STATS – AI OVERVIEW
In the pre-Civil War United States, enslaved individuals made up about 13% to 14% of the total national population. By 1860, nearly 4 million of the 4.4 million Black Americans were enslaved. Regionally, up to 25% of all Southerners owned enslaved people. [1, 2, 3]; Explore the historical breakdown and modern realities of slavery percentages in the U.S.: [1]
1860 Census: Pre-Civil War Breakdown; The year 1860 marked the final U.S. census taken before the American Civil War. [1, 2]
- Total Population: Enslaved people made up approximately 13% of the national population. [1]
- Southern Population: In the American South, slaves accounted for roughly one-third of the total population. In specific Deep South states, enslaved individuals were the majority:
- White Slaveholders: Nationally, only about 1.4% to 2% of the entire U.S. population owned slaves. In the South, roughly 25% of white families held enslaved people, with many owning fewer than five individual
Myth One: The majority of African captives came to what became the United States.
Truth: Only a little more than 300,000 captives, or 4-6 percent, came to the United States. The majority of enslaved Africans went to Brazil, followed by the Caribbean (approximately 6 million people if we calculate 300,000 at a 5 percent rate. A significant number of enslaved Africans arrived in the American colonies by way of the Caribbean, where they were “seasoned” and mentored into slave life. They spent months or years recovering from the harsh realities of the Middle Passage. Once they were forcibly accustomed to slave labor, many were then brought to plantations on American soil.
Myth Two: Slavery lasted for 400 years.
Popular culture is rich with references to 400 years of oppression. There seems to be confusion between the Transatlantic Slave Trade (1440-1888) and the institution of slavery, confusion only reinforced by the Bible, Genesis 15:13:
Then the Lord said to him, ‘Know for certain that for four hundred years your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own and that they will be enslaved and mistreated there.’
Listen to Lupe Fiasco – just one hip-hop artist to refer to the 400 years – in his 2011 imagining of America without slavery, “All Black Everything”:
You would never know
If you could ever be
If you never try
You would never see
Stayed in Africa
We ain’t never leave
So there were no slaves in our history
Were no slave ships, were no misery, call me crazy, or isn’t he
See I fell asleep and I had a dream, it was all black everything
[Verse 1]
Uh, and we ain’t get exploited
White man ain’t feared so he did not destroy it
We ain’t work for free, see they had to employ it
Built it up together so we equally appointed
First 400 years, see we actually enjoyed it(Personal Hitorical NOTE: this song is a bit mis-leading – as Slavery was practiced by certain groups/ African tribes – who used to sell each other’s members into slavery, when loosing battles and so on)- also sell their slaves to slave traders to the Americas and the Carribean. ) – however, most of the “slavery” practiced in Africa by these tribes were more like servants – on lands, houses, or slave girls (for providing sexual services to a master)- not the kind where you would be beat to death, etc; other than the European masters who colonized some of African countries and tribes – such as the British, French, Dutch and other European countries.
Truth: Slavery was not unique to the United States; it is a part of almost every nation’s history, from Greek and Roman civilizations to contemporary forms of human trafficking. The American part of the story lasted fewer than 400 years.
How, then, do we calculate the timeline of slavery in America? Most historians use 1619 as a starting point: 20 Africans referred to as “servants” arrived in Jamestown, Virginia on a Dutch ship. It’s important to note, however, that they were not the first Africans on American soil. Africans first arrived in America in the late 16th century not as slaves but as explorers together with Spanish and Portuguese explorers.
One of the most well-known of these African “conquistadors” was Estevancio, who traveled throughout the Southeast from present-day Florida to Texas. As far as the institution of chattel slavery – the treatment of slaves as property – in the United States, if we use 1619 as the beginning and the 1865 13th Amendment as its end, then it lasted 246 years, not 400.
Myth Three: All Southerners owned slaves.
Truth: Roughly 25 percent of all Southerners owned slaves. The fact that one-quarter of the southern population were slaveholders is still shocking to many. This truth brings historical insight to modern conversations about inequality and reparations.
Take the case of Texas.
When it established statehood, the Lone Star State had a shorter period of Anglo-American chattel slavery than other southern states – only 1845 to 1865 – because Spain and Mexico had occupied the region for almost one-half of the 19th century with policies that either abolished or limited slavery. Still, the number of people impacted by wealth and income inequality is staggering. By 1860, the Texas enslaved population was 182,566, but slaveholders represented 27 percent of the population, and controlled 68 percent of the government positions and 73 percent of the wealth. These are astonishing figures, but today’s income gap in Texas is arguably more stark, with 10 percent of tax filers taking home 50 percent of the income.
REASON FOR ABOLISHING AMERICAN SLAVERY: Revolutionary War 1775–1783;
The Revolutionary War was waged for independence from Britain in the name of equal rights for men, while nearly one-fifth of the colonial population was enslaved. This contradiction, inherent from the beginning of the nation, inspired a strong response from Africans. For them, the Revolution was primarily about another kind of independence—freedom from slavery. Though slavery continued, enslaved people seized the opportunity to support the efforts of colonists or the British, based on whomever they believed would guarantee them freedom.
From their earliest forced arrival in colonial North America, enslaved Africans had rebelled. Crispus Attucks, a 47-year-old sailor and fugitive enslaved man, became the first casualty in the Boston Massacre, and his act of defiance marked the beginning of the march towards revolution. By April 1775, Massachusetts militiamen clashed with British troops, launching the Revolutionary War.
The conflict touched everyone—white, Black, enslaved, or free. With much of colonial society built on human bondage, some felt that there was a paradox at the heart of the American Revolution. Abigail Adams, a white Patriot, wrote: “It allways appeard a most iniquitious Scheme to me—fight ourselves for what we are daily robbing and plundering from those who have as good a right to freedom as we have.” For Africans, the Revolution was a battle for freedom from slavery.
Africans, at 20% of the colonial population, could tip the scales of war and therefore could not be ignored. The British and Colonial armies, initially reluctant, sought the advantage of recruiting able-bodied enslaved African men to support their cause. Africans aligned with whichever side offered the better promise of freedom. Black Patriot Boyrereau Brinch remembered: “Thus was I, a slave for five years, fighting for liberty.”
Source: https://www.searchablemuseum.com/revolutionary-war
Myth Four: Slavery was a long time ago.
Truth: African-Americans have been free in this country for less time than they were enslaved. Do the math: Blacks have been free for 152 years, which means that most Americans are only two to three generations away from slavery. This is not that long ago.
Over this same period, however, former slaveholding families have built their legacies on the institution and generated wealth that African-Americans have not had access to because enslaved labor was forced. Segregation maintained wealth disparities, and overt and covert discrimination limited African-American.
Source: https://theconversation.com/american-slavery-separating-fact-from-myth-79620
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