Early settlers in North America had a wide variety of racial groups such as; Native Americans, Europeans and Africans. The British came to take over the area in North America (later was known as the thirteen original colonies) and their policies created relationships with both blacks and whites. But in the late 1600s the British treated Africans much like their indentured servants. Africans could obtain their freedom, own property and had legal rights. Legal changes by 1700 reduced slaves to their personal property. They lost almost all their legal rights as humans. Although slavery was not common in the north, many New England shippers profited from the triangular trade. The triangular trade is a system of trading in which a country pays for its imports from one country by its exports to another. The triangular trade was used to refer to the trade in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries that involved shipping goods from Britain to West Africa to be exchanged for slaves, these slaves were shipped to the West Indies and exchanged for sugar, rum, and shipped back to Britain. …show more content…
The Mid Atlantic Colonies was known as the “Breadbasket Colonies”, The first settlers of the Mid-Atlantic colonies realized that the land was good for farming, once the trees and rocks were cleared. There was a lot of diversity in the middle colonies of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware. The middle colonies represented that a middle ground between its neighbors to the North and South. Elements of both New England towns and sprawling country estates could be found. Religious people from all regions could settle in the tolerant middle zone. New England shipbuilding and lumbering and the large farms of the South could be found. They provided a perfect picture for English
Winthrop D. Jordan author of White Over Black: American Attitudes Toward the Negro 1550-1812, expresses two main arguments in explaining why Slavery became an institution. He also focuses attention on the initial discovery of Africans by English. How theories on why Africans had darker complexions and on the peculiarly savage behavior they exhibited. Through out the first two chapters Jordan supports his opinions, with both facts and assumptions. Jordan goes to great length in explaining how the English and early colonialist over centuries stripped the humanity from a people in order to enslave them and justify their actions in doing so. His focus is heavily on attitudes and how those positions worked to create the slave society established in this country.
They preferred African slaves to European or Native American slaves because they "could be held for unlimited terms, and there was no means by which word of harsh or arbitrary treatment could reach their homelands" (Wood, 43). The ability of the Englishmen to hold slaves for an unlimited amount of time and to use any methods of punishment gave them all the power. The indentured servant only worked to fulfill the previous contract as part of the headright system. Colonists "complained of the 'servants that dayley become free"(41). Since the servants had varying terms of service, it made it difficult to keep enough workers. Native Americans were cheap and did not have to be imported, but knew the land better than the Englishmen and could easily escape. There was also a language barrier and they died relatively quick, which made them not worth the investment. This shows some insight into how the African population started to become
They made their money through shipbuilding, small-scale farming, and trading. These colonies also had big commercial centers, such as Philadelphia and New York City. The people that lived here were very tolerant to others’ religions. They had multiple different groups of different religions: Quakers, Huguenots, Jews, and Presbyterians. They had very flexible social viewpoints; they developed a middle class of farmers and business owners. Colonists came to settle in the Middle colonies for two reasons, to make money and to practice religion. Finally, the political life of the colonists reflected around the basic rights of Englishmen.
The New England, Middle and Southern colonies were all English ruled, but yet very different. Among their distinctions, was the geography which played an important role in shaping these colonies. New England attracted Puritan farmers who wanted to separate from the Catholic Church. But because of the bone dry soil in the North, these colonists found they couldn't continue with their traditional ways of farming. However, with the immense amounts of water that surrounded them, they found that they could fish and trade. The Middle colonies on the other, hand had a moderate amount of everything. The fertile soil and the major seaports such as Philadelphia and New York, allowed these Middle colonists to make a living any way they saw fit. This led to the brisk development of the Middle Seaboard . Unlike the Middle and Northern colonies, the Southern colonies had large amounts of fertile land allowing for the development of large plantations. Because farming the plantations was the economic thrust for the South, towns and cities developed slowly. Thusly Geography greatly affected the lifestyles of these regions in the New World.
Following the success of Christopher Columbus’ voyage to the Americas in the early16th century, the Spaniards, French and Europeans alike made it their number one priority to sail the open seas of the Atlantic with hopes of catching a glimpse of the new territory. Once there, they immediately fell in love the land, the Americas would be the one place in the world where a poor man would be able to come and create a wealthy living for himself despite his upbringing. Its rich grounds were perfect for farming popular crops such as tobacco, sugarcane, and cotton. However, there was only one problem; it would require an abundant amount of manpower to work these vast lands but the funding for these farming projects was very scarce in fact it was just about nonexistent. In order to combat this issue commoners back in Europe developed a system of trade, the Triangle Trade, a trade route that began in Europe and ended in the Americas. Ships leaving Europe first stopped in West Africa where they traded weapons, metal, liquor, and cloth in exchange for captives that were imprisoned as a result of war. The ships then traveled to America, where the slaves themselves were exchanged for goods such as, sugar, rum and salt. The ships returned home loaded with products popular with the European people, and ready to begin their journey again.
These four colonies are entirely diverse from one another. They are also not like any of the other colonies. They are the middle colonies because they separate the southern colonies from New England. Each colony within the Middle Colonies had its own different religious and political ideas. The diversity that was brought about between these different groups was a change because usually those that live in surrounding colonies have similar beliefs. Here though the diversity was encouraged and it is what made this section so special but also so different. Their different beliefs shaped the political and religious landscape for the people of this region giving everyone a dose of different ideas. New York would be considered one of the most diverse because it was home to Dutch, Scandinavians, Germans, French, Jews, Africans, and Indians. New York grew rapidly because of the Dutch heritage. They started the business of trading shares of companies, which then flourished into the start of the New York Stock Exchange. They also started banks and insurance companies which led to a very successful colony. New Jersey shared great ethnic and religious diversity like New York, yet it was not as successful because of the lack of large landowners. Pennsylvania had a big amount of immigration which led to a great success for the colony. The perfect climate and good soil made Pennsylvania an ideal place to
The three colonial regions blossomed quite differently in terms of economy. English colonists first settled in Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. Failing to find gold, however, people in the southern colonies grew tobacco and rice as marketable commodities. Since tobacco plantation was labor-intensive, a large number of the population was indentured servants and black slaves. Because of the high mortality rate and unbalanced sex ratio, headright system was created in order to attract more settlers. In New England, due to the poor soil condition, people mainly relied on fishing, and lumber. Also, the Navigation Acts stimulated shipbuilding industry. The Middle colonies were based on growing grains and trading with European nations as well as other colonies.
To the south of New England were the middle colonies. There the soil was fertile, and the weather more acclimated to farming (Sarcelle, 1965). Rivers flowed west toward the frontier, enabling transportation. The middle colonies, as opposed to the relatively Puritan dominated New England, were very diverse in people. A mixture of Dutch, German, Swedes, English and other smaller groups were present in middle colonial cities such as New York (Higginbotham, 1996).
The American colonies new England ,middle and southern colonies were very similar but different.The New England, Middle, and Southern Colonies grew differently over the period on 1619-1760. The three sets of colonies will prove that they were all different. There is hugely different between each other and style to lived. Such as, economics and agriculture.In this essay,
The first arrivals of Africans in America were treated similarly to the indentured servants in Europe. Black servants were treated differently from the white servants and by 1740 the slavery system in colonial America was fully developed.
The American colonies were established with the idea of freedom and liberty to all. This goal, however, is darkened by a contradictory event: racism. Racism against African Americans (Negroes) in America was a by-product of permanent and inhumane enslavement of the black population. This type slavery was built upon the need for the American colonies to achieve economic prosperity and social stability. The slavery prior to these social and economic problems was equal to that of white slavery. Black and white slaves and indentured servants received the same treatments, given equal punishments and working conditions. Both races were regarded as equally low in status and slavery itself in general carried a term of negative connotation. Free black men held the same Englishmen rights as fellow whites and were seen in every aspect as equal to whites. Only when the colonies began to strip blacks of all their titles and properties and reduce them to the title chattel, or property, because of the need to solve economic and societal problems did racism emerge to define all blacks as slaves.
In the beginning of colonial America people used religion and wealth to define status. As the years progressed fewer people migrated to America. This resulted in a labor shortage of indentured servants. Farmers turned to the transatlantic slave trade, and started replacing indentured servants with African slaves. African slaves worked for nothing, could be easily identified by their skin separating them from indentured servants, and were valued for their farming skill. Plantation owners found what they an ideal and endless labor supply and developed the first slave system where all slaves shared a common appearance and ancestry. The abundance of this new labor source brought poor whites new rights, opportunities, and a sense of superiority for whiteness. Many were elevated to manager’s plantations and bounty hunters. White societies for the first time started to identify themselves with each other not based on wealth or status because they were white. As slave labor increased, slavery became inherently identified with blackness. This perpetuated white Americans belief that Africans were a different kind of person and stimulated the theory that Africans maintained a "natural" inferiority.
It is referred to as triangular trade because it consists of trade with Africa, the thirteen colonies, and England. These three areas are commonly called the trades “three legs.” The first leg of this trade was merchants from Europe bringing refined goods to Africa to trade for slaves. The merchants traded with chiefs and high authority leaders. The chiefs pretty much could and would trade whomever they pleased, there was no restriction regarding who the slaves were.
Both the Europeans and Indigenous People were treated differently than African American slaves since they had slightly more freedom and rights, but in many ways they are also treated the same. The social construction of race between the Europeans, Indigenous People, and Africans led to the establishment of how one group is different from the other. Europeans are one of the groups that have been racialized during the colonial times. Since the Europeans strived for power and expansion to gain wealth for their motherland, they voyaged around to look for new places to control or get resources from. During their explorations, the Europeans also encountered other groups that were also racialized for a long period of time.
Slavery, as an institution, has existed since the dawn of civilization. However, by the fifteenth century, slavery in Northern Europe was almost nonexistent. Nevertheless, with the discovery of the New World, the English experienced a shortage of laborers to work the lands they claimed. The English tried to enslave the natives, but they resisted and were usually successful in escaping. Furthermore, with the decline of indentured servants, the Europeans looked elsewhere for laborers. It is then, within the British colonies, do the colonists turn to the enslavement of Africans. Although Native Americans were readily available and were initially numerous, Africans became the primary slave used in the colonies because the Native American slaves could not fill the colonists' labor needs, while the Africans did.