AP Chapter 4 Slavery and the Empire

The African Slave Trade  million slaves were brought to the Americas with 67% coming between  Men outnumbered the women 2 to 1 and most were field workers

The Middle Passage  Middle Passage- name given to the middle part of the trading triangle from England to Africa to America and back to England  Conditions on the ship were brutal

Middle Passage

Triangular Trade

Effects on Africa  Those taken captive were the strongest members of their tribe which weakened Africa  African kingdoms fought each other for slaves  West African economy grew weaker  Demoralized Africans and led Europeans to conquer the continent in the 1800s

Slavery in North America  First slaves arrived in Virginia around 1619  As the need for slavery rose so did the slave population  English law had no precedent for allowing slavery but as slavery grew laws were created

 Expansion of tobacco production relied on the size of the slave labor force  Maryland, Virginia and North Carolina (Upper South) needed slaves for the tobacco fields  S. Carolina was a slave state from the beginning  Slavery was accepted in the North as an American institution

 Northern states were not considered slave states but slavery was an important form of labor  Slavery made up the majority of the workforce on the plantations in the South  Slave Codes- laws primarily in the South that defended slavery and denied basic civil rights to them

 Most slaves were not converted to Christianity until the Great Awakening that swept the South in the 1760s  Music and dance formed the foundation of African American culture before a common language

Politics of Mercantilism  Mercantilism- economic system were the govt. intervenes in the economy for the purpose of increasing national wealth  Mercantilists policies controlled the trading networks and was successfully used by the British

 Govt. regulated wages, encouraged agriculture and manufacturing, and erected trade barriers.  England tried to control as much as they could to maximize profits  Mercantilist era led to intense and violent competition among Europeans for colonies

 Queen Anne’s War and King George’s War- war between England and France over succession of the Spanish and Austrian thrones respectively  Some of the wars were fought in N. America and included N. American tribes  Wars were a sign of things to come

British Colonial Regulations  Navigation Acts- created a legal and institutional structure for Britain's colonial system  Acts said the colonies were providers of raw materials and markets for manufactured goods  Banned trading of merchants from other nations in the colonies and all goods must be shipped on British vessels

Colonial Economy  Despite the harsh mercantilist regulations the economy benefited planters, merchants and whites  Southern slave owners made huge profits  Enumerated Goods- items produced in the colonies that could be shipped to specific locations with Parliaments approval

Conclusion  Slavery was used to provide a reliable supply of labor for the British colonies  Slavery had a negative social and economic impact on Africa  Mercantilist policies controlled the economy of early colonial America