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The Counter-Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance
and the Origins of the United States of America,
Gerald Horne, 2014
The Second Amendment to the
US Constitution and Slavery The New York Times 1619 Project has discussed
the ideas on this page. |
Slavery and the American
Revolution
|
Leonard L. Richards, The Slave Power (2000)
Don E. Fehrenbacher, The Slaveholding Republic (2001)
Paul Finkelman, Slavery and the Founders (2001)
Garry Wills, “Negro President”: Jefferson and the Slave Power (2003)
Alfred W. Blumrosen, and Ruth G. Blumrosen’s Slave Nation: How Slavery United
the Colonies and Sparked the American Revolution (2005)
Lawrence Goldstone, Dark Bargain: Slavery, Profits, and the Struggle for the
Constitution (2005)
Gary Nash, Forgotten Fifth: African Americans in the Age of Revolution (2006)
Robin L. Einhorn, American Taxation, American Slavery (2008)
Colin Kaepernick Is Righter Than You Know: The National Anthem Is a Celebration
of Slavery 8/28/2016 The Intercept: "Almost no one seems to be aware that
even if the U.S. were a perfect country today, it would be bizarre to expect
African-American players to stand for “The Star-Spangled Banner.” Why? Because
it literally celebrates the murder of African-Americans."
Afro-Mexican
President Guerrero abolished slavery in 1829. American colonists in Texas,
largely Southerners, managed to get exceptions and brought in slaves, but the
exceptions were tenuous as all the leaders of Mexico were anti slavery and
Mexico's independence in 1821 was won thanks to an army that had many Africans
and Native Americans in it, like the Mambi army in Cuba. As with the foundation
of the US, the cry for Independence in Texas was substantially motivated by a
desire to keep those slaves, and slavery was enshrined in the 1836 Texas
Constitution. When the Mexican Army came to suppress the Texas rebellion and
retake the Alamo, they had explcit orders to free the slaves, much as the
British offered run away slaves positions in their army during the Revolutionary
War. The history of Texas parallels that of the US with respect to the rampant
hypocrisy of claiming Independence, Freedom, and Liberty when the independence
movement was an effort by colonialists to keep their privileges and maintain
slavery.
The Alamo: America’s Shrine to White Supremacy 11/6/2015 Counterpunch: "One
of Phil Collins’ Alamo heroes is Jim Bowie, famed for the development of a
long-bladed knife which became known as the “Bowie knife.” Less well-known is
that shortly after the War of 1812, Bowie went into business as a slave trader
and was a partner in a Louisiana sugar plantation. Bowie later moved to Texas
where he was a leader of one of the most extreme group of expansionists. The
fever dreams of the Texians didn’t die at the Alamo. On March 1, 1837 the United
States formally recognized the Republic of Texas, which joined the U.S. as a
slave state in 1845."
Slavery
and the Myth of the Alamo 5/28/2012 History News Network: "The Mexican
armies that entered the department to put down the rebellion had explicit orders
to free any slaves that they encountered, and so they did. The only person
spared in the retaking of the Alamo was Joe, the personal slave of William
Travis.'
Alamo was a battle for slavery 2/7/2009 Mondoweiss: "John Quincy Adams, two
months after the Alamo, argued on the floor of the U.S. House that "the war now
raging in Texas is a Mexican civil war and a war for the re-establishment of
slavery where it was abolished.""
Forget the Alamo! 4/8/2004 Counterpunch: "Contrary to popular mythology and
the spurious history of White Man Movie Fiction, the story of the Alamo is not a
story of a fight for freedom. It is the story of a fight for slavery. It is
important for us to look honestly at our cultural and historical mythologies so
that we can learn from them. By perpetuating the old myths, we create a stagnant
and dangerous platform which prevents our cultural and artistic growth as a
society."
Native Latin American Contribution to the Colonization and Independence of Texas 6/30/1935 Sons
of Dewitt Colony: "To Austin and the men of his time, the rapid development of
Texas seemed absolutely dependent upon the right of the colonists to introduce
negro laborers in the form of slaves or contract servants. To them, it was a
practical question of physical energy. The country was a wilderness and there
was no labor for hire. Many leaders of the new Mexican nation, however, were
saturated with the liberal philosophy of the French Revolution, and slavery was
abhorrent to them. Austin, by great exertion and skillful lobbying, obtained the
legalization of slavery in his first colony of three hundred families, but
children born to slave parents in Texas were to be free at the age of fourteen.
This law was passed in January, 1823, during the reign of Iturbide. In July,
1824, however, the Republican Congress passed a law forbidding the further
introduction of slaves into any part of the Mexican Republic."
Slavery in Early Texas 12/1/1898 Sons of Dewitt Colony: "Under the Spanish
rule in Mexico negro slavery was tolerated and protected. The conditions,
however, were so unfavorable that the institution never obtained a secure
foothold, and was almost unknown outside of Vera Cruz and the hot lands. Even in
the most favorable localities and after the introduction of cane growing, the
slaves formed no considerable element in the population of the country. As late
as 1793, according to Humboldt, there were not more than nine or ten thousand in
all New Spain. [In a total population of 3005, December 31, 1792, there were 34
negroes and 415 mulattoes; no mention is made of slaves. Census of Texas, Texas
Archives, No. 345] H. G. Ward, the British agent in Mexico in 1825-27, believed
that the number did not exceed six thousand in 1793, and that it continued to
decrease till 1827. So many were manumitted, and so many received their freedom
during the long struggle for independence by joining the ranks of the patriot
army, that Ward thought he was justified in stating that there is now hardly a
single slave in the central portion of the republic."
THE WAR IN
TEXAS 12/1/1847 Sons of Dewitt Colony: by Benjamin Lundy - "the Texian
revolution was concerted by the planters and slave speculators in the southern
states ever since the first permission given by the Spanish authorities to Moses
Austin, of Missouri, in the year 1820, to introduce 300 families, professing the
Catholic religion, as colonists of grant of land which lie obtained on this
express condition. From that time to the Present moment the aggressions have
been on the part of the colonists, under the sanction of the southern
speculators; and riot until their purpose of getting a physical force into the
province which should detach it from Mexico, and make it a slaveholding state,
became flagrant and undisguised, the settlers, ever received aught but
protection encouragement, toleration and kindness, from the Mexican government."
African Americans - For free people of color, the Republic of Texas was a rock and a hard place, Bullock Museum
"No free person of African descent, either in whole or in part, shall be
permitted to reside permanently in the Republic of Texas without the consent of
Congress." - 1836 Constitution of the Republic of Texas
Most historians believe that African American history in Texas begins with
Estevanico, a North African Muslim who came to Texas with the Spanish
expeditions in the 1520s. By 1792, free blacks and mulattos made up 15% of the
population of Spanish Texas. Free peoples of color prospered as Mexican
citizens. They owned land, built successful businesses, and married whomever
they loved, regardless of skin color. However, when Mexico lost Texas, people of
color lost their rights and their place.
This project, founded by Nikole Hannah-Jones, has given support to the ideas expressed on this page.
As Confederate Statues Come Down, It's Worth Remembering That the Civil War
Wasn't the Only American Conflict Involving Slavery 6/22/2020 Time: "Three
attorneys who dedicated their careers to American civil rights, in two separate
books, have provided the basis for a fresh but compelling explanation for the
American south to enter the American Revolution alongside their northern
brothers: A. Leon Higginbotham Jr.’s 1978 In the Matter of Color and 2005’s
Slave Nation by Alfred W. and Ruth G. Blumrosen. These authors, whose work has
more recently been cited by the New York Times’ 1619 Project, arrive at a single
conclusion. The Southern colonies had no reason to put their lives, their
families’ lives, their property and their legacy on the line until a single
decision at the Court of King’s Bench in London on June 22, 1772, Somersett v.
Steuart, often seen written as Somerset v. Stewart."
I Helped Fact-Check the 1619 Project. The Times Ignored Me. 3/6/2020 Politico: "It
is easy to correct facts; it is much harder to correct a worldview that
consistently ignores and distorts the role of African Americans and race in our
history in order to present white people as all powerful and solely in
possession to the keys of equality, freedom and democracy. At least that is the
corrective history toward which the 1619 Project is moving, if imperfectly."
1619 Project Fact-Checker Says The New York Times Ignored Her Objections 3/6/2020 Reason: "Far
from being fought to preserve slavery, the Revolutionary War became a primary
disrupter of slavery in the North American Colonies. Lord Dunmore's
Proclamation, a British military strategy designed to unsettle the Southern
Colonies by inviting enslaved people to flee to British lines, propelled
hundreds of enslaved people off plantations and turned some Southerners to the
patriot side. It also led most of the 13 Colonies to arm and employ free and
enslaved black people, with the promise of freedom to those who served in their
armies."
The Fight Over the 1619 Project 2/9/2020 The Bulwark: "Revisionist claims
of such a backlash rely heavily either on apparent speculation—the Blumrosens’
2005 book, Slave Nation, is particularly egregious in this respect, discussing
at some length how “slave owners and their lawyers react[ed]” without citing a
single source—or on disturbingly out-of-context citations."
We Respond to the Historians Who Critiqued The 1619 Project 12/20/2019 NYT: "The
work of various historians, among them David Waldstreicher and Alfred W. and
Ruth G. Blumrosen, supports the contention that uneasiness among slaveholders in
the colonies about growing antislavery sentiment in Britain and increasing
imperial regulation helped motivate the Revolution. One main episode that these
and other historians refer to is the landmark 1772 decision of the British high
court in Somerset v. Stewart. The case concerned a British customs agent named
Charles Stewart who bought an enslaved man named Somerset and took him to
England, where he briefly escaped. Stewart captured Somerset and planned to sell
him and ship him to Jamaica, only for the chief justice, Lord Mansfield, to
declare this unlawful, because chattel slavery was not supported by English
common law."
As Confederate Statues Come Down, It's Worth Remembering That the Civil War Wasn't the Only American Conflict Involving Slavery 6/22/2020 Time: "Three attorneys who dedicated their careers to American civil rights, in two separate books, have provided the basis for a fresh but compelling explanation for the American south to enter the American Revolution alongside their northern brothers: A. Leon Higginbotham Jr.’s 1978 In the Matter of Color and 2005’s Slave Nation by Alfred W. and Ruth G. Blumrosen. These authors, whose work has more recently been cited by the New York Times’ 1619 Project, arrive at a single conclusion. The Southern colonies had no reason to put their lives, their families’ lives, their property and their legacy on the line until a single decision at the Court of King’s Bench in London on June 22, 1772, Somersett v. Steuart, often seen written as Somerset v. Stewart."
I Helped Fact-Check the 1619 Project. The Times Ignored Me. 3/6/2020 Politico: "It
is easy to correct facts; it is much harder to correct a worldview that
consistently ignores and distorts the role of African Americans and race in our
history in order to present white people as all powerful and solely in
possession to the keys of equality, freedom and democracy. At least that is the
corrective history toward which the 1619 Project is moving, if imperfectly."
The Fight Over the 1619 Project 2/9/2020 The Bulwark: "Revisionist claims
of such a backlash rely heavily either on apparent speculation—the Blumrosens’
2005 book, Slave Nation, is particularly egregious in this respect, discussing
at some length how “slave owners and their lawyers react[ed]” without citing a
single source—or on disturbingly out-of-context citations."
We Respond to the Historians Who Critiqued The 1619 Project 12/20/2019 NYT: "The
work of various historians, among them David Waldstreicher and Alfred W. and
Ruth G. Blumrosen, supports the contention that uneasiness among slaveholders in
the colonies about growing antislavery sentiment in Britain and increasing
imperial regulation helped motivate the Revolution. One main episode that these
and other historians refer to is the landmark 1772 decision of the British high
court in Somerset v. Stewart. The case concerned a British customs agent named
Charles Stewart who bought an enslaved man named Somerset and took him to
England, where he briefly escaped. Stewart captured Somerset and planned to sell
him and ship him to Jamaica, only for the chief justice, Lord Mansfield, to
declare this unlawful, because chattel slavery was not supported by English
common law."
Why Are Conservatives So Threatened by the 1619 Project? 8/22/2019 Washington
Monthly: "The reason so many conservatives are threatened by the 1619 Project is
that the story the authors tell is prophetic. It challenges the totalism on
which their entire world view has been constructed. It is their mindset, which
monopolizes imagination and stifles alternatives, that lays the groundwork for
authoritarianism."
This passage was deleted from the Declaration of Independence — here’s what it
reveals about motivation for the American Revolution 8/22/2019 Alternet: "“However
intoxicating the heady rhetoric of ‘rights’ and ‘liberty’ emanating from Patriot
orators and journalists, for the majority of farmers, merchants and townsmen in
Virginia, the Carolinas and Georgia (the vast majority of whom owned between one
and five negroes), all-out war and separation now turned from an ideological
flourish to a social necessity,” Schama wrote. “Theirs was a revolution, first
and foremost, to protect slavery."
White Supremacy and Capitalism Are Deeply Entangled With the Colonial Slave
Trade 4/26/2018 Truth Out: "From the advent of Columbus to the end of the
nineteenth century, it is possible that five million indigenous Americans were
enslaved. This form of slavery coexisted roughly with enslavement of Africans,
leading to a catastrophic decline in the population of indigenes. In the
Caribbean basin, the Gulf Coast, northern Mexico, and what is now the US
Southwest, the decline in population during the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries was nothing short of catastrophic. Population may have fallen by up to
90 percent through devilish means including warfare, famine, and slavery, all
with resultant epidemics. The majority of the enslaved were women and children,
an obvious precursor, and trailblazer, for the sex trafficking of today. But for
the massive revolt of the indigenous in 1680 in what is now New Mexico, the toll
might have been much worse."
The Apocalypse of Settler Colonialism 4/18/2018 Black Agenda Report: "This
article is adapted from The Apocalypse of Settler Colonialism: The Roots of
Slavery, White Supremacy, and Capitalism in Seventeenth-Century North America
and the Caribbean, just out from Monthly Review Press."
The Apocalypse of Settler Colonialism 4/1/2018 Monthly Review: "Thus, in
the French Caribbean, those who happened to be Jewish enjoyed rights they did
not have in Paris, precisely because of the desperation wrought by the ceaseless
search for those who could be defined as “white.” On the other hand, this trend
did not proceed without backsliding; in 1683 the Jesuit denunciation of supposed
Jewish dominance of local commerce and of Jewish slaveholders allegedly refusing
Christianity to their bondsmen led to a royal order expelling them from
Martinique. They were given one month to depart and a similar wave of
persecution beset French Huguenots, allowing English Protestants to benefit, as
they pioneered in developing “whiteness” and white supremacy and passed on this
enriching skill to their rebellious progeny in what became the United States."
What the Koch Brothers Want Students to Learn About Slavery 3/11/2018 Alternet: "The
main “Documents of Freedom” reading on slavery, titled “Slavery and the
Constitution,” is essentially a defense of the founding fathers and the
Constitution against “some scholars” who “portray the founding fathers as
racists.” The reading cherry-picks quotes from “the Founders” to argue that they
believed slavery was morally wrong."
The U.S. is Not a Democracy, It Never Was 12/13/2017 Counterpunch: "What
will be seen, however, if this record is soberly and methodically inspected, is
that a country founded on elite, colonial rule based on the power of wealth—a
plutocratic colonial oligarchy, in short—has succeeded not only in buying the
label of “democracy” to market itself to the masses, but in having its
citizenry, and many others, so socially and psychologically invested in its
nationalist origin myth that they refuse to hear lucid and well-documented
arguments to the contrary."
The U.S. is Not a Democracy, It Never Was 12/13/2017 Africa
Speaks: "Second, when the elite colonial ruling class decided to sever ties from
their homeland and establish an independent state for themselves, they did not
found it as a democracy. On the contrary, they were fervently and explicitly
opposed to democracy, like the vast majority of European Enlightenment thinkers.
They understood it to be a dangerous and chaotic form of uneducated mob rule.
For the so-called “founding fathers,” the masses were not only incapable of
ruling, but they were considered a threat to the hierarchical social structures
purportedly necessary for good governance. In the words of John Adams, to take
but one telling example, if the majority were given real power, they would
redistribute wealth and dissolve the “subordination” so necessary for politics.
When the eminent members of the landowning class met in 1787 to draw up a
constitution, they regularly insisted in their debates on the need to establish
a republic that kept at bay vile democracy, which was judged worse than “the
filth of the common sewers” by the pro-Federalist editor William Cobbett."
Roy Moore: Last Time America Was 'Great' Was During 'Slavery' 12/7/2017 Newsweek: "At
a campaign event earlier this year, an audience member asked Moore for his
opinion on when the last time America was "great." Moore responded: "I think it
was great at the time when families were united—even though we had slavery—they
cared for one another…Our families were strong, our country had a direction."
The individual who asked the question was among the few African-Americans in
attendance at the rally, according to the Los Angeles Times."
Raza y fraternidad republicana en Cuba: entre la “trampa” de la armonía racial y
el antirracismo en las primeras décadas del XX 2/28/2017 Julio Guanche: "La
divisa “libertad, igualdad y fraternidad” se toma habitualmente como “la”
consigna de la Revolución francesa. Sin embargo, es menos conocido que el tercer
concepto de esa tríada apareció en el curso de dicha revolución, a impulso de
los sectores que radicalizaron su contenido popular."
What If The British Had Won? 6/30/2016 Indypendent: "At no point though did
the British declare the end of slavery to be a war goal; it was always just a
military measure. But if the Brits had won, as they came close to doing, it
might well have set off a series of events that went beyond their control. Would
England have been able to restore slavery in the 13 colonies in the face of
certain anti-slavery resistance by the tens of thousands of now free ex-slaves,
joined by growing anti-slavery forces in the northern colonies ? As Alan Gilbert
puts it in Black Patriots and Loyalists, “Class and race forged ties of
solidarity in opposition to both the slave holders and the colonial elites.”
Another sure ally would have been the abolitionist movement in England which had
been further emboldened by the 1772 Somerset decision. And if England had to
abolish slavery in the 13 colonies, would that not have led to a wave of
emancipations throughout the Caribbean and Latin America?"
Slavery and
the American Revolution 9/1/2015 Solidarity: "The Counter-Revolution of
1776 provides some deep insight into the origins of this bitter history and how
its legacy can be seen today. Throughout it is clear that African slaves were
never viewed as a people who would take an equal part in building the country.
Instead, they were to be constantly surveilled and repressed by any means
necessary. The devastating results of these racist origins reveal themselves in
numerous ways, from a white voting bloc that consistently acts against the
interests of people of color, to the failure to create any significant political
party for working-class people across racial lines. This book should be read by
all who wish to better understand these realities, and seek to overcome them."
RECOGNIZING THE PASSING OF ALFRED W. BLUMROSEN 7/31/2015 Congressional
Record: by Eleanor Holmes Norton
Alfred W. Blumrosen, Eminent Rutgers Expert on Discrimination Law, Dies at 86 7/23/2015 Rutgers: “Although
it seems that the Justice did not attribute the doctrine to Al with affection or
approval,” says Chen, “there are, I imagine, many colleagues who read the
dissent with no small amount of satisfaction, as acknowledgement – however
grudging – of the enormous impact that Al had on the development of
anti-discrimination law in this country.”
Thoughts on
“Slave Nation” 4/16/2015 Scott Ainsley: "Throughout their work and married
lives, the Blumrosens asked themselves, “Why has race always been such an issue
in America?” It is a powerful question."
A
History of a Counter-Revolution 4/2/2015 MR On Line: "Gerald Horne‘s new
book The Counter-Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance and the Origins of the
United States of America puts slavery and the struggles of the enslaved to
become free men and women at the very axis of the American Independence
narrative. Horne is a Marxist historian who has written extensively on the
relationship of “Reds” and Blacks in U.S. and global history, including a book
just published by Monthly Review Press, Race to Revolution: The U.S. and Cuba
During Slavery and Jim Crow."
Review of Gerald Horne. The Counter-Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance and the
Origins of the United States of America. 2/1/2015 American Historical
Review: "....how one is to explain the massive rise in British slavery and slave
owning that occurred after the United States gained independence. At just the
time slave owners were “pouring” into North America from the Caribbean due to
fear of slave revolt, potential slave owners were flocking to the Caribbean to
greatly enhance Britain's slave ownership and dominion south of Florida. Indeed,
many American slave-owning loyalists, as Maya Jasanoff has recently illuminated,
fled to the British Caribbean to continue as slave owners there."
Book Review - "The Counter-Revolution of 1776 7/24/2014 Portside: "What
emerges from Gerald Horne's new book, "Counter-Revolution," is a picture of
courage, heroism and betrayal. Most importantly, it is a history that accounts
for the fact that so many "advances" of democracy in the United States have been
at the expense of Africans and their descendants, people brought in chains to
the shores of the United States. What emerges is a glimmer of understanding why
white supremacy in the United States is so virulent."
“Counter-Revolution of 1776”: Was U.S. Independence War a Conservative Revolt in
Favor of Slavery? 6/27/2014 Democracy Now: "Gerald Horne, one of the things
that struck me in your book is not only your main thesis, that this was in large
part a counterrevolution, our—the United States’ war of independence, but you
also link very closely the—what was going on in the Caribbean colonies of
England, as well as in the United States, not only in terms of among the slaves
in both areas, but also among the white population. And, in fact, you indicate
that quite a few of those who ended up here in the United States fostering the
American Revolution had actually been refugees from the battles between whites
and slaves in the Caribbean. Could you expound on that?"
White supremacy and slavery: Gerald Horne on the real story of American
independence 5/30/2014 Salon: "Horne marshals considerable research to
paint a picture of a U.S. that wasn't founded on liberty, with slavery as an
uncomfortable and aberrant remnant of a pre-Enlightenment past, but rather was
founded on slavery — as a defense of slavery — with the language of liberty and
equality used as window dressing. If he's right, in other words, then the
traditional narrative of the creation of the U.S. is almost completely wrong.
Salon recently spoke with Horne about his book, why the conventional story of
the U.S. founding has been so widely accepted, and what this new view of the
American Revolution might mean for those still fighting white supremacy today.
Our conversation is below and has been lightly edited for clarity and length."
The Second Amendment Was Ratified to Preserve Slavery 1/15/2013 Truth
Out: "The real reason the Second Amendment was ratified, and why it says "State"
instead of "Country" (the framers knew the difference -- see the 10th
Amendment), was to preserve the slave patrol militias in the southern states,
which was necessary to get Virginia's vote. Founders Patrick Henry, George Mason
and James Madison were totally clear on that... and we all should be too. In the
beginning, there were the militias. In the South, they were also called the
"slave patrols," and they were regulated by the states."
Slavery and the American Revolution 7/4/2012 Facing South: "Total estimated
number of African Americans who escaped, died or were killed during the American
Revolution: 100,000"
Was the American Revolution Fought to Save Slavery? 5/23/2011 Counterpunch: "As
Schama notes, international news about slavery and legal decisions made in
Britain, for example, spread like wild fire through the slave populations of the
South in the late 18th century. By the time of the Revolutionary War, the Black
community in the South and throughout the country, in fact, were aware of the
political posturing and opportunities they perceived for gaining their freedom."
Was
Slavery a Cause of the Revolutionary War? Yes. (Book Review of SLAVE NATION)) 6/9/2009 Daily
Kos: "The main point of their book is that the American colonists-particularly
Southern colonists-were afraid that the British government would abolish
slavery. And that this fear was a major reason for the colonists' desire to
break away from Great Britain."
Was Slavery a Cause of the Revolutionary War? Yes. 6/8/2009 All Other
Persons: "Truth hurts. And this might be one of the more hurtful truths an
American can learn: a major reason for the Revolutionary War was the protection
of slavery. That’s not something they teach in the schools. But our history
lessons might look different in the future, if more people read the book Slave
Nation: How Slavery United The Colonies And Sparked The American Revolution, by
Alfred and Ruth Blumrosen."
Reading the Founders’ Minds 6/28/2007 New York Review of Books: "Indeed,
there is hardly a book now written about the founding of the nation that does
not place the problem of slavery at its center. So in recent years we have had
Leonard L. Richards’s The Slave Power (2000); Don E. Fehrenbacher’s The
Slaveholding Republic (2001); Paul Finkelman’s Slavery and the Founders (2001);
Garry Wills’s “Negro President”: Jefferson and the Slave Power (2003); Alfred W.
Blumrosen’s and Ruth G. Blumrosen’s Slave Nation: How Slavery United the
Colonies and Sparked the American Revolution (2005); and Gary Nash’s Forgotten
Fifth: African Americans in the Age of Revolution (2006). Now we have these
additional two books under review to help satisfy the seemingly insatiable
desire of many historians today to place slavery at the heart of America’s
origins."
Slave
Nation: How Slavery United the Colonies & Sparked the American Revolution 12/1/2006 Zinn
Education Project: "To ensure the preservation of slavery, the southern colonies
joined the northerners in their fight for “freedom” and their rebellion against
England. In 1774, at the First Continental Congress John Adams promised southern
leaders to support their right to maintain slavery. As Eleanor Holmes Norton
explains in her introduction, “The price of freedom from England was bondage for
African slaves in America. America would be a slave nation.”"
Give Us Liberty 6/4/2006 NY Times: "Simon Schama's "Rough Crossings:
Britain, the Slaves and the American Revolution" picks up where Dr. Johnson left
off. It offers a stirringly ambitious reconsideration of the Revolution with the
question of slavery set at the very heart of the matter. Schama follows on the
heels of historians like Benjamin Quarles, Gary Nash, Sylvia R. Frey and
Cassandra Pybus, who have already highlighted the paradox of a revolution
initiated in the name of liberty for people who passionately defended slavery."
'Rough Crossings': Slaves and the Revolution 4/25/2006 NPR: "Historian
Simon Schama talks about his most recent book, Rough Crossings. In it, Schama
tells the story of slaves during the American Revolution. Thousands of slaves
fled plantations to join forces with the British."
Slave Nation reviewed by Daniel C. Littlefield 3/1/2006 Journal of American
History: "From at least the 1960s and in some cases long before that, a number
of historians have argued about the complicity of the whole nation in the
decision to perpetuate the peculiar institution. The distinctive contribution of
Alfred W. Blumrosen and Ruth G. Blumrosen, who are lawyers rather than
professional historians, is to make a connection between Parliament's
Declaratory Act of 1766 and the Somerset decision of 1772, on the one hand, and
the American Revolution, the “great compromise” at the Constitutional
Convention, and the adoption of the Northwest Ordinance by the Continental
Congress in 1787, on the other."
Slave Nation review 1/31/2005 Publisher's Weekly: "Blaming spotty records
and backroom deal making, the authors often build their case on speculation,
circumstantial evidence and interpretations of Revolutionary slogans about
"liberty" and "property" as veiled references to slavery; they must often argue
around documentary evidence showing Revolutionary leaders' preoccupation with
other controversies that did not break down along North-South fault lines. Their
reassessment of the centrality of slavery during the period is an intriguing
one, but many historians will remain skeptical."
Slavery and the Revolutionary War 1/31/2005 Revolutionary War Net: "Perhaps
the most well-known of the slaves who joined the British Ranks is Colonel Tye,
originally Titus. He ran away from home at age 22 and joined the British
Ethiopian Regiment. He took the title colonel; it wasn't given to him by the
British army. His ruthless guerrilla raids with his small mixed-race band of
mostly ex-slaves, called the Black Brigade, terrorized the Patriot colonies.
They raided the small towns and villages, demoralizing the residents, and
stealing supplies and food. Sometimes they specifically targeted their previous
owners for revenge."
books.google.com/books/about/Slave_Nation.html?id=BjM5RK9vi98C
''A radical, well-informed, and highly original reinterpretation of the place
of slavery in the American War of Independence.''-David Brion Davis, Yale
University
www.bol.com/nl/p/slave-nation/9200000016259977/
Ku Klux Klan, Nazis, and other American White Supremacists
www.revolutionary-war.net/slavery-and-the-revolutionary-war.html
Somerset v Stewart
www.wikiwand.com/en/Somerset_v_Stewart
The Founding Fathers, Deism, and Christianity - Encyclopedia Britannica
David Walstreicher - www.gc.cuny.edu/people/david-waldstreicher
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This carefully documented, chilling history presents
a radically different view of the profound role that slavery played in the
founding of the republic, from the Declaration of Independence and the
American Revolution through the creation of the Constitution. The book
begins with a novel explanation about the impact of the Somerset Case
on the founding of the republic.
