# Would an Arab traveler w/ white slaves be able to travel freely in the old south? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 27, 2005, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867 "2005-11-27T02:22:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2005, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/41 "2005-11-28T17:49:32Z")
> [@Exapno Mapcase](#): > > But the OP asked if they would be _legally_ harassed. This seems to preclude vigilantism. And while local officials always had some means of enforcing their will, mopery and dopery with intent to loiter could be applied against anybody, anywhere at any time, making it not a very interesting answer. Not that a visiting Sultan was ever likely to be so charged. > > The real question is the status of white slaves in the U.S. As I and others have said, there do not seem to be any laws specifically mentioning them. We can speculate all we want, but, unless a real scholar weighs in with some specialized knowledge, we’ve gone as far as we can go. Well, OK. If illegal actions by non-officials are out then I suppose extralegal actions by officials in the south would be next. I would bet money that southern law officers could have found some reason to at least harass and probably jail any dark complexioned foreigner who travelled around with white slaves irrespective of the legal status of slaves. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2005, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/42 "2005-11-28T18:10:25Z")
The complexion of the slaves wouldn’t matter; slaves had as little as 1/16 African blood. Numerous slaves passed for white, the children of Sally Hemmings being famous examples. No, the “white” color of many slaves did not seem to bother Southerns. And the complexion of the slave owner would not have mattered either; after all, free blacks owned slaves too. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2005, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/43 "2005-11-28T18:31:11Z")
> [@astro](#): > > Interesting. So an Arab traveler could bring his harem of attractive white women into a southern antebellum town and live unmolested while he visited? It’s an interesting gedanken experiment to imagine what the effect would have been on the locals if your harem consisted of extremely beautiful white women in chains or other bindings. Or maybe if the gorgeous ladies had to carry you around in a sedan chair. I wonder if the local white slave owners would pop a cork or swallow hard and live and let live with a fellow slave owner. Why do I get the feeling that **astro** lays awake late at night, fantasizing about this? 😉😃😛 ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2005, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/44 "2005-11-28T18:54:34Z")
Jacob Berman, _Captive Identity: Images of Barbary and Ante Bellum American Identity Politics_. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/45 "2005-11-29T06:15:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally posted by me: In some territories and states in the North, slavery survived much longer than in much of the Old South. > [@](#): > > **Walloon** : (And no, I do not consider the border states of Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri to be Northern, nor would the citizens of those states.) > > No Southern state gave up slavery before 1863. > [@](#): > > **Exapno Mapcase** : > You are, however, quite right about rebuking Zoe, whose statement is unfathomable As soon as I reread my own post, I was quite humiliated. I did not come close to expressing what I meant. In some territories and states in the North, slavery existed for a longer period of time than it did in the South – a greater number of years. If I am mistaken, I will eat my straw bonnet. I believe that New York had slaves for about two hundred years. I haven’t checked my home state of Tennessee, but I don’t think that we match that. I would guess that Virginia exceeds New York. For what it’s worth, I don’t mind boundary hopping to embrace Maryland as part of the Old South. That is culturally accurate. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/46 "2005-11-29T06:27:39Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > The complexion of the slaves wouldn’t matter; slaves had as little as 1/16 African blood. Numerous slaves passed for white, the children of Sally Hemmings being famous examples. No, the “white” color of many slaves did not seem to bother Southerns. > > And the complexion of the slave owner would not have mattered either; after all, free blacks owned slaves too. I simply don’t believe this. Yes, a whte owner could have slaves who were light complexioned but a dark complexioned owner would be in deep trouble for the same thing. Did any free black own white slaves? ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/47 "2005-11-29T06:55:08Z")
My point is that the caste system in the antebellum south made India look egalitarian. A white planter could pretty much do as he pleased. Blacks or anyone with a dark complexion had better “know their place.” And I don’t believe that owning white slaves was “their place.” Keeping the lid on was vital to the patricians, particularly in view of the[slave revolts](http://www.wsu.edu/~dee/DIASPORA/REBEL.HTM), and I think that having someone with a dark skin parading around with a bunch of white women as slaves would have been pretty provokative. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/48 "2005-11-29T07:14:36Z")
To expand on **Zoe** ’s point: The exact date of the first slaves in the Massachusetts Bay Colony is not known, but is believed to be in the period 1624-1629. Slavery was abolished in Massachusetts by a 1783 judicial decision. Total, 154-159 years. The first slaves were brought to New York in 1626, when it was called New Amsterdam under Dutch rule. New York adopted a gradual plan for the abolition of slavery in 1799, with the last slaves freed in 1827. Total, 201 years. Slaves were imported to Jamestown, Virginia, in 1619. The last Southern colony to acquire slavery was Georgia in 1749, where slaves were freed in 1864 by the occupation of Union troops. The last territory admitted to the Union as a slave state was Missouri in 1820. Slavery was not abolished in any Southern state before 1863, and in most slave states not until 1865. So, Virginia had slavery for 246 years, Georgia for 115 years, and Missouri for 45 years. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 10:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/49 "2005-11-29T10:42:20Z")
Thanks, **Walloon** , that’s an interesting .pdf article. (Once my Adobe Acrobat was stirred into sluggish life by that link, it prompted me to download updates, which then prompted me to reboot.) The author did a good job of bringing out the mirror-image fascination for antebellum white Americans of Africans owning white slaves. How their own sense of guilt for enslaving Africans produced a fascination with the tables being turned. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 11:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/50 "2005-11-29T11:25:11Z")
> [@astro](#): > > Interesting. So an Arab traveler could bring his harem of attractive white women into a southern antebellum town and live unmolested while he visited? If he also had a working Green Lantern power ring, sure. 'Course, GLs can’t own slaves. ---
**Author:** ![Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carnac_the_Magnificent)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/51 "2005-11-29T15:50:48Z")
> [@Zoe](#): > > I haven’t checked my home state of Tennessee, but I don’t think that we match that. I would guess that Virginia exceeds New York. Tennessee was admitted into the Union in 1796, as a spinoff from North Carolina. On Feb 22, 1865, Tennessee adopted a new constitution that abolished slavery. Slavery thus existed in Tennessee for 69 years. ---
**Author:** ![Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carnac_the_Magnificent)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/52 "2005-11-29T15:54:17Z")
Borrowing from **Walloon** , we have: Virginia, 246 years New York, 201 years Massachusetts, 154-159 years Georgie, 115 years Tennessee, 69 years Missouri, 45 years ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/53 "2005-11-29T16:59:36Z")
> [@David Simmons](#): > > I simply don’t believe this. Yes, a whte owner could have slaves who were light complexioned but a dark complexioned owner would be in deep trouble for the same thing. Did any free black own white slaves? Part of it depends on how you define “white” and how you define “black”, too. A lot of “black” slaveholders were themselves pretty light skinned. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/54 "2005-11-29T17:08:47Z")
> [@Captain Amazing](#): > > Part of it depends on how you define “white” and how you define “black”, too. A lot of “black” slaveholders were themselves pretty light skinned. I know that but I have a lot of trouble believing that the white, southern power structure wouldn’t take some action if a dark skinned man kept a bunch of white skinned women openly as slaves in a society that was, as my cite shows, more or less always on edge over race and slavery. ---
**Author:** ![MMI](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@MMI](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MMI)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/55 "2005-11-29T17:36:58Z")
**Exapno** According to this site: [http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/tguide/1pindex.html](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/tguide/1pindex.html) : > [@a PBS series](#): > > In the 1640s society begins to limit opportunities for African Americans. The English definition of who can be enslaved begins to shift from non-Christian to non-white. White indentured servants tried for running away are punished by adding two to five years to their contract. For the same crime, a black servant is indentured for the “rest of his natural life.” No the clearest of cites that whites could not be slaves, but certainly suggesting that whites _couldn’t_ be slaves as defined by the legal code/common law. I am currently hunting for a cite on when indentured servitude became illegal (for whites, it having long since been transformed into slavery for non-whites) ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/56 "2005-11-29T18:01:34Z")
They probably would. Free blacks were in a really precarious situation in the pre-Civil War South, because they were sort of in an in between place. They weren’t slaves, and some of them were even very successful, but they also weren’t white people. Here’s a registry of free blacks in Augusta County, VA (the first two links) I’m just pointing it out, because you can see how many of them are described as “mulatto” or “yellow”. [http://valley.vcdh.virginia.edu/govdoc/free.html](http://valley.vcdh.virginia.edu/govdoc/free.html) ---
**Author:** ![MMI](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@MMI](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MMI)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/57 "2005-11-29T18:14:25Z")
From here : [http://www.nbufront.org/html/FRONTalView/BookExcerpts/char1.html](http://www.nbufront.org/html/FRONTalView/BookExcerpts/char1.html) > [@](#): > > Generally, though, Whites ended up as servants. But acts existed in thecolonies which reduced the immigrants to slavery. White women marrying slavesended up in bondage in Maryland fro 1663 to 1677. . . Debt satisfaction inConnecticut in the 17th century required servitude (Hurd 219,220,261).Punishment for certain types of sales, particularly by Quakers, ended up in slavery… > Isolated instances of Whites in slavery and not just as servants occurred throughout the colonial period. In 1641, Massachusetts convicted WilliamAndrews, an indentured servant, for assaulting his master. Andrews receivedthe punishment of enslavement. For theft and housebreaking, John Hasslewoodand Giles Player received similar sentences. As late as 1790, Connecticut sold a White man into slavery to Barbados for “notorious stealing, breaking up androbbery of mills and living in a renegade manner in the wilderness” (Greene19n; Shurtleff 246; Sternier 23). New Jersey legislation of 1754 stated thefollowing: > > any White servant, servants, slave or slaves, which shall be brought beforethe mayor and so forth by their masters of other inhabitants of the borough forany misdemeanor or rude or disorderly behavior may be committed to theworkhouse to hard labor to receive correction not exceeding thirty lashes (Hurd229). > > This act clearly indicates White slavery. So apparently through late colonial times whites could legally be slaves - although the site also notes that whites were still persons with some rights rather than chattel. I am still looking to see if I can find evidence of a legal change in the enslavability of whites, rather than a cultural and economic shift. From a couple of other sites: It seems that at the same time (1670) that Indian indentured servitude was extended to 30 years and Black indentured servitude converted to slavery it was made illegal for an Indian or a Negro to own a Christian. Still nothing banning white slavery or indentured servitude yet. ---
**Author:** ![groman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/73ab20/32.png) [@groman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/groman)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/58 "2005-11-29T19:33:32Z")
> [@David Simmons](#): > > I know that but I have a lot of trouble believing that the white, southern power structure wouldn’t take some action if a dark skinned man kept a bunch of white skinned women openly as slaves in a society that was, as my cite shows, more or less always on edge over race and slavery. By the same argument they would take some action if a dark skinned man tried to stay in the president suite at their best hotel, no? I think any foreign royalty would be rich royalty first and whatever their race was second. Aristocracy has a way of trascending racial barriers, doesn’t it? I have trouble imagining an Arabian prince getting harassed, much less lynched, for pretty much anything he did in any part of the western world in the past 200 years. If admitted to the country legally and peacefully, they are foreign dignitaries, nobody will mess with them. Any cites on whether any foreign non-white royalty ever visited the American south and how they were treated? ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/59 "2005-11-29T21:40:18Z")
> [@groman](#): > > By the same argument they would take some action if a dark skinned man tried to stay in the president suite at their best hotel, no? No. Not even in the same ball park as keeping white women. Hell, years later the black heavyweight boxing champion got into all sorts of legal problems for consorting with a white woman who wasn’t in any way a slave. [quoteI think any foreign royalty would be rich royalty first and whatever their race was second. Aristocracy has a way of trascending racial barriers, doesn’t it? I have trouble imagining an Arabian prince getting harassed, much less lynched, for pretty much anything he did in any part of the western world in the past 200 years. If admitted to the country legally and peacefully, they are foreign dignitaries, nobody will mess with them. Any cites on whether any foreign non-white royalty ever visited the American south and how they were treated?[/QUOTE] Possibly true. I have the whole history of legal, illegan and extra legal efforts to “keep them in their place.” Do you have any cites of an Arabian prince with white women in a harem being teated royally in the south, or the north for that matter? ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2005, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867/60 "2005-11-29T22:15:02Z")
Can anyone come up with a cite for how black slaves of a visiting white person were handled? That is, if a Frenchman from Haiti arrived in New Orleans in 1840, would he have been able to bring his slaves with him, or would that have constituted importing slaves? I have to believe that visiting foreigners…diplomats, businessmen, etc, not immigrants, could bring along their household slaves, much like Thomas Jefferson bringing Sally Hemmings with him to Paris. But I’m no historian and I don’t know where to start looking for such evidence. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-arab-traveler-w-white-slaves-be-able-to-travel-freely-in-the-old-south/332867.md?page=4)