“The Very Idea of a Slave is a Human being in Bondage”

For many of us today, the idea of being bought, sold, or held as property seems irreconcilable with being recognized as a human being. Accordingly, there is an assumption that because enslaved African Americans were advertised, auctioned, mortgaged, and deeded alongside tables and chairs, cows and horses, wagons and saddles, they were therefore considered subhuman. Yet, for the most part, such was not the case. Whether they lived with enslaved African Americans in the most intimate domestic relations or merely encountered them at a distance, most Americans understood slaves to be their fellow human beings – politically, socially, or intellectually inferior, perhaps, but unquestionably members of a shared human community. As proslavery lawyer John Howard put it “the very idea of a slave is a human being in bondage.” ¹