The Alchemy of Slavery

Human Bondage and Emancipation in the Illinois Country, 1730-1865

M. Scott Heerman (Autor)

Buch | Softcover

248 Seiten

2022
University of Pennsylvania Press (Verlag)
978-0-8122-2517-4 (ISBN)

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In this sweeping saga that spans empires, peoples, and nations, M. Scott Heerman chronicles the long history of slavery in the heart of the continent and traces its many iterations through law and social practice. Arguing that slavery had no fixed institutional form, Heerman traces practices of slavery through indigenous, French, and finally U.S. systems of captivity, inheritable slavery, lifelong indentureship, and the kidnapping of free people. By connecting the history of indigenous bondage to that of slavery and emancipation in the Atlantic world, Heerman shows how French, Spanish, and Native North American practices shaped the history of slavery in the United States.

The Alchemy of Slavery foregrounds the diverse and adaptable slaving practices that masters deployed to build a slave economy in the Upper Mississippi River Valley, attempting to outmaneuver their antislavery opponents. In time, a formidable cast of lawyers and antislavery activists set their sights on ending slavery in Illinois. Abraham Lincoln, Lyman Trumbull, Richard Yates, and many other future leaders of the Republican party partnered with African Americans to wage an extended campaign against slavery in the region. Across a century and a half, slavery's nearly perpetual reinvention takes center stage: masters turning Indian captives into slaves, slaves into servants, former slaves into kidnapping victims; and enslaved people turning themselves into free men and women.

M. Scott Heerman is Associate Professor of History at the University of Miami.

Introduction. Slavery and Freedom on the American Continent

Chapter 1. Making the French Negroes

Chapter 2. Another Law and Empire

Chapter 3. Remaking the French Negroes

Chapter 4. Contesting Bondage in the Slave North

Chapter 5. Paths to Independence

Chapter 6. Freedom Practices, Freedom Politics

Conclusion. North of Slavery, South of Freedom

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Acknowledgments

Erscheinungsdatum	21.02.2022
Reihe/Serie	America in the Nineteenth Century
Zusatzinfo	12 illus.
Verlagsort	Pennsylvania
Sprache	englisch
Maße	152 x 229 mm
Themenwelt	Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Geschichte / Politik ► Allgemeines / Lexika
	Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► Neuzeit (bis 1918)
	Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Regional- / Ländergeschichte
ISBN-10	0-8122-2517-1 / 0812225171
ISBN-13	978-0-8122-2517-4 / 9780812225174
Zustand	Neuware