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Atlantic slave trade

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: British History 1750-1900

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   The Atlantic slave trade, started by the Portuguese, but soon dominated
   by the English, was the sale and exploitation of African slaves by
   Europeans that occurred in and around the Atlantic Ocean from the 15th
   century to the 19th century. Most slaves were transported from West
   Africa and Central Africa to the New World. While Europeans obtained
   most slaves through coastal trade with African trading states, some
   slaves were captured through raids and kidnapping. Some contemporary
   historians estimate that 12 million Africans arrived in the new world,
   making it one of the largest forced migrations in human history.
   However, some estimate that the number is as high as 25 to 40 million .
   The slave-trade is sometimes called the Maafa by African and
   African-American scholars, meaning "holocaust" or "great disaster" in
   Kiswahili. The slaves were one element of a three-part economic
   cycle—the Triangular Trade and its Middle Passage—which ultimately
   involved four continents, four centuries and millions of people.

Triangular trade

   European colonists practiced Indian slavery, enslaving many of the
   natives of the New World. For a variety of reasons Africans replaced
   Indians as the main population of slaves in the Americas. In some
   cases, such as on some of the Caribbean Islands, disease and warfare
   eliminated the natives completely. In other cases, such as in South
   Carolina, Virginia, and New England, the need for alliances with native
   tribes coupled with the availability of African slaves at affordable
   prices (beginning in the early 18th century for these colonies)
   resulted in a shift away from Indian slavery. It is often falsely
   claimed that Indians made poor slaves compared to Africans, explaining
   the shift to using Africans. The reasons had more to do with economics
   and politics.

   Research published in 2006 reports the earliest known presence of
   African slaves in the New World. A burial ground in Campeche, Mexico,
   suggests slaves had been brought there not long after Hernán Cortés
   completed the subjugation of Aztec and Mayan Mexico.

   The first side of the triangle was the export of goods from Europe to
   Africa. A number of African kings and merchants took part in the
   trading of slaves from 1440 to about 1900. For each captive, the
   African rulers would receive a variety of goods from Europe. Many of
   them were confronted with the dilemma of trading with Europe or
   becoming slaves themselves. The second leg of the triangle exported
   enslaved Africans across the Atlantic Ocean to South America, the
   Carribean islands, and North America. Five times the number of slaves
   were transported to the Americas compared to those transports to
   Europe. This is because the slaves were exposed to new diseases and
   also because of malnutrition. The third and final part of the triangle
   was the return of goods to Europe from the Americas. The goods were the
   products of slave-labor plantations and included cotton, sugar,
   tobacco, molasses and rum.

Labour and slavery



   The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade originated as a shortage of labour in
   the American colonies and later the USA. The first slaves used by
   European colonizers were Indigenous peoples of the Americas 'Indian'
   peoples until African slaves were available in quantity at affordable
   prices. It was also difficult to get Europeans to emigrate to the
   colonies, despite incentives such as indentured servitude or even
   distribution of free land (mainly in the English colonies that became
   the United States). Massive amounts of labour were needed, initially
   for mining, and soon even more for the plantations in the
   labour-intensive growing, harvesting and semi-processing of sugar (also
   for rum and molasses), cotton and other prized tropical crops which
   could not be grown profitably — in some cases, could not be grown at
   all — in the colder climate of Europe. It was also cheaper to import
   these goods from American colonies than from regions within the Ottoman
   Empire. To meet this demand for labour European traders thus turned to
   Western Africa (part of which became known as 'the Slave Coast') and
   later Central Africa as the new source for slaves.

African slave market

   Europeans usually bought slaves who were captured in wars between
   African kingdoms and chiefdoms, or from Africans who had made a
   business out of capturing Africans and selling them. Europeans provided
   a large new market for an already-existing trade, and while an African
   held in slavery in his own region of Africa might escape or be traded
   back to his own people, a person shipped away was sure never to return.
   Peoples living around the Niger River were transported from these
   markets to the coast and sold at European trading ports in exchange for
   muskets and manufactured goods such as cloth or alcohol.

   Europeans rarely entered the interior of Africa, due to fear of disease
   and moreover fierce African resistance. They would be brought to
   coastal outposts where they would be traded for goods. Enslavement also
   became a major by-product of war in Africa as nation states expanded
   through military conflicts in many cases through deliberate sponsorship
   of benefiting European nations. During such periods of rapid state
   formation or expansion ( Asante or Dahomey being good examples),
   slavery formed an important element of political life which the
   Europeans exploited: As Queen Sara's plea to the Portuguese courts
   revealed, the system became "sell to the Europeans or be sold to the
   Europerans". In Africa, convicted criminals could be punished by
   enslavement and with European demands for slaves, this punishment
   became more prevalent. Since most of these nations did not have a
   prison system, convicts were often sold or used in the scattered local
   domestic slave market.

   The majority of European conquests occurred toward the end or after the
   Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. One exception to this is the conquest of
   Ndongo in Angola where warriors, citizens and even nobility were taken
   into slavery after the fall of the state.

African versus European slavery

   See also African slave trade

   "Slavery", as it is often referred to, in African cultures was
   generally more like indentured servitude: "slaves" were not made to be
   chattel of other men, nor enslaved for life. African "slaves" were paid
   wages and were able to accumulate property. They often bought their own
   freedom and could then achieve social promotion - just as freedmen in
   ancient Rome - some even rose to the status of rulers (e.g. Jaja of
   Opobo and Sunni Ali Ber). Similar arguments were used by western slave
   owners during the time of abolition, for example by John Wedderburn in
   Wedderburn v. Knight, the case that ended legal recognition of slavery
   in Scotland in 1776. Regardless of the legal options open to slave
   owners, rational cost-earning calculation and/or voluntary adoption of
   moral restraints often tended to mitigate (except with traders, who
   preferred to weed out the worthless weak individuals) the actual fate
   of slaves throughout history.

African kingdoms of the era

   There were over 173 city-states and kingdoms in the African regions
   affected by the slave trade between 1502 and 1853, when Brazil became
   the last Atlantic import nation to outlaw the slave trade. Of those
   173, no fewer than 68 could be deemed "nation states" with political
   and military infrastructures that enabled them to dominate their
   neighbors. Nearly every present-day nation had a pre-colonial forbear
   with which European traders had to barter and eventually battle. Below
   are 38 nation states by country with populations that correspond to
   African-Americans:
     * Mali: Bamana Empire, Kenedougou Kingdom and Songhai Empire
     * Burkina Faso: Mossi Kingdoms
     * Senegal: Jolof Empire, Denanke Kingdom, Kingdom of Fouta Tooro,
       Kingdom of Khasso and Kingdom of Saalum
     * Guinea-Bissau: Kaabu
     * Guinea: Kingdom of Fouta Djallon and Mali Empire
     * Sierra Leone: Koya Temne and Kpaa Mende
     * Cote d'Ivoire: Gyaaman Kingdom and Kong Empire
     * Ghana: Asante Confederacy and Mankessim Kingdom
     * Benin: Kingdom of Dahomey
     * Nigeria: Aro Confederacy, Kingdom of Benin, Igala, Nupe and Oyo
     * Cameroon Kingdoms: Bamun and Mandara kingdom
     * Gabon: Orungu
     * Equatorial Guinea: Otcho
     * Republic of Congo: Anziku and Loango
     * Democratic Republic of Congo: Kuba Kingdom, Luba Empire, Lunda
       Kingdom and Matamba
     * Angola: Kingdom of Kongo and Kingdom of Ndongo

   There were eight principal areas used by Europeans to buy and ship
   slaves to the Western Hemisphere.
     * Senegambia: Present day Senegal, Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, and Guinea
     * Sierra Leone: Present day Sierra Leone and Liberia
     * The Windward Coast: Present day Cote d'Ivoire
     * The Gold Coast: Present-day Ghana
     * The Bight of Benin or the Slave Coast: Togo, Benin and Nigeria west
       of the Benue River
     * The Bight of Biafra: Nigeria south of the Benue River, Cameroon and
       Equatorial Guinea
     * Central Africa (sometimes called Kongo in slave ship logs): Gabon,
       Democratic Republic of Congo) and Angola
     * Southeast Africa: Mozambique and Madagascar.

   The number of slaves sold to the new world varied throughout the slave
   trade. The minimum and least disputed number is 10 million. As for the
   distribution of slaves from regions of activity, the Senegambia
   provided about 5.8%, Sierra Leone 3.4%, Windward Coast 12.1%, Central
   Africa 14.4%, Bight of Benin 14.5%, Bight of Biafra 23%, Gold Coast 25%
   and Southeast Africa 1.8%.

Ethnic groups

   The different ethnic groups brought to the Americas closely corresponds
   to the regions of heaviest activity in the slave trade. Over 45
   distinct ethnic groups were taken to the Americas during the trade. Of
   the 45, the ten most prominent according to slave documentation of the
   era are listed below.
    1. The Gbe speakers of Togo, Ghana and Benin (Adja, Mina, Ewe, Fon)
    2. The Mbundu of Angola (includes Ovimbundu)
    3. The BaKongo of the Democratic Republic of Congo and Angola
    4. The Igbo of Nigeria
    5. The Yoruba of Nigeria
    6. The Akan of Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire
    7. The Mandé speakers of Upper Guinea
    8. The Wolof of Senegal
    9. The Chamba of Nigeria
   10. The Makua of Mozambique

Human toll

   The trans-Atlantic slave trade resulted in a vast loss of life for
   African captives both in Africa and in America. Around 20 million
   Africans died during the brutal process, which turned human beings into
   property. The savage nature of the trade, where most of the slaves were
   procured during African wars, led to the destruction of individuals and
   cultures. For every African captive arriving in the New World two died
   during capture, storage, transport or "seasoning". The exact number of
   dead may never be known, but records of the period and modern research
   paint a grim picture. The following figures do not include deaths of
   African slaves as a result of their actual labor, slave revolts or
   diseases they caught while living among New World populations.

African conflicts

   According to David Stannard's American Holocaust, 50% of African deaths
   (10 million) occurred in Africa as a result of wars between native
   kingdoms, which produced the majority of slaves. This includes not only
   those who died in battles, but also those who died as a result of
   forced marches from inland areas to slave ports on the various coasts.
   The practice of enslaving enemy combatants and their villages was
   widespread throughout Western and West Central Africa, although wars
   were rarely started to procure slaves. The slave trade was largely a
   by-product of tribal and state warfare as a way of removing potential
   dissidents after victory or financing future wars. However, some
   African groups proved particularly adept and brutal at the practice of
   enslaving such as Kaabu, Asanteman, Dahomey, the Aro Confederacy and
   the Imbangala war bands.

Port factories

   After being marched to the coast for sale, Africans waited in large
   forts called factories. The amount of time in factories varied, but
   Milton Meltzer's Slavery: A World History states this process resulted
   in 4.5% of deaths during the Trans-Atlantic slave trade. In other
   words, around 900,000 Africans would have died in ports such as
   Benguela, Elmina and Bonny.

Atlantic shipment

   After being captured and held in the factories, slaves entered the
   infamous Middle Passage. Meltzer's research puts this phase of the
   slave trade's overall mortality at 12.5%. Around 2.5 million Africans
   died during these voyages where they were packed into tight, unsanitary
   spaces on ships for months at time. Measures were taken to stem the
   onboard mortality rate such as mandatory dancing above deck and the
   practice of force-feeding any slaves that attempted to starve
   themselves. The conditions on board also resulted in the spread of
   fatal diseases. Other fatalities were the result of suicides by jumping
   over board by slaves who could no longer endure the conditions .

Seasoning camps

   Meltzer also states that 33% of Africans would have died in the first
   year at seasoning camps found throughout the Caribbean. Many slaves
   shipped directly to North America bypassed this process; however most
   slaves (destined for island or South American plantations) were likely
   to be put through this ordeal. The slaves were tortured for the purpose
   of "breaking" them (like the practice of breaking horses) and
   conditioning them to their new lot in life. Jamaica held one of the
   most notorious of these camps. All in all, 6.6 million Africans died in
   these camps reducing the final number of Africans to about 10 million.

European competition

   Reproduction of a handbill advertising a slave auction in Charleston,
   South Carolina, in 1769.
   Reproduction of a handbill advertising a slave auction in Charleston,
   South Carolina, in 1769.

   The trade of enslaved Africans in the Atlantic has its origins in the
   explorations of Portuguese mariners down the coast of West Africa in
   the 15th century. Before that, contact with African slave markets was
   made to ransom portuguese that had been captured by the intense North
   African pirate attacks to the portuguese ships and costal villages,
   frequently leaving them depopulated. The first Europeans to use African
   slaves in the New World were the Spaniards who sought auxiliaries for
   their conquest expeditions and laborers on islands such as Cuba and
   Hispaniola (mod. Haiti-Dominican Republic) where the alarming decline
   in the native population had spurred the first royal laws protecting
   the native population (Laws of Burgos, 1512-1513). After Portugal had
   succeeded in establishing sugar plantations (engenhos) in northern
   Brazil ca. 1545, Portuguese merchants on the West African coast began
   to supply enslaved Africans to the sugar planters there. While at first
   these planters relied almost exclusively on the native Tupani for slave
   labor, a titantic shift toward Africans took place after 1570 following
   a series of epidemics which decimated the already destabilized Tupani
   communities. By 1630, Africans had replaced the Tupani as the largest
   contingent of labor on Brazilian sugar plantations, heralding equally
   the final collapse of the European medieval household tradition of
   slavery, the rise of Brazil as the largest single destination for
   enslaved Africans and sugar as the reason that roughly 84% of these
   Africans were shipped to the New World.

   Merchants from various European nations were later involved in the
   Atlantic Slave trade: Portugal, Spain, France, England, Scotland,
   Germany, Denmark, Holland. As Britain rose in naval power and settled
   continental north America and some islands of the West Indies, they
   became the leading slave traders, mostly operating out of Bristol and
   Liverpool. By the late 17th century, one out of every four ships that
   left Liverpool harbour was a slave trading ship. Other British cities
   also profited from the slave trade. Birmingham, the largest gun
   producing town in Britain at the time, supplied guns to be traded for
   slaves. 75% of all sugar produced in the plantations came to London to
   supply the highly lucrative coffee houses there.

Slavery and Christianity

   In general, early Christians, such as Paul, St. Augustine, or St.
   Thomas Aquinas did not oppose slavery. Pope Nicholas V even encouraged
   enslaving non-Christian Africans in his Papal Bull Romanus Pontifex of
   1454. Since then other popes stated that slavery was against Christian
   teachings, as is now generally held. Even earlier, in 1435, Pope Eugene
   IV condemned the enslavement of the inhabitants of the Canary Islands.
   A list of papal statements against slavery (and also claims that the
   popes nonetheless owned and bought slaves) is found in the discussion
   Christianity and Slavery.

   Most Christian sects found some way to soothe the consciences of their
   slaveowning members. One notable exception was the Society of Friends (
   Quakers), who advocated the abolition of slavery from earliest times.

New World destinations

   African slaves were brought to Europe and the Americas to supply cheap
   labour. Central America only imported around 200,000. Europe topped
   this number at 300,000, North America, however, imported 500,000. The
   Caribbean was the second largest consumer of slave labour at 4 million.
   South America, with Brazil taking most of the slaves, imported 4.5
   million before the end of slavery.

Economics of slavery

   Slavery was involved in some of the most profitable industries in
   history. 70% of the slaves brought to the new world were used to
   produce sugar, the most labour intensive crop. The rest were employed
   harvesting coffee, cotton, and tobacco, and in some cases in mining.
   The West Indian colonies of the European powers were some of their most
   important possessions, so they went to extremes to protect and retain
   them. For example, at the end of the Seven Years' War in 1763, France
   agreed to cede the vast territory of New France to the victors in
   exchange for keeping the minute Antillian island of Guadeloupe.

   Slave trade profits have been the object of many fantasies. Returns for
   the investors were not actually absurdly high (around 6% in France in
   the eighteenth century), but they were higher than domestic
   alternatives (in the same century, around 5%). Risks—maritime and
   commercial—were important for individual voyages. Investors mitigated
   it by buying small shares of many ships at the same time. In that way,
   they were able to diversify a large part of the risk away. Between
   voyages, ship shares could be freely sold and bought. All these made
   the slave trade a very interesting investment.

   By far the most successful West Indian colonies in 1800 belonged to the
   United Kingdom. After entering the sugar colony business late, British
   naval supremacy and control over key islands such as Jamaica, Trinidad,
   and Barbados and the territory of British Guiana gave it an important
   edge over all competitors; while many British did not make gains, some
   made enormous fortunes, even by upper class standards. This advantage
   was reinforced when France lost its most important colony, St.
   Dominigue (western Hispaniola, now Haiti), to a slave revolt in 1791
   and supported revolts against its rival Britain, after the 1793 French
   revolution in the name of liberty (but in fact opportunistic
   selectivity). Before 1791, British sugar had to be protected to compete
   against cheaper French sugar. After 1791, the British islands produced
   the most sugar, and the British people quickly became the largest
   consumers of sugar. West Indian sugar became ubiquitous as an additive
   to Indian tea. Products of American slave labour soon permeated every
   level of British society with tobacco, coffee, and especially sugar all
   becoming indispensable elements of daily life for all classes.

Effects

Effect on the economy of Africa

   Cowrie shells were used as money in the slave trade
   Cowrie shells were used as money in the slave trade

   No scholars dispute the harm done to the slaves themselves, but the
   effect of the trade on African societies is much debated due to the
   apparent influx of capital to Africans. Proponents of the slave trade,
   such as Archibald Dalzel, argued that African societies were robust and
   not much affected by the ongoing trade. In the 19th century, European
   abolitionists, most prominently Dr. David Livingston, took the opposite
   view arguing that the fragile local economy and societies were being
   severely harmed by the ongoing trade. This view continued with scholars
   until the 1960s and 70s such as Basil Davidson, who conceded it might
   have had some benefits while still acknowledging its largely negative
   impact on Africa. Historian Walter Rodney estimates that by c.1770, the
   King of Dahomey was earning an estimated £250,000 per year by selling
   captive African soldiers and even his own people to the European
   slave-traders. Most of this money was spent on British-made firearms
   (of very poor quality) and industrial-grade alcohol.

Effects on Europe’s Economy

   Eric Williams has attempted to show the contribution of Africans on the
   basis of profits from the slave trade and slavery, and the employment
   of those profits to finance England’s industrialization process. He
   argues that the enslavement of Africans was an essential element to the
   Industrial Revolution, and that European wealth is a result of slavery.
   However, he argued that by the time of its abolition it had lost its
   profitability and it was in Britain's economic interest to ban it. Most
   modern scholars disagree with this view. Seymour Dreshcer and Robert
   Antsey have both presented evidence that the slave trade remained
   profitable until the end, and that reasons other than economics led to
   its cessation. Joseph Inikori has shown elsewhere that the British
   slave trade was more profitable than the critics of Williams would want
   us to believe. Nevertheless, the profits of the slave trade and of West
   Indian plantations amounted to less than 5% of the British economy at
   the time of the Industrial Revolution.

Demographics

   The demographic effects of the slave trade are some of the most
   controversial and debated issues. Tens of millions of people were
   removed from Africa via the slave trade, and what effect this had on
   Africa is an important question. Walter Rodney argued that the export
   of so many people had been a demographic disaster and had left Africa
   permanently disadvantaged when compared to other parts of the world,
   and largely explains that continent's continued poverty. He presents
   numbers that show that Africa's population stagnated during this
   period, while that of Europe and Asia grew dramatically. According to
   Rodney all other areas of the economy were disrupted by the slave trade
   as the top merchants abandoned traditional industries to pursue slaving
   and the lower levels of the population were disrupted by the slaving
   itself.

   Others have challenged this view. Joseph E. Inikori argues the history
   of the region shows that the effects were still quite deleterious. He
   argues that the African economic model of the period was very different
   from the European, and could not sustain such population losses.
   Population reductions in certain areas also led to widespread problems.
   Inikori also notes that after the suppression of the slave trade
   Africa's population almost immediately began to rapidly increase, even
   prior to the introduction of modern medicines. Ideology versus the
   Tyranny of Paradigm: Historians and the Impact of the Atlantic Slave
   Trade on African Societies, by Joseph E. Inikori African Economic
   History. 1994. Shahadah also states that the trade was not only of
   demographic significance, in aggregate population losses but also in
   the profound changes to settlement patterns, epidemiological exposure
   and reproductive and social development potential..

Legacy of racism

   Maulana Karenga states that the effects of slavery where 'the morally
   monstrous destruction of human possibility involved redefining African
   humanity to the world, poisoning past, present and future relations
   with others who only know us through this stereotyping and thus
   damaging the truly human relations among peoples.' He cites that it
   constituted the destruction of culture, language, religion and human
   possibility.

End of the Atlantic slave trade

   François-Dominique Toussaint L'Ouverture
   François-Dominique Toussaint L'Ouverture

   Virtually every major reform pertaining to the abolition of the slave
   trade and slavery took place in the immediate aftermath of a major
   armed rebellion and/or victory by enslaved or formerly enslaved
   Africans. Although in Britain, the U.S. and in other parts of Europe,
   moral, economic and political opposition developed against the slave
   trade, this was largely ineffective unless combined with the political
   factor of African rebellions. The single most significant event in the
   history of the abolition of the Atlantic slave trade and slavery was
   the Haitian Revolution, ( 1791- 1804), led by Toussaint L'Ouverture and
   Jean-Jacques Dessalines (later Jacques I). Prior to the Haitian
   Revolution there were no major reversals in the centuries-old trend of
   an increasing trade in Africans across the Atlantic. After the Haitian
   Revolution, there was an immediate, terminal and rapid decline. This is
   because the Haitian Revolution and other uprisings created such
   significant military and political fears and costs for the
   European/American colonial powers that the continued importation of an
   African population became unsustainable, as the fears and costs
   outweighed stability and profitability.

   In Great Britain, led by the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) and
   establishment Evangelicals such as William Wilberforce, the
   Abolitionist movement was joined by many and began to protest against
   the trade, but until the Haitian revolution, they were successfully
   opposed by the owners of the colonial holdings. Denmark, which had been
   very active in the slave trade, was the first country to ban the trade
   through legislation in 1792 - one year after the start of the
   victorious insurrection in Saint-Domingue (modern day Haiti). Denmark's
   legislation only took effect in 1803, as the Haitian Revolution moved
   towards its final victory. Britain banned the slave trade in 1807],
   imposing stiff fines for any slave found aboard a British ship, just
   three years after the final victory of the slave rebellion in Haiti.
   The Royal Navy, which then controlled the world's seas, moved to stop
   other nations from filling Britain's place in the slave trade and
   declared that slaving was equal to piracy and was punishable by death.


   The United States outlawed the importation of slaves on January 1,
   1808, the earliest date permitted by the constitution for such a ban.

   For the British to end the slave trade, significant obstacles had to be
   overcome. In the 18th century, the slave trade was an integral part of
   the Atlantic economy: the economies of the European colonies in the
   Caribbean, the American colonies, and Brazil required vast amounts of
   man power to harvest the bountiful agricultural goods. In 1790, the
   British West Indies islands such as Jamaica and Barbados had a slave
   population of 524,000 while the French had 643,000 in their West Indian
   possessions. Other powers such as Spain, the Netherlands, and Denmark
   had many slaves in their colonies as well.

   Despite these high populations more slaves were always required because
   harsh conditions and demographic imbalances left the slave population
   with fertility levels well below what was necessary to replenish or
   increase the labour force. Between 1600 and 1800, the English imported
   around 1.7 million slaves to their West Indian possessions. That there
   were well over a million fewer slaves in the British colonies than had
   been imported to them means that the African population of the British
   West Indian colonies had, in effect, declined by two-thirds during the
   slave-trading period. This not only illustrates the conditions which
   the African labourers endured, it also puts paid to the myth that
   Africans were somehow 'immune' to ill-treatment in comparison to the
   exterminated aboriginal population. The continued importation of
   Africans by the colonial powers was not the result of African
   'immunity' to ill-treatment, but rather of the availability of a supply
   of abduction victims in Africa.

British influence

   After the total victory of the Haitian Revolution in 1804, the British
   realised it was a military necessity to prevent the importation of
   potential African insurgents into the Caribbean. However, in order to
   maintain the economic competitiveness of their colonies, they were also
   compelled to induce other colonial and slave-trading powers to do the
   same. Therefore, the British campaign against the slave trade by other
   nations was an unprecedented foreign policy effort. Denmark, a small
   player in the international slave trade, and the United States (which
   also had a deep fear of African insurrection) banned the trade during
   the same period as Great Britain. Other small trading nations that did
   not have a great deal to give up, such as Sweden, quickly followed
   suit, as did the Dutch, who were also by then a minor player.

   Four nations objected strongly to surrendering their rights to trade
   slaves: Spain, Portugal, Brazil (after its independence), and France.
   Britain used every tool at its disposal to try to induce these nations
   to follow its lead. Portugal and Spain, which were indebted to Britain
   after the Napoleonic Wars, slowly agreed to accept large cash payments
   to first reduce and then eliminate the slave trade. By 1853, the
   British government had paid Portugal over three million pounds and
   Spain over one million pounds in order to end the slave trade. Portugal
   had abolished slavery on the February 12, 1761; from this date onwards
   any slave entering in Portugal would be given freedom. However, the
   banning of slavery in the Portuguese colonies faced much opposition by
   the plantation owners who would have their profits reduced, and the law
   that was being enforced in Portugal did not take effect in the colonies
   where it faced opposition. Brazil, however, even after its
   independence, did not agree to stop trading in slaves until Britain
   took military action against its coastal areas and threatened a
   permanent blockade of the nation's ports in 1852. Criminals from
   England, transported to Australia from 1788 as convicts, were used as
   slaves until they attained freedom at the end of their sentences.

   For France, the British first tried to impose a solution during the
   negotiations at the end of the Napoleonic Wars, but Russia and Austria
   did not agree. The French people and government had deep misgivings
   about conceding to Britain's demands. Britain demanded that other
   nations ban the slave trade and that they had the right to police the
   ban with units such as the West Africa Squadron. The Royal Navy had to
   be granted permission to search any suspicious ships and seize any
   found to be carrying slaves, or equipped for doing so. It is especially
   these conditions that kept France involved in the slave trade for so
   long. While France formally agreed to ban the trading of slaves in
   1815, they did not allow Britain to police the ban, nor did they do
   much to enforce it themselves. Thus a large illegal market in slaves
   continued for many years. While the French people had originally been
   as opposed to the slave trade as the British, it became a matter of
   national pride that they not allow their policies to be dictated to
   them by Britain. Also such a reformist movement was viewed as tainted
   by the conservative backlash after the French Revolution. The French
   slave trade thus did not end until 1848.

Apologies

   At the 2001 World Conference Against Racism in Durban South Africa,
   African nations demanded a clear apology for the slavery from the
   former slave-trading countries. Some EU nations were ready to express
   an apology, but the opposition, mainly from the United Kingdom, Spain,
   Netherlands, Portugal, and the United States blocked attempts to do so.
   A fear of monetary compensation was one of the reasons for the
   opposition. Apologies on behalf of African nations, for their role in
   trading their countrymen into slavery, also remains an open issue, too
   uncomfortable and politically inconvenient to address.

   On November 27^th, 2006, Tony Blair made a partial apology for
   Britain's role in the African slavery trade. However African rights
   activists denounced it as "empty rhetoric" that failed to address the
   issue properly. They feel his apology stopped shy to prevent any legal
   retort.. Mr Blair again said sorry on March 14^th, 2007

   On February 24, 2007 the Virginia General Assembly passed House Joint
   Resolution Number 728 acknowledging "with profound regret the
   involuntary servitude of Africans and the exploitation of Native
   Americans, and call for reconciliation among all Virginians."

   With the passing of this resolution, Virginia becomes the first of the
   50 united states to acknowledge through the states governing body their
   states negative involvement in slavery. The passing of this resolution
   comes on the heels of the 400th anniversary celebration of the city of
   Jamestown, Virginia, which was the first permanent English colony in
   what would become the United States to survive, Jamestown is also
   recognized as one of the first slave ports of the American colonies.

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