Slave state

A slave state is a U.S. state that had legal slavery (overwhelmingly the enslavement of African-Americans, although historically also the enslavement of Native Americans, and whites through indentured servitude) in the period before the American Civil War and the Emancipation Proclamation. The 15 slave states at the time of the Civil War were Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia. (The District of Columbia also had slavery prior to the Civil War.) The last state to abolish slavery before the war was New Jersey in 1846, although the laws of that state retained slaves over a certain age as "apprentices for life" until the 13th Amendment.

Original state-based abolition efforts

Prior to the Revolution, all of the British North American colonies had slavery, but the Revolutionary War gave impetus to a general antislavery sentiment. The Northwest Territory, now known as the Midwest, was organized under the Northwest Ordinance with a prohibition on slavery in 1787. Massachusetts accepted that its 1780 Constitution effectively abolished slavery, and several other northern States adopted statutes requiring gradual emancipation. In 1804, New Jersey became the last State to embark on the course of gradual emancipation, a process which had still not quite entirely eliminated slavery as late as 1860.

Related Topics:
Northwest Territory - Midwest - Northwest Ordinance - Massachusetts - New Jersey

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Northern slave states

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