SLAVERY IN PENNSYLVANIA

A DISSERTATION

SUBMITTED TO THE BOARD OF UNIVERSITY STUDIES OF THE JOHNS HOPKINS
UNIVERSITY IN CONFORMITY WITH THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE
DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY, 1910

BY

EDWARD RAYMOND TURNER

Professor of History in the University of Michigan

THE LORD BALTIMORE PRESS
BALTIMORE, MD., U. S. A.
1911

CHAPTER I.

The Introduction of Negroes into Pennsylvania.

There were negroes in the region around the Delaware river before Pennsylvania was founded, in the days of the Dutch and the Swedes. As early as 1639 mention is made of a convict sentenced to be taken to South River to serve among the blacks there.[1] In 1644 Anthony, a negro, is spoken of in the service of Governor Printz at Tinicum, making hay for the cattle, and accompanying the governor on his pleasure yacht.[2] In 1657 Vice-director Alricks was accused of using the Company’s oxen and negroes. Five years later Vice-director Beekman desired Governor Stuyvesant to send him a company of blacks. In 1664 negroes were wanted to work on the lowlands along the Delaware. A contract was to be made for fifty, which the West India Company would furnish.[3] In the same year, when the English captured New Amstel, afterward New Castle, the place was plundered, and a number of negroes were confiscated and sold. From Peter Alricks several were taken; of these eleven were restored to him.[4] At least a few were living on the shores of the Delaware River in 1677.[5] A year later an emissary was sent by the justices of New Castle to request most urgently permission to import negroes from Maryland.[6]

Thus negroes had been brought into the country before Pennsylvania was founded. Immediately after Penn’s coming there is record of them in his first counties. They were certainly present in Philadelphia County in 1684, and in Chester in 1687.[7] Penn himself noticed them in his charter to the Free Society of Traders. In 1702 they were spoken of as numerous.[8] By that time merchants of Philadelphia made the importation of negroes a regular part of their business.[9] Thenceforth they are a noticeable factor in the life of the colony.

While there was an active demand for negroes, there was, nevertheless, almost from the first, strong opposition to importing them. This is evident from the fact that during the colonial period the Assembly of Pennsylvania passed a long series of acts imposing restrictions upon the traffic. In 1700 a maximum duty of twenty shillings was imposed on each negro imported. Five years later this duty was doubled.[10] By that time there had arisen a strong adverse sentiment, due partly to economic causes, since the white workmen complained that their wages were lowered by negro competition, and partly to fear aroused by an insurrection of slaves in New York.[11] Accordingly in 1712 the Assembly very boldly passed an act to prevent importation, seeking to accomplish this purpose by making the duty twenty pounds a head. The law was immediately repealed in England, the Crown not being disposed to tolerate such independent action, nor willing to allow interference with the African Company’s trade.[12] Either the local feeling was too strong, or the requirements were less, since in spite of this failure there was for a while a falling off in the number imported.[13] A more moderate duty of five pounds was imposed in 1715, but again the English authorities interposed, repealing it in 1719. Meanwhile an act to continue this duty had been passed in 1717–1718, but apparently it was not submitted to the Crown. In 1720–1721 the five pound duty was again imposed, this act also not being submitted. In 1722 the duty was repeated, and once more the law expired by limitation before it was sent up for approval.[14]

Up to this time restrictive legislation had been largely frustrated. It had encountered not only the disapproval of certain classes in Pennsylvania, but the powerful opposition of the African Company, which could count on the decisive interposition of the Lords of Trade.[15] The Assembly accordingly submitted the acts long after they had been passed, and made new laws before the old ones had been disallowed.[16] Nevertheless the number of blacks in the colony had steadily increased, and in 1721 was estimated to be somewhere between twenty-five hundred and five thousand.[17] The wrath of the white laborers was correspondingly increased, and in this year they presented to the Assembly a petition asking for a law to prevent the hiring of blacks. The