Mon. Feb.

2nd = The Culture of

Colonial Plantations: Cash crops and
the need for cheap labor (1600s)
The Culture of Colonial Plantations: Cash crops and the need for cheap labor (1600s)

1. What did it mean to be "free" in 1600s colonial America?

A. "Headright" system gave free land to self-paying immigrants, but lacked incentives for
laborers
B. new laborers were lured over by the promise of "freedom dues" under the indenture
system (1614)

1. Colonial American society & politics parallel English government & classes
A. King appoints officials in each colony (small group of elites)
B. England’s Parliament has a weak counterpart: colonial assemblies can only debate laws
& petition the King

C. Two levels of land-owning farmers (“Gentlemen” of the “independent classes” who could
claim headrights, vote and hold political office):
i. “Planters” = large-scale plantation owners
ii. Farmers (“freeholders” or “smallholders”)

D. Four “dependent” (non-land-owning) classes, who could neither vote nor hold office:
i. Tenants (small group) = renting their farmland from the planters
ii. Merchants (small group) = shopkeepers & tradesmen in towns or on planters’ estates

iii. indentured servants (2/3 of all 1600s immigrants) = non-land-owning, voluntary

white/English laborers [some abuses did occur -- see article at:
http://www.history.org/Foundation/journal/Spring05/scots.cfm]

iv. slaves (big influx after 1690s) – at the very bottom of colonial society (but not in England) =
involuntary, forced labor from Africa [later session]

Review of AMST themes:

* land as source of real economic power, and the basis for political power

* "freedom" seen as a lack of debt or other legal contract (economic status, not
race/ethnicity)