American Slavery, American Freedom

By: Edmund S. Morgan

Narrated by: Sean Pratt

Length: 14 hrs and 19 mins

Publisher's summary

"If it is possible to understand the American paradox, the marriage of slavery and freedom, Virginia is surely the place to begin," writes Edmund S. Morgan in American Slavery, American Freedom, a study of the tragic contradiction at the core of America. Morgan finds the key to this central paradox in the people and politics of the state that was both the birthplace of the revolution and the largest slaveholding state in the country.

With a new introduction. Winner of the Francis Parkman Prize and the Albert J. Beveridge Award.

©2003 W.W. Norton & Company, Inc. (P)2013 Gildan Media LLC

Critic reviews

"Thoughtful, suggestive and highly readable." ( New York Times Book Review)

A concise and fascinating view of early America and its colonists.

Nothing should dissuade you from reading this work if you have any interest in the topic.

An interesting look at Virginia's history.

I loved this telling of a little known piece of Virginia's history. It focus on actual evens and letting the history tell the story as opposed to his opinion.

Great historic content

I got this piece because of the Breaking Brown Family Book Club. I’m glad that I did.

Explaining the great American contradiction

It’s the huge irony in the creation of the United States: a country dedicated to freedom but founded on the back of slavery. Morgan confronts that irony head-on and seeks to explain how such contradictions could coexist.
He focuses on Virginia, which had the most slaves of any of the 13 colonies and yet also produced the authors of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, as well as 4 of the first 5 Presidents.
His argument is meticulously researched and presented in great detail. He argues that improvements in the tobacco market meant planters could afford to make the greater initial investment required to purchase slaves, rather than the contracts of indentured servants. The growth of slavery then significantly curtailed the flow of indentured servants into Virginia. This in turn gradually reduced the size of the white underclass, which had previously threatened the security of the Virginia gentry. Building off the classical notions that first, a successful republic requires virtuous citizens, and second, virtue requires economic independence, Morgan argues that republican ideologists were able to ignore those persons, white or black, who didn’t fit the mold. Since such persons, by definition, could not be good republicans, they were not entitled to the benefits of republican liberty.
When the underclass was white, and the distinction was one of class, there was inevitably class conflict, which occasionally would erupt in violence. When the underclass was composed of slaves, however, and the distinction was racial, then whites could unite to think of themselves as special. As they grew more successful, they could even consider themselves virtuous. They thus could throw off what they saw as the corrupting ways of executive tyranny in the mother country, at the same time subjecting another race to much crueler horrors than those against which they rebelled.
Morgan has some great discussions of intellectual trends, including attitudes towards work, class consciousness and fears of tyranny. He discusses only briefly the traditional classical connection between virtue and the success of a republic, and the book would have benefited from a more thorough discussion.
He also mentions that some Virginians were able to see the inconsistencies between their rhetoric and slaveholding. That discussion too could have been fuller.

Strong white history of slavery and freedom in Colonial Virginiania

This book is a strong history of the path to slavery in Colonial Virginia. However, it lacks almost any contextual connection to the deeper roots of slavery in North America. This book seems to be written almost as a comparison between the servant class in colonial America and the negro slave, rather than a book on ideas of freedom within a slave state. It’s a great build up to the question the book was meant to answer but is less effective at answering the burning question. How dehumanization takes hold and the idea that freedom and democracy was for white men and never meant for the wider brown world. These are the forces that continue to apply pressure to the darker skinned to this day. I still recommend this read.

A Classic Among Classics

I read American Slavery, American Freedom when I was an undergraduate a long time ago. Frankly, I thought it was rather dry. I don’t know what the hell was wrong with me. This is a great book. Great research, great detail, outstanding narrative and surprising irony. Morgan also concludes with his thesis, tying the role slavery played in enabling Virginians to embrace republicanism. The narrator, Sean Pratt does an excellent job.

The story of slavery's origins in Virginia

Insanely researched, logically organazied, the final conclusion jawdropps, shames and inspires us to change society.

This Is America, Then and Now

I gained an enormous insight to understanding the European way of thinking. Great for educating young & old Americans.

NO MORE PAYMENT TO AUDIBLE.KEPT BOOK IN LIBRARY

I got this book I was paying $14 a month could no longer in the monthly book club. This book is mine to keep in my library I enjoyed it. I NOW HAVE PRIME BOOKS

The most significant book I have read.

I think this book is the most significant book I have ever read/listened to. Dr. Samuel Johnson of England more or less said, Why is it that we hear the loudest calls for liberty from the drivers of slaves? The answer to that very question is the topic of this very book.

The book starts off a bit slowly, but It what it is doing is laying out all the facts, all the evidence, all the sources to explain how colonial Virginia went from utilizing Indentured Servitude as a source of labor, to how it transitioned to using Slavery as a primary source of labor. It explains all the many reasons for this change with a vast array of sources. It explains the significance that Bacon's Rebellion had on this change, an event not taught well in schools. It explains the importance that the Tobacco Economy had on the change as well as the relations with Indians. All of this is explained. And in eventually it explains how all this lead to Southern elites being more populist in their counties to appeal to the descendants of Indentured Servants for votes, and how these men transformed into the yeoman of Republican idealism. Many themes in the book are still very relevant in today's politics and culture.

I highly recommend this book for anyone who wants to understand how Men such as Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry could be hailed the greatest champions of liberty at the same time as being slave owners.