Slavery

... and the fight against it

“Bottom rail on top this time”: the American Civil War and after

9 April was the 150th anniversary of the surrender of the South in the American Civil War. In this speech given at recent AWL public meetings, Sacha Ismail explains why that war and what came after are so important. The American Civil War is not dry, dusty history. It is relevant to the inspiring protests against racism going on in the United States now. The US of today — a capitalist democracy, but one deeply racist and unequal even by the standards of capitalism — was created by revolution, but also the betrayal of that revolution. Between 1861 and 1865, the US fought a bloody war in which...

Black slavery in North America

History is rich in examples of the revival of institutions appropriate to more primitive civilizations in advanced societies. Mankind is infinitely ingenious in adapting old cultural forms to new uses under the changed conditions of a new social order. Like a thrifty housewife, humanity hesitates to discard familiar acquisitions, however outmoded; it prefers to store them in attics or cellars in the hope of finding a use for them in the future. The history of economics, no less than the history of philosophy, religion, and politics, shows that such expectations are often realized. The rise of...

Negro Slavery in North America

History is rich in examples of the revival of institutions appropriate to more primitive civilizations in advanced societies. Mankind is infinitely ingenious in adapting old cultural forms to new uses under the changed conditions of a new social order. Like a thrifty housewife, humanity hesitates to discard familiar acquisitions, however outmoded; it prefers to store them in attics or cellars in the hope of finding a use for them in the future. The history of economics, no less than the history of philosophy, religion, and politics, shows that such expectations are often realized. The rise of...

Negro Slavery in North America

History is rich in examples of the revival of institutions appropriate to more primitive civilizations in advanced societies. Mankind is infinitely ingenious in adapting old cultural forms to new uses under the changed conditions of a new social order. Like a thrifty housewife, humanity hesitates to discard familiar acquisitions, however outmoded; it prefers to store them in attics or cellars in the hope of finding a use for them in the future. The history of economics, no less than the history of philosophy, religion, and politics, shows that such expectations are often realized. The rise of...

Negroes in the US Civil War: Their Role in the Second American Revolution [CLR James, 1943]

An indispensable contribution to the understanding of the role of the Negro in American history is a study of the period between 1830 and 1865. In this article we treat the subject up to 1860. The basic economic and social antagonisms of the period embraced the whole life of the country and were fairly clear then, far less today. The system of chattel slavery needed territorial expansion because of the soil exhaustion caused by the crude method of slave production. But as the North developed industrially and in population, the South found it ever more difficult to maintain its political...

Depicting a barbaric history

Solomon Northup, on whose autobiographical memoir 12 Years a Slave is based, was lucky by the standards of most of the thousands of “free negroes” kidnapped and sold into slavery in the Southern United States. His release in 1853 and the story he went back North to tell boosted the abolitionist movement which a decade later helped destroy slavery in the US. Yet, after regaining his freedom, his colour meant he was unable to testify against his kidnappers in a Washington D.C. court. Like Steve McQueen’s first film, Hunger, 12 Years is often difficult to watch, unflinchingly brutal in its...

When Gone With the Wind Glorified the Old Slave-holding South

Eighty million Americans visit the cinema every week, and in the course of the next year or so, perhaps ninety million will see the film Gone With the Wind. Millions will get from this film their most powerful impression of the greatest civil war in history and one of the decisive turning points in modern history. What will they see? At the very start we are informed that the film is a tribute to the “grace and gallantry” of a vanished civilization “the age of chivalry.” The South was a “land of grace and plenty” (our quotations are literal). The Civil War took place, God knows why: as far as...

Gone With the Wind Glorifies the Old Slave-holding South

Eighty million Americans visit the cinema every week, and in the course of the next year or so, perhaps ninety million will see the film Gone With the Wind. Millions will get from this film their most powerful impression of the greatest civil war in history and one of the decisive turning points in modern history. What will they see? At the very start we are informed that the film is a tribute to the “grace and gallantry” of a vanished civilization “the age of chivalry.” The South was a “land of grace and plenty” (our quotations are literal). The Civil War took place, God knows why: as far as...

Revolution for black liberation: black soldiers in the US Civil War

This special publication for Black History Month 2013 (republished January 2014) is adapted from a presentation given at Ideas for Freedom 2013 . To download the PDF, click here . "Many people have an idea that slavery in the United States was abolished through the benevolence of white 'liberals' such as Abraham Lincoln - but that popular racism made white supremacy afterwards inevitable. The real history is different... "As the conflict unfolded, the logic of the struggle pushed the issue of slavery, and beyond that the rights of black Americans, to the fore. The war and its aftermath have...

We Only Want the Earth

Some men, faint-hearted, ever seek Our programme to retouch, And will insist, whene’er they speak That we demand too much. ’Tis passing strange, yet I declare Such statements give me mirth, For our demands most moderate are, We only want the earth. “Be moderate,” the trimmers cry, Who dread the tyrants’ thunder. “You ask too much and people fly From you aghast in wonder.” ’Tis passing strange, for I declare Such statements give me mirth, For our demands most moderate are, We only want the earth. Our masters all a godly crew, Whose hearts throb for the poor, Their sympathies assure us, too, If...

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