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Book Review
Canada and the United States
| Robert H. Gudmestad. A Troublesome Commerce: The Transformation of the Interstate Slave Trade. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press. 2003. Pp. xii, 246. Cloth $59.95, paper $21.95.
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| This is a study of the emergence and transformation of the interstate slave trade after the War of 1812 down to the outbreak of the Civil War. Its role in the fragmentation of the union is not exactly Robert H. Gudmestad's concern, although there is sufficient evidence here for others to read the book with that question in mind. Gudmestad rather is concerned with the relationship between slavery and capitalism. In the end, the trade stood out as "the most blatant form of capitalist exploitation in the South" (p. 184). One of the most productive scholarly views of slavery has been concerned with its place in an emerging capitalist world, and Gudmestad's work should be seen within that framework. There are occasional flashes of insight in the book, but, unfortunately there are also some confusions, occasional contradictions, and some puzzling claims. |
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At the center of the book stands the "speculator," exemplified by Isaac Franklin, and his partner, John Armfield. They are among a small number of leaders of the trade, and Gudmestad's description of such figures is one of the stronger parts of his study. Methodologically, he tends to use a small number of people to carry the weight of his analysis. Given the complexity, not to say quirkiness of some of his choices (John Randolph of Virginia comes to mind; he was often on the margins of political developments in the early republic), it is a heavy interpretive burden the author has chosen. Sometimes the link between the person and the generalization does not quite work. An example is Gudmestad's treatment of Andrew Jackson and the transformation of the trade. Jackson's critics described him as a "slave trader," for instance. It was a term of derision. The point is that Jackson was not a "slave trader," but it is not certain why Jackson is chosen as illustration of the way southerners came to see the trader, a figure Gudmestad wants to keep separate from a "speculator" for some analytical purposes. The latter in time became domesticated, almost respectable, even though he was engaged in "speculation." |
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At the outset, Gudmestad provides a definition of a speculator that is crucial to the whole study. A "slave trader or speculator is a man who bought slaves in one state and sold them in another on a regular basis as the sole or principal source of his income" (p. 4). Speculation in slaves over time tended to become something respectable as traders like Franklin and Armfield diligently tried to adopt modern business practices. They tried to create a character known as the "good" trader who "merely facilitated the exchange of bondservants, serving as benign middlemen in a trade that brought benefits to whites and blacks" (p. 153). The benefits blacks received are unclear, and that might serve as one example of a puzzling statement. While the author is attempting to describe the arguments of those involved are we to understand that these were widespread views? Some criticism of the trade within the South reflected the moral views of the churches. How widespread or how strong the arguments were is not really evident. The moral argument against the trade included the claim that among traders there was a "tendency to rape female slaves," followed by this claim: the result was that the trade promoted promiscuity "by putting attractive young women in the hands of lecherous old men" (p. 75). |
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