The development of the Chesapeake colonies is a bright example of how slavery became one of the integral parts of societies existing on these lands. The necessity to grow specific crops and use them to earn money and survive resulted in the constantly growing demand for the workforce. However, the practice of using indentured servants was ineffective because of the end date of their contracts. It meant that new sources of people to work on fields and plantations were needed. The resolution of the given problem was a matter of survival, as the inability to raise crops would mean death for the whole community (Kidd, 2019). Under these conditions, the development of slavery was inevitable as people stripped of their rights could be used to perform diverse tasks, and the term of exploitation was not limited. It created the basis for the evolution of slavery which became one of the fundamental institutions functioning on these lands.
At the same time, the example of the Middle colonies proves that the enslavement of people and their use as a cheap workforce was inevitable. Although the pacific principles of Quakerism dominated these lands at the first stages of their evolution, settlers still needed people to perform complex tasks and support the evolution of colonies. Regarding the limited number of arriving settlers, slavery became the possible option to compensate for the deficit and create the basis for future expansion. The given trend was similar to the Middle and Chesapeake colonies, proving specific attitudes to slavery peculiar to people of that period (Huntley, 2019). They were ready to promote further evolution of this institution as the central way to support the development of the agricultural sector critical for survival and enrichment.
References
Huntley, D. (2019). America’s forgotten colonial history (7th ed.). Lyons Press.
Kidd, T. (2019). American history. B&H Academic.