21 8 : The Atlantic 



Slavery aflfected not only the countries and states employing slave 

 labor but also Atlantic areas like England and New England that 

 were deeply involved in the slave trade. 



The rapid development of the New World was in a considerable 

 measure due to slavery and whole industries were founded on it 

 such as mining and sugar in the West Indies; cotton, tobacco, indigo 

 and rice in the southern colonies and states. Slavery added an impor- 

 tant and permanent element to the population of the New World 

 notably in the West Indies, in Brazil and the United States. Alto- 

 gether the slave trade and the slave ships played an important part 

 in Atlantic history and some aspects of their operations, though 

 interesting, are not well understood. 



At the time slavery grew up as an operating system, social con- 

 trasts between slavery and freedom were not as sharp as they are 

 today. There did not then exist in any country large bodies of free 

 and mobile labor composed of men and women who enjoyed a great 

 measure of economic independence and all the rights of nationality, 

 citizenship and suffrage. The contrast to be drawn was not that be- 

 tween the absolute slave and the absolute free laborer but between a 

 slave and whole class of people who enjoyed various grades of rela- 

 tive freedom all the way from that of slave to that of independent 

 employer. 



In the colonial period all the nations that sent colonists to the 

 New World were still strongly marked by feudal traditions and prac- 

 tices. In varying measure this was true of Spain, Portugal, France, 

 England and Holland. It was assumed and accepted that the leaders 

 of the colonial enterprises would become the large landholders and 

 as such would exercise economic privileges and also a measure of 

 political and social control over those who helped them in the devel- 

 opment of the properties whether slaves, indentured servants, peons 

 or laborers for hire. 



A large number of those who came as colonists to American shores 

 came as indentured servants with few possessions save the clothes 

 on their backs and with no independent financial resources. They 

 signed an agreement with an individual master or with a colonizing 

 company under which in exchange for their transportation and for 

 their maintenance they were, for a variable period of time that might 

 run up to seven years, to perform labor for the other party to the 

 contract. But an independent and enterprising indentured servant by 

 performing extra services or by other means might be able to shorten 

 his term of service and buy his freedom. In any event, he became free 



