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Eugene Genovese’s “Slave Revolts in Hemispheric Perspective” offers an interesting perspective on criteria that appeared as necessary for a successful slave revolt, specifically relating to those within the United States. In his piece, Genovese lists a series of conditions that were favorable to have in order for an African slave revolt to occur. Things such as; “African-born slaves” outnumbering American born ones, a slave structure where an autonomous black leadership could develop, and a variety of other pieces were almost necessary if a slave revolt was to occur (12).
Unfortunately, as Genovese describes, these criteria were rarely ever allowed to come to fruition within the “old south” of the United States, suppressing large scale revolts. For one, though slaves were at times trained in the use of firearms, there was rarely ever enough in one given area to adequately overthrow the white owners and they were also untrained in any tactical usage (16). Furthermore, as a result of westward movement, it was difficult for strong ties to be created amongst slaves due to the constant physical reshuffling and potential for any leaders to be sold out (15). With factors such as these restricting them, Genovese indicates how slaves struggled to generate any significant momentum for a slave revolt in North America.
Though slave revolts struggled to gain momentum within North America, in places like Brazil this was not the case during the 19th century. Genovese elaborates on how a factionalized and weakened political system opened the door for a series of slave revolts in Bahia from 1807-1835. These revolts occurred as a result of the tensions between the bourgeois and landowners, which created the perfect climate for African slaves to take acquire a strong foothold in revolts, desertions, etc. (23).
For every potential successful rebellion, Genovese describes a number of gruesome results of failed rebellions. In describing “The Great Rebellion” in Berbiece, Genovese indicates how the defeat of the revolting slaves led to mass executions “conducted with all the cruelty Europeans invariably attribute to nonwhite savages” (34). The article also depicts how even when slaves showed moderation in the rebellions, they were still put down in cold blood regardless of how violent they were (35). In how Genovese describes these retaliations, it almost like he is casting the whites as the savages the slave owners believed slaves to be. He casts their brutality towards the slaves, who were merely fighting for their freedom, as something comparable to the brutality which we today associate with mass genocides.
Throughout our semester so far we have discussed a number of different types of rebellions and riots that were used to express the positions of the rebels. Yet, within all these various rebellions, the participants took a number of steps before reaching any type of violent gathering. They spoke to officials, wrote petitions to their representative bodies, and so on. Yet, the slaves mentioned in Genovese’s piece were not able to take any steps as these. As underprivileged and silent people, the slaves typically had no voice where they could express their problems with freedom. It could be guessed that by speaking out as an individual, a slave would face a harsh punishment. Without the ability to speak for themselves, the African slaves were left with only one option in terms of expressing their position, rebellion. Yet, unlike white revolts, where even an unsuccessful rebellion had some positive influence, slaves were faced with a much more negative result. By the eighteenth and nineteenth century revolts for slaves were almost suicidal, as the retaliation was so brutal (49). Without this “social right,” African slaves were left with little to no options to express their hatred for their position in society.