1. Abolition Movement

2. Origins of Slavery
Slavery was not an institution created in the United States. Slavery roots go back more than 2 millennium. It has footprints in most Ancient civilizations.
Egypt
Greece
The Roman Empire
China
Pre-Columbian Societies in the Americas

3. The Colonies
The earliest slaves were white indentured servants from England
As the Colonies grew and agricultural production increased indentured servants were not enough and the African slave trade took hold Slavery was legal in all the Colonies except Georgia until 1751 when it was the last to legalize the practice
The Plantation System developing in the South was a major force behind the booming slave trade.

5. Image of the Plantation System - A. R
Image of the Plantation System - A. R. Waud's sketch Rice Culture on the Ogeechee, Near Savannah, Georgia depicts slaves working in the rice fields. From Harper's Weekly

7. What were the arguments for slavery?
Read handout.
Annotate justifications for slavery.
How can these justifications be forces pushing African-Americans to the periphery? Can we identify the forces specifically?

8. Impact of the Great Awakening(s)
Form of christian revivalism in many ways:
started in the colonies from roughly 1720s through the American Revolution.
prayer & spirituality reside in the heart and therefore people can experience an inward spirituality.
evangelicalism evolved and spread.
printing became more widely used - more people were exposed to sermons, teaching, etc.
People became more emotionalized by religion.
People were empowered and ministers lost some of their authority - people began thinking they could make their own political decisions.
many preached spiritual equality regarldess of race.
“democratization of american christianity”

9. 1839 Methodist Camp Meeting

10. The Abolition Movement & arguments against slavery.
Definition of abolition:
Abolition definition: the action or an act of abolishing a system, practice, or institution.

11. Development of the Abolition Movement
the abolition movement was taking place informally from the moment slavery became institutionalized.
Formally,
1775 first abolition organization formed - Society for the Relief of Free Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage - Philadelphia
1787 Society for Promoting the Manumission of Slaves - NYC
By the end of the American Revolution, all states (Except Georgia and South Carolina) had anti-slavery societies.
Greater efforts were made in the North
Vermont abolished slavery in 1777
1780 Pennsylvania passed a gradual emacipation law.
Manumission is the act of a slave owner freeing his or her slaves.
By the end of the Revolution, all the states had antislavery societies, except for Georgia and South Carolina, the two states most committed to slavery and the slave trade. Whites dominated the organized antislavery movement, and they saw African Americans as the objects of their benevolence. Nonetheless, these societies provided valuable legal and political services to the slaves and free blacks who fought against enslavement, kidnapping, and attempts to bypass emancipation laws. In 1794 all the antislavery societies met in Philadelphia and formed a national antislavery convention. Yet while the Founding Fathers of the new American republic expressed their abhorrence of slavery, many were slave owners themselves, and only those in the North joined antislavery societies. Men such as Thomas Jefferson undermined their antislavery pronouncements with their intense racism, though others, such as Thomas Paine, George Mason of Virginia, Luther Martin of Maryland, and Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania, were unequivocal in their condemnation of slavery.
In the North, where slavery was not the mainstay of the economy and society, antislavery sentiment made greater headway.

12. What were the arguments against slavery?
To examine such we are going to look into specific abolitionists.
This will begin in class and be your homework.
Pg. 12 in reader.
Add a 4th question:
What were their arguments against slavery? (thus why were they in favor of abolition?)

13. Abolition Movement
What types of people were involved in the abolitionist movement?
What methods did members of the abolitionist movement use and which were more effective?
How did membership of the abolitionist movement increase the political voice of women?
What does the abolition movement highlight about equality & hierarchy for African Americans at this time?
What forces are African Americans working against?