By Nancy Spannaus
Sept. 29, 2024—I am pleased to announce that a video of my September 18th talk to the Alexander Hamilton Awareness Society on my book Defeating Slavery: Hamilton’s American System Showed the Way, is now posted on AmericanSystemNow’s You Tube channel. I encourage you to watch this presentation by clicking here.
While my approximately 40-minute-long power point presentation is no substitute for reading the book,[1] I believe you will find it a useful introduction to the theses which I have elaborated. During the seven occasions on which I have given this talk, I have found that it stimulates a productive discussion.
My Theses
The following are the four major theses which Defeating Slavery sets forth:
* The American Revolution created a strong anti-slavery movement, the strongest in the world.
* But to realize abolition, it was necessary to break from the British economic system, which consigned America to supplying raw materials, a large portion of which were produced with slave labor.
* Alexander Hamilton put forward the economic principles, and laid the basis, for breaking with that system through industrialization.
* Tragically, it was the sabotage of Hamilton’s industrialization program, called the American System of Economics, which effectively made the Civil War necessary to end the slave system.
Economics and Morality
As you can see, one of the crucial points I am stressing in Defeating Slavery is the connection between political economy (or “economics”) and morality. As I wrote in my introduction, “a moral society of free men demands the institution of a moral political economy.” Thus, to be successful, the fight to eliminate slavery en masse required replacing the slave economy with an agro-industrial economy.
Why? In short, because the success of an agro-industrial economy, with its strong manufacturing sector, demands the upgrading of the living standards of the workforce, mass education, and technological progress in the means of production. Hamilton even cited its benefit in being able to “stimulate the activity of the human mind.” All of those prerequisites are the very opposite of the characteristics of a slave economy.
As my audiences come to realize this, they also have to face the fact that the British Empire, with its dominant support of the U.S. slave economy and its expansion (The British purchased from 75 to 80% of U.S. cotton up to the Civil War), played a critical role in preventing the shift to the Hamiltonian program of industrialization.
Ironies abound. First, the fact that the opponents of government support for developing manufactures, especially Thomas Jefferson, professed to be the leading opponents of Great Britain. Yet their anti-manufacturing policies were major props to British interests.
Second, that the British themselves, and many scholars today, claim that they were far more advanced than the Americans in seeking an end to slavery. Yet, their financial support for that inhuman practice never faltered up to the Civil War. This led some Americans, such as Henry C. Carey, to note that their policies seemed more oriented to splitting up the United States than to genuinely seeking to liberate those in bondage.
And lastly, what about the oft-repeated line that Alexander Hamilton was a British tool, seeking to adopt British policies? In reality, the British vigorously opposed his industrialization policies, a fact which seems quite at odds with this claim.
Virginia’s Role
On September 9, I adapted the book presentation described above to specifically address a Virginia audience. I was speaking to the Lovettsville Historical Society, which is located in my hometown. The video of this presentation is also available, and can be gotten by clicking here.
While sticking to the overall theses of the book, I added in the particular role played by leading Virginians in the struggle over slavery in early America. “It Was More Complicated Than You Think,” I noted in my title. I then identified how Virginians contributed to each element of the theses, including their participation in the anti-slavery movement early on.
But the most significant role Virginians played, I stressed, was their action to oppose Hamilton’s industrialization program. This started with Jefferson, and continued with Virginians’ attacks on the Second National Bank and on the John Quincy Adams’ administration’s decision to provide Federal support for developing national infrastructure. Then in 1828, the Richmond Junto, a political grouping of pro-slavery, states’ rights political leaders in Virginia’s capital, joined together with a group of prominent New Yorkers, led by Martin van Buren, to form the Democratic Party. That party went on to elect Andrew Jackson as President, and support the subversion of Adams’ Hamiltonian program – a subversion that, as Congressman John Quincy Adams said at the time, would lead inevitably to a civil war.
{For more information on my upcoming events, and Defeating Slavery, please visit my book page. If you have ideas for future events, please contact me at americansystemnow@gmail.com.}
[1] To order Defeating Slavery, click here.
Tags: Defeating Slavery: Hamilton's American System Showed the Way, Nancy Spannaus, The Alexander Hamilton Awareness Society, video