Reactions of Europeans, Africans, and Native Americans to 18th Century Change in Slave Labor

Sweeping changes during the eighteenth century dramatically altered the colonial world. American colonists had developed permanent residences and farms, which required hard labour to function properly. Initially, colonists used white indentured servants who worked for a set period of time, but as the Atlantic markets for sugar and tobacco expanded and lawmakers enacted white labour laws, plantation owners turned to a new labour system. The change from a servant based system to a slave-based system elicited fear and, subsequently, racial laws from Europeans, a struggle for freedom from the slaves, and a fight for survival in a changing land from Native Americans.

The conversion from a servant-based labour system to a slave-based system initiated a complete reworking of colonial American labour systems. Plantation owners realised they needed an alternative to European indentured servants for several reasons. The white servants earned their freedom after their period of servitude ended, leaving the plantation owners with a continuous need for new workers. While demand for labour rose, the supply fell because immigration from Europe slowed. In addition to the English Civil Wars decreasing migration, the quality of life in Europe had improved and poorer whites felt less motivated to move to the dangerous colonies (McConville, 1 Mar.). Along with the change in economy and labour laws, owners also grew weary of white workers’ “lethargy and laziness” (Wood, 42) on part of the white workers and sought a new labour force that could be worked harder and kept longer than the indentured servants.

The easiest solution to the problems with the white labour force was to import slaves from Africa. As colonists veered from servant labour, slavery came as “the cheapest labour they could get” (Morgan, “Slavery” 283), filling the capitalistic colonists’ need for cheap labour. Since servants had to be freed after a set period of time and there were laws to protect their well-being, it made more sense for masters to buy slaves. As lawmakers passed white labour laws to protect the white labour force from abuse and overwork, it became more expensive to keep the white servants. Slaves, however, were owned for life and there were few regulations. In the long run, since slaves could be “purchased outright…worked harder, maintained more cheaply, and retained longer…” (Wood, 48) than white indentured servants, owning slaves greatly reduced cost for owners, allowing larger plantation style farms to emerge.

The shift to plantations and a mono-crop culture, such as sugar, coffee, tobacco, and later, rice (McConville, Mar. 1) required difficult, constant labour and a different type of servitude. In addition to reduced immigration and cost efficiency, plantation owners could work the imported African labour harder than they could white servants. Already accustomed to warm climates, the African slaves could work in fields longer, thereby increasing productivity on the plantations. Unlike European labourers, Africans experienced weathering in the winter, not the summer, which meant they could work during the growing season. Due to the reduced expenditures of owning a slave and the slaves’ ability to work harder, the “substitution of slaves for servants…[also] increased the profitability of the plantation system” (Morgan, American 316). For these reasons, colonists began to engage in a large scale slave trade throughout the eighteenth century.

The mass importation of slaves from Africa in the eighteenth century elicited changes in European behaviours. Europeans feared the growing number of slaves and passed racially based laws to control them. At first, “there is no evidence that English servants or freedmen resented…African slaves…” (Morgan, American 327). However, as slavery became more common and servants more rare, colonists “required new methods of discipline” (Morgan, American 316) to keep their slaves under control. In Virginia, “fears increased as the labour force grew… and the proportion of blacks in it rose” (Morgan, American 328). Due to the slave boom, colonists were terrified of rebellions not only in Virginia, but all over the colonies, from the South to New England (McConville, Mar. 31). The sheer number of slaves frightened the white colonists as it rose. To combat a perceived threat, the colonists exercised control by passing laws to restrain the slaves.

The colonists implemented many racially based laws to prevent any misdoings by the slaves. It was forbidden to school slaves because “learning was a dangerous thing” (Morgan, American 322) in the eyes of the masters. Education promoted independent thought, which would be detrimental to a slave’s overall value. As of 1705, slaves could no longer own livestock (Morgan, American 333), which curtailed economic independence for the slaves. The white masters sought to hamper slave rebellions by restricting the slaves to a menial status educationally and economically.

Some blacks, however, did achieve freedom and, eventually, fear of a growing free black population prompted the white lawmakers to extend the racial laws to the freedmen. To avoid a mulatto race, in 1717, lawmakers forbade copulation between races (Wood, 99). In 1721, South Carolina took the vote away from free Africans, stating that only free white men “meeting the age and property qualifications could participate” (Wood, 99). Black freedmen were also banned from holding office, voting, and testifying in court (Morgan, 337). In 1722, colonists passed the Negro Act, which stated “freed slaves must leave the province within twelve months…” (Wood, 99) of being freed to keep the freedmen from socialising with enslaved friends and prompting a rebellion. Police sweeps patrolled for wandering slaves out after curfew or out alone in order to curtail slave revolt meetings (McConville, Mar. 31). As time wore on, the slaves’ small freedoms, such as time to farm and make clothes for themselves, “would gradually dwindle” (Wood, 139) in yet another European rule to control the slave population.

The colonial masters were very cruel and intolerant of criminal acts committed by slaves. However, masters generally did not kill their slaves (McConville, Mar. 31) for most disobedience, even though murdering a slave was not illegal (McConville, Mar. 31). They wanted to instil fear through the racial laws, not lose an investment (McConville, Mar. 31), which is what the slaves amounted to in the eyes of their masters. The whites feared arsons, poisonings, and rebellions at the hands of the slaves and, since the slaves were so numerous, these fears were not entirely unfounded.

The slaves’ reactions to slavery revolved around gaining their freedom. Some revolted against colonial slavery and others adapted to colonial society. The major revolts occurred primarily in the 1730s, after the colonists began importing slaves on a large scale and after the shift in labour system (McConville, Mar. 31). Ironically, the slave population grew because the Europeans imported them at a high rate and it was precisely the large number of slaves the Europeans feared. The slaves’ greater numbers gave them the opportunity to rise against their owners more effectively.

Along with a larger population, unification of the slaves was a key ingredient for slave rebellions. Events such as the Zenger Crisis served to unite the slaves under a common cause in New Jersey’s slave rebellion of 1734 (McConville, Mar. 31). By having one cause to gather around, the slaves had a focal point, which is key in any rebellion. Similarly, revolts such as the ones in Virginia from 1729 to 1730, and Antigua in 1736, the slaves believed their cause for freedom was backed by the king’s support (McConville, Mar. 31). In other rebellions, slaves came together based on places of origin in Africa (McConville, Mar. 31). The increased number of slaves in the colonies and the uniting causes gave the slaves a new opportunity to rebel against their masters.

Alternatively, slaves sought their freedom through peaceful means, working to achieve liberation legally. As the slave population increased, there was “a tendency toward social, and occasionally economic, self-sufficiency…” (Wood, 196). As more slaves came to the colonies, masters allowed them to live independently and some masters even granted their slaves small plots of land to farm food. As the colonies grew, “the demand for…craftsmen…” (Wood, 196) became so high, freed status and skin colour became insignificant. Therefore, slaves gained status by learning trades and masters sold those slaves “as accomplished artisans” (Wood, 198). These skilled slaves climbed at least a few rungs on the social ladder of colonial America, rising from a simple workman to someone with a trade the colony desperately needed. However, slaves, despite their most honourable intentions to earn their freedom through work, found themselves “increasingly hemmed in and suppressed…” (Wood, 196) by white dominated society.

In addition to rebelling against their owners and working for their freedom, slaves attempted to assimilate themselves into colonial religion. Before the large importation of slaves, slaves hoped they would gain their freedom by converting to Christianity. In Virginia, there had been “a rough congruity of Christianity, whiteness, and freedom…” (Morgan, 331). African slaves could not change their colour, but they could change their religion and they did so under the belief that their freedom would follow. Forced servitude was linked to non-Christianity and, at the time, it was commonly accepted that one could not own Christian slaves.

However, as more Africans came to the colonies in the eighteenth century, masters were more reluctant to allow their slaves to convert to Christianity. Owners wanted to keep “[t]he prestige that went with being Christian…reserved…” (Morgan, 332) for whites alone. Conversions still happened and ministers still actively perused slaves as potential converts, but the ministers “assured slaves and owners…that baptism contained no implication of…freedom…” (Wood, 134). The very idea that colonial slaveholders attempted to stop conversions reveals the true importance of African Christianity. The colonial slaveholders believed that converting their African slaves would make the slaves arrogant and poor servants (Morris, 332) by providing a clause for freedom. However, despite efforts to curtail conversions, slaves still became Christians.

Before they imported large numbers of African slaves, Europeans used Native Americans as their labour force. Though natives “never became available in sufficient numbers to form a significant part of Virginia’s labour force” (Morgan, 330), colonists still used the indigenous population as slaves. In Virginia, colonists bought large numbers of Africans and Native Americans at the same time and the same feelings of contempt were extended toward both races (Morgan, 330). Before the large numbers of Africans arrived in the colonies during the eighteenth century, the Native Americans provided “knowledge of the land…” (Wood, 38), as well as food and medicines for new Europeans who had no knowledge of the New World.

However, enslaving the native population was more difficult than enslaving Africans proved to be, so the role of the Native American changed. Native Americans had to be sold far from their native regions “where they were less likely to run away…” (Wood, 39) because they were so familiar with the land and tribes had allies to which an enslaved native could seek refuge. Africans, however, were not familiar with America and they had no allies to assist them back to their homelands. Enslaving natives made the colonists wary because they were “fearful of prompting hostilities with local tribes…” (Wood, 39). Colonists had trade relations to consider and profitable trade was more important than native labour, so when the large scale importation of African slaves began, the need to utilise Native American labourers “as the core colonial work force had dissipated…” (Wood, 40).

No longer central members of the colonial labour supply, the Native Americans struggled for a place in a changing world. Some engaged in peaceful interactions with the colonists, trading furs, skins, food, and other New World commodities while others fought colonial expansion violently. When the labour supply shifted to African slaves and those slaves began to rebel and run away, Native Americans found yet another position: bounty hunter. Tribes engaged in peaceful interactions with the settlers, such as the Catawba and Iroquois (McConville, Mar. 31), expanded their interaction with the colonists by capturing escaped slaves. The natives used their knowledge of the land to find and return or kill runaways. In the 1729 to 1730 revolt in Virginia, for example, after over three hundred slaves fled to the Great Dismal Swamp, twenty five were found and killed by Native American slave hunters (McConville, Mar. 31). When African slaves were imported on a larger scale, Native Americans had to find a new niche to stay afloat in a European society.

The change in colonial America’s labour supply from white indentured servants to African slaves affected European settlers, the Africans themselves, and the Native Americans profoundly. With such a high rate of importation, the colonists became fearful of revolts and implemented racial laws to curtail the perceived threats from their slaves. The African population struggled for their freedom by rebelling and attempting to assimilate into European society. New slave labour presented the Native Americans, originally the enslaved labour supply for colonial America, with a new role; they became primarily a trade resource for settlers and bounty hunters. The change in labour supply during the eighteenth century altered each demographic profoundly and would likewise transform the colonies by introducing African culture, which infused itself into American society and left a mark that is seen today.

Works Cited McConville, Brendan. Lecture. Boston University, Boston. 1 Mar. 2005. McConville, Brendan. Lecture. Boston University, Boston. 31 Mar. 2005 Morgan, Edward S. American Slavery American Freedom: The Ordeal of Colonial Virginia. New York City: W.W. Norton & Company, 1975. Wood, Peter. Black Majority. New York: W.W. Norton, 1974.

Works Consulted Jordan, Winthrop D. Colonial America: Essays in Politics and Social Development. Ed. Douglas Greenberg, Stanley N. Katz, and John M. Murrin. New York City: McGraw-Hill, 1976. Kulikoff, Allan. Colonial America: Essays in Politics and Social Development. Ed. Douglas Greenberg, Stanley N. Katz, and John M. Murrin. New York City: McGraw-Hill, 1976. Morgan, Edward S. Colonial America: Essays in Politics and Social Development. Ed. Douglas Greenberg, Stanley N. Katz, and John M. Murrin. New York City: McGraw-Hill, 1976. Morgan, Philip D. Colonial America: Essays in Politics and Social Development. Ed. Douglas Greenberg, Stanley N. Katz, and John M. Murrin. New York City: McGraw-Hill, 1976.