Two of the most pervasive sources of misinformation and racial oppression were the construction of race and the creation of the “Nigger” as a non-human beast. Both of these creations were a result of the colonial systems that formed the thirteen companies, that history records as the thirteen original colonies.
These companies were England’s business ventures in competition with other empires for wealth and power. Acquiring wealth and power was, and is, dependent on free and cheap labor.
While the first slaves, a.k.a non-person, to labor in these companies were England’s own prisoners and children, the successful cultivation of tobacco meant more free labor was needed. The need for free labor intensified the transatlantic slave trade. Over 12 million Africans were taken from their homelands from 1501 to 1866, with the U.S. receiving over 305,000 people as property.
The transatlantic slave trade was abolished in 1807. However, “illegal” trade continued and the legal, more brutal, domestic slave trade industry boomed. The black enslaved population grew 487% from 1790 to 1860.
Sparked by fears of slave uprisings (both black and white), particularly the Bacon Revolt in 1676, the propaganda campaign of creating race by aligning European slaves with the English elite through