11+a.+Reasons+for+the+abolition+of+the+slave+trade

__**REASONS FOR THE ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE**__

Supporters of Abolition or Abolitionists
 * Religious Humanitarian Abolitionists
 * Secular Supporters who were mostly Parliamentarians.

Religious humanitarians such as members of a Protestant religion called the Quakers tried to educate the British about the wrongs involved in slavery and the slave trade.. They also began the struggle for the abolition of the slave trade.

The Secular Supporters of Abolition achieved definite goals by causing Parliamentary Agitation against slavery and the slave trade.

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 * __The campaign by the Abolitionists.__**

The campaign to end the enslavement of Africans had to proceed in stages because it was a well established practice and it was central to economic activity in the Caribbean colonies. Even politicians who became well known Abolitionists at first did not support Abolition.

The politician who became the best known leader of the Abolition movement was **William Wilberforce.** Interestingly, at first he rejected a suggestion made in parliament in Britain in 1814 to free enslaved Africans illegally brought to British territories. Sir Thomas Buxton was also hesitant (while other abolitionists were in a hurry to end slavery) and did not rush abolition because he believed that slavery would eventually decline on its own.


 * __STEP 1__**

The first step in the campaign for abolition was to abolish slavery in English parliament. This was because Britain was the main slave owning nation by the 18th century. This first step was pushed by a man named Granville Sharp, a junior clerk in the Ordinance Office. He first became involved in the slavery issue when he nursed an abandoned slave named Strong who had been attacked and nearly killed by his master, back to health. Strong's former master saw him and tried to capture him and put him on a ship to be sold in Jamaica. Sharp was able to get Strong freed and went to court to get the English law on slavery made clearer.

In 1772, Sharp also went to court to free a slave called James Somerset who had escaped from an American slave master who was living in England. Sommerset was also re captured and put on a ship set for Jamaica but Sharp was once again able to free the slave before the ship sailed due to another court trial. Because of Sharp's anti slavery trials, the English court under Judge Mansfield decided that there was no legal definition of slavery in England. This decision made it illegal to take a slave against his will back to the slave colonies, so a slave could walk away from slavery by refusing to go back. **The Mansfield judgement helped boost public opinion against slavery.**


 * __STEP 2__**

In 1775, the Quakers pushed for the establishment of a commission of the House of Commons to be set up to take evidence of the slave trade. This commission did a report and in 1776 after the report was submitted, parliamentarians began to debate the godliness of the slave trade. In 1787, the Quakers formed **__The Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade.__** This society set up branches in Britain's large towns, with town leaders organising meeting and getting petitions against slavery signed.By 1792, 500 petition were sent into Parliament. The society also produced and handed out pamphlets to the public highlighting the evils of slavery and cases of cruelty against slaves.

Although the Society distributed their pamphlets to the public, it was not their main intention to attract the attention of the public. Their main focus was to persuade the rich British people (or aristocrats), the Members of Parliament (MP's) and others who held important offices. .

Members of the Society were William Wilberforce, Thomas Clarkson, Granville Sharp, Henry Thorton, Charles Grant,Edward James Elliot, Zachary Macaulay and James Stephen.

__**STEP 3**__

William Wilberforce contributed greatly to the campaign for Abolition by being the first to introduce a proposal for abolition in a session of Parliament. In 1804, he got the Abolition bill passed in one section of Parliament but it was overruled and thrown out in another section.

In 1805, the British Prime Minister at the time, William Pitt secured an order forbidding the importation of slaves into Trinidad and some areas of Guyana. After Pitt's death in January 1806, the new Prime Minister Charles James Fox moved a resolution for the total abolition of the Slave Trade. This act of Abolition was passed in March 1807 and came into action from 1st January, 1808.


 * __OUTCOME__**

The Act of Abolition meant the end of the slave trade (i.e. the end of trading of slaves or their transportation to any other place). One could be fined 100 pounds if he was found engaging in such trade and the ship involved could be seized. Rewards were offered to naval officers who recovered slaves from such ships.

The Abolition Act did not result in a complete end of the slave trade. Profits were too large and tempting. Additional laws had to be passed to end it altogether. In 1827, a person who still engaged in slave trading could be killed.

To this extent, the 1807 Abolition Act put a legal end to slave trading. However, the battle for Emancipationwas still to be fought.


 * __Question and answer.__**

(1) What factors accounted for the success of the British Anti slavery movement?

The main factor was the extreme support for this movement from British Parliament. This support was important because Parliamentary acts were necessary to effect change. Men such as William Wilberforce and the then Prime Minister Pitt were instrumental in having the Abolition Act passed and therefore was the main factor that accounted for the success of the Anti-slavery movement.

(2) Give 3 arguments used by both the French and British abolitionists against slavery in the Caribbean.


 * On religious grounds it was argued that slavery imposed by man was contrary to the word of God and that enslavement of one race by another violated the principle of the equality of man.
 * Slavery was uneconomic and it was cheaper to operate estates by means of paid labour.
 * The education of slaves as well as religious instruction about Christianity was neglected. The activities of missionaries who sought to Christianize slaves were discouraged and missionaries even suffered perc\persecution by slave owners.

(3) Explain 3 ways in which the French Anti slavery movement differed from the British Anti slavery movement.


 * The slaves in the French colonies did not have to undergo a period of Apprenticeship like slaves in British colonies had to do. (read about Apprenticeship in the upcoming section).
 * The members of the British Anti Slavery movement consisted of both religious and non-religious humanitarians.
 * Unlike the members of the British anti slavery movement, the French members did not make great attempts to take up the proposal in Parliament.
 * The French anti antislavery movement recognized that full emancipation was the only answer to the problem of slavery unlike the British who proposed Amelioration and Apprenticeship before Emancipation. Therefore, slaves in the French colonies didn't have to undergo a period of Apprenticeship as did slaves in Britain.

__**ARGUMENTS FOR AND AGAINST SLAVERY**__

__Arguments for slavery /Arguments by the Antagonists or opponents of the Anti-slavery Movement.__

N.B. These arguments were usually put forth by the slave owners and the rich and elite whites in Britain and in the British colonies in the West Indies.


 * There was nothing immoral in slavery since it has been practiced throughout history and there were even examples of it in the bible. (Religious argument)
 * The labour of slaves was important to make plantations productive. Amerindian labour was inadequate, white indentured labour was difficult to get. Africans worked well in tropical climates as it was similar to their own at home. (Economic argument)
 * Slave labour helped in providing Europe with essential tropical raw materials. (Economic argument)
 * West Indian agriculture developed by slave labour promoted British Economic development and created employment for British men both home and abroad.(Economic argument)
 * The treatment of slaves on West Indian plantations was better than the treatment of African slaves in Africa that were captured during tribal wars.
 * Slaves were provided with food, housing clothing and medical care. Slaves were an investment and if they were not taken care of and provided with these things and kept healthy, this would mean a loss to the owner.(Economic argument)
 * Flogging or whipping of slaves was a normal feature of navy traning and English children working in coal mines. Therefore in comparison slaves were not badly treated.( Humanitarian reason)
 * Education of slaves was not necessary for them to perform estate labour. Slaves who were educated might believe themselves to be equal to their masters.

__Arguments against slavery/ Arguments by the Protagonists or Supporters of the Anti Slavery movement.__


 * It was argued that slavery imposed by man was contrary to the will of God and did not support the idea of Equality of man. (Religious argument)
 * The passage of slaves across the Atlantic to the West Indies was unsanitary and slaves were subject to disease. Also on the estates, the treatment of slaves was harsh and brutal. The harshness of the slave system was proven by the man slave suicides, runaways and rebellions. (Humanitarian argument)
 * Slaves were improperly housed and fed. They were also prone and exposed to disease and in these cases they were not offered immediate and good medical services (Humanitarian argument)
 * Slavery was uneconomical and unprofitable and it was cheaper to operate estates using paid labour. (Economic argument)
 * The education of slaves as well as religious knowledge was neglected. ( Religious argument).
 * Justice for the slaves was hardly to be expected especially where judges were themselves owners of slaves and where slaves could not give evidence against whites in court. (Humanitarian argument).
 * The rights of masters over slaves was expressed by means of strict laws, however the slaves had little to no rights. (Humanitarian argument).

__**INTEREST GROUPS FOR AND AGAINST SLAVERY**__

__Interest groups against slavery__
 * Non conformist missionaries belonging to the following religions - Baptists, Methodists, Moravians and Congregationalists who instructed the slaves in Christianity and attempted to improve their conditions.
 * __The Quaker society of friends__ - a group made up of Granville Sharp and some other critics of slavery.
 * __The Chapham sect-__ a group made up of evangelical humanitarians such as Ramsey, Wilberforce, Macaulay and others.
 * __Society for effecting the Abolition of the slave trade__ created in 1787. Its chief parliamentary member was Wilberforce. Other prominent members were Clarkson, Sharp, Ramsey, Stephen and Macaulay.
 * __Society for the Mitigation and Gradual Abolition__ of slavery formed in 1823. Its humanitarian crusade, aided by favourable economic conditions resulted in the passing of the Emancipation act.
 * __The New Torries__ - This was a group of industrialists who believed that slavery was a wasteful crusade and an inefficient system of labour.

__Interest groups for slavery__
 * The West India Lobby - A powerful pressure group made up of retired planters, absentee planters, slave trading interest agents and friends of the West India plantocracy. Well represented in Parliament, the lobby was able to block the passage for abolitionist legislature for a long time. Angered by theobjectionof the Amelioration proposals as a means of preventing Emancipation, they still secured twenty million pounds compensation and the apprenticeship scheme for the planters in the Emancipation Act.

N.B. The Plantocracy - The plantocracy was a rich white minority who held power in the colonies in the 18th century.

__**SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC FACTORS THAT LED TO THE END OF SLAVERY**__

__Social Factors__
 * Firstly there was a surge of religious sympathy for the welfare of mankind because of a new form of Christianity introduced in the later 18th century. Therefore slaves got more public support and sympathy than before. Closely followed by the Quakers who had long quarreled for an end to slavery. They were supported by other religious groups.
 * Secular humanitarians were influenced by the agitation against the slave trade started by religious groups and achieved definite goals in law courts and in Parliament e.g. Granville Sharp in the Somerset case, Wilberfoce who secured the support of Prime Ministers Pitt and Fox against slavery. Both Sharp and Wilberforce were connected to the Committee against the slave tradde formed by the Quakers.

__Economic Factors__
 * The main English cities engaged in the slave trade namely London, Bristol and Liverpool had begun to develop other economic interests other than sugar from the Caribbean. Interests such as cotton from the USA and sugar from beet root from Europe itself. Because of this, the early 19th Century was a period of depression in West Indian agriculture.
 * The British government earned more from customs and taxes on imported cotton and the export of manufactured goods than it did from the slave trade.
 * The British trading empire began to grow in other parts of the world because a new group of influential and rich men had emerged - the industrialists and merchants. These were the owners for big industries that were built during the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century.Before this revolution, the only rich and influential men were the plantation owners.These industrialists had little care for the slave trade and slavery as they were attracted by more profitable business opportunities in India. (This new interest in Inida was called the East India Interest).For instance, merchants would import food and goods from India to sell in Englandsuch as cloth, tea and cotton. Industrialists and merchants involved in trade with India resented the slave trade because West Indian planters had the advantage of protection from competition because of the Navigation Acts which forbade competing cpountries from trading in their zone.
 * Slavery was bound to come to an end when these new influential men - industrialists and merchants- came to dominate parliament in 1832. The industrialists dominance mean a victory of industiralists over agriculturalists and this eventually led to less people fighting their cause in Parliament.


 * __RELATED PAST PAPER QUESTIONS__**

(1)Name 1 leader of the British anti slavery movement.

(2)Sate 3 achievements of the British anti-slavery movements up to 1834.

(3) Give 2 reasons why many Caribbean sugar planters did not want slavery to be abolished.

(4)Explain some religious and humanitarian arguments that made many Christian missionaries in the Caribbean support the abolition of slavery.

(5)Outline the economic arguments used by many British Caribbean planters/ plantation owners to defend slavery.