3.1 Slavery and Emancipation
Talking about racial discrimination, slavery must be mentioned as a very important factor. Racism in the United States can be traced back to 17th century. It was long rooted in this nation’s country. At that time, the black American were slaves in the plantations. They have no social status, payroll, and welfare. People showed no mercy to the blacks. Hence, racism was deeply in white people’s mind. In the past, slavery was regarded as reasonable and acceptable.
In August, 1619, about twenty black people were brought to America from Africa by a Dutch Captain. That was the beginning of the “Black Immigration”. At first, they were not regarded as slaves or servants, instead they were average workers. The English settlers hired them and paid them salaries. That is to say, the black workers’ social status was equal to that of white workers. Then the white settlers and planters changed their mind and decided to set up slavery system. They were driven by interest and the harsh environment. The first immigrants found it quite difficult for them to survive if they were separated from the civilization society. The most important thing is that what they really need are not tools, technology or savings but human resources. We can imagine that in primitive society, more men were needed to do everything, like building houses and plowing the arable land. Security was also needed to protect themselves from various dangers. More human resources were also involved to set up an army. In this case, just like the old saying,“Many hands make light work”. With the booming immigration wave, the demand of cheap labor was growing. In that background, slavery emerged as the times required. Most of the slaves were black and they lived a pitiful life because they worked more than 19 hours without fair welfare. It was because the white people looked down all the blacks at that time They viewed them as animals because of their black skin. Professor Gao Chunchang once stated in his book, “ When the information of Africa was brought into Britain, Africans’ black color skin became the focus. (高长春,2000:27). From another perspective, the black people were underdog both in economic and military aspects. So they could not beat white army. In the colonial era, the power overshadowed the dignity of the weak. The ruling race’s aesthetic standard became the reason of enslaving the other races. (高春常, 2000:35). In the first half of the 19th century, the American people carried out extensive movement against slavery. Anti-slavery movements were widely popular since 1930s. In the 1940s, the number of the abolitionist group reached 2000. In spite of the powerful suppression and persecution, the abolitionists still worked on their goal.