The Power of Images

From an Economist review of Adam Hochschild's Bury the Chains and Steven Wise's Though the Heavens May Fall, two books about the slave trade:

Both authors remind us how a committed minority can persuade a majority to see what at first they cannot or do not want to see. In one of many vivid passages, Mr Hochschild describes a simple but electrifying piece of evidence that Clarkson placed before an enquiry into the slave trade by the Privy Council in 1788. It was a diagram of a slave ship, the Brookes, showing slaves tightly packed and chained in rows. For many people, this was perhaps the first time that the reality of the slave trade had impinged upon them: with their own eyes, they could see its cruelty.

Whole thing here.

Via Arts & Letters Daily.

Comments

[Gary Gunnels]

See also the Josiah Wedgewood medallion: http://www.wwnorton.com/nael/18century/topic_2/illustrations/immedallion.htm

[smacky]

I didn't bother to read the article, but that same picture was in one of either my gradeschool or my highschool history book. I guess my remembering it makes a case for the power of visuals, as the blog suggested.

[Gary Gunnels]

smacky,

Yes, it is commonly used in American textbooks.

There's a great story of an American Quaker (note that many Quakers were heavily involved in the slave trade in the 17th and 18th centuries) in 17th century wearing a sword to meethinghouse, yanking pig's heart filled with blood from a pocket and slashing the heart with his sword. He splattered the crowd with the blood and screamed something like "This is the blood of the slave!"

[smacky]

He splattered the crowd with the blood and screamed something like "This is the blood of the slave!"

Whoa...that's pretty dramatic. Probably effective, though.

[Ironchef]

Not effective enough, given that we're only 1 of 2 nations to fight a war over the abolition of slavery (the other being Haiti).

But given enough time and pressure, Lew Rockwell would have you believe market forces (& abolitionists) would have ended it eventually.

[Trey]

But given enough time and pressure, Lew Rockwell would have you believe market forces (& abolitionists) would have ended it eventually.

Jeffry Hummel makes that very case, and pretty well, in "Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men: A History of the American Civil War"

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0812693124/reasonmagazinea-20/

[Gary Gunnels]

Trey,

The slave economy in 1860 was the most robust it had ever been.

[Gary Gunnels]

Also, note that at the close of the Revolutionary War it was generally argued that slavery was also on its way out. Slavery is an age-old human institution; why anyone discounts its adapability to modern times I don't know.

[thoreau]

Even before going to the comments section I somehow knew what this thread would degenerate into.

[bigbigslacker]

This reminds me, I need to pick up Turbotax or Taxcut on the way home from work today. I'm Gonna owe lots due to my own personal screwup on my W2 - exemption at "4", probably ought to have been a "1". I may need to get a part-time gig for a couple months, or raid my savings or 401K, so I can continue to participate in our "voluntary" system. Oh well, at least my master takes good care of me...

[Gary Gunnels]

thoreau,

There's an obsession with some on the right to vindicate the Confederacy.

[ai]

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/slavery/

"slavery and the making of america" premieres in a coupla days. the wall street journal gave it a favorable review focusing on slavery as an achievement - "the single factor most responsible for building America into a global powerhouse"

[Trey]

The slave economy worked because the cost of having slaves was socialized through the fugitive slave laws and the like. In fact, the abolitionist proposed secession of the free states ("No Union With Slavery!") long before the confederacy did its thing. Of course, there's no way to know, but I would like to think that this would have peacefully killed slavery by giving slaves a refuge and thus raising the cost of maintaining slaves.

[Rex Little]

I'd love to see someone (Harry Turtledove) write an alternate history where the Confederacy was allowed to peacefully secede. I'm sure the history of the world would be different in some interesting ways.

I do think that one way or another, slavery wouldn't have lasted much longer. As Trey mentioned, fugitive slave laws helped keep the system in place, and those would have disappeared. Possibly abolitionists from the U.S. would have funneled enough private aid to rebels in the CSA to make a slave revolt possible.

And possibly this and other factors might have triggered a USA-CSA war that wound up being just as bloody as the Civil War.

[Trey]

Where is the attempt to "vindicate the Confederacy"? I don?t see it on this thread, at least.

Is slavery an abomination? Yes, it was a poison that the British left for us. I wish our forefathers had had the courage to end it when this country was born. Originally, Jefferson included the introduction of slavery as one of our grievances against the British. In the end, keeping it cost us. Of course, if a war is what it took to end slavery, it was worth it, but I think it could have ended peacefully and we would all be better for it today if the United States would have split peacefully.

Did the south have the right to succeed? Yes, as much right as the colonies had to leave the British Empire - both were slave states. The north should have let the south go in peace and then stew in its own juices. Instead, the north invaded and we are still feeling many of the effects of that today.

If it was really about slavery, why didn?t they go to invade Haiti and Brazil, etc. and put an end to the slavery there?

[Trey]

A slave revolt would have been a great thing!

John Brown had the right idea.

[Trey]

Gary, did you mean to say that "many Quakers were heavily involved in the slave trade in the 17th and 18th centuries"? This surprised me. I thought the Quakers were leaders in the abolitionist movement.

[Gary Gunnels]

Trey,

They were both. Quakers were some of the first to oppose slavery, but many Quaker businessmen were deeply involved in the slave trade. Its only in 1761 that slave traders are excluded from the Society of Friends. Note that many Quakers continued to own slaves after that date, though involvement in the trade itself was verboten.

[Ruthless]

Trey,
Amen to John Brown had the right idea.
Why couldn't he get traction?
Perhaps he was too early?

[joe]

bigbigslacker, comparing yourself to people who labored in irons and were subject to whipping, because you pay an income tax, is so old hat.

What you need to do is pull a Norquist, and compare yourself to Jews murdered in a death camp.