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Catholics and Abolitionists

Sarah A. Curtis

in Civilizing Habits: Women Missionaries and the Revival of French Empire

This chapter examines the opposition to Javouhey's radical ideas and her independence within the Catholic church, especially a prolonged conflict with the Bishop of Autun (the Autun affair) regarding ... More

This chapter examines the opposition to Javouhey's radical ideas and her independence within the Catholic church, especially a prolonged conflict with the Bishop of Autun (the Autun affair) regarding authority over the SSJC. Javouhey was one of the few Catholics of her time and the only Catholic nun to support the abolition of slavery in the French empire, which allied her with Protestants and anticlericals. In the SSJC missions in Guadeloupe and Martinique, however, the nuns had to acquiesce to the settlers' views on slavery and race equality. Starting in the 1840s, Javouhey took advantage of the “moralization” campaign to expand educational networks there to free blacks and slaves. The chapter also examines events in SSJC missions after the slave emancipation of 1848 and concludes by discussing Javouhey's role as a woman in the Catholic church.Less

Introduction: Spaces of Freedom in North America

Damian Alan Pargas

in Fugitive Slaves and Spaces of Freedom in North America

The introduction explains the changing geography of slavery and freedom in North America in the Age of Revolutions, specifically the development of various “spaces of freedom” throughout the ... More

The introduction explains the changing geography of slavery and freedom in North America in the Age of Revolutions, specifically the development of various “spaces of freedom” throughout the continent, and how this affected patterns of slave flight. It further provides a brief overview of the purpose and contents of the book and positions this volume within the academic literature on runaway slaves. It also looks at issues related to what Dale Tomich calls “the second slavery,” manumission, and the abolition of slavery.Less

The Road To Abolition

Ismael M. Montana

in The Abolition of Slavery in Ottoman Tunisia

Chapter 5 explores the political background of the prohibition of the slave trade in 1841 and the process of ending slavery in the Regency. It assesses the interaction between the slave trade and ... More

Chapter 5 explores the political background of the prohibition of the slave trade in 1841 and the process of ending slavery in the Regency. It assesses the interaction between the slave trade and European domination after 1816 when Lord Exmouth liberated the western Mediterranean from corsairing activities and abolished Christian slavery in Tunis and Algiers. By the mid-1830s, the traffic in black slaves from Tunis across the Mediterranean rose in tandem with the establishment of European maritime domination in the Mediterranean, prompting Great Britain to pressure Tunis to abolish both the Saharan slave trade and black slavery. Moreover, the political disequilibrium arising from the 1830 French occupation of Algiers also altered the status quo in Tripoli and Tunis and shaped the abolition process in the Regency. On 24 January 1846 slavery was finally abolished in Tunisia.Less

‘Let Us Look it Up in Macaulay’—The Anti-Slavery Arms Manufacturer

in Zachary Macaulay 1768–1838: The Steadfast Scot in the British Anti-Slavery Movement

This chapter examines Zachary Macaulay's work for total abolition of slavery. It describes Macaulay's strategy of using authentic eyewitness accounts in building up public opinion over the much more ... More

This chapter examines Zachary Macaulay's work for total abolition of slavery. It describes Macaulay's strategy of using authentic eyewitness accounts in building up public opinion over the much more difficult cause of emancipation. The chapter highlights Macaulay's founding of The Mitigation and Gradual Abolition of Slavery and his editorship of its publication Anti-Slavery Reporter, which had paid circulation of over twenty thousand. The chapter also considers Macaulay's presentation of the horrors of slavery in Mauritius to the British public and the success of his campaign in rousing public interest against slavery.Less

Triumph and Tragedy on the Path to Glory

in Zachary Macaulay 1768–1838: The Steadfast Scot in the British Anti-Slavery Movement

This chapter focuses on the final years of Zachary Macaulay's anti-slavery campaign. It discusses his organization of the May 1830 meeting of the Anti-Slavery Society and the involvement of his son ... More

This chapter focuses on the final years of Zachary Macaulay's anti-slavery campaign. It discusses his organization of the May 1830 meeting of the Anti-Slavery Society and the involvement of his son Thomas Babington Macaulay as a speaker at this event. The chapter highlights the deteriorating health of Macaulay during this time, which was further aggravated by the death of his daughter Jean in September 1830 and his wife Selina in May 1831. It also considers the implications of the passage of the 1829 Catholic Emancipation Act for the anti-slavery campaign and highlights the abolition of slavery throughout the British West Indies in August 1838, three months after Macaulay's death.Less

Creating Lasting Meaningful Social Reform: The Abolition of Slavery I

Samuel Cohn

in All Societies Die: How to Keep Hope Alive

This chapter analyzes the possibility to produce cultural change that produces long-term improvement in human life, looking at the case of the abolition of slavery. Early attempts to restrict slavery ... More

This chapter analyzes the possibility to produce cultural change that produces long-term improvement in human life, looking at the case of the abolition of slavery. Early attempts to restrict slavery were based on both cynical and idealistic forces. Cynically, reformers wanted to protect people on their own territories from being enslaved, but they had fewer objections to making money from slavery in distant places. In Britain in the 1700s, however, there arose a small group of reformers who wished to see slavery abolished for all people in all places. By 1807, Britain had banned the transatlantic slave trade. Social movement organizing and the force of transmission of ideas were fundamental to the elimination of slavery in Britain. Once Britain was committed to the abolition of slavery, it used its economic and diplomatic muscle to obtain reform elsewhere.Less

Epilogue

Aline Helg

in Slave No More: Self-Liberation before Abolitionism in the Americas

The epilogue briefly examines slave self-liberation strategies and legal emancipation in the fifty years following general emancipation in the British colonies in 1838 up to the abolition of slavery ... More

The epilogue briefly examines slave self-liberation strategies and legal emancipation in the fifty years following general emancipation in the British colonies in 1838 up to the abolition of slavery in Brazil in 1888. The epilogue explores differences in national trajectories to abolition, with particular attention paid to Cuba, Haiti, and the United States in order to show how these national narratives mask a longer history of repression, white compensation, and slave survival. While emancipation was eventually enacted across the Americas, many states' recalcitrance to liberate slaves-or to compensate them once emancipated-meant that even after 1838, slaves still relied on self-liberation in order to gain their freedom. Given the relative rarity of outright slave rebellion, many of the strategies of self-liberation-including self-purchase, flight, and enlistment-used by slaves before 1838 remained central to their attempt to gain freedom in the Americas even after British emancipation.Less

The Shock Waves of the Haitian Revolution

Aline Helg

in Slave No More: Self-Liberation before Abolitionism in the Americas

This chapter explores the shock waves caused by the Haitian Revolution and the massive slave insurrection that took both the Americas and Europe by surprise. Despite the rarity of large-scale revolts ... More

This chapter explores the shock waves caused by the Haitian Revolution and the massive slave insurrection that took both the Americas and Europe by surprise. Despite the rarity of large-scale revolts after 1794, the Saint Domingue insurrection did have a lasting impact on the slaves. The greatest lesson they retained from Haiti was that the institution of slavery was neither unchangeable nor invincible. Amid the troubled backdrop of the age of revolutions, many attentively followed the legal changes upsetting their owners, like the Spanish Códigno Negro, the French abolition of slavery, gradual emancipation laws in the northern United States, and the ban of the slave trade by Great Britain and the United States. Furthermore, after 1794, protests during which slaves claimed freedom they believed to have been decreed by the king or the government, but hidden by their masters, multiplied.Less

Introduction

Aline Helg

in Slave No More: Self-Liberation before Abolitionism in the Americas

This introductory section presents the historiography of the slave trade and the humanity of the slaves involved. How did slaves express themselves as human beings and social actors in their own ... More

This introductory section presents the historiography of the slave trade and the humanity of the slaves involved. How did slaves express themselves as human beings and social actors in their own right, when the laws of the time primarily considered them to be personal property? Spanning the early sixteenth century to 1838 and considering the entirety of the continental and Caribbean Americas, the author utilizes a multidimensional approach to conduct a long-term comparative study of the Americas, revealing the breadth and success of actions taken by slaves to liberate themselves long before abolitionism. This section also examines the particular circumstances of slaves and the actions of slaves who were able to obtain their own freedom, which reveals how slaves ultimately sped up the abolition of slavery. Looking at various forms of slave resistance also demonstrates the affirmation of slaves' intrinsic humanity. Finally, the introduction provides a review of secondary literature that serves as the foundation of Helg's book.Less

Reverberations of the Haitian Revolution: Media, Narratives and Political Debates, 1791–1863

Florian Kappeler

in Reverberations of Revolution: Transnational Perspectives, 1770-1850

Florian Kappeler’s chapter examines reactions to the Haitian Revolution in the German-speaking world. After the defeat of Napoleon’s army in 1803, discussion of the events in Haiti was heavily ... More

Florian Kappeler’s chapter examines reactions to the Haitian Revolution in the German-speaking world. After the defeat of Napoleon’s army in 1803, discussion of the events in Haiti was heavily censored in France. In German-speaking countries, however, the events were debated in historico-political journals and later in historical monographs. As Kappeler shows, German writers focused primarily on three issues: racial equality, the potential economic impact of the abolition of slavery, and the question of whether the events in Haiti were simply an imitation of the French Revolution or an independent phenomenon. Although writers disagreed about these issues, the debates called into question the ideologies of racism, slavery and Eurocentrism in significant ways.Less

Freeborn Sons or Slaves?

Mary Nyquist

in Arbitrary Rule: Slavery, Tyranny, and the Power of Life and Death

This chapter examines two major critiques of institutional slavery that overlap in analogical discursive practices. Bodin's proposal of the abolition of slavery in Republique, and Henry Parker's ... More

This chapter examines two major critiques of institutional slavery that overlap in analogical discursive practices. Bodin's proposal of the abolition of slavery in Republique, and Henry Parker's similar proposal in Jus Populi—which is overtly indebted to Bodin's—should be known more widely than they are. Today, while Bodin's abolitionist text is occasionally mentioned in scholarship on slavery, Parker's is virtually unknown. It is possible, though, that they influence early modern political theorizing more than is recognized. Bodin's characterization of “lordly monarchy” certainly affects the semantic vicissitudes of “despotism” in ways that need further examination. Filmer, Hobbes, and Locke are acutely aware of what is at stake ideologically in interrelations among paternal power, legal slavery, and antityranny discourse, as is Parker, though from an entirely different standpoint.Less

The Struggle over History in the Antilles

Kristen Stromberg Childers

in Seeking Imperialism's Embrace: National Identity, Decolonization, and Assimilation in the French Caribbean

Metropolitan French and Antilleans have often been at odds over interpretations of Martinican and Guadeloupean history. For Antilleans, slavery and the fight to overturn it have been the defining ... More

Metropolitan French and Antilleans have often been at odds over interpretations of Martinican and Guadeloupean history. For Antilleans, slavery and the fight to overturn it have been the defining events of the past centuries, and the French historical record contains both exemplary and shameful deeds. Immediately following departmentalization, racial conflict on the islands revolved around relationships with the white béké minority, but over time, antagonism between Antilleans of color and metropolitan white French have come to the fore. Commemorations of the landing of Pierre Belain d’Esnambuc and the abolition of slavery have been flashpoints for conflicting views on the meaning of history, while controversy surrounding contemporary exhibitions demonstrates that the struggle to define the Antillean past continues to this day.Less

Interests of the Elite

John Schulz

in The Financial Crisis of Abolition

This chapter presents the protagonists in the story of the abolition of slavery in Brazil, namely, the members of the nineteenth-century Brazilian elite: men more than prepared to enslave their ... More

This chapter presents the protagonists in the story of the abolition of slavery in Brazil, namely, the members of the nineteenth-century Brazilian elite: men more than prepared to enslave their fellow humans for profit. The financial policies adopted by successive governments served the interests of this elite with little regard for the needs of the remainder of the society. Of course, this elite was far from monolithic; it included planters, merchants, professionals, and public officials. Planters, in expanding areas such as western Sao Paulo Province, had interests that differed from those in declining zones such as the Paraiba Valley, not to mention those of the sugar provinces of the Northeast. Thus, financial policy had to accommodate a considerable variety of often conflicting objectives.Less

Winning the War

Sajal Nag

in The Uprising: Colonial State, Christian Missionaries, and Anti-Slavery Movement in North-East India (1908-1954)

The death of Peter Fraser did not end the controversy. The conclusion of the First World War saw the formation of the League of Nations, which had held an anti-slavery convention in 1926 whereby it ... More

The death of Peter Fraser did not end the controversy. The conclusion of the First World War saw the formation of the League of Nations, which had held an anti-slavery convention in 1926 whereby it wanted to collect information about all forms of slavery all over the world and secure their abolition. This forced the Indian government to provide information regarding the forms of slavery practised in India, including bawi in the Lushai Hills. The League of Nations eventually declared the abolition of all forms of slavery. This was celebrated as a victory of Fraser’s long struggle in the Lushai Hills.Less

Prelude: ‘L’Âme nègre doit sortir des musées’

Pierre-Philippe Fraiture

in Past Imperfect: Time and African Decolonization, 1945-1960

This prelude focuses on the role played by international organizations such as the United Nations and UNESCO to manage political decolonization in the immediate post-World War II era and envisage the ... More

This prelude focuses on the role played by international organizations such as the United Nations and UNESCO to manage political decolonization in the immediate post-World War II era and envisage the basis for cultural emancipation in the ‘non-self-governing’ and ‘trust’ territories controlled by European empires. In France, this period coincided with attempts to explore African cultures and understand their development in the context of late colonialism. In 1948, Madeleine Rousseau and Cheikh Anta Diop edited a special issue of Le Musée vivant entitled ‘1848 Abolition de l’esclavage - 1948 Evidence de la culture nègre’. This publication, which included contributions by Michel Leiris and Jacques Howlett but also by lesser known figures such as Olivier Le Corneur and the Belgian literary critic Auguste Verbeken, examined the factors behind a possible ‘African renaissance’ (C.A Diop) in literature and the arts. The views defended here capture the mood of a period torn between an allegiance to existentialism and the ontological tenets of the Bantu philosophy as expounded by Placide Tempels.Less

Epilogue

Ruma Chopra

in Almost Home: Maroons between Slavery and Freedom in Jamaica, Nova Scotia, and Sierra Leone

When the British Empire abolished slavery in 1833, their West Indian colonies confronted a severe labor shortage. Caribbean elites knew that slaves despised fieldwork and would not be ready to ... More

When the British Empire abolished slavery in 1833, their West Indian colonies confronted a severe labor shortage. Caribbean elites knew that slaves despised fieldwork and would not be ready to voluntarily perform the labor they had endured as slaves. Unprepared to forgo the profits of sugar plantations, the British government looked to Africa and Asia for new sources of dependent labor. The Maroons of Trelawney Town unexpectedly found a route to return home. Less

New Horizons

Peter Earle

in The Earles of Liverpool: A Georgian Merchant Dynasty

The end of trade with Livorno and the slave trade forced the Earle brothers to reduce their involvement in trade overall while seeking new specializations, such as the import of cotton from Guiana ... More

The end of trade with Livorno and the slave trade forced the Earle brothers to reduce their involvement in trade overall while seeking new specializations, such as the import of cotton from Guiana and Brazil and agricultural products, especially oilseeds, from Canada and the Baltic. Meanwhile, they lived as gentlemen, both brothers building large country houses, while William became a major collector of paintings. Thomas died in 1822 and was praised for his contributions to public service and his sociability as well as his success as a merchant. William survived a further 17 years, much of it in Rome. The book ends with an attempt to explain the success of the Earles which rested on striking a profitable balance between innovation and caution and an awareness of the ever-present possibility of disaster and bankruptcy.Less

As Others Saw Him—As We Might Assess Him

in Zachary Macaulay 1768–1838: The Steadfast Scot in the British Anti-Slavery Movement

This chapter analyses different views on Zachary Macaulay's contribution to the abolition of slavery. It discusses views on the conflict between his anti-slavery campaign and his public duty in ... More

This chapter analyses different views on Zachary Macaulay's contribution to the abolition of slavery. It discusses views on the conflict between his anti-slavery campaign and his public duty in Sierra Leone. The chapter explains that Macaulay's childhood experiences may have influenced his intemperate behaviour when under threat in Sierra Leone. It also discusses Scottish poet Robert Burns's tribute to Macaulay.Less