- Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup
- Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written by Herself by Linda Brent
and watched the film
- Django Unchained
These have got me thinking. The lives of the abolitionists is well documented, but most of us know far less about the logistical arrangements surrounding the abolition. In particular, I have asked the following question on Quora, my favourite 'Q&A' website:
I understand how the slave trade, and later slavery, came to be abolished, but there are some more questions which I don't understand:
- When slaves were freed, the workforce grew. Where did all of these slaves find work?
- When slaves were freed, former slave owners had a shortage of workers. Who worked on the plantations? Did their slaves return in a paid capacity?
- If free labour was replaced with paid labour, did this lead to a sharp rise in inflation, especially in the price of goods such as cotton?
- Were former slave owners notified in advance or compensated? What if they bought 10 slaves, then the following day found they had to free them? Were the transactions reversed? Who took the financial hit?
Do you have any of the answers? Please let me know on here, or by answering the question on Quora if so! Any further questions on the topic would also be appreciated, as I'm sure that there's a lot of interesting questions to ask which are usually neglected.
I said Quora was good - I have just received this answer:
ReplyDeleteMost southern states passed laws forcing former slaves to sign labor contracts working for almost nothing, and also remain very indebted. Some states and local govts passed vagrancy laws, where if you did not have a job or money you went to jail. In jail you were hired out during the day, your wages going to the govt. Both these practices tried to replicate slavery as much as possible.
In the Caribbean many ex slaves refused to work on plantations anymore, preferring to grow only enough to feed themselves on unclaimed or remote land. So British plantation owners imported people from India as laborers.
Slaves were not compensated for their unpaid labor. In British colonies, slave owners were paid off, actually paid far more than the slaves were worth. Very unjust.
No, none of this led to a rise in prices. Just the opposite, cotton prices collapsed in the 1870s. This led to many Blacks migrating north, and the rise of the Populist movement, the biggest third party in US history. Its members were white, Black, and Mexican (in Texas and New Mexico). To break them, southern states passed poll taxes aimed at keeping the poor of all three groups from voting.