provided. They have looked into the economics of slavery, slave demography, slave culture, slave treatment, and slave-owner ideology (p. ix). Despite slavery being a global issue, the main focus is always on American slavery. Peter Kolchin effectively illustrates in his book, American Slavery how slavery evolved alongside of historical controversy, the slave-owner relationship, how slavery changed over time, and how America compared to other slave nations around the world.

Owning slaves is a matter which many people have different opinions of and often their beliefs are extremely contradictory from each others. James Madison, the fourth president of the United States, worked hard to abolish the practice of slavery. Even though he firmly believed slavery was wrong, “...as a national evil, [it should] be abolished, and it [shouldn’t] be done at the national expense…”, he kept slaves his whole life (Weinstein). Madison in his heart believed the practice of slavery to be wrong, however his belief of slavery didn’t show through his action. His ownership of slaves was partly his dad’s doing because when he died in 1801 Madison inherited his plantation which had many slaves working on

During the 17th to 19th centuries, the atrocious act of enslaving another race for free labor took place in the United States. Upwards of 15 million Africans were captured and forced into slavery, with half a million of them coming into North America where the slave population rapidly reproduced over the years. Africans suffered immoral and inhumane treatment on the passage to the Americas, but the brutality only increased when arriving to the United States. Slaves were forced to work long hours with little rations and constant physical beatings. By the 1800s, the barbaric act of slavery evolved into an established and accepted institution in American society (McKinnon). Advocates of slavery used racial, legal, religious, and economic justifications

During this time the most of the North states had abolished slavery and were looking to expand west, but they didn’t want the Ideology of slavery expanding west. Although, the south’s view of slavery was different and they were also pursuing western expansion, the Missouri Compromise of 1820, became the first debate over allowing the spread of slavery into new land to the west. This compromise helped to maintain an equal balance until Texas was annexed in 1845 as a slave state. All this would lead to war with Mexico, and then the American Civil War The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, was the end of the Mexican American war, but the United States also took half a million square acres. This would create tension between the North and the South regarding

meant that they needed more land, but also more hands to do the terrible and

There has been much debate on the topic of slavery in the early times, although most of the countries considered slavery as a criminal activity. Some countries such as Myanmar and Sudan do not abolish it. They even expedite the slavery system. It is no doubt that slavery violent the human rights. However, it was commonly spread in the early times from 17th to 19th century. In this research, I will talk about the origin of the slavery, the reasons for people to becoming slave and the life of the slave.