part 3 civic literacy essay abolition of slavery

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Slavery and Abolition in America

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An Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery, 1799

Activities that use this source material

• Civic Literacy Essay: Slavery
• Slavery in New York
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• An Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery

March 29 1799

Description

Laws of 1799, Chapter 62. In 1799 the New York State Legislature, based on a model in Pennsylvania, passed a law to gradually abolish the institution of slavery in the state. Though freeing many enslaved individuals, it did not do so immediately, in part to allow enslavers at the time to recoup the most profit from enslaved individuals before being forced to release them. Thus, children born to an enslaved mother after July 4, 1799 were declared legally free--but not until male children had turned 28, and females 25.

Written Document

New York State

Revolution and New Nation

African Americans, Slavery

New York State Archives

NYSA_13036-78_L1799_Ch062

New York State Archives, New York (State). Dept. of State. Bureau of Miscellaneous Records. Enrolled acts of the State Legislature. Series 13036-78, Laws of 1799, Chapter 62.

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The Abolition of Slavery in the United States: Historical Context and Its Contemporary Application

In The Legal Understanding of Slavery: From the Historical to the Contemporary (Jean Allain, ed., Oxford Univ. Press, 2012)

U. of Pittsburgh Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2015-42

21 Pages Posted: 23 Dec 2015

William M. Carter, Jr.

University of Pittsburgh - School of Law

Date Written: 2012

The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America marked the legal end of slavery in the United States. By declaring that ‘neither slavery nor involuntary servitude . . . shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction’, the Amendment enshrined freedom in the country’s fundamental charter. As this chapter will demonstrate, the Thirteenth Amendment’s Framers intended to eliminate both chattel slavery and the ‘the badges and incidents’ of slavery. Those Framers, whose worldview was grounded in natural rights and abolitionist theory, knew that abolishing the property relationship of owner and owned would not by itself be sufficient to create enduring freedom. Rather, they believed that the legal practices and social customs surrounding and supporting the system of slavery must also be abolished if the freedmen were to enjoy the full benefits of citizenship. This chapter discusses those badges and incidents of slavery in American history and suggests lessons that can be drawn from that history to inform the movement to abolish contemporary slavery. In so doing, this chapter suggests that just as the Thirteenth Amendment’s Framers realized that slavery constituted a system of interlocking forms of subordination, so too should modern-day advocates, lawmakers, and judges recognize that abolishing slavery requires a broad and evolving understanding of the conditions that support or arise out of enslavement.

Keywords: Thirteenth Amendment, slavery, abolition, civil war, badges and incidents of slavery, race, civil rights, racial discrimination, Jones v. Alfred H. Mayer Co., Fourteenth Amendment, equal protection, Equal Protection Clause, Constitutional interpretation, original intent, critical race theory

JEL Classification: K00, K19, K39

Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation

William M. Carter, Jr. (Contact Author)

University of pittsburgh - school of law ( email ).

3900 Forbes Ave. Pittsburgh, PA 15260 United States 412-648-1420 (Phone)

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Collection African American Perspectives: Materials Selected from the Rare Book Collection

Abolition and slavery.

In the debate over whether new states and territories should be free or slaveholding, few spoke more passionately than Massachusetts senator Charles Sumner. In this speech, delivered before the Senate in 1860 when Kansas applied for statehood, Sumner makes clear his abolitionist stance. Decrying slavery as barbaric, he criticizes various pro-slavery arguments and offers statistics to show how, in his opinion, slavery rendered the South economically inferior to the North.

First-person accounts of American slave life appeared in print as early as 1760. In the early and mid-nineteenth century abolitionists encouraged their publication and often used slave narratives to elicit support for their cause.

Life of James Mars was written by an aging former slave at the encouragement of his sister, who was born after the family was free. While many slave narratives focus on slavery and cruel abuses in the South, Mars tells of slavery in Connecticut and of the complex relationships he had with the people who owned him. As Mars puts it, "Many of the people now on the stage of life do not know that slavery ever lived in Connecticut."

The U.S. Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, commonly known as the Freedmen's Bureau, was created at the end of the Civil War to provide aid to newly-freed African Americans and displaced whites. The bureau distributed rations, built schools, ran courts, and attempted to find employment for former slaves. The bureau failed to effect any real change in land ownership, however, and many African Americans were ultimately pressured into exploitative sharecropping agreements with white landowners. The bureau was closed in 1872.

Reports of Generals Steedman and Fullerton offers valuable information about the bureau's powers and responsibilities and on the living conditions of Southern African Americans immediately after the war. The generals' goal was to "ascertain, by a thorough and impartial investigation, the manner in which the Bureau has been administered and conducted . . . and to observe the effect produced by it upon the relations between the white and black races." They found that in places where bureau affairs had been "faithfully and impartially" administered, harmony reigned. In some districts, however, they discovered corrupt bureau agents. Of one North Carolina agent, they note:

"This agent has exercised the most arbitrary and despotic power, and practiced revolting and unheard-of cruelties on the helpless freedmen under his charge. The outrageous conduct of this man was brought to our attention by a delegation of freemen from the settlement, who called upon us and made statements in relation to his oppressions and outrages which we could scarcely credit. After hearing their statements we visited the settlement, convened the freedmen, investigated the charges against this man, and ascertained that he had been guilty of even greater wrongs and oppressions than had been complained of."

CIVIC LITERACY ESSAY - ABOLITION

Description

I made this to help my students approach the new Civic Literacy essay component of the New York State U.S. History Regents. It includes a detailed breakdown on how to approach the prompt. Can be used as a mini lesson or brief demo.

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Investigating and disseminating knowledge concerning slavery and its legacies across all borders and all time.

The Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition at the Whitney and Betty MacMillan Center for International and Area Studies was founded in 1998 at Yale University. The Gilder Lehrman Center was the first institution in the world wholly devoted to scholarship, public education, and outreach about the global problem of slavery across all borders and all time. In a world that needs this work now more than ever, we invite you to join us in sustaining our mission to foster an improved academic and public understanding of the role of slavery, its destruction, and its legacies in the functioning of the modern world.

To support the annual programming, outreach, and other key activities of the Gilder Lehrman Center, please contribute to the   Gilder Lehrman Center Legacy Fund .

Among those honored were MacMillan Center affiliates David Blight, Carlos Eire, and Margherita Tortora.

The research project was led by David W. Blight, Sterling Professor of History and director of the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition at Yale.

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