BENJAMIN FRANKLIN AND SLAVERY – Corsairs & Captives

The United States of America is nearing its 250^th anniversary, and so I reckon this might be an appropriate time to devote a blog post to one of the famous Founding Fathers of America—Benjamin Franklin.

It may seem a little surprising to find Benjamin Franklin included in a blog focused on North African corsairs, but you’ll see the connection in a moment.

In the late eighteenth century, the institution of slavery was a fundamental part of both the North African corsair States and the newly minted Republic of the United States. The difference was that the United States had embarked on a project that would eliminate slavery long before it was eliminated in North Africa.

But it took quite a while.

In 1790, the public debate about slavery in American was intense. One of the debaters was a Congressman from Georgia named James Jackson. On March 5, 1790, he gave a long speech in Congress refuting an anti-slavery petition submitted by Quakers and supported by Benjamin Franklin. His refutation morphed into a full-throated defense of slavery.

Among other things, he argued

that slavery was an established institution in America
that slavery was an established institution in Africa as well, so slaves in America were no worse off than their counterparts in Africa
that slaves were absolutely necessary to cultivate the crops that brought prosperity to the southern States in America
that the issue of what to do with freed slaves was intractable, and that freed slaves and their erstwhile owners could never learn to live peacefully with each other
that Old Testament passages in the Bible sanctioned slavery

In response to this speech, Benjamin Franklin wrote an article for a Philadelphia newspaper titled The Federal Gazette and Philadelphia Evening Post. The article appeared, under the pseudonym Historicus, on March 23, 1790—19 days after Jackson’s speech (and less than four weeks before Franklin’s death on April 17, 1790, at the age of 84). In this article, Franklin responds to Jackson’s arguments not by presenting counterarguments, but by presenting a pro-slavery argument put forth by Sidi Mehemet Ibrahim, a member of the Divan of Algiers in 1687.

Franklin invented Sidi Mehemet Ibrahim and his speech in order to lampoon Jackson’s arguments.

As you may already be realizing, this post is longer than the usual fare here in this blog. That’s because I didn’t want to break up Franklin’s article or abridge it (sometimes there’s just no substitute for reading the author’s original words in their entirety), and because that article needed some historical context to be properly appreciated.

So my apologies for the length of this post. But I reckon it’s worth it.

Here’s the full text of Franklin’s article:

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Reading in the newspapers the speech of Mr. Jackson in congress against meddling with the affair of slavery or attempting to mend the condition of slaves, it put me in mind of a similar speech, made about one hundred years ago, by Sidi Mehemet Ibrahim, a member of the Divan of Algiers, which may be seen in Martin’s account of his consulship, in 1687. The speech was against granting the petition of the sect called Erika, or Purists, who prayed for the abolition of piracy and slavery as being unjust.

Mr. Jackson does not quote it. Perhaps he has not seen it. If, therefore, some of its reasonings are to be found in his eloquent speech, it may only show that men’s interests operate, and are operated on, with surprising similarity, in all countries and climates, whenever they are under similar circumstances.

The African speech, as translated, is as follows:

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Alla Bismillah, &c. God is great, and Mahomet is his prophet.

Have these Erika considered the consequences of granting their petition? If we cease our cruises against the Christians, how shall we be furnished with the commodities their countries produce, and which are so necessary for us? If we forbear to make slaves of their people, who, in this hot climate, are to cultivate our lands? Who are to perform the common labors of our city, and of our families? Must we not then be our own slaves?

And is there not more compassion and more favor due to us Mussulmen, than to those Christian dogs?

We have now above fifty thousand slaves in and near Algiers. This number, if not kept up by fresh supplies, will soon diminish and be gradually annihilated. If, then, we cease taking and plundering infidel ships and making slaves of the seamen and passengers, our lands will become of no value, for want of cultivation; the rents of houses in the city will sink by one half; and the revenues of government, arising from the share of prizes, must be totally destroyed.

And for what? To gratify the whim of a whimsical sect, who would have us not only forbear making more slaves, but even manumit those we have. But who is to indemnify their masters for the loss? Will the State do it? Is our treasury sufficient? Will the Erika do it? Can they do it? Or would they, to do what they think justice to the slaves, do a greater injustice to the owners?

And if we set our slaves free, what is to be done with them? Few of them will return to their native countries, for they know too well the greater hardships they must there be subject to. They will not embrace our holy religion. They will not adopt our manners. Our people will not pollute themselves by intermarrying with them. Must we maintain them as beggars in our streets? Or suffer our properties to be the prey of their pillage? For men accustomed to slavery will not work for a livelihood, when not compelled.

And what is there so pitiable in their present condition? Were they not slaves in their own countries? Are not Spain, Portugal, France, and the Italian States governed by despots who hold all their subjects in slavery, without exception? Even England treats her sailors as slaves, for they are, whenever the government pleases, seized and confined in ships of war, condemned not only to work but to fight for small wages, or a mere subsistence—no better than our slaves are allowed by us.

Is their condition then made worse by their falling into our hands? No. They have only exchanged one slavery for another. And I may say a better. For here they are brought into a land where the sun of Islamism gives forth its light and shines in full splendor, and they have an opportunity of making themselves acquainted with the true doctrine and thereby saving their immortal souls. Those who remain at home, have not that happiness. Sending the slaves home, then, would be sending them out of light into darkness.

I repeat the question: What is to be done with them? I have heard it suggested that they may be planted in the wilderness, where there is plenty of land for them to subsist on, and where they may flourish as a free State. But they are, I doubt not, too little disposed to labor without compulsion, as well as too ignorant to establish good government. And the wild Arabs would soon molest and destroy them, or again enslave them.

While they serve us, we take care to provide them with everything. And they are treated with humanity. The laborers in their own countries are, as I am informed, worse fed, lodged, and clothed. The condition of most of them is therefore already mended, and requires no farther improvement. Here, they live in safety. They are not liable to be impressed for soldiers and forced to cut one another’s Christian throats, as in the wars of their own countries.

If some of the religious mad bigots, who now tease us with their silly petitions, have, in a fit of blind zeal, freed their slaves, it was neither generosity nor humanity that moved them to the action; it was from the conscious burden of a load of sins, and the hope, from the supposed merits of so good a work, to be excused from damnation.

How grossly are they mistaken in imagining slavery to be disavowed by the Alcoran! Are not the following two precepts (to quote no more)—“Masters, treat your slaves with kindness” – “Slaves, serve your matters with cheerfulness and fidelity”—clear proofs to the contrary? Nor can the plundering of infidels be in that sacred book forbidden, since it is well known from it that God has given the world, and all that it contains, to his faithful Mussulmen, who are to enjoy it, of right, as fast as they can conquer it.

Let us then hear no more of this detestable proposition—the manumission of Christian slaves—the adoption of which would, by depreciating our lands and houses, and by depriving so many good citizens of their properties, create universal discontent and provoke insurrections, to the endangering of government and the producing of a general confusion. I have, therefore, no doubt that wise council will prefer the comfort and happiness of a whole nation of true believers to the whim of a few Erika, and therefore dismiss their petition.

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The result of this speech was that the Divan of Algiers came to the following resolution:

“That the doctrine that the plundering and enslaving the Christians is unjust is at best problematical, while it is clear that it is in the interest of this State to continue the practice. Therefore, let the petition be rejected.”

And it was rejected accordingly.

And since like motives are apt to produce, in the minds of men, like opinions and resolutions, may we not venture to predict, from this account, that the petitions to the parliament of England for abolishing the slave trade, to say nothing of other legislatures, and the debates upon them, will have a similar conclusion.

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As usual with these old texts, I have modernized the spelling and lightly edited the original to make it more accessible.

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