Human Currency In African-American Slavery

Human Currency It is hard to imagine a society in which we would place a monetary value on human life. The practice of slavery in early American history was a disturbing example. Beginning in the early seventeenth century, the demand for labor became increasingly important as plantations in the South were on the rise. Slaves were considered a cheap form of labor and highly valuable. The output they provided far exceeded the input of resources. According to History.com, African-American slaves helped build the economic foundations of the new nation. Following on this principle of economics, the acceptability of slaves as a value of a transaction encouraged the spread of the system. The rationale was that, the more and higher the quality of
the slaves, the more economic gain an individual would obtain from their labor.
The use of slaves as a currency was inhumane as well as unethical. The abolishment of the slave trade noted the end of the use of slaves as a currency. Through this, individuals noted that the more economic power an individual would have the more social control he could achieve. It is this inference which led to the large dispute towards the ban of slavery in most of the Southern states. The belief that the economic system would fail on account of the abolishment of slavery was the initial reason for the resistance against abolishment policies.
Apart from the ethical controversy, there was also the inference of the social influence of slavery. Slave raids were used to accumulate slaves and this became more of a legal issue due to the fact that most slaves were “forced” into slavery. Unlike traditional times where slavery arose from debt bondages, the forced slavery status meant that human beings were being stolen from their homes and from their countries or continents of origin. This illegal acquisition had attached implications on the treatment of slaves and hence the abolishment of slavery and by extension abolished the use of slaves as a currency. It can be noted that for an item of value to be termed as currency, it must be divisible, denominated, acceptable and transferable. It is these characteristics of slavery which led to the emergence of the use of slaves as currency. Additionally, the economic gains which were acquired on account of the use of slavery denoted an inclination of the measurement of a person’s economic significance through the use of the number of slaves they had. In conclusion, the use of slavery as a currency, while serving its purpose in a primitive society, is undoubtedly the most unethical currency the world ever devised.