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CHAPTER 4 Slavery, Freedom, and the Struggle for
Empire to 1763
This chapter concerns the simultaneous growth of slavery and freedom in British North America up to the
immediate aftermath of the Seven Years’ War. It opens with an account of Olaudah Equiano, who experienced both
freedom and slavery. Following treatment of how slavery functioned as the engine of the Atlantic world’s economy,
CHAPTER OUTLINE
I. Introduction: Olaudah Equiano
II. Slavery and Empire
A. Atlantic Trade
1. A series of triangular trade routes crisscrossed the Atlantic.
2. Colonial merchants profited from the slave trade, even in areas where slavery was a minor institution.
3. Slavery became connected with the color black and liberty with the color white.
B. Africa and the Slave Trade
1. Except for the king of Benin, most African rulers took part in the slave trade, gaining guns and
textiles in exchange for their slaves.
2. The slave trade was concentrated in western Africa, greatly disrupting that region’s society and
economy.
C. The Middle Passage
1. The Middle Passage was the voyage slaves took across the Atlantic from Africa.
2. Slaves were crammed aboard ships for maximum profit.
D. Chesapeake Slavery
1. Three distinct slave systems were entrenched in Britain’s mainland colonies:
a. Chesapeake
b. South Carolina and Georgia
c. Nonplantation societies of New England and the Middle Colonies
2. Chesapeake slavery was based on tobacco.
3. After 1680, labor switched from indentured servitude to slavery.
a. As Virginians moved westward, so did slavery.
b. The center of slavery moved from the Tidewater region to the Piedmont.
4. Slavery transformed Chesapeake society into an elaborate hierarchy of degrees of freedom:
a. Large planters
E. Freedom and Slavery in the Chesapeake
1. With the consolidation of a slave society, planters enacted laws to protect their power over the slaves.
2. Race became more important as a line of social division; free blacks lost rights as “free” and “white”
became virtually identical.
F. Indian Slavery in Early Carolina
1. The Creek Indians initially sold the early settlers their slaves, generally war captives and the captives’
families.
2. As the Carolina plantations grew, the Creeks became more concerned.
G. The Rice Kingdom
1. South Carolinian and Georgian slavery rested on rice.
2. Rice and indigo required large-scale cultivation (which was done by slaves).
H. The Georgia Experiment
1. Georgia was established by a group of philanthropists led by James Oglethorpe in 1733.
2. Oglethorpe had banned liquor and slaves, but the settlers demanded their right of self-government
and repealed the bans by the early 1750s.
3. In 1751, Georgia became a royal colony.
I. Slavery in the North
1. Because the economies of New England and the Middle Colonies were based on small farms, slavery
was far less important.
2. Given that slaves were few and posed little threat to the white majority, laws were less harsh than in the
South.
3. Slaves did represent a sizable percentage of urban laborers, particularly in New York and Philadelphia.
III. Slave Cultures and Slave Resistance
A. Becoming African-American
1. The common link among Africans in America was not kinship, language, or even “race,” but slavery
itself.
2. For most of the eighteenth century, most American slaves were African by birth.
B. African Religion in Colonial America
1. The experience of transitioning from traditional African religions to Christianity was difficult for the
slaves.
C. African-American Cultures
1. In the Chesapeake, slaves learned English, participated in the Great Awakening, and were exposed to
white culture.
2. In South Carolina and Georgia, two very different black societies emerged:
a. Communities on rice plantations retained significant African cultural elements (e.g., housing styles,
3. In the northern colonies a distinctive African-American culture developed more slowly, and African-
Americans enjoyed more access to the mainstream of life.
D. Resistance to Slavery
1. A common thread among African-Americans was the experience of slavery and desire for freedom.
a. Many plantation slaves in South Carolina and Georgia ran away to Florida or to cities.
2. The first eighteenth-century slave uprising occurred in New York City in 1712.
3. Uprisings also occurred in French Louisiana and on various Caribbean islands.
E. The Crisis of 1739–1741
1. The Stono Rebellion of 1739 in South Carolina led to the tightening of the slave code.
2. A panic in 1741 swept New York City after a series of fires broke out that were rumored to have been
part of a slave conspiracy to attack whites.
IV. An Empire of Freedom
A. British Patriotism
1. Despite the centrality of slavery to its empire, eighteenth-century Great Britain prided itself on being the
world’s most advanced and freest nation.
B. The British Constitution
1. Central to this sense of British identity was the concept of liberty.
2. British liberty was simultaneously a collection of specific rights, a national characteristic, and a state of
mind.
3. Britons believed that no man was above the law, not even the king.
4. Britons saw other European nations, especially Catholic ones, as being “enslaved.”
C. The Language of Liberty
1. The ideas of liberty went beyond the voters, officeholders, and political debaters.
D. Republican Liberty
1. Republicanism celebrated active participation in public life by economically independent citizens.
2. Republicanism held virtue—meaning a willingness to subordinate self-interest to the public good—to
be crucial in public life.
3. Republicanism in Britain was associated with the Country Party, which criticized the established
political order.
a. Cato’s Letters, imbued with republican ideas, were widely read by the American colonists.
E. Liberal Freedom
1. Liberalism was strongly influenced by the philosopher John Locke.
V. The Public Sphere
A. The Right to Vote
1. Ownership of property was a common qualifier for voting in the colonies.
2. Suffrage was much more common in the colonies than in Britain.
3. Colonial politics was hardly democratic in a modern sense.
B. Political Cultures
1. Considerable power was held by those with appointive, not elective, offices.
2. Property qualifications for officeholding were far higher than for voting.
3. Deference—the notion among ordinary people that wealth, education, and social prominence carried a
right to public office—limited choices in elections.
4. In New England, most town leaders were the biggest property holders.
C. Colonial Government
1. During the first half of the eighteenth century the colonies were largely left to govern themselves, as
British governments adopted a policy of “salutary neglect.”
2. The colonial elected assemblies used their control of finance to exercise great influence over governors
and other appointed officials.
D. The Rise of the Assemblies
1. Elected assemblies became more assertive in colonial politics during the eighteenth century.
of their own experience.
E. Politics in Public
1. The American gentry were very active in the discussion of politics, particularly through clubs.
a. The Junto was a club for mutual improvement, founded in 1727 by Benjamin Franklin.
F. The Colonial Press
1. Widespread literacy and the proliferation of newspapers encouraged political discourse.
2. Bookstores, circulating libraries, and weekly newspapers all contributed to the dissemination of
information.
a. In Philadelphia Ben Franklin founded the first library in colonial America.
3. Political commentary was widespread in colonial newspapers.
G. Freedom of Expression and Its Limits
4. Elected assemblies, not governors, discouraged freedom of the press.
a. Routinely, publishers were forced to apologize for negative comments about assembly members.
b. Colonial newspapers defended freedom of the press as a central component of liberty.
H. The Trial of Zenger
1. Newspaper publisher John Peter Zenger went on trial in 1735 for seditious libel for his criticism of New
York’s governor.
a. He was found not guilty.
b. The outcome promoted the idea that publishing the truth should always be permitted and
demonstrated that free expression was becoming ingrained in the popular imagination.
I. The American Enlightenment
1. Americans sought to apply to political and social life the scientific method of careful investigation based
on research and experiment.
2. One inspiration for the Enlightenment was a reaction against the bloody religious wars that wracked
Europe in the seventeenth century.
VI. The Great Awakening
A. Religious Revivals
1. The Great Awakening was a series of local events united by a commitment to a more emotional and
personal Christianity than that offered by existing churches.
2. Islam and Judaism in Asia and Europe, respectively, saw a rise in fundamentalism.
3. The Great Awakening was led by flamboyant preachers like Jonathan Edwards, whose Sinners in the
Hands of an Angry God stressed the need for humans to seek divine grace.
B. The Preaching of Whitefield
1. The English minister George Whitefield is often credited with sparking the Great Awakening.
2. The Great Awakening enlarged the boundaries of liberty as Old Lights (traditionalists) and New Lights
(revivalists) defended their right to worship.
a. New Light churches criticized colonial taxes used to support an established church.
b. They also defended religious freedom as a natural right.
C. The Awakening’s Impact
1. The Great Awakening inspired criticism of many aspects of colonial society.
VII. Imperial Rivalries
A. Spanish North America
1. A vast territorial empire on paper, Spanish North America (in what would become the future United
States) consisted of a few small and isolated urban clusters.
2. In the second half of the nineteenth century, Spain tried to reinvigorate its empire north of the Rio
Grande.
3. Despite establishing religious missions and presidios, the Spanish population in Spain’s North
American empire remained relatively small and sparse.
B. The Spanish in California
1. Russian immigrants established forts in Alaska and later moved southward into California, creating a
clash of empires.
a. Spain responded with the “Sacred Experiment” to prevent occupation of California by foreigners.
b. Native American resistance along the overland routes led to Spain focusing on missions instead of
forts.
2. Junípero Serra founded the first mission in San Diego in 1769.
a. Heavy death toll of Native Americans existed due to forced labor and disease.
C. The French Empire
1. France was Britain’s biggest rival in Europe and North America.
2. The French empire in the early eighteenth century expanded.
3. Much smaller in population, the French tended to view North America as a place of cruel exile for
criminals and social outcasts.
VIII. Battle for the Continent
A. The Middle Ground
1. Indians were constantly being pushed from their homes into a “middle ground” between European
empires and Indian sovereignty.
2. The Indians of the Ohio River Valley saw the rivalry between Britain and France as a threat and an
opportunity.
3. The area was known more by rumor than observation, and contemporary maps bore little resemblance
to the actual geography.
B. The Seven Years’ War
1. In the first half of the eighteenth century, wars against Spain and France set the stage for England
becoming the dominant power in Europe.
2. The war began in 1754 as the British tried to dislodge the French from western Pennsylvania.
3. The war went against the British until 1757, when William Pitt became British secretary of state and
enacted policies that turned the tide of battle.
4. In 1759, the British gained control of pivotal Forts Duquesne, Ticonderoga, and Louisbourg and the key St.
Lawrence River settlement of Quebec.
C. A World Transformed
1. The Peace of Paris in 1763 resulted in the expulsion of France from North America.
2. Pitt declared that peace would be as hard to make as war, and the war indeed put future financial strains
on all the participants.
D. New Indian Identities
1. The Seven Years’ War helped lay the foundation for the emergence of a distinct Native American
identity.
2. The violence directed against Indians by soldiers and settlers during the war led many Indian leaders to
envision both stronger allegiance to tribal “nationhood” and pan-Indian identity more broadly.
3. With the removal of the French, the balance-of-power diplomacy that had enabled groups like the
Iroquois to maintain a significant degree of autonomy was eliminated.
7. Voices of Freedom (Primary Source document feature)
a. Pontiac’s Speeches (1762 and 1763).
b. Pontiac criticizes the English while calling for all Indians to resist the English government.
E. The Proclamation Line
1. To avoid further Indian conflicts, London issued the Proclamation of 1763, which banned white settlement
west of the Appalachian Mountains.
2. The Proclamation enraged settlers and land speculators hoping to take advantage of the expulsion of the
French.
F. Pennsylvania and the Indians
1. The war deepened the hostility of western Pennsylvanian farmers toward Indians and witnessed
numerous indiscriminate assaults on Indian communities.
2. The Paxton Boys demanded that Indians be removed from Pennsylvania.
3. Voices of Freedom (Primary Source document feature)
G. Colonial Identities
1. The colonists emerged from the Seven Years’ War with a heightened sense of collective identity.
SUGGESTED DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
• One early American contemporary stated that there was a widespread “dangerous spirit of liberty” among the
New World’s slaves. Explore that idea by considering slave culture and forms of resistance.
• How vital was slavery to the Atlantic economy in the eighteenth century? Provide specific evidence to support
your response.
• How was slavery different in the British northern, Chesapeake, and Lower South colonies by 1770?
• Discuss republicanism and liberalism. What are the similarities and differences between the two concepts?
by the English were never intended to be extended to the Indians.
• Discuss the crisis of identity that Native American leaders like Pontiac and Scarouyady profess in the Voices
of Freedom (Primary Source document feature). Compare how the two leaders fomented strategies to deal with
the English before and after the Seven Years’ War.
• Have the students each write a broadside to be posted in the classroom. It can be for anything they would like: an
advertisement for a consumer good, a slave advertisement, a political announcement or announcement for a new
club, or an advertisement for a religious revival meeting. Use the completed broadsides to generate discussions.
• Discuss the concept of the middle ground in the eighteenth century.
SUPPLEMENTAL WEB AND VISUAL RESOURCES
Africans in America
www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/home.html
Africans in America is a four-part PBS video about America’s history of slavery. Part 1 is “The Terrible Transformation, 1450–
1750.”
Slavery and the Making of America
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/slavery/
The accompanying website for the 2005 PBS series provides a wealth of primary source material on many aspects of the
Atlantic slave trade and African-American culture.
overview in the form of narratives, artifacts, and reenactments of the role Fort Pitt played in the French and Indian War.
Great Awakening
www.nhc.rtp.nc.us/index.htm
The National Humanities Center. Teacher Serve: An Interactive Curriculum Enrichment Service for Teachers. Toolbox Library
offers a plethora of primary sources, discussion questions, additional online sources, and talking points.
www.nhc.rtp.nc.us/tserve/eighteen/ekeyinfo/grawaken.htm
This link takes you to the section on the Great Awakening.
www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/apocalypse/explanation/puritans.html
This PBS site offers information on the Frontline video Apocalypse. There is a list of primary sources and other valuable
information pertaining to the Great Awakening.
SUPPLEMENTAL PRINT RESOURCES
Aldridge, A. Owen. “Natural Religion and Deism in America before Ethan Allen and Thomas Paine.” William and Mary Quarterly
54, no. 4 (1997): 835–838.
Anderson, Fred. A People’s Army: Massachusetts Soldiers and Society in the Seven Years’ War. New York: W. W. Norton &
Company, 1985.
Breen, T. H., and Stephen Innes. “Myne Owne Ground”: Race and Freedom on Virginia’s Eastern Shore, 1640–1676. New
York: Oxford University Press, 1980.
Carretta, Vincent. Equiano, the African: Biography of a Self-Made Man. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2005.
Kenny, Kevin. Peaceable Kingdom Lost: The Paxton Boys and the Destruction of William Penn’s Holy Experiment. New York:
Oxford University Press, 2011.
Stout, Harry S. The Divine Dramatist: George Whitefield and the Rise of Modern Evangelicalism. Grand Rapids, MI: William B.
Eerdman’s, 1991.
Wood, Peter. Black Majority: Negroes in Colonial South Carolina from 1670 through the Stono Rebellion. New York: W. W.
Norton & Company, 1996.
INTERACTIVE INSTRUCTOR ACTIVITIES
1. Documentary Film Analysis
a. Show an episode from the 1970s documentary Roots, particularly the second and third episodes when Kunta Kinte
adjusts to tobacco plantation life in Virginia during the late 1760s. Next, show Part 1 of the documentary series Slavery
and the Making of America that focuses in part on slavery in the Chesapeake. Ask the students to take brief notes for a
class discussion in comparing what the historians are arguing in the documentary to the concepts and images conveyed in
the docudrama Roots. Feel free to repeat short segments of both visual pieces for the students as part of this interactive
exercise.
b. Sample questions to ask the students include: Why did slavery arise in the Chesapeake? How was slave life in the tobacco
colonies different from the experiences of African-Americans in the rice colonies of the Carolinas and Georgia? How did
African-Americans resist slavery? What were the limitations to black resistance across the thirteen colonies?
2. Classroom Debate: Indians and Spaniards in California
Divide the class into two groups: California Indians and Spanish missionaries. Create the conditions for a classroom
discussion/debate based on questions such as: Why did Spain missionize the Indians? What impact did the missions have on
