Conditons of Slavery

 

To a degree, the material conditions of slave life were predetermined by the status of the slave. During the early colonial period, slaves and indentured servants enjoyed greater freedoms than black slaves would in later periods. But even then, they belonged to the lowest, poorest ranks of society. In the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, slaves were condemned to impoverishment by the law. In many colonies, slaves could not participate in wage-earning trade or labor. In others they were denied the right to own property. The slave's resulting dependence on his or her master for the most basic necessities -- food, clothing, shelter -- was integral to the preservation of the master's power and the sustaining of the slave society. The doctrine of paternalism guided much of the Southern rationale for slavery. As a public expression of humanitarian ideals drawn from both the American Revolution and the Great Awakening, which spread Christianity far and wide, Southern plantation owners defined slavery not as an institution of brute force, but of responsible dominion over a less fortunate, less evolved people. 


Slave Cabin