Chattel Slavery And Wage Slavery: The Anglo-American Context, 1830-1860 (Mercer University Lamar Memorial Lectures Ser.)

Chattel Slavery and Wage Slavery: The Anglo-American Context, 1830-1860 (Mercer University Lamar Memorial Lectures Ser.)

This book begins with a provocative paradox: George Fitzhugh of Virginia, one of the most eloquent defenders of Southern chattel slavery, appealed to a New York abolitionist for support. How can this be? The abolitionist in question, Charles Edwards Lester, had confessed that "he would sooner subject his child to Southern slavery, than have him to be a free laborer of England." Lester was in fact referring to the "white" or "wage" slavery of the mother country.