History of slavery in California

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Ruins of Mission San Luis Rey and a residence with a tule-thatched awning (1887) The Open court (1887) (14782321805).jpg
Ruins of Mission San Luis Rey and a residence with a tule-thatched awning (1887)

The history of slavery in California began with the enslavement of Indigenous Californians under Spanish colonial rule. The arrival of the Spanish colonists introduced chattel slavery and involuntary servitude to the area. Over 90,000 Indigenous peoples were forced to stay at the Spanish missions in California between 1770 and 1834, being kept in well-guarded mission compounds. This has been described as de facto slavery, [1] as they were forced to work on the mission's grounds amid abuse, malnourishment, overworking, [2] and a high death rate. [3] Indigenous girls were taken from their parents to be housed in guarded dormitories known as monjeríos for conversion to Catholicism and control over their sexuality. [4] [5]

Contents

White colonists from the Southern and Eastern United States brought their systems of organized slavery to California. Several thousand [6] free and enslaved people of African ancestry were part of the California Gold Rush (1848–1855). Some were able to buy their freedom and freedom for their families, primarily in the South, with the gold they found. [7] [8] [9] This included enslaved African American Edmond Edward Wysinger (1816–1891). After arriving in the Northern mine area of the California Mother Lode with his slaver in 1849, Wysinger and a group of 100 or more African American miners surface mined in and around Mormon, Mokelumne Hill at Placerville, and Grass Valley. [10]

Spanish missionaries (1769–1820)

The Spanish first began to settle in The Californias in 1769, founding the first Spanish mission, Missión San Diego de Alcalá. [11] They also established four military installations throughout California, including el Presidio Real de San Carlos de Monterey, el Presidio Real de San Diego, el Presidio Real de San Francisco, and el Presidio Real de Santa Bárbara.

The padres would often baptize Native Californian villages en masse and relocate them to the missions, where they would work either voluntarily or by force from location to location. To the padres, the Native Californians were newly baptized members of the Catholic Church and were treated with varying amounts of respect, depending on the priest in question. Many of the soldiers, however, saw them solely as manpower to be exploited. The soldiers would force the Native Californians to perform most of the manual labor needed in their fortresses, and often raped the women of their villages. [12] There was multiple recorded uprisings by the Native Californians, both violent and nonviolent. [13]

Mexico and Alta California history (1821–1846)

Mexico gained its independence from Spain, and from 1821 to 1846 California (called Alta California by 1824) was under Mexican rule. The Mexican National Congress passed the Colonization Act of 1824 in which large sections of unoccupied land were granted to individuals, and in 1833 the government secularized missions and consequently many civil authorities at the time confiscated the land from the missions for themselves. [12] These two acts aided in the creation of a ranchos system that required a large labor force to maintain. Essentially the entire economy shifted from work on the missions to work on large land estates of wealthy Mexicans. A system was devised where it was virtually cost free to utilize indigenous labor; workers were exchanged between ranchos and essentially became indentured servants.

Most of the future western United States, roughly south of 42 degrees North latitude and from California eastward to Texas, the Oklahoma Panhandle and southwestern Kansas, was part of the Viceroyalty of New Spain and, thus, became part of Mexico upon independence from Spain in 1821.

President Vicente Guerrero, who was of Spanish, African and Native American descent, abolished slavery within Mexico in 1829. This law was intended by its proponents as a counter-measure against settlement by Americans, who used slave labor in their Texas cotton plantations. This did not stop Americans from moving into the Mexican province of "Tejas". Instead, by 1832, American settlement in Texas reached sufficient critical mass to declare and win independence from Mexico as the Republic of Texas. The annexation of Texas by the United States in 1845 precipitated the Mexican–American War, which resulted in California becoming American territory.

Early California and Gold Rush (1847–1855)

With the 1848 defeat of Mexico, California and other Mexican territories were ceded to United States rule (the Mexican Cession) under the terms of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which ended the war.

Enslavement of indigenous peoples

Between 1846 and 1855, the Native population decreased by two-thirds and in order to craft California's own code of labor, the Act for the Government and Protection of Indians was passed in 1850 which "legally" curtailed the rights of the Indigenous. [14] Within this Act, Native children could be obtained for indenture, convicted Native American could be hired out of jail and Indians could not testify for or against whites. This legalized a form of slavery, of forced labor in California. 24,000 to 27,000 Californian Natives were taken as forced laborers by settlers including 4,000 to 7,000 children. [15] Between 1851 and 1852, three Indigenous commissioners negotiated treaties with the Natives and eventually eighteen were written, allocating 7.5% of the state as Native American reservations. The United States Senate rejected these treaties and about a year later in 1853, the government designed its own five reservations. These reservations had very poor living conditions and displaced many of the Native Californians from their native lands. There were not enough resources to sustain the Native tribes being forced onto them. Native Californians found themselves struggling to survive from disease and starvation on the foreign land. [16]

Enslavement of African Americans

During this time, the 30-state nation was divided equally between 15 free states and 15 slave states. With the addition of vast new, agriculturally rich territories, including California, the debate over slavery intensified dramatically. California itself was divided over the issue, as a large number of slave-owning Southerners had travelled to California to seek their fortunes [17] in the 1849 Gold Rush, and many brought their slaves. [9] Many miners expressed concern that slaveholders accompanied by slaves had an unfair advantage in the mining camps and that slavery's inherent inequality violated "the independent entrepreneurial sprit of the mines". [18] However, taking slaves into California, which had no laws or enforcement mechanisms for maintaining the institution, turned out to be quite risky for the slave owners themselves. The territory had no slave patrols, nor local police interested in maintaining slavery, so slave escapes were quite common. [19]

In October 1849, the first California Constitution Convention was held. One of the most heated debates of the convention was on the status of slavery in the new state. [20] While some Southerners who had come to California were staunchly in favor of giving official sanction to slavery in California, Northern abolitionists and White-American miners (who did not want competition from the slave-holders in the gold fields) were well represented within the ranks of the convention. The chairman of the convention, William Gwin, was himself a slaveholder from Tennessee. Gwin, however, was much more interested in gaining control of the California Democratic Party than he was in favoring either side of the debate.[ citation needed ] To the later chagrin of his fellow Southern members of Congress, he did not write the institution of slavery into the 1849 Constitution. The Compromise of 1850 later permitted California to be admitted to the Union as a free state. Gwin and war hero/abolitionist John C. Frémont became California's first Senators.

Although California entered the Union as a free state, the framers of the state constitution wrote into law the systematic denial of suffrage and other civil rights to non-white citizens. Some authorities went so far as to attempt to deny entry of all African Americans, free and slave, to California. The Legislature passed a bill that would ban the immigration of free blacks to California. State Senator David C. Broderick, a fierce opponent of slavery and former firefighter from San Francisco, managed to kill the bill through parliamentary maneuver.

Slavery did persist in California even without legal authority. Some slaveowners simply refused to notify their slaves of the prohibition, and continued to trade slaves within the state. Numerous state trials ruled in the favor of emancipation.

A backlash against these legal wins for the free black community in California whipped up in the State government; the Chinese Exclusion Act was also being debated at that time. Fearful of the hostile maneuvers against them, over 700 African Americans left California in a mass exodus via steam ship for the women and children and mass cavalcade for the men to Victoria, Canada, and the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush.

Civil War (1861–1865)

During the American Civil War, clergyman and politician Thomas Starr King was a fervent speaker, he spoke in favor of the Union and was credited by Abraham Lincoln with preventing California from becoming a separate republic. [25] At the urging of activist and writer Jessie Benton Frémont, Starr King teamed up with writer Bret Harte. [26] Starr King read Harte's patriotic poems at pro-Union speeches. [26] Starr King also raised $1 million in fundraising for Union soldiers, California's largest charity effort during this war. [25]

Slavery was, for the most part, abolished in all states under the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which took effect on 18 December 1865.

Related Research Articles

Human history in California began when indigenous Americans first arrived some 13,000 years ago. Coastal exploration by the Spanish began in the 16th century, with further European settlement along the coast and in the inland valleys following in the 18th century. California was part of New Spain until that kingdom dissolved in 1821, becoming part of Mexico until the Mexican–American War (1846–1848), when it was ceded to the United States under the terms of the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. The same year, the California gold rush began, triggering intensified U.S. westward expansion. California joined the Union as a free state via the Compromise of 1850. By the end of the 19th century, California was still largely rural and agricultural, with a population of about 1.4 million.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slavery in the colonial history of the United States</span>

The institution of slavery in the European colonies in North America, which eventually became part of the United States of America, developed due to a combination of factors. Primarily, the labor demands for establishing and maintaining European colonies resulted in the Atlantic slave trade. Slavery existed in every European colony in the Americas during the early modern period, and both Africans and indigenous peoples were targets of enslavement by Europeans during the era.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Colonial Brazil</span> 1500–1815 Portuguese possession in South America

Colonial Brazil comprises the period from 1500, with the arrival of the Portuguese, until 1815, when Brazil was elevated to a kingdom in union with Portugal. During the 300 years of Brazilian colonial history, the main economic activities of the territory were based first on brazilwood extraction, which gave the territory its name; sugar production ; and finally on gold and diamond mining. Slaves, especially those brought from Africa, provided most of the workforce of the Brazilian export economy after a brief initial period of Indigenous slavery to cut brazilwood.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slavery in colonial Spanish America</span>

Slavery in the Spanish American viceroyalties included indigenous peoples, enslaved people from Africa, and enslaved people from Asia. The economic and social institution of slavery existed throughout the Spanish Empire including Spain itself. Enslaved Africans were brought over to the continent for their labour, indigenous people were enslaved until the 1543 laws that prohibited it.

The history of California can be divided into the Native American period, the European exploration period (1542–1769), the Spanish colonial period (1769–1821), the Mexican period (1821–1848), and United States statehood. California was one of the most culturally and linguistically diverse areas in pre-Columbian North America. After contact with Spanish explorers, many of the Native Americans died from foreign diseases. Finally, in the 19th century there was a genocide by United States government and private citizens, which is known as the California genocide.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Hardeman Burnett</span> American judge, governor of California, slave owner

Peter Hardeman Burnett was an American politician who served as the first elected Governor of California from December 20, 1849, to January 9, 1851. Burnett was elected Governor almost one year before California's admission to the Union as the 31st state in September 1850.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ranchos of California</span> Land concessions by Spain and land grants by Mexico in the 18th and 19th centuries in California

In Alta California and Baja California, ranchos were concessions and land grants made by the Spanish and Mexican governments from 1775 to 1846. The Spanish Concessions of land were made to retired soldiers as an inducement for them to settle in the frontier. These Concessions reverted to the Spanish crown upon the death of the recipient.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slavery in Brazil</span>

Slavery in Brazil began long before the first Portuguese settlement. Later, colonists were heavily dependent on indigenous labor during the initial phases of settlement to maintain the subsistence economy, and natives were often captured by expeditions of bandeirantes. The importation of African slaves began midway through the 16th century, but the enslavement of indigenous peoples continued well into the 17th and 18th centuries. Europeans and Chinese were also enslaved.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slavery among Native Americans in the United States</span>

Slavery among Native Americans in the United States includes slavery by and enslavement of Native Americans roughly within what is currently the United States of America.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">European enslavement of Indigenous Americans</span>

During and after the European colonization of the Americas, European settlers practiced widespread enslavement of Indigenous peoples. In the 15th century, the Spanish introduced chattel slavery through warfare and the cooption of existing systems. A number of other European powers followed suit, and from the 15th through the 19th centuries, between two and five million Indigenous people were enslaved, which had a devastating impact on many Indigenous societies, contributing to the overwhelming population decline of Indigenous peoples in the Americas.

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Archy Lee (1840–1873), was an African American man born into enslavement; and was later part of a series of notable 19th-century court cases that defined civil rights in the state of California. In 1857, he was brought from Mississippi to Sacramento, California and continued to work as if he was enslaved. He escaped while in California, but was later arrested and brought to a few court trials. By April 14, 1858, he was legally declared a free man by the state of California. It was one of the most celebrated court cases related to slavery in the country, and was widely published.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slavery in Latin America</span>

Slavery in Latin America was an economic and social institution that existed in Latin America before the colonial era until its legal abolition in the newly independent states during the 19th century. However, it continued illegally in some regions into the 20th century. Slavery in Latin America began in the pre-colonial period when indigenous civilizations, including the Maya and Aztec, enslaved captives taken in war. After the conquest of Latin America by the Spanish and Portuguese, of the nearly 12 million slaves that were shipped across the Atlantic, over 4 million enslaved Africans were brought to Latin America. Roughly 3.5 million of those slaves were brought to Brazil.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Forced labor in California</span> Labor laws in the United States

Forced labor of Native Americans in California spanned from the Spanish missions of the 18th century to the gold rush era of the mid-19th century. Native Californians were subject to systematic exploitation, forced labor, and cultural disruption.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mormonism and slavery</span>

The Latter Day Saint movement has had varying and conflicting teachings on slavery. Early converts were initially from the Northern United States and opposed slavery, believing that their opposition was supported by Mormon scripture. After the church base moved to the slave state of Missouri and gained Southern converts, church leaders began to enslave people. New scriptures instructing Latter-Day Saints not to intervene in the lives of the enslaved people were revealed. A few enslavers joined the church, and when they moved to Nauvoo, Illinois, they illegally took their enslaved people with them, even though Illinois was a free state.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amerindian slave ownership</span> Ownership of enslaved Africans and Amerindians by Amerindians

The ownership of enslaved people by indigenous peoples of the Americas extended throughout the colonial period up to the abolition of slavery. Indigenous people enslaved Amerindians, Africans, and—occasionally—Europeans.

Slavery in New Spain was based mainly on the importation of slaves from Central Africa and West Africa to work in the colony in the enormous plantations, ranches or mining areas of the viceroyalty, since their physical constitution supposedly made them suitable for working in warm areas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">California Statehood Act</span> Federal admission act to join California to the United States

The California Statehood Act, officially An Act for the Admission of the State of California into the Union and also known as the California Admission Act, is the federal legislation that admitted California to the United States as the thirty-first state. Passed in 1850 by the 31st United States Congress, the law made California one of only a few states to become a state without first being an organized territory.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of slavery in Colorado</span>

The history of slavery in Colorado began centuries before Colorado achieved statehood when Spanish colonists of Santa Fe de Nuevo México (1598–1848) enslaved Native Americans, called Genízaros. Southern Colorado was part of the Spanish territory until 1848. Comanche and Utes raided villages of other indigenous people and enslaved them.

<i>The Other Slavery</i> 2016 book by Andrés Reséndez

The Other Slavery: The Uncovered Story of Indian Enslavement in America is a book about slavery among Native Americans and the European enslavement of Indigenous Americans. It was written by Andrés Reséndez and published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in 2016.

References

  1. ↑ "Lorenzo Asisara (b. 1819)". Annenberg Learner. Retrieved January 9, 2023. Between 1770 and 1834 over 90,000 California Indians (a third of the pre-contact population) were enslaved within the Franciscan missions.
  2. ↑ Pritzker, Barry (2000). A Native American encyclopedia : history, culture, and peoples. Barry Pritzker. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 114. ISBN   0-19-513877-5. OCLC   42683042.
  3. ↑ Encomium musicae : essays in memory of Robert J. Snow. Robert J. Snow, David Crawford, George Grayson Wagstaff. Hillsdale, NY: Pendragon Press. 2002. p. 129. ISBN   0-945193-83-1. OCLC   37418391.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  4. ↑ Vaughn, Chelsea K. (2011). "Locating Absence: The Forgotten Presence of Monjeríos in Alta California Missions". Southern California Quarterly. 93 (2): 141–174. doi:10.2307/41172570. ISSN   0038-3929. JSTOR   41172570.
  5. ↑ Raquel Casas, Maria (2005). "Victoria Reid and the Politics of Identity". Latina legacies : identity, biography, and community. Vicki Ruíz, Virginia Sánchez Korrol. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 19–38. ISBN   978-0-19-803502-2. OCLC   61330208.
  6. ↑ Another estimate is 2,500 forty-niners of African ancestry. Rawls, James, J. and Orsi, Richard (eds.) (1999), p. 5.
  7. ↑ Jason B. Johnson, "Slavery in Gold Rush Days -- New Discoveries Prompt Exhibition, Re-examination of State's Involvement," SFGate, January 27, 2007.
  8. ↑ Smith, Stacey L. (2015). Freedom's Frontier: California and the Struggle over Unfree Labor, Emancipation, and Reconstruction. University of North Carolina Press. Retrieved July 15, 2021.
  9. 1 2 Waite, Kevin (2021). West of Slavery: The Southern Dream of a Transcontinental Empire. University of North Carolina Press. Retrieved July 19, 2021.
  10. ↑ Delilah L. Beasley, The Negro Trail Blazers of California, 1919, pp. 105 & 183 (Has been reprinted in 1997 and 2004).
  11. ↑ Yenne, Bill (2004). The Missions of California. Thunder Bay Press. p. 24. ISBN   978-1-59223-319-9.
  12. 1 2 Trafzer, Clifford E.; Hyer, Joel R. (1999). Exterminate Them: Written Accounts of the Murder, Rape and Enslavement of Native Americans During the California Gold Rush, 1848–1868 . East Lansing, MI: Michigan State University Press. pp.  1–30. ISBN   978-0-87013-961-1.
  13. ↑ "California Indian History – California Native American Heritage Commission". nahc.ca.gov. Retrieved February 17, 2023.
  14. ↑ Magliari, M (August 2004). "Free Soil, Unfree Labor". Pacific Historical Review. 73 (3): 349–390. doi:10.1525/phr.2004.73.3.349. ProQuest   212441173.
  15. ↑ Exchange Team, The Jefferson. "NorCal Native Writes Of California Genocide". JPR Jefferson Public Radio. Info is in the podcast. Archived from the original on November 14, 2019.
  16. ↑ "Gold, Greed & Genocide". International Indian Treaty Council. Retrieved January 10, 2023.
  17. ↑ Terrell, Ellen (February 2, 2021). "African Americans and the Gold Rush | Inside Adams". The Library of Congress. Retrieved October 25, 2023.
  18. ↑ Janet Neary and Hollis Robbins, "African American Literature of the Gold Rush," Mapping Region in Early American Writing. Eds. Edward Watts, Keri Holt, and John Funchion. Athens: University of Georgia Press (2015), p. 232
  19. ↑ "Slavery in the Far West (CA, CO, NM, NV, OR, UT, WA)". Encyclopedia.com.
  20. ↑ California Constitutional Convention 1849
  21. ↑ "California, a "Free State" Sanctioned Slavery". California Historical Society. April 2, 2020. Retrieved May 18, 2021.
  22. ↑ Benjamin Hayes (January 24, 2007). "Mason v. Smith". none of the said persons of color can read and write, and are almost entirely ignorant of the laws of the state of California as well as those of the State of Texas, and of their rights
  23. ↑ Archy Lee's historical documents [ permanent dead link ]
  24. ↑ Kong, Deborah (February 12, 2004). "Uncovering California's overlooked slave past". NBC News. Retrieved May 18, 2021.
  25. 1 2 Dowd, Katie (May 26, 2020). "Thomas Starr King: The man who 'saved' California - and who California forgot". SFGATE. Retrieved May 18, 2021.
  26. 1 2 Tarnoff, Benjamin (2014). The Bohemians: Mark Twain and the San Francisco Writers Who Reinvented American Literature. Penguin Books. pp. 30–31. ISBN   978-1594204739.

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