The Impact Of The American Revolution On Slavery

The Revolution had a contradictory impact on American notions of freedom, in terms of slavery. During the 18th century the understanding of freedom began to be known as a “universal entitlement, rather than a set of rights to a particular place or people” (Foner, 233). Thus, it was inevitable that questions about the status of slavery would arise.

“How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty from the drivers of negroes” (Foner, 232)? This is a quote from Dr. Samuel Johnson proclaiming that those who desire most the benefits of freedom and liberty, contradict the moral standards of natural freedom itself, by enslaving African Americans. During the 18th century we began to see a development in the language of slavery. Colonial writers

often contrasted the ideals of freedom and its relation to slavery. For example, James Otis of Massachusetts claimed that freedom must be universal. He wrote, “What man is or ever was born free if every man is not” (Foner, 232)
It seems self-evident that notions of freedom would contradict notions of slavery.

Thomas Jefferson, for instance, “owned more than 100 slaves when he wrote mankind’s unalienable rights of liberty, and everything he cherished in his own manner of life, from lavish entertainments to the leisure that made possible the pursuit of arts and sciences, ultimately rested in slave labor” (Foner, 233). Yet, in private, he was against slavery and thought it elicited misery on its victims.

To a slave owner, nothing was more vital to their freedom, than the right to self-government and the protection of their property. In this view, their property included their slaves. This posed a great obstacle on the road to abolition. It was believed that if the government sought to seize their “property” that would, in turn, be infringing on their natural rights as citizens. “If the government by the consent of the governed formed the essence of political freedom, then to require owners to give up their slave property would reduce them to slavery” (Foner,

233).
Despite opposition, with this new definition of freedom as a universal right, many slaves were given hope that slavery could be abolished from American life. “The most insistent advocates of freedom as a universal entitlement were African-Americans, who demanded that the leaders of the struggle for independence live up to their self-proclaimed creed” (Foner, 234). Enslaved African-Americans began creating “freedom petitions,” claiming that their natural liberties were not being recognized. Such petitions asked how Americans could, “seek release from English tyranny and not seek the same for disadvantaged African’s in their midst” (Foner, 234)?
Lemuel Haynes, advocated that Americans “extend” their ideals of freedom. “If liberty were truly an innate principal for all mankind, even an African has equally good a right to his liberty in common with Englishmen” (Foner, 234).
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In addition to African-American mobilization during the 18th century we also began seeing British support for abolition. “Lord Dunmore’s proclamation of 1775, and the Phillipsburgh Proclamation of General Henry Clinton issued four years later, offered sanctuary to slaves who escaped to British lines” (Foner, 235). Thomas Jefferson lost 30 of his slaves to the British. Harry Washington, a slave owned by George Washington fled to join Lord Dunmore eventually becoming corporal in the Black Pioneers.
The repercussions of the revolution seemed to pose a threat on the existence of slavery. As some slave owners began voluntarily emancipating their slaves. “In 1796, Robert Carter III, a member of one of Virginia’s wealthiest families, provided for the gradual emancipation of more than 400 slaves he owned. In the same year, Richard Randolph, a member of another prominent Virginia family…provided for the freedom of about 90 slaves, and set aside part of his land for them to own” (Foner, 236).
It seemed that abolition was on the horizon, especially in the North.

In fact, “between 1777 (when Vermont drew up a constitution that banned slavery) and 1804 (when New Jersey acted), every state north of Maryland took steps toward emancipation” (Foner, 237). However, many stipulations applied. Living slaves, for example were not included, but their children had the opportunity to someday, be freed. Generally, the child had to serve their mother’s master until adulthood. Or, in Pennsylvania, “after the states emancipation act of 1780 had to serve the owner for twenty-eight years” (Foner, 237). Although that is far beyond the required term for emancipated servants, these laws gave African-American’s “a new lease on life.” Still, the abolition of slavery in the North was still an extremely slow process.

All in all the American Revolution had a contradictory effect on the conceptions of freedom and slavery within American life. Colonial peoples desired universal freedom for all, however they did not understand how this new notion of freedom would apply to African-Americans slaves, in which they perceived as “property”. With the language of freedom changing, along with the uprising of petitions and the mobilization of slaves during the 18th century we began to see a glimpse of abolition, for the first time in American

history.