Okla-homey
3/25/2007, 08:50 AM
Mar. 25, 1807: The Slave Trade Act
Precisely two hundred years ago today, at the height of the Regency Period, the British Parliament outlawed trading in slaves throughout the British Empire and effectively ended the Atlantic slave trade by passage of the Slave Trade Act.
The act included a critical and effective enforcement mechanism. It specified that ships intercepted by the Royal Navy would be considered on par with pirate vessels and their crews could be considered akin to pirates and therefore subject to execution.
Passed on March 25, 1807, the long title is "An Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade." The original act is still held in the Parliamentary Archives(citation 47 Geo III Sess. 1 c. 36).
The Atlantic slave trade had begun in 1562, during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I when John Hawkins led the first slaving expedition. Persons were captured or otherwise acquired in western Africa and transported under incredibly inhumane conditions to eager buyers in the western hemisphere. After their purchase in the New World, they were generally put to work cultivating labor-intensive crops like sugar, tobacco, rice, indigo and eventually cotton.
http://aycu24.webshots.com/image/12303/2001552774239381576_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2001552774239381576)
Graphic depiction of the the African Slave Trade.
http://aycu13.webshots.com/image/11212/2001588390971050980_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2001588390971050980)
18th century plan of a slave ship. People were packed in below decks under inhumane conditions. It has been documented that approximately 1 in 4 did not survive the passage.
The people who pushed the act through Parliament were a group of evangelical Protestants allied with Quakers and united in their opposition to slavery and the slave trade.
The Quakers had long viewed slavery as immoral, "a blight upon humanity." By 1807 British anti-slave-trade groups had a very sizable faction of like-minded members in the British Parliament. They controlled, at their height, some 35-40 seats.
Known as the "saints" this alliance was led by William Wilberforce, the most important of the anti-slave trade campaigners. Anti-slave trade MP's had access to the legal draughtmanship of James Stephen, Wilberforce's brother-in-law, and were extremely dedicated. They often viewed their personal battle against slavery as a divinely ordained crusade.
http://aycu10.webshots.com/image/12809/2001517912377710044_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2001517912377710044)
William Wilberforce
http://aycu11.webshots.com/image/11930/2001573948131613701_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2001573948131613701)
Wilberforce Univesity was the first university owned and operated by African-Americans, and is named for the 18th century English statesman and abolitionist William Wilberforce. The school played a role in the Underground Railroad. The campus is located three miles from Xenia, Ohio and 21 miles from Dayton, Ohio.
Also among their number was Lord Grenville. Grenville's short term as Prime Minister was known as the "Ministry of all The Talents." Not long after the act was passed, Grenville's government lost power to the Duke of Portland but despite this change, the later British governments continued to support the policy of ending the Atlantic slave trade for all time.
http://aycu38.webshots.com/image/10957/2001509206721367903_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2001509206721367903)
Lord Grenville
After the British ended their own slave trade, they felt compelled by economic pressures to press other nations to support the end of the trade. They feared the British colonies would become uncompetitive with those of other nations if their competitors continued to avail themselves of fresh slave labor brought from western Africa for service on Carribean and Latin American plantations.
The British campaign against the slave trade carried on by other nations was an unprecedented transnational effort. Incidentally, the United States abolished its African slave trade at the same time. The US outlawed participation in the trade by US flagged vessels on January 1, 1808. Other trading nations that did not have a great deal to give up, such as Sweden, quickly followed suit, as did the Dutch, who were also by then a minor player in the Atlantic slave trade.
As stated above, The British Admiralty formally declared that any ship caught transporting slaves would be considered the same as a pirate ship, and its crew could be subject to trial and execution upon conviction. It was this aspect of British policy that really got everyone's attention and went farthest to add force to the Act.
Whether or not this unilateral British act would be considered "legal" under modern notions of international law, it meant that unless a nation had sufficient naval power to protect its vessels from Royal Navy enforcement of the Act, it had to give up the trade.
Enforcement of the US law was less effective because the infant US Navy simply did not have anywhere near the number of warships as the British.
It's worth noting that these developments did not end slavery in the US. That wouldn't happen until the end of the Civil War and ratification of te XIII Amendment in 1866.
Slavery was not completely ended in the western hempishere until Brazil ended it in 1888, approximately eighty years after the passage of the British and US anti-slave trade acts.
On December 10, 1948, the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article 4 states:
'No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.'
Precisely two hundred years ago today, at the height of the Regency Period, the British Parliament outlawed trading in slaves throughout the British Empire and effectively ended the Atlantic slave trade by passage of the Slave Trade Act.
The act included a critical and effective enforcement mechanism. It specified that ships intercepted by the Royal Navy would be considered on par with pirate vessels and their crews could be considered akin to pirates and therefore subject to execution.
Passed on March 25, 1807, the long title is "An Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade." The original act is still held in the Parliamentary Archives(citation 47 Geo III Sess. 1 c. 36).
The Atlantic slave trade had begun in 1562, during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I when John Hawkins led the first slaving expedition. Persons were captured or otherwise acquired in western Africa and transported under incredibly inhumane conditions to eager buyers in the western hemisphere. After their purchase in the New World, they were generally put to work cultivating labor-intensive crops like sugar, tobacco, rice, indigo and eventually cotton.
http://aycu24.webshots.com/image/12303/2001552774239381576_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2001552774239381576)
Graphic depiction of the the African Slave Trade.
http://aycu13.webshots.com/image/11212/2001588390971050980_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2001588390971050980)
18th century plan of a slave ship. People were packed in below decks under inhumane conditions. It has been documented that approximately 1 in 4 did not survive the passage.
The people who pushed the act through Parliament were a group of evangelical Protestants allied with Quakers and united in their opposition to slavery and the slave trade.
The Quakers had long viewed slavery as immoral, "a blight upon humanity." By 1807 British anti-slave-trade groups had a very sizable faction of like-minded members in the British Parliament. They controlled, at their height, some 35-40 seats.
Known as the "saints" this alliance was led by William Wilberforce, the most important of the anti-slave trade campaigners. Anti-slave trade MP's had access to the legal draughtmanship of James Stephen, Wilberforce's brother-in-law, and were extremely dedicated. They often viewed their personal battle against slavery as a divinely ordained crusade.
http://aycu10.webshots.com/image/12809/2001517912377710044_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2001517912377710044)
William Wilberforce
http://aycu11.webshots.com/image/11930/2001573948131613701_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2001573948131613701)
Wilberforce Univesity was the first university owned and operated by African-Americans, and is named for the 18th century English statesman and abolitionist William Wilberforce. The school played a role in the Underground Railroad. The campus is located three miles from Xenia, Ohio and 21 miles from Dayton, Ohio.
Also among their number was Lord Grenville. Grenville's short term as Prime Minister was known as the "Ministry of all The Talents." Not long after the act was passed, Grenville's government lost power to the Duke of Portland but despite this change, the later British governments continued to support the policy of ending the Atlantic slave trade for all time.
http://aycu38.webshots.com/image/10957/2001509206721367903_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2001509206721367903)
Lord Grenville
After the British ended their own slave trade, they felt compelled by economic pressures to press other nations to support the end of the trade. They feared the British colonies would become uncompetitive with those of other nations if their competitors continued to avail themselves of fresh slave labor brought from western Africa for service on Carribean and Latin American plantations.
The British campaign against the slave trade carried on by other nations was an unprecedented transnational effort. Incidentally, the United States abolished its African slave trade at the same time. The US outlawed participation in the trade by US flagged vessels on January 1, 1808. Other trading nations that did not have a great deal to give up, such as Sweden, quickly followed suit, as did the Dutch, who were also by then a minor player in the Atlantic slave trade.
As stated above, The British Admiralty formally declared that any ship caught transporting slaves would be considered the same as a pirate ship, and its crew could be subject to trial and execution upon conviction. It was this aspect of British policy that really got everyone's attention and went farthest to add force to the Act.
Whether or not this unilateral British act would be considered "legal" under modern notions of international law, it meant that unless a nation had sufficient naval power to protect its vessels from Royal Navy enforcement of the Act, it had to give up the trade.
Enforcement of the US law was less effective because the infant US Navy simply did not have anywhere near the number of warships as the British.
It's worth noting that these developments did not end slavery in the US. That wouldn't happen until the end of the Civil War and ratification of te XIII Amendment in 1866.
Slavery was not completely ended in the western hempishere until Brazil ended it in 1888, approximately eighty years after the passage of the British and US anti-slave trade acts.
On December 10, 1948, the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article 4 states:
'No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.'