1776 ALL men are created equal? African Americans and the american revolution

OUTLINE Imperial Crisis Slavery, Liberty and the American Revolution Rhetoric Legal Challenges Military Service Flight The Impact of the Revolution in the North and South Could Slavery have been Abolished? The Federal Constitution

Chronology of Imperial Crisis 1765: Stamp Act 1766: Declaratory Act 1767: Townshend Duties 1768: British troops arrive in Boston in response to the political unrest 1770: Boston Massacre 1773: Tea Act and Boston Tea Party 1774: Intolerable Acts 1774: Continental Congress 1775: Battles of Lexington and Concord 1775: Battle of Bunker Hill 1775: Olive Branch Petition 1776: Thomas Paine’s Common Sense is published 1776: Declaration of Independence

"How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of Negroes?" - Samuel Johnson, 1775

Old Hill Burying Ground, Concord MA

John Jack God wills us free Man wills us slaves Gods will be done Here lies the body of John Jack, Native of Africa. Who died March 1773 Aged about sixty years Tho' born in a land of slaves He was born free Tho' he lived in a land of liberty He lived a slave, Till by his honest tho' stolen labour He acquired the source of slavery Which gave him his freedom; Tho' not long before Death the grand tyrant gave him his final emancipation, and put him on a footing with kings Tho' a slave to vice He practiced those virtues Without which kings are but slaves.

MILITARY SERVICE: African-American Loyalists 1774: Slaves in Mass. offer services to General Cage in return for their freedom 1775: Dunmore’s Proclamation and creation of Ethiopian Regiment – “Liberty to Slaves” 1779: Philipsburg Proclamation African Americans generally employed as labourers, skilled workers, servants – did not usually serve in the Army unless necessary At the end of the war, British transported 20,000 African Americans from U.S. – some given manumission certificates and taken to Nova Scotia (Book of Negroes)

MILITARY SERVICE: African-American Patriots Americans (partic. New Englanders) allowed slaves to serve in militia in times of crisis Washington banned African Americans from Continental Army in 1775, but manpower shortages forced Congress to accept black troops in 1777 Free African Americans and slaves served in mixed regiments Slaves who enlisted received their freedom in return for service

IMPACT: The NORTh Better able to reconcile the rhetoric of the Revolution with the practice of slavery because they were not slave societies. Some colonial assemblies had attempted to limit slavery in 1760s and 1770s African American slaves in Massachusetts active in petitioning for freedom or bringing lawsuits to court Every northern state abolished slavery or initiated emancipation – still 75 slaves in NJ in 1850

IMPACT: THE SOUTH Wartime disruption gave many slaves the opportunity to run away (SC lost 30% slave population) Virginia, Maryland, Delaware relaxed manumission laws – freed thousands Increased autonomy in both Upper and Lower South, but this took different forms

COULD SLAVERY HAVE BEEN ABOLISHED? No: Too radical Resistance of Lower South would have threatened Union Yes: Antislavery consciousness was at its peak Lower South was weak Cultural environmentalism was gaining acceptance Opening of trans-Appalachian West offered sanctuary for former slaves or means of funding emancipation programme Wave of antislavery radicalism by mid-1790s

Federal Constitution Neither “slaves” nor “slavery” is mentioned in the Constitution – “all other persons” Three-fifths clause (Article 1, Section 2) Congress prohibited from banning the slave trade until 1808 (Article 1, Section 9) Fugitive Slave clause (Article 4, Section 2)