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Fifteen: Slavery
Our country has a lot of tillable, fertile land. With the long growing season in the south, it is easy to grow massive amounts of crops when you aren't even trying. Climates in the north take a little more planning and a little less labor to maximize the yield of a productive farm.
In the early years of our colonies, some devious entrepreneurs found that the centuries-old practice of slavery was attractive to these new land owners, who had acquired land more productive than their family could manage by themselves.
Slavery was an economic system of employing people through capture, transport, imprisonment, control (which sometimes included rape), and punishment (which sometimes included death). The only compensation for those persons' services was meager housing, food, and clothing, distributed at their owners' discretion. Over 400,000 people were captured in Africa and sold into slavery in the US beginning in 1525. With their descendents, the total enslaved population grew to almost 4 million people--or 14% of the population--before 1865, when the 13th Amendment to the Constitution eliminated the practice in its previous form.
What was your first exposure to slavery? Did you grow up in the North or the South? Do you think you would have heard a different story if you had grown up elsewhere? Have you seen movies made about the antebellum era? What was your reaction? Do you think of these atrocities as beyond comprehension and not part of your personal family history? Or do you feel shame for the crimes that formed the economic foundation of our country, and have trouble reconciling your personal experience with this collective history?
Your practice today is to explore your relationship with the slave trade in the US of the era before 1865. Do you choose not to think about it? Or do you seek out more information as it becomes easily available? Do you fear that your ancestors were involved directly, or are you proud that they were abolitionists? What do you feel when you learn a person is a descendant of a slave? Do you want to apologize or do you want to tell them to get over it? Was it a long time ago or is it still with you every day?
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By Edie Milligan DriskillOur country has a lot of tillable, fertile land. With the long growing season in the south, it is easy to grow massive amounts of crops when you aren't even trying. Climates in the north take a little more planning and a little less labor to maximize the yield of a productive farm.
In the early years of our colonies, some devious entrepreneurs found that the centuries-old practice of slavery was attractive to these new land owners, who had acquired land more productive than their family could manage by themselves.
Slavery was an economic system of employing people through capture, transport, imprisonment, control (which sometimes included rape), and punishment (which sometimes included death). The only compensation for those persons' services was meager housing, food, and clothing, distributed at their owners' discretion. Over 400,000 people were captured in Africa and sold into slavery in the US beginning in 1525. With their descendents, the total enslaved population grew to almost 4 million people--or 14% of the population--before 1865, when the 13th Amendment to the Constitution eliminated the practice in its previous form.
What was your first exposure to slavery? Did you grow up in the North or the South? Do you think you would have heard a different story if you had grown up elsewhere? Have you seen movies made about the antebellum era? What was your reaction? Do you think of these atrocities as beyond comprehension and not part of your personal family history? Or do you feel shame for the crimes that formed the economic foundation of our country, and have trouble reconciling your personal experience with this collective history?
Your practice today is to explore your relationship with the slave trade in the US of the era before 1865. Do you choose not to think about it? Or do you seek out more information as it becomes easily available? Do you fear that your ancestors were involved directly, or are you proud that they were abolitionists? What do you feel when you learn a person is a descendant of a slave? Do you want to apologize or do you want to tell them to get over it? Was it a long time ago or is it still with you every day?