Question

Was the development of African slavery in the North American colonies inevitable? (Consider that it never deceloped in some other colonial areas, like Mexico and New France). How would the American colonies be different without slavery? What role did the Spanish encomienda system and British sugar colonies play in introducing slavery to the southern colonies?

Answer 1

The slaveary in North America began with indentures servers who were taken from the ghettoes and debotors prison of London

Answer 2

• It is difficult to say whether the development of slavery was inevitable, but it certainly was very likely to happen. Slavery did not develop that way in other areas, but their situation was significantly different from that in the US. In Mexico, the labour force remained quite large without the need to import people, while in the US, the population struggled to grow. Moreover, the Spanish government had different ideas regarding the humanity and rights of the population in their empire.

• American colonies would have been very different without slavery, as it is unlikely that the big plantations of the South, and the wealth they brought, would have developed without slaves. The work is extremely difficult and time-consuming, and the population was very small.

• The Spanish encomienda was a system of "communal slavery," similar to the feudal system. A Spaniard would be in charge of a community of Indigenous people, and in exchange for labour, he would provide education and protection. The sugar plantations of the British empires were more similar to the slavery that developed in the United States. Both systems served as models for the plantations of the Southern United States.