Slavery in the mid 1800's

In the time period between 1775 and 1830, African Americans start to gain more freedom in the North while the institution of slavery expanded in the South. These changes occurred due to the existence of different point of views. The North did not need slavery and acknowledge the cons of slavery while the South’s want for slavery quickly became a need.

Rebellion has always been the cornerstone of change. Wherever a rebellion has surfaced a change has soon followed, whether it is political change such as an overthrow of a government or just the overthrow of an oppressor such as a slaver. Some rebellions however are less justified than others; none more so than slave rebellions. Slavery in America was one of our biggest mistakes as a nation and was by far the most terrible time in African American history. However most slaves although poorly treated were given places to live and enough food to survive. They weren’t treated as people but as property and had about as many rights as a sack of potatoes. This led to most, if not all, slaves feeling a lot of animosity towards their owners. The more educated of slaves tried to find ways to get out of their servitude. When all peaceful means of getting out of their servitude had failed they went to flat out rebellion. Slave rebellions tended to be extremely violent and usually very rash. And when the rebellions were better planned they tended to be even more violent and disturbing. These rebellions however were completely unjustified and the slaves had no right to revolt the way they did.

Nat Turner’s Rebellion is just one example of a slave uprising. Nat Turner encouraged rebel slaves to kill their slaveholders during this rebellion, and Southern’s were afraid of more slave revolts after this occurrence. Also, the Pottawatomie Massacre left Southerners in fear after the abolitionists had killed five people in Pottawatomie Creek, Kansas. Lastly, John Brown’s Raid on Harper’s Ferry pushed the South’s wanting to secede even greater.

Initially, there had been slave rebellions, but most occurred on boats. The fact was none had an impact on actual southern society. This entire event outraged and struck fear into the hearts of the southerners. The rebellion triggered harsher punishments and policies on rebellions, and threat of rebellions. Slaves were often convicted and killed for simple threats of possible rebellion, and whether or not the threat was legitimate, we may never know.

As a means of showing contempt and overall disapproval of being forced to live and labor against their will slaves resisted in a variety of ways that ranged from minor delinquency to felonious methods. To disrupt the daily routine where they worked they would purposefully break tools and make false claims of illness. On the other end of the spectrum they would sometimes launch physical attacks, both covert and overt, against whites.

Dating as far back at the time of slavery, African Americans have have fought back against suppression. The first, and only successful slave revolt was in 1831. It was led by Nat Turner, a slave in Virginia who led a group of over seventy slaves in an attempt for a “revolution” that ended in over one hundred casualties. Other key moment in African American history was the Underground Railroad where Harriet Tubman helped tens of

rederick Douglass once said “The thing worse than rebellion is the thing that causes rebellion.” This quote was in regards to the slavery and oppression plaguing America in the 18th and 19th century. Rebellion is an act of violent or nonviolent disobedience that typically occurs as a result of being treated unfairly or inhumanly. So, what makes a rebellion effective when protesting against slavery? An effective slave rebellion would be one that improves social equality from previous social situations in which all peoples would be considered equal to one another without producing too many negative factors such as deaths. During the 17th and 18th century there were three groups that led slavery rebellions which were called “The New York

Revolt is a rise away from constitution authority, Several slaves in the plantation revolted in the 1800s, but the Denmark vessey and Nat turner organized slave revolt is one of the most excellently and brilliant planned. Both men prepared strategically to override the institution of slavery. They were never contented with it, cause it made them sad. The revolts took time, courage, bravery and ambition, selfless to even have conceived this idea during that ambition. They were both leader in their community, who strives for greater black opportunities. Their resentment and meticulous planning to execute mass revolt have earned them a place in the history of African American.

Slaves were forced to work in the colonies and already had very limited freedom, but to make it worse slave codes was then created. Slave codes were biased laws created by the English colonies and soon later enforced to the American English colonies. Sometimes slave codes would differ from state to state. It restricted African Americans’ rights whether they were free or not. Even if an African American was free, they weren’t truly free because of the restrictions of the slave codes. Colonists pride themselves needing to be the more dominant and supreme person. Slave codes were tightened after every slave rebellion, in effort to prevent them from escaping and diminishing the chance of it happening again.

They reverted to drastic measures to resist this awful feeling and condition by cutting off their fingers, poisoning themselves, killing themselves, and their masters. They often ran away, slowed down while performing their duties in the fields, attacked their masters, cut off their toes, poisoned the master’s cattle, or targeted their destination for the Underground Railroad. These were some of the strong measures of resistance by the enslaved African Americans (Holt & Barkley, 2000).

The fundamental element of a successful slave rebellion is a heroic slave rebel. Madison Washington of Frederick Douglass' The Heroic Slave and Henry Blake of Martin Delany's Blake or the Huts of America serve as models of that rebel. First, he must possess a will to stay and fight-he must not be content to just run away and gain individual freedom, abandoning his family and friends. Second, he needs intelligence, and preferably education as well, to be able to organize large, complex plans of rebellion. Finally, he must be a natural leader, drawing fellow slaves and free abolitionists to follow him and fight for his cause. Throughout the novels,

(wikipedia.org) Slaves in the slavery society could be treated as personal property and be sold or bought as commodity, besides slaves could be deprived of rights and interests randomly by the slaveholder. Endurance of overloaded work and poor treatment seemed like endless alongside with maltreat and punishment, forced the indignant slaves to revolt against both the master and the unjust institution, whether there would be brutal repression. During the vigorous slavery abolition, the continuous strike of numerous slaves’ resistance and rebellion had been indispensable and irreplaceable.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau once said, “Men are born free, but everywhere they are in chains.”(Mulder) Well it is the exact opposite, men are born in chains, and they will have to earn their freedom, because nothing is free in this world or there is no such thing as free lunch as they say. Bing dictionary defines the word slavery as “the state or condition of being held in involuntary servitude as the property of somebody else.” (Bing Dictionary) They were sold and purchased at many different auctions, and most of the time, they were miserable and afraid. Imagine being traded around like a piece of clothing, wear and tear shows through you, and being shipped to a foreign country. The slaves really had a hard time with their lives. Many Americans ruined African Americans’ lives by treating them as lesser beings and using them for their own needs, this not only takes away their freedom but also their dignity and since the Americans took away the slave’s freedom, they shall not deserve any themselves.

The first abolitionists of slavery were the slaves themselves, who adopted various forms of resistance from their capture in Africa to their sale and exploitation in the plantations of the Americas and the Caribbean. Many times they used rebellions and suicides as forms of resistance. The American colonial worlds were often disturbed by the revolts of their slaves or at least by the threat of revolts. The administrators of the English and French colonies of the Caribbean indicate that, in the 1730s, a "wind of freedom" was blowing in the Caribbean, demonstrating the existence of a true resistance to slavery, which ended up unleashing half a century later with the rebellion of the slaves of Santo Domingo.

Hegemony and resistance are different subjects, where hegemony is one buying into their own oppression, while resistance is breaking free from oppression. These aspects play a role in creating a slave who does not to have the capacity to rebel due to past slaves who resisted through various of ways. Resistance is illustrated during the 1750’s in “The Horrors of the Middle Passage” by Olaudah Equiano, who was an African sold into slavery, and this resistance is one of the first ways that Africans showed rebellion towards Europeans. According to the text, “ … cut for attempting to do so, and hourly whipped for not eating” (The Horrors of the Middle Passage, Olaudah Equiano, 2) meaning slaves analyzed a situation where eating would keep them