American Slavery, American Freedom, Book Review Example

Morgan’s book provides narratives pertaining to the consolidation of power in North America. He examines how the meaning of freedom transformed with respect to the poor whites, American natives, the wealthy Americans, Africans, and their descendants. The book entails a small history of colonial Virginia. In order to bring out the point clearly, he uses two narratives in his book. These narratives are mainly the ascendancy and declension. Morgan’s book is about Virginians in that it portrays how the revolutionary leaders advocated for liberty whilst upholding the system of slavery. The book focuses on how lack of freedom superseded racial slavery. Morgan also discloses the role played by racial slavery in solving the problems affecting the poor whites in Virginia. Morgan’s arguments throughout his book try to explain on factors that led to the revolution of America with respect to humanity, economic, and political aspects. In his book, Morgan highlights on slavery and freedom of the American people. Morgan captivates us with the depth of the consequences of slavery in by enumerating on the ordeal of the colonial Virginia. This book highlights on the impact of the colonial experience in the American nation especially in the context of Virginia State. It is important to note from the Author’s explanations that because of slavery and infringed freedom, is the impetus of the current political system realignments. In his book, he highlights on the establishment of the utopian communities owing to the British governance that laid much emphasis on the rights of all men. Morgan points out the American slavery as the genesis of racism and segregation that deters the world development today. He explains how the early English explorers brought about revolutions among other aspects that enhance growth and development of nations and personalities.

The book explains how aspects such as poverty that undermine human dignity accrued during the slavery era. In his book, Morgan also captures the manner in which the colonialists brought about revolution in many aspects such as agricultural and industrial revolutions. He explains how the aspects of competition, labor, and crop production stepped up during the colonization period. He cites how the aspect of settlement improved leading to the growth of new cash crops such as Tobacco. The aspect of slavery in this case took center stage. Morgan explains how the planters infringed the freedom of slaves by treating them poorly whilst disregarding their interests. Morgan’s strength is exhibited by how he vividly explains the undermining of human dignity. The importation of African slaves and the indenturing is a clear indication. It emerges from the book that the freedom of the Englishmen at the expense of the natives led to the daunting poverty of the Virginia state. This led to the segregation based on social class differences. Morgan also explains how lack of political participation by the slaves provided roots for republicanism. The manner in which the poor were subdued out of politics intrigues the readers of Morgan’s book. The one weakness that emerges out of Morgan’s book is his failure to capture how the human injustices can be alleviated. Morgan should have provided suggestions that warrant enactment to curb injustices against the weak and the poor in the society. Morgan would have provided such remedies since the subject matter of his book dealt with the slavery and freedom infringement. Around 1670s, enslaving of Africans was a rampant activity. Morgan tells of how Virginia residents became rich and gathered so much wealth. Armed with capital, they could now get cheap labor to facilitate their plantation farming. During this time, ‘life expectancy’ shot up tremendously, forcing people to engage in cost effective acquisition of servants. Ironically, former English slaves had become too rebellious to an extent that they incensed the natives. This, he says coupled with allowing poor citizens to gain economic independence did not go down well with the leaders.

He goes on to argue that these leaders knew that the moment they get economic freedom, controlling them would be even harder. Blacks and very poor white men started to form friendships, since they all served the same common interest. ‘Alarmed’ by sudden turn of events, the natives set out to ‘reverse’ things in their favor. This happened after they already slapped restrictive measures on African imports. Virginia leaders hence made tremendous efforts in making discriminative gestures against blacks by using racist coded messages. This was a blessing for low class white people. They were given opportunities to rise up the social and economic ladder. What was important to them he says, was unity, and necessarily not classes based on economic power. These events occurred at the same time England was endorsing legislations regarding respect for rights of Englishmen.

Morgan goes on to say that, English legislations on human rights were helpful in protecting poor whites yet it also condemned blacks to slavery and allowed the white people to be on the same platform both socially and politically. Allowing whites political involvement gave Republicanism a stepping-stone, though this progress was greatly hampered by poverty. Votes during these times were used as collaterals for borrowing money from creditors. Racism therefore continued to be used as a way to separate the rich from the poor. Economic gains made the poor blacks to be locked out of politics entirely, giving more power to Republicans who continuously showed their dislike for slaves. The spirit behind Republicans love for slavery can hence be seen as a blatant method of suppressing landless poor people in Virginia.

Morgan who is a great historian, tries to tell us about ’freedom’ during the colonization of America in his book. He did well to bring out the timeline of events and his method of doing it is wonderful. He deserves credit for a well-written story. His mention of Englishmen in the 16^th Century depicts the differences between them and the Spanish in the New World is a good piece of writing. He continues to mention of how the Spanish cruelly enslaved Indians and Africans. Morgan states, that Englishmen see themselves as slave liberators for the Africans and Indians who co-existed together peacefully. From my point of view, his written work is a clear demonstration of his vast knowledge and cutting-edge research on American history.