Slave Nation (31 page)
Authors: Alfred W. Blumrosen
49
. Lord Mansfield, in the parliamentary debate over repeal of the Stamp Act in 1766 said that nothing “could be more fatal to the peace of the colonies at any time, than the Parliament giving up its authority over them; for in such a case there must be an entire dissolution of government. Considering how the colonies are composed, it is easy to foresee there would be no end of feuds and factions among the several separate governments, when once there shall be no one government here or there of sufficient force or authority to decide their mutual differences; and, government being dissolved, nothing remains but that the colonies must either change their constitution and take some new form of government, or fall under some foreign power.…Proceed, then, my Lords, with spirit and firmness; and when you have established your authority, it will be time to show your lenity. The Americans…are a very good people and I wish them exceedingly well; but they are heated and inflamed...in the words of Maurice, prince of Orange, concerning the Hollanders, ‘God bless the industrious, frugal, and well-meaning, but easily deluded people.’”
http://balrog.sdsu.edu/~putman/410a/parldebates.htm
50
. See Peabody,
There Are No Slaves in France
51
. Hildreth,
History of the United States
, Vol. II, 567, defined the problems the colonial lawyers had with the repugnancy laws after the
Somerset
decision declared slavery “odious” and not recognized as common law in his 1846 book. Hildreth had marshaled the evidence necessary to conclude that the South had joined the Revolution to protect slavery, but he did not reach that conclusion. Such a conclusion at the time would have supported southern claims that slavery was protected by the Constitution, a conclusion that Hildreth would not have wished to support. Hildreth’s antislavery position is explained in his
Despotism in America: An Inquiry into the Nature and Results, and Legal Basis of the Slave-Holding System in the United States
(Boston: A. Kelley Publishers, 1970) 177–218. He argued that
Somerset
plus the repugnancy clauses invalidated slavery in the colonies before the Revolution.
52
. See Wood,
Americanization of Benjamin Franklin
, 70–72
C
HAPTER
3
VIRGINIA RESPONDS TO THE
SOMERSET
DECISION
1
. Breen,
Tobacco Culture,
32–37
2
. Oakes,
Ruling Race
, 180
3
. Breen,
Tobacco Culture
, 15–39, discusses the thesis that some Virginian planters sought independence as a way of avoiding payment of their debts to British merchants. Breen finds that an oversimplification, but notes that starting in 1772, the issue of planter debt, which had been a private matter, became politicized. “Neither the transition away from tobacco nor the rising level of indebtedness caused the great planters to support the Revolution. These experiences did, however, help determine how the tidewater gentlemen ultimately perceived the constitutional issues of the day.” (at 161). Breen does not mention the
Somerset
case.
4
. The Slave, Grace, 2 Haggard Admiralty (G.B.) 94, 1827.
5
. Fryer,
Staying Power
, 71–72
6
. Breen,
Tobacco Culture
, 20–3, 58–9, 60, 65, 69, 87, 89
8
. Not long! In the Cape area of South Africa in 1812, the British enacted restrictions on the de facto slavery status of bushmen, and set up a special court, nicknamed the “Black Circuit,” to assure their enforcement. When a “bushman” named Booy sought to enforce his rights, and his master refused, the resulting battle at Slaughters Nek led to the hanging of five Boers, laid the foundation for the Boer separation, the Boer War, and ultimately apartheid. Allister Sparks,
The Mind of South Africa
, (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1990) 91-96
9
. In contrast, France had created conditions during the eighteenth century in which slave owners could bring their slaves to France for certain purposes, and keep them there for limited periods of time. See Peabody,
There Are No Slaves in France.
10
. Ben Franklin may have suggested something of this sort to the British while he was the colonial agent for Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and Georgia. Isaacson,
Benjamin Franklin
, 158–161
11
. “I seek for the liberty and constitution of this kingdom no further back than the [Glorious] Revolution. There I take my stand.” Quoted in Reid,
Constitutional History,
171–72. Mansfield was a protector of parliamentary supremacy vis a vis the king, and therefore opposed the view of the colonies that they were connected with the king, not parliament. Reid suggests that Mansfield’s position was necessary to prevent the king from controlling a major source of revenue and influence, which would not be subject to Parliament. Reid,
Constitutional History,
163–173
12
. Wood,
Radicalism of the American Revolution
, 169–189
13
. Cappon,
Adams–Jefferson Letters
, 455
14
. Isaacson,
Benjamin Franklin
, 158–161
15
. Higginbotham,
In the Matter of Color
, 19–150. Bradley,
Slavery, Propaganda
, points out that the northern press, by its continual reporting of criminal activities of slaves, helped create an atmosphere of distrust and distaste for blacks in Massachusetts and elsewhere, even as criticism of slavery was becoming more common.
16
. Foner,
History of Black Americans
, 295
17
. Robinson,
Structure of American Politics,
34-86
18
. Ellis,
American Sphinx
, 29–36
19
. Burnett,
Continental Congress
, 16
20
. Jefferson, “Autobiography,” in Ford,
Works
, 9–10
22
. Washburne,
Sketch of Edward Coles,
21–31
23
. Chitwood,
Richard Henry Lee
, 18–19
24
. Henry Mayer,
Son of Thunder
, 168–69
25
. Stanley Elkins and Eric McKitrick,
The Age of Federalism
(Oxford University Press, 1993) 203–04
26
. MacLeod,
Slavery, Race
, 31–61, at 32 notes that “the objection [to the slave trade] arose principally from a concern for the white community and not from a concern for the Negro.”
27
. MacLeod,
Slavery, Race
, 44
28
. Jefferson, “Letter to Edward Coles,” August 25, 1814: “In the first or second session of the legislature after I became a member, I drew this subject [of slavery] to the attention of Col. Bland, one of the oldest, ablest, & most respected members, and he undertook to move for certain moderate extensions of the protection of the laws to these people. I seconded his motion, and, as a younger member, was more spared in the debate; but he was denounced as an enemy of his country, & was treated with the grossest indecorum.” Washburne,
Sketch of Edward Coles
, 25
29
. Ellis,
American Sphinx
, 89. See Ellis’s index under “Jefferson, conflict avoidance by”
30
. See Peter Kolchin,
American Slavery, 1619-1877
(New York: Hill and Wange, 1993) 37–38; Richard S. Dunn, “Servants and Slaves: The Recruitment and Employment of Labor,” in Jack P. Greene and J. R. Pole, Eds.,
Colonial British America
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1984) 157, 164–69, 175–76.
31
. Morgan,
American Slavery, American Freedom
, 301
32
. Henretta, “Wealth and Social Structure,” 273–74
33
. Rhys Isaac,
Transformation of Virginia, 1740–1790
(Chapel Hill, NC: University of NC Press, 1982) 247-248
34
. Ballagh,
History of Slavery in Virginia
, 22
35
. Bancroft,
History of the United States, IV
, 413–15
36
. See Freehling,
Road to Disunion
, 214–16
37
. Greene, “Foundations of Political Power in the Virginia House of Burgesses, 1720–1776,” in Greene,
Negotiated Authorities
, 238–58, 259–318, for an analysis of the political culture of mid-eighteenth-century Virginia.
39
. See Clinton Rossiter and Richard Bland, “The Whig in America,” 10
William & Mary Quarterly
, 3d series (Jan.1953) 33–79 at 38
41
. See Mays,
Edmund Pendleton
, Vol. II, 3–17
42
. Mays,
Edmund Pendleton
Vol. I, 268
43
. Mayer,
Son of Thunder
, 243
44
. Mays,
Edmund Pendleton
, Vol. II, 11. Grigsby,
Virginia Convention
, 44–55
45
. Draper,
Struggle for Power,
381
46
. Isaacson,
Benjamin Franklin,
271–78
47
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography.
The episode is examined closely in Bailyn,
Ordeal of Thomas Hutchinson
, 221–59. Bailyn, examining all the facts—which were not available to Franklin or Adams—acquits Hutchinson of the wrongdoing as seen by the people of Massachusetts.
48
. Ferling,
John Adams
, 81. See 80–84 for Ferling’s discussion of the different positions taken by historians as to when Adams became so committed, and why he picked the Hutchinson letters episode as the last event that committed Adams.
C
HAPTER
4
T
HE
V
IRGINIA
R
ESOLUTION
U
NITES THE
C
OLONIES AND
L
EADS TO THE
F
IRST
C
ONTINENTAL
C
ONGRESS IN
1774
1
. John Pendleton Kennedy, Ed.,
Journal of the House of Burgesses of Virginia
, Volume 1773–1776, (Richmond, VA, 1905–15) 28
2
. See Ch. 3
3
. Morgan,
Birth of the Republic,
56. Samuel Adams developed such committees within the towns of Massachusetts in 1772, but it was Virginia’s version that united the colonies, ending the British assumption that they could not work together.
4
. This information, not available to the colonials in 1772 or 1773, is available to us at
http://gaspee.org/index.htm#Analysis
. Details of the Gaspee Days Parade Saturday, June 11, 2005 are available at
http://www.gaspee.com/GaspeeDaysParade.html
.
5
. Andrews,
Colonial Background
, 153
6
. Flournoy, “Calender,” 27–65
7
. Morgan,
Birth of the Republic
, 58–59; Ferling,
Leap in the Dark
, 91–93
8
. Ferling,
Leap in the Dark
, 101–103
9
. Ibid. 103–108
10
. Wills,
Inventing America
, 26-27, describes the “tea party” as “an arduous undertaking, full of military risk and sheer physical problems.”
11
. Draper,
Struggle for Power
, 441. “For the British government, the Continental Congress was illegal. That it could not be prevented from meeting showed how far the decline of British power had gone.”
12
. Draper,
Struggle for Power,
417
13
. Reid
Constitutional History
, Vol. IV, 11
14
. Flournoy, “Calender,” 10
15
. Ibid. 68
16
. Morris,
Forging of the Union
, 77–79, charts the method of election of the delegates: Pennsylvania and Rhode Island selected its delegates by the assembly; the Connecticut assembly chose the committee of correspondence; the Delaware speaker called assembly when the governor declined to act; Maryland, extralegal committees appointed by counties; Massachusetts, general court in defiance of governor; New Hampshire, extralegal meeting of town deputies; New Jersey, extralegal committee appointed by counties; New York, extralegal committee elected in New York City and County, endorsed by some other counties; Suffolk and Orange Counties sent their own delegates; South Carolina, extralegal general meeting, later ratified by assembly; Virginia, provincial convention of county delegates.
17
. The Virginia instructions to delegates of Aug. 1, 1774, stated in part: “The original constitution of the American colonies possessing their assemblies with the sole right of directing their internal polity, it is absolutely destructive of the end of their institution that their legislatures should be suspended or prevented, by hasty dissolutions, from exercising their legislative powers.” Commager,
Documents of American History
, 78
Polity
is defined in
Oxford English Dictionary
, (2d ed. 1989) as (1) civil organization (as a condition); civil order. Administration of a state; civil government (as a process or course of action), quoting Jefferson’s “Summary View”: “sole right of directing their internal polity.” (2) a particular form of political organization: a form of government.
Policy
is defined as “a course of action adopted and pursued by a government, party ruler, or statesman, etc. any course of action adopted as advantageous or expedient.” Whether the two terms are generally interchangeable, it is clear that the institution of slavery was so integral to the southern economy that a decision respecting it would be embraced by either term.
18
. Julian P. Boyd, Ed.,
Papers of Thomas Jefferson
(Princeton University Press, 1950) Vol. 1, 121–37. For a critique of the accuracy of Jefferson’s factual statement in his summary view, see Wills,
Inventing America
, 27–28
