October 2013 – Page 2 – Popular Politics in Early America

October 24, 2013

American Injustice

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I agree with Wade that Patricia Reid’s extensive background information is a little excessive and dilutes her argument. She does, however, makes some points in her article, “Margaret Morgan’s Story: A Threshold Between Slavery and Freedom, 1820-1842,” worth dissecting. Her strongest point states the obvious, yet summarizes her entire article. For those blacks who had their freedom undocumented or unrecorded, their freedom was based on white authority (368). Her example of Richard Allen’s struggles with the slave catcher who had a fake cause, serve as prime justification for her argument. I’ve often wondered how blacks in the north determined their freedom from slave catchers. Since technology merely allowed for a paper stating “this man is a free man” (or something like that) for a slave to carry around, a slave catcher could easily ask for documentation proving the slaves freedom, tear up said document, then claim this was the slave he was looking to catch. Immoral? Absolutely. But a quick way to make a few extra bucks. Interestingly though, some whites did stand up for their fellow man against these unethical slave catchers. Without white support, however, blacks had a much more difficult time defending themselves against the claims of a white person (we all remember the difficulties Django had about proving his freedom) As we’ve talked about in class, this is a similar problem Native Americans faced as well.

Reid loses me when she discusses the Constitution being used as a pro-slavery document. This claim is a stretch. I understand the prosecution addressed the constitutionality of the Pennsylvania Personal Liberty Law of 1826, but I don’t think the ruling of this case makes the Constitution a pro-slavery document. The creators of the Constitution either viewed slavery too divisive (let’s keep in mind they were trying to unify a new nation, not tear it apart) or simply didn’t know what to do about slavery, but either way, the framers intentionally left out slavery from the Constitution. They called for an end to the slave trade in 1808, which at least shows that the framers viewed taking people from their native lands, across an ocean, to work for another human wasn’t acceptable anymore. Granted, the Constitution does allow for runaway slaves to be returned to their owners. But this (in the context of the time where slaves were viewed as property, something we condone today) is comparable to a horse running away to a pasteur with better food and more places to frolic and play, and giving anyone the power to return the horse to its owner. Back to the original point, the case involving Margaret Morgan and her family is tragic because they, along with the lower court’s decision, were in the right. As Reid states, the Morgan’s had no lawyer to defend them, so their case became a quarrel between Maryland and Pennsylvania instead of over their actual freedom. But this doesn’t support slavery as an institution, rather it supports the Federal government’s superiority over the states and the Pennsylvania legislators’ inability to craft a worthy law protecting blacks during this period. Henry’s and Ian’s posts support the latter part of my previous sentence.

October 24, 2013

Not Free Yet

Reid’s analysis provided a far more detailed analysis of a specific incident and area that of Genovese, and successfully navigates and explains the complex political framework that dealt with runaway and freed slaves in Maryland and Pennsylvania. Moreover, while Genovese posits revolution as the ultimate form of resistance in slave communities, Reid explores personal struggles and resistances to slavery in the form seeking freedom by fleeing to free territories. However, as Reid clearly articulates the struggle for freedom did not end upon reaching the north or even being freed by one’s master, the struggle was perpetual and later compounded by the decision in Prigg v. Pennsylvania. I think her engagement free African-Americans continued experience with slavery provided a different perspective on the issue of slavery and contributes to a more complete assessment of slavery’s far-reaching effects in United States society prior to the Civil War.

While I agree with Wade’s assessment that an additive element of laymen perspective would have made the piece more complete, I don’t think that the goal that Reid sought to accomplish. Rather, I believe her focus revolved around the legislative and judicial history of slavery in Pennsylvania and Maryland. Although there are certainly more aspects to explore in the story that Reid laid out, I did not find the introduction to history of litigation on slavery and its development superfluous and helped paint a more complete picture of what she sought to depict.

October 23, 2013

The Unfreedom of "Freedom"

Patricia Reid’s “Margaret Morgan’s Story” challenged me to think about aspects of slavery among border states that I had previously never given thought. Her juxtaposition of the concepts of slavery and freedom within the states of Maryland and Pennsylvania ultimately led to a thorough examination of the legitimacy of freedom for African Americans in the early- to mid-nineteenth century. This analysis was supported in large part by Reid’s excellent critique on the personal liberty laws passed in Pennsylvania in 1826. While Reid explains the initial, benevolent intentions of the laws, she proceeds to reveal their myriad weaknesses in protecting African Americans. When compared to the personal liberty laws of New York or Massachusetts, the laws of Pennsylvania had no effect in changing the political voice or power of African Americans – if accused of being a fugitive slave, African Americans were not even provided a jury trial (369). If anything, Reid effectively emphasizes that the political stance of free African Americans was weakened by placing the jurisdiction of their trials into the hands of elite white slaveholders. For many African Americans, freedom was entangled in a convoluted system of unfreedom.

Continuing her mockery of personal liberty laws in border states, Reid highlights the proceedings of the Prigg v. Pennsylvania trial of 1842. When the issue of these laws were taken to the U.S. Supreme Court, the status of Margaret Morgan and her children – previously free African Americans who had been accused of being fugitive slaves, kidnapped, and then sold into slavery in the South – was never addressed, although state laws of both Maryland and Pennsylvania dictated that they were free (373). In depicting the proceedings of the trial, Reid demonstrates that the personal liberty laws of Pennsylvania were wholly ineffective. In this light she also reveals the lack of importance placed on African American issues by the white elite in the nineteenth century – equal treatment towards free African Americans was a non-issue because in the minds of many blacks were not, and would never be, equals. Reid uses the example of the Pennsylvania personal liberty laws as a kind of satire for the entire system by which African Americans were to be protected against injustice. Collectively, I think this writing contributes greatly to supporting her overarching thesis of a growth of “pro-slavery constitutionalism” throughout the middle of the nineteenth century (360)

While Reid’s criticism of personal liberty laws is both detailed and insightful, the first half of her work dilutes her argument. In trying to establish the legal framework for the unfortunate events of the Morgan family and the subsequent Prigg trial, Reid provides readers with a background that is largely excessive. I think Reid could have made a much more powerful argument had she spent more time emphasizing the opinions and perspectives of those directly affected by the liberty laws, freed African Americans. With this in mind, I think the questions presented by Henry and Ian are very important. These questions underscore Reid’s lack of layman perspective in her work. What did the populace think about freed slaves? How did African Americans view personal liberty laws? Reid’s use of quotes from both a freed African American and Frederick Douglass were critical in establishing the black perspective in her argument, but the paucity with which they were used left me wanting more depth in this portion of her analysis (370, 365). Despite her missed opportunities, Reid is still able to clearly articulate that manumission did not imply freedom, and freedom in no means implied equality for African Americans in the nineteenth century.

October 23, 2013

Crossroads of Slavery

In Patricia Reid’s “Margaret Morgan’s Story: A Threshold between Slavery and Freedom, 1820-1842”, she recounts the Morgan family’s predicament in terms of the laws of Maryland and Pennsylvania which were in constant flux and ambiguity. The Morgans lived in the ultimate border state, Maryland, in which “the status between ‘slave’ and ‘free’ was regularly blurred.” They had been free for some years, manumitted by their owner, however the unclear nature of the laws in the states made it simple for slaveholders and catchers to capture any black they saw and transport them back into servitude. Margaret noted this and the increasing paranoia among Maryland legislators that free blacks posed a bad example for the enslaved and that they were bad for business. These revelations pushed her to move her family further north, to Pennsylvania.

Maryland was seen as one of the important bastions of slavery that if it were to give way to abolitionist sentiment, the rest of the slave states would soon follow, expanding these interests. Slave owners and the governmental legislators they influenced had other plans though. They gradually began to institute harsher restrictions to make it more difficult for blacks to maintain their free status. They were forced to prove their freedom in more than one way, often in manners that were greatly inconvenient. These laws and statutes only served to put a tighter leash on the Maryland blacks who were free and looked to extract them from the state as a whole. Maryland occupied a unique position as a state wanting to benefit from the all the profits that slavery provided for the powerful slave-holding class.

As Reid says, “Marylanders depended on northern and southern insterstate comity to govern relations with respect to slaves and slaveholders migrating in and out of the state.” Maryland was at the crossroads of the north and the south, slavery and freedom. Their legislators made a conscious decision in the 1830s, just as the Morgans were leaving to Pennsylvania, to give slavery a grand welcome back into society. Maryland used their close proximity to the North and South to install “new legal parameters…discriminatory statutes that both the North and South employed.” I agree with Ian’s post this week asserting how a short distance between just a few states could make a large difference in terms of how slaves could be prosecuted in a court of law. I concur with his statement that, “for slaves, this seemed a blessing in disguise, as it was a close state in terms of difference in which they could feasibly assimilate into society.”

I liked the method in which Reid made her argument and used the microhistory of Morgan and her case to illustrate how slavery and freedom legislation was progressing during the period. Her writing is very clear and concise and her use of primary sources and block quotes only served to legitimize her explanations. She inserted short facts about slave-catching, one of which particularly caught my attention: the conviction of slaveholders could yield up to US$2000 or 7 to 21 years of hard labor. I would not have expected slave catchers to have been prosecuted so harshly at that time.

October 23, 2013

The Doubled Edged Sword of Pennsylvania's Liberty Laws

In Patricia A. Reid’s “Slavery and Abolition: a Journal of Slave and Post Slave Studies,” she references a quote by Fredrick Douglas that indicates an interest system regarding runaway slaves. Douglas once said “white men have been known to encourage slaves to escape, and then, to get the reward, catch them and return them to their masters” (365). This statement describes how the retrieval of slaves became somewhat of a business for white men during the 19^th century. Previously, I had known it was common for a reward to be given for a man to return another person’s slave. Yet, I never guessed that whites working alongside slaves in lower class jobs during this period would try to influence them into escaping only to have an upper hand in securing the reward. It is shameful at best but, it reiterates the idea that slaves were not considered people but, were property used for monetary gain.

An interesting situation that Reid details in her work was the predicament of being a free black within Pennsylvania. Reid describes how slaves and free blacks could easily integrate into Pennsylvania society because, this state, unlike Ohio, did not record free blacks (367). For slaves, this seemed like a blessing in disguise, as it was a close state in terms of distance in which they could feasibly assimilate into society. Yet, Reid reveals how this apparent blessing was actually a detrimental issue for black individuals of any status during the 19^th century.

Even though Pennsylvania enacted personal liberty laws in 1826, which were supposed to halt free blacks from being wrongfully uprooted and returned to slavery, the very system of the state essentially negated this law. Though this law was in effect, the free blacks were not granted a trial by jurors, or any due process of the law, leaving the decision of their case up to a white authority (369). As free blacks were not recorded in the state, if they did not have a strong white authority to speak on their behalf, like in Richard Allen case, they were left with little proof of their position (368). With this type of system in effect, the freedom of free blacks in Pennsylvania was unfortunately always in danger. Without strong white support behind them, a posse of slave catchers could appear and carry a number of blacks back to the south to be sold back into slavery, which is what occurred with the Morgan family. Though Pennsylvania tried to halt these practices with their laws, the system they had in place negated such affects, leaving free blacks generally unprotected in an often hostile environment.

After reading over Henry’s post, I completely agree with his questions regarding why both Maryland and Pennsylvania did not have significant legislation reflecting their people’s views. Though Pennsylvania did have a gradual emancipation policy, this was a limited route to abolition at best. Maryland meanwhile, did not feature such laws but, did have white slave owners releasing their slaves, which is what happened with the Morgans. In regards to Henry’s potential answer, I’d have to agree once again. Slavery as a whole was a critical social issue that had caused the Founding Fathers, as well as the Constitutional Convention. Though the United States had grown in many ways at the time of this issue, the idea of total abolition was still a distant possibility for the country as a whole. Even if people viewed it as wrong, it was so deeply ingrained into American culture that it was going to take a war that ripped the country in two to end this practice for good.

October 23, 2013

Reid's Legal History of Free African-Americans' Rights

In her article for Slavery and Abolition, Patricia Reid looks at the how fugitive slaves and free African-Americans were treated under the law in Maryland and Pennsylvania. Specifically, she looks at the story of Margaret Morgan, a free slave who was at the centerpiece of the Supreme Court case that essentially invalidated laws requiring slaveholders to show definitive proof of the freedom status of a black person accused of being a fugitive slave. Reid begins by outlining how border states like Maryland and Pennsylvania were important because of the large numbers of free and enslaved African-Americans living in the same areas. Reid points out that a significant number of slave owners in Maryland voluntarily freed their slaves due to abolitionist sentiments. (361) However, at the same time, the state passed laws restricting the movements of all people of color due to a fear that having so many free blacks around would encourage escape attempts and enable fugitive slaves to hide.

Unlike Maryland, Pennsylvania was a free state, also with high abolitionist sentiments. Reid cites Pennsylvania’s 1826 personal liberty laws, which put the burden of proof on the claimant slaveholder attempting to recapture a fugitive slave. (368) However, these laws were weakened by the fact that Pennsylvania did not keep records of free African-Americans, and also because the personal liberty laws put final decisions in the hands of white authority figures rather than in the hands of a jury. Morgan’s case of disputed freedom went all the way to the Supreme Court, who decided that Pennsylvania’s personal liberty laws were unconstitutional as they interfered with a slave owner’s constitutionally guaranteed right to escaped slaves who fled to free states. That finding made slave owner’s claims to their human property preeminent to blacks’ claims to the constitutionally guaranteed right of a fair trial, legally implying that blacks were not protected under the Constitution, which was enumerated explicitly years later in the Dred Scott case.

Reid convincingly argues for everything I discussed in the above paragraphs. She cites primary sources and countless laws and amendments to make clear the progression of laws restricting African-Americans’ rights in Maryland and Pennsylvania, regardless of their freedom status. She also makes a good case that those restrictive laws were bright on by legislators’ concerns that having so many free blacks in a slave state or a border state brought on enough ambiguity to structurally threaten slavery, as it provided slaves with more escape mechanisms. She also acknowledges the role of railroads and ships, both of which were large methods of transportation on the coasts of those states, as escape methods and therefore further threats to slavery.

However, I believe her argument begs the question of why, if Maryland and Pennsylvania had such abolitionist populations, were those sentiments not more reflected in legislation? If so many people in those states were against slavery, or at least in Maryland’s case in favor of freeing their own slaves personally, why were they not electing officials who would legislate more explicit protection for freed slaves? Reid cites the citizens of Pennsylvania’s York County as “disgusted” at what happened to Margaret Morgan, and also that a York County jury found the slave catcher in the case guilty of kidnapping (372). If so many people held those views, then why did Pennsylvania not have laws recording free African-Americans as such? My guess is that perhaps outright abolitionism was still a relatively radical view. Perhaps most people felt that they themselves did not want to own slaves, but were alright with it happening in the South and thus alright with laws to bring back fugitive slaves. However, it would have been nice for Reid to spend some time on this.

October 22, 2013

People should not be afraid of their governments; governments should be afraid of their people.

For me, it was easy to assume that banning the trans-Atlantic slave trade was a moral act, fought for by the noble abolitionists as a first step toward ending slavery. My assumption, though perhaps part of the reason for such an act, was not comprehensive: in “Slave Revolts in Hemispheric Perspective” from “From Rebellion to Revolution” by Eugene Genovese, he suggests that the end of the trans-Atlantic slave trade was, partially, a tactical move on the part of slaveholders to avoid more slave revolts. He points out that slave populations in the American south were already significant and were growing, so slaveholders felt no need for imported slaves. Significantly, however, he points out that imported slaves were more likely to incite rebellion than those that had been suppressed for a l0ng time.

The presence of imported African slaves, however, is not the only reason that slaves might revolt, as Genovese makes clear in his overview of slave revolts and the causes. Though likely not, it feels comprehensive; he mentions causes such as the presence of skilled laborers, slave’s knowledge of firearms, large and concentrated slave populations, real or expected political alliances with other groups or states, religion (especially Islam), and enlightenment ideologies as factors that might foment revolt. Furthermore, he discusses the ways in which white populations might affect the possibility of a slave revolt: the white populations familiarity with firearms, and their access to local and federal militias; the size of the white population compared with the black one; political rhetoric at the elite level, and the discussion of it around the slaves; black expectations about the duration of their enslavement.

CT mentions that he believes that slaves’ ability to use firearms was an insignificant element in determining whether or not slaves would revolt. I believe he is correct–many of these causes by themselves are insignificant. Furthermore, he is also correct in a practical sense: a few single-shot muskets would not turn the tide of battle. I believe, however, that there is a certain psychological element that accompanies the use of firearms, and–though insignificant in the course of battle itself–I believe this would potentially have a large impact on whether or not slaves revolted. Especially, I think, in the American south, since I believe there is a psychological value to meeting your enemy on the field of battle with a parity of technology, and southerners were often heavily armed and trained in the use of firearms.

I also appreciate Genovese’s placement of slave revolt within a broader context. As he writes, slave revolts “contributed toward the radical though still bourgeoisie movement for freedom, equality and democracy, while they foreshadowed the movement against capitalism itself” (2). It is logical that slavery would arise within a capitalistic mindset, as the owners of capital can avoid dealing with labor at all, and simply make labor part of their capital. Luckily, our consciences have pulled us beyond this abhorrent form of torture, and yet, make no mistake that every capitalists attempts to lower wages and shut out unions, reduce benefits and privatize education, are intended to push the working class back toward the dehumanization of slavery, in which the labor (barely) survives and the capitalists reap the benefits.

October 22, 2013

A Hopeless Situation for the Hopeful

I thoroughly enjoyed Eugene Genovese’s writing about Slave Revolts and his conclusions and justification for his conclusions are quite plausible. Although Ian does a fine job of hashing out some of Eugene’s points, I’m going to disagree a bit on the hierarchy of importance for a slave revolt. While I can understand the importance of knowing how to fire a single shot rifle during a violent revolt, I’m not convinced this lack of knowledge played a huge factor in discouraging slaves from revolting. The vast numerical advantage of whites over blacks created an insurmountable obstacle for those revolting. Guns or no-guns, blacks knew that whites dominated 18th and 19th century America with more freedom (obviously), but also greater numbers. Only two states, South Carolina and Mississippi, witnessed a higher percentage of blacks over whites and even these states maintained a total population with 52-57% slaves (15). Furthermore, Genovese compares the concentration of slaves in the South with that of other British colonies. I think he should have expanded on this point even more than he did because the massive, stereotypical plantation contained a small percentage of the nation’s slaves. Half of slaves worked on farms, probably working alongside their yeoman farmer master, while another quarter lived on plantations of fifty or less (11). Using British Guinea as a case study, blacks outnumbered whites 9 to 1 and I’ve read in other works that the treatment of slaves in the Caribbean far surpassed that of the United States in hostility and violence. The slaves in America were extremely valuable and masters saw senseless violence as a detriment to their financial stance. A prime male field hand was worth close to $600,000 in 2007 dollars {Hugh Rockoff and Gary M. Walton, History of the American Economy, 11th edition, (Cengage Learning: Mason, OH, 2010), 231}. As we’ve discussed earlier in class, the mob influence can be very powerful, but only works with a large group of people. Hence power in numbers. So, when the most support a revolting party can gather is 500 (using the largest figure Genovese provides although he believes the Louisiana revolt was closer to 180) against an entire controlling population, the revolt is doomed to fail.

Perhaps the most astounding aspect of Genovese’s research was how often slaves viewed emancipation as just around the river bend (I hope you’re all singing the Pocahontas song right now http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DE5a80I8EU). Slaves around the globe felt that the king or ruling faction had actually freed them, yet their master refused to acknowledge this emancipation. To paraphrase Genovese, one is going to act more rationally if there’s a glimmer of hope at the end of the tunnel. Only when backed into a corner of suffering did slaves consider revolt a more practical option.

October 22, 2013

A Detailed Look at the Reasons For Slaves to Revolt

Eugene Genovese’s “Slave Revolts in Hemispheric Perspective” is a detailed analysis of why slave revolts in the Old South were much rarer than in other slave-holding areas. It is clear that Eugene is very well-versed on slave revolts and his research appears to be immense. I enjoyed how he approached the question of why large-scale slave revolts occurred in some areas, but not others. He provided several conditions that made slave revolts more favorable such as blacks outnumbering whites, economic struggles, the number of slaves approaching two hundred per farm, and political instability among the ruling class. Next, Genovese explores some of these conditions in particular and describes how specific situations accentuated his points.

I particularly liked how Genovese described how political divisions could affect the potential for slave revolts. Genovese showed how the United States (specifically the elite Southern slave holders) held the appearance of one big unified structure. While European countries were constantly at war with each other (which dictated that they turn their enemies’ slaves against them), the United States was on the other side of the Atlantic with a centralized government capital located far north. I just think that this reasoning was very effective because it showed a major contrast between the American states and the European powers that struggled to keep slave revolts down.

I also thought that Genovese’s analysis of the leaders of the major slave-revolts in the U.S. was strong. He took us into the minds and backgrounds of Denmark Vesey, Gabriel Prosser, and Nat Turner. He showed why each was fit as a slave-revolt leader. Vesey, in particular, had the credentials to lead. He spoke several languages, was well read politically, he had an outstanding group of men directly below his command, and had visited many countries while he was still a slave. Genovese did a good job of showing how these men were qualified to lead, which then made me realize that the lack of slave revolts may be due to a lack of these over-qualified leaders.

Genovese mentions the slaves’ religion a few times throughout the piece. He does an excellent job of explaining how the American slaves developed their own sort of Christianity that did not exactly promote rebellions. The slaves morphed their traditional African folk beliefs into a new Christianity of “love and mutual support,” that emphasized their value as human beings and encouraged an attitude of survival.

Overall, I think that Genovese’s article was detailed and explained exceedingly well. I do not think that his organization was first-rate, but once I followed where he was going, I bought his arguments.

Ian Solcz (Rochester, NY) makes an interesting point at the end of his post next week. He compares and contrasts white and black rebellions and revolutions that we have studied thus far in class. I think he touches on an excellent point of freedom of speech. Slaves lacked the freedom to speak out against their condition, which is obviously a severe handicap for them. Yet, Ian says that their only option left to speak out was through rebellion. While rebelling was probably the most obvious and effective way, I believe that there were other things that slaves could do as well. Teaching each other to read and write, slowing down their pace of work, and organizing networks of communication with other slaves are just a few things that they could do to fight back. Ian makes a good point, I just think that there were more options (not great options though), than he lets on to.

October 22, 2013

When You Play the Game of Revolts, You Win or You Die

In Eugene Genovese’s detailed, strategic chapter “Slave Revolts in Hemispheric Perspective,” rebelling slaves in the Western Hemisphere are portrayed as black Davids attempting to slay the well-armed, well-funded, white Goliaths. These rebels risked it all for a shot at freedom- they typically have few supplies, few allies, and little detailed intelligence about their foes. However, as Michael wrote earlier today, not all rebelling slaves had equal chances of success, as “major differences” separated the regions that could support broad slave revolts from those that could not. The rebellious slaves of the Caribbean and South America had a slim, but viable, chance of victory thanks to volatile island diplomacy and their vast outnumbering of the white captors. Bands of guerrilla runaways, known as maroons, would harass the colonizing classes and form their own communities based on traditional African culture. (3) However, the slave ringleaders of the British Colonies and United States faced an even more stacked deck. Due to the large number of whites, the paternalist slave society, and the white public’s horrific fear of slave uprisings, Genovese surmises that all revolts planned by black slaves in the United States were doomed to fail.

Genovese goes into extensive, if not overreaching, detail concerning the slave revolts of the Caribbean from 1500 to 1900 (including Latin America, Brazil, and Guiana). The European powers viewed these colonies less as opportunities for colonial resettlement and more as possibilities of wealth and mercantile prestige through sugar cultivation. These “thoroughly bourgeois” colonies generally contained a small amount of white businessmen and a large number of black slaves (mostly African-born) who worked under pitiful conditions in the sugar fields. (2) The Pan-African identity, supported by sheer numbers and the natural island geography, encouraged dozens and dozens of revolts throughout the Indies and the mainland. The runaways who survived the initial outbreak became formidable adversaries, forming themselves into guerilla armies. They sometimes gained support and protection from nations at war with their owners, augmenting their political clout as independent bodies. However, these successes were few and far between- many European nations allied amongst themselves to assist each other in putting down slave revolts and suppressing conspiracies as statements of their dominance over the region. (21)

The circumstances of rebellion in the United States made a slave revolt a difficult proposition, with American slaveholders “in a position of unusual strength”. (23) The Americanization of slavery after the abolition of slave importation created a more paternalistic culture, with traditional African identity losing its strength in the nineteenth century, especially compared to that of the Caribbean. The population balance simply did not favor the rebels, nor did the geography support the thought of a guerilla war. While his citations are not provided, it is evident that Genovese focused on utilizing the dialogue of both slave leaders and ordinary slaves in his analysis of the revolts. He claims that many slaves deemed the proposition of revolt to be suicidal, and wonders how they had any uprisings at all. (50) To Genovese, Nat Turner, Denmark Vesey, and Gabriel Prosser were a radical minority while most slaves “shifted away from revolt to other forms of resistance”. (49) While Genovese chronicles the ill-fated rebels in detail and scope, he fails to analyze what this alternative resistance might be, and therefore fails to answer an important question: Did American slaves have any political speech beyond violence? In my opinion, slaves played an instrumental role in the economic, religious, and cultural development of the African-American identity; for that, I believe the answer is yes.