Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and Race in New England, 1780-1860 [Paperback]

Joanne Pope Melish (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0801484375 | ISBN-13: 978-0801484377 | Publication Date: November 2000

Following the abolition of slavery in New England, white citizens seemed to forget that it had ever existed there. Drawing on a wide array of primary sources--from slaveowners' diaries to children's daybooks to racist broadsides--Joanne Pope Melish reveals not only how northern society changed but how its perceptions changed, and how the collective amnesia about local slavery's existence became a significant component of New England regional identity. 9 photos.

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 296 pages
• Publisher: Cornell Univ Pr (November 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0801484375
• ISBN-13: 978-0801484377
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #141,746 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The legacy of northern slavery, October 15, 2001

By 

Sandra Parke Topolski (New Albany, Indiana United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and Race in New England, 1780-1860 (Paperback)

In Disowning Slavery, Joanne Pope Melish strongly refutes the myth of a free New England, untainted by slavery and racial disharmony. While slavery did not exist in either quantity or duration on a scale comparable to the South, Melish conclusively shows that it existed in the northern states well into the 19th century, and argues that it was an important component of New England's economic success. Like feminist historians who have argued that women's domestic labor was crucial if men were to be able to engage in economic activity outside the home, Melish shows that as domestic servants and agricultural laborers, slaves performed the drudgework that Yankee entrepreneurs would otherwise have been employed in. Because such urban entrepreneur slaveowners were a small (though influential) percentage of the population, slavery was allowed to gradually die out in New England, most often through judicial interpretation. Gradual emancipation meant that there were few great political battles over ending slavery in the North, allowing New Englanders to erase their memories of its very existence.

However, because slavery was allowed to die without the benefit of public debate and legislative control, freedmen's legal and social status was never clearly defined, nor was the means by which former slaves were to be integrated into free society. Whites were able to congratulate themselves on their moral superiority as free societies without having to concern themselves with the welfare of now-emancipated slaves. In turning their backs on the problems of freedmen trying to adjust to their new status, they prevented blacks from becoming full members of their communities. They saw proof of blacks' inability to provide for themselves as an insurmountable racial characteristic even as whites refused to provide economic or legal opportunities that would have allowed former slaves to improve their condition. Over time such self-reinforcing racial attitudes grew into a fully developed philosophy of racism, embellished by exaggerated depictions of black caricatures in the popular culture of the North.

Indeed, Melish cites a vast array of cultural documents (popular literature, newspaper editorials, plays, and pop art) to demonstrate New Englanders' racist attitudes. Her narrative also amply demonstrates how the process of gradual emancipation allowed the North to forget that slavery had ever been part of their society, leading to their smug moral superiority. However, neither her evidence nor her reasoning adequately explains why it was necessary for Northerners to adopt racist attitudes. It does not seem that the limited number of freed blacks in the North were a significant economic or social threat to whites; there seem to be no concrete reasons for the development of racist attitudes, especially considering how committed many northern whites were to ending slavery in the South for moral reasons. Melish seems satisfied to accept that people have a natural need to define themselves by creating an "other" as a point of (negative) comparison; her work would be greatly enhanced by exploring the reasons that this might be so.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A timely book, December 20, 2008

By 

Truthwillfreeus (Missionary in Hungary from USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and Race in New England, 1780-1860 (Paperback)

This is a timely book along with some others being researched and written now. It was not easy to read but contains documented historically acurate information unlike much of the history of the North that has been written in the past. It is enlightening to read the truth about Yankee slavery. This book and some others like it if taught as real history in our schools and universities could lead to bring Americans closer together as the truth, no matter how bad or humbling, can do if we humble ourselves and accept it. We can see from this book that people in both the South and the North were guilty and that most of them ,in the North, weren't ending slavery really for the benefit of the the African Slave but to get rid of the Africans and return to a white and specifically New England America.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars How we got to where we are, October 17, 2008

By 

Linda Pagliuco "katknit" (CT, United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and Race in New England, 1780-1860 (Paperback)

Over the past few years, general interest in the subject of slavery in the northern US has been growing. Books such as Complicity and Inheriting the Trade have done much to bring attention to this previously under-researched area of American History. In Disowning Slavery, author Mellish takes a look at the abolition movement before and immediately after the civil war, at how the reality of emancipation affected the lives of the people who were now "free".

This book requires patience and concentration, as much of the narrative necessarily focuses upon legal documentation. But careful reading pays off. Mellish makes clear the inability of northerners to grasp the concept of sharing "their" country with the population of the previously enslaved. Indeed, she shows that the identity of "slave" adhered to black persons no matter were they freeborn or emancipated. Abraham Lincoln has been widely criticized for his proposal that former slaves be moved back to Africa, but, according to this body of research, recolonization was held to be the best solution by countless others. These and other deeply embedded attitudes form the underpinnings of America's racial status today.

To read Disowning Slavery is to come to a better understanding of the appalling racial situation that persisted in the US for a century. It isn't pretty, but it is essential to know where we were, and why we were there, in order to bring ourselves to a better place.