Some reflections in reply to Anita Henderson--

The recent scholarship by Levy, Wiencek, and Ely documents in
particular detail a number of large emancipations in Virginia.
Part of the value of the stories that they tell is that they
reminds us that history need not have developed the way that
it did.  Some elite Virginians were capable not only of
perceiving that slavery was evil, but were also capable of
acting on that perception.

This is an argument made powerfully by John P. Kaminski in his
superb document collection A NECESSARY EVIL?  SLAVERY AND THE
DEBATE OVER THE CONSTITUTION (Madison House, 1995).  Kaminski
writes "Something dramatic had happened to the character of
the American people in the intervening decade between the
signing of the Declaration of Indendence and the promulgation
of the Constitution.  The principles for which Americans were
willing to die--freedom, equality, and unalienable rights--had
given way to the Constitution's call for justice, tranquility,
defense, general welfare, and liberty.  Americans qualified
their earlier expression of universal equality by applying it
only to certain groups of people.  They also wrote a
constitution that strongly protected personal property.  In
the eighteenth century that meant condoning, sanctioning, and
even rewarding the institution of slavery." (pp. ix-x)

Later in the book, Kaminski offers the following thesis:

"The American Revolutionary era was a time when slavery might
have been abolished peacefully without dismembering the Union.
 The rhetoric and reality of fighting for liberty sparked in
the American consciousness a devotion to freedom and a
concomitant sense of guilt in the continued enslavement of a
race of people.  Tragically, by 1787 this unique chance to rid
America of slavery vanished." (p. 243)

Kaminski's book is a model for how to make an argument through
the presentation of primary sources.  It is valuable for the
breadth of its coverage, both geographically and in the use of
source materials.

The natural rights ideals of the American Revolution
themselves have a profound religious dimension--see, for
example, the recent study of the Declaration of Independence
by Allen Jayne.  Absent the experience of the Revolution,
however, its hard to imagine abolition making much headway in
Virginia--it was the combination of religion and natural
rights, politicized and made real in the revolution, which
made abolition potentially viable at that moment.

By the time Carter emancipated his slaves, the historical
moment of which Kaminski writes was already in the past.  I
agree with those who have written here suggesting that Carter
was exceptional.  But that said, I think there is something
useful to be found in contemplating his life--Carter's
religious impulse was intimately tied to the revolution, it
seems to me.

Case studies will always lack the broad dimensions that a work
like Kaminski's possesses.  They lack the broad context--a
weakness to be found in all three of these studies.  But
without them, we are not ultimately able to sustain the
synthetic judgments of scholars like Kaminski.  I take the
three works we've been talking about here to confirm
Kaminski's thesis, at least in part.  The moment was past, by
the time that Randolph, Carter, and Washington acted.

The first part of Kaminski's thesis--that there was a window
of opportunity open in the 1780s to end slavery, and to end it
peacefully, strikes me as fruitful, and deserving of a great
deal more study.  We need more case studies.

But don't we always need more case studies?

All best,
Kevin



---- Original message ----
>Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 15:04:23 -0500
>From: "Anita L. Henderson" <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Re: Andrew Levy's FIRST EMANCIPATOR
>To: [log in to unmask]
>
>Dear Joan:
>
>I would also like to expand on your observation that slavery
involved the entire 13 colonies (anybody remember a slave
graveyard in NYC)???  Slavery involved not just the 13
colonies but Canada as well.  All of North America was
involved in the slave trade albeit, the Canadian provinces
gave it up after England outlawed it and again because it
wasn't as profitable in Canada  and also the northern colonies
as it was in the American South.   This difference in
profitability gets a huge boost with the invention of the
cotton gin by Eli Whitney in the late 18th century.  Prior to
that, there were quite a few prominent slaveholders who
emancipated their slaves in the spirit of that  new national
idea of "all men are created equal"  that created personal
internal discord with the realities of a slave society and the
hypocrisy therein.
>
>Anita L. Henderson
>Woodbine, MD
>
Kevin R. Hardwick, Ph.D.
Department of History
James Madison University

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