As written in the dictionary, slavery is an act of exploitation the labor force and is moral and inhuman. Nothing can possibly defend the brutal acts of slave owners against their slaves like commodities.
While reading about the life of a slave, readers get to question whether this institution is truly beneficial or morally wrong. Exposing the horrors of slavery, the narratives elaborate on the stripping away of all human identity.
Introduction:
The United States of America was never founded the way it is today. Laws, customs, and even holidays have shaped the culture we Americans call normal. However, there was a point in time when humans were considered objects that disqualify the character needed for a human being. Although certain countries had their own rules on selling humans, slavery was never abused and manipulated as it was in America. Not only was the slave trade very important for colonists, but it also became a habit, something that they thought they could not live without. Our respect for people of all color and religion took a long time to create. It is just now that we as a society have started to tell the slaves’ stories, with no detail left behind.
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Slave owners show absolutely no empathy towards their slaves. The way that slave owners treated their slaves is such that the slaves will obey whatever they tell them to do. Slave owners were brainwashed and believed that severe discipline would make their slaves too scared to rebel. One example of this idea is transcribed in Document 6. In this quote, Josiah Henson describes the moment when his father was brutally punished for standing up to a slave owner that was hurting Josiah’s mother. He said “Oh! he could stand the whole. Again and again the thong fell on his lacerated back. His cries grew fainter and fainter, till a feeble groan was the only response to the final blows.” Another example of this idea is transcribed in Document 4. In this quote, Solomon Northrup describes a day in the life of a slave in charge of picking enough cotton for the day. He said, “A slave never approaches the gin-house with his basket of cotton but with fear…. Most frequently they have too little, and therefore it is they are not anxious to leave the field. After weighing follow the whippings; and then their contents are stored away like hay”. These two examples show that. slaves are unwittingly morphed into a “thing” that exists solely for the labor he or she can perform. Not only are they diminishing the human qualities of their slaves, but they are altering their own minds to view slaves not as humans, but as tools from which they can gain a desired end.
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There are many ways an enslaved family can be separated.The thought of leaving your family forever to once again suffer is a painful experience no human should ever go through. But again, this happened in the buildings of the South every day. One example of this idea is transcribed in Document 2. In this quote, Lewis Clarke states the dreams he had for his family that we all take granted for. He said, “I never knew a whole family to live together till all were grown up in my life. There is almost alway, in every family, some one or more keen and bright, or else sullen and stubborn slave, whose influence they are afraid of one the rest of the family, and such a one must take a walking ticket to the south.” Another example of this idea is transcribed in Document 5. In this quote, James Martin tells the story of how his family were auctioned and sold for a certain amount of money. He said, “The slaves are put in stalls like the pens they use for cattle; a man and his wife with a child on each arm.” This shows that the fear and threat of separation can impact families in harsh ways. Slaves were ultimately treated as if they were an object with no feelings whatsoever.
Conclusion:
Overall, this piece of writing narrates the extreme day-to-day differences in people’s lives throughout the Antebellum Period. It was possible. in a day back then that a human was earning his Masters degree at Harvard while another human was being whipped for standing up to his slave owner. This shows that the law ultimately provided slaves with no protection from their masters. The need to make money out of slavery seems to put slave owners and those who would benefit from the slave trade in a psychological “dispute” to hurt slaves for not getting “their money”. I believe this crave for large cash funds drove the slave owners to go further than needed when punishing their slaves. I also believe that the past originators of slavery influenced masters into thinking that slavery was moral and humane towards the economy.
