Virginia analysis late 1600s to early 1700s
The race relations in Virginia during the mid-1600’s was not defined by a set tension between
races , it was however a hierarchal society splitted into separate groups of ‘’Masters’’ (upper
class) and ‘’Indentured servants’’ (lower class) where the servants part of the hierarchal
position is was one of no power, experiencing a complete lack of any rights other than due
process. The lack of a set tension between the races was a set precedence engrained in the
population at that time. This precedence is seen through courting documents where as they
did not divide indentured servants into any category other than the vocabulary category of
‘’negro’’ which was also commonly used for those that were not English. IE ‘’Christopher
Miller, a dutchman’’. The categories were not slurs, it was the common vocabulary at the time.
At year 1705 through the passage of the reformed slave ownership laws and those who were
indentured servants there was a change in the valuation of slaves & servants. Where as the
new set of laws states ‘’That all masters and owners of servants, shall find and provide for
their servants, wholesome and competent diet, clothing, and lodging’’. This clearly states that
there was a societal change, since large parts of the social hierarchy were defined by law
through the mechanisms of the justice system.
These mechanisms by which the state switched up the rights of servants caused a universal
improvement for most servants likewise for those that were from Africa as those that were
from Europe. This gives a glimpse into the reality that shows how the split between races that
