Inhuman commerce: Anti-slavery and the ownership of freedom

Abstract

This article explores the British anti-slavery writings of the mid-to late 18th century, and the meanings which they gave to the idea of owning a property in the person. It addresses the construction of a particular moral and political landscape where freedom was understood as both a kind of property and as non-domination, and slavery was constructed as a form of theft, and as the exercise of arbitrary power. This created a complex moral space, where possession, commerce, savagery, tyranny and the emergence of race were all caught up with each other and entangled with the concept of consent. The article concludes with the suggestion that our current understandings of slavery continue to be informed by our notions of contract and consent, and so by conceptions of freedom and ownership that take us back to the tensions and debates of the 18th century.Keywords abolitionism, antislavery, consent, freedom, property in the person, race, slaveryThe antislavery writings of the late 18th century were famously, and significantly, saturated with sentiment. 1 They were also central to the success of the abolitionist movement, and to 'the unfolding of history in personalized terms'. The story of abolition was told as the triumph of good over evil, and in the process the abolitionists captured and held on to the moral high ground. 2 This was a complex moral space, and the antislavery movement colonized it through their Quakerism, through a brilliant propaganda campaign and through the mobilization of sentiment and sensibility. Antislavery writers addressed their readers' humanity through sentiment, and focused on sharing the suffering of others. 3 This means that antislavery is read as a moral movement, driven by Enlightenment ideals, and by