Justifying Slavery as a Positive Good[i]

 

 

Overview:  The institution of slavery became part of the United States when it was sanctioned by the U.S. Constitution.  At the time of the ratification of the constitution (1789), southerners who owned or aspired to own slaves, considered that existence of slavery was a “necessary evil”:” Slavery was necessary to support the agricultural system dependent upon tobacco and cotton.

 

Yet, in the 1830s, slaveholders shifted their position on justifying slavery. Instead of shrugging their shoulders and saying that “slavery is a necessary evil,” they sharpened their tongues and pens to argue that slavery was a “positive good.” In sum, they claimed that enslaving African Americans was part of the natural order of things – it was part of God’s law, part of history, part of the US legal system and part of sociological principles racial superiority and inferiority.

 

The essential reason that slaveholders and other advocates of slavery in the South changed their rationale for slavery was that they were under attack from white and free black abolitionists in the northern states.  These abolitionists argued that slavery was immoral and contrary to the basic principles of American democracy. 

 

Thus, by the 1830s and 1840s, we find that there were two groups debating the existence of slavery in the United States.  Those who justified slavery as a positive good waged the “proslavery argument.  Those who damned slavery as immoral and undemocratic shaped the agenda for the abolitionist movement.

 

In this activity, you will be asked to evaluate arguments made by white southerners who defended slavery as a positive good.  

 

Activity

 

Timing/Assessment:

 

·         This activity is due on or before November 2

·         It is worth up to 30 points.

 

Requirements:

 

• Before beginning this specific activity, read the Overview to this activity (above) and “Justifying Slavery,” pages 333-334 of the textbook. 

·         Shown below are links to writings of George Fitzhugh and James Hammond.  Each defended slavery as a positive good.

·         Read  and answer the questions for each document

·         Write a short summary that compares the ideas of these two proslavery advocates.

 

 

 

Documents: 

 

1.  George Fitzhugh, "The Universal Law of Slavery"
2.  James Henry Hammond, "The Mudsill Theory"

Questions (20 points; 10 points for each document):  Answer the answers for each document.  Provide specific examples.  

1. How does the writer justify slavery as a positive good?
2. What is the direct benefit to the slave, according to the writer?
3. What is the direct benefit to citizens in American society and/or the United States?

 

Topic for Short Summary (10 points): Compare and contrast Fitzhugh’s and Hammond’s justifications for slavery as a positive good and/or benefit to the slave.