Act for the Abolition of Slavery throughout the British Colonies

Explanation and Analysis of the Document

Approved by Parliament on August 28, 1833, the Slavery Abolition Act was a law that promised much for those kept in captivity in British colonies. As is typical of legal edicts, the act was meticulously composed and includes numerous detailed sections. While the media of the era reported extensively on the act's freeing of slaves, far less was noted regarding its many other clauses.

Core Principles

The Slavery Abolition Act was founded upon three principles, which made up its “long title”: “the abolition of slavery throughout the British colonies; for promoting the industry of the manumitted slaves; and for compensating the persons hitherto entitled to the services of such slaves” (Yorkshireman, p. 288). With regard to the first principle, the opening clause of the act states that “divers Persons are holden in Slavery within divers of his Majesty's Colonies, and it is just and expedient that all such Persons should be manumitted and set free.” On liberating persons from captivity, the act subsequently remarks that “a reasonable compensation should be made to persons hitherto entitled to the services of such Slaves for the loss which they will incur by being deprived of their right to such services.” In short, former slave owners are entitled to financial recompense for their loss of human capital. What exactly a “reasonable” financial sum would amount to is not stated, but, in total, £20 million was to be handed out by Parliament to cover all reparation claims by former slave owners.

The first section proceeds to appreciate “the new state and relations of society therein” that shall be produced within the colonial context. However, so as to allow for colonial societies to prepare to adopt the law and in turn adapt to the new social situation it would create, the act specifies that “a short interval should elapse before such Manumission should take effect.” To assist in this adaptation phase, slave owners were compelled to register their slaves between August 28, 1833—the date when the law was passed by Parliament—and August 1, 1834—the date when royal assent was awarded. Once these persons were registered, they were obliged to continue to work for their slave masters but now with legal rights through their new status as “apprenticed Labourers.” This labor system was to end before August 1, 1840, when workers were given the legal right to work where they pleased.

Registered Workers

With regard to the apprenticeship system, former slaves were divided into three categories. As noted in section IV, the first group was known as “prædial apprenticed Labourers attached to the soil,” encompassing individuals employed in the agricultural-industrial sector (“prædial,” or “predial” relating to the land or products from the land). The second group, “prædial apprenticed Labourers not attached to the soil,” comprised persons employed in the manufacturing sector. “Non-prædial apprenticed Labourers,” the third category, included persons in the domestic service industry or clerks, among others. Irrespective of their class of apprenticeship, former slaves were to work from 1834 until 1840—the period of adjustment to the “new state and relations of society” prior to full manumission. The abolition act is explicit in stating in section I that freedom was to be awarded in August 1834 to those slaves younger than six years old. Very young children had no labor status under the new law, but all those older than six were to be given the new standing of “apprenticed Labourers”; they would continue to serve their former colonial masters as paid employees for no more than forty-five hours per week until no later than August 1, 1840. Persons of infirm body or mind, and very young children, could not be registered as apprentices.

The abolition act of 1833 did not apply to all parts of the British Empire. The decree states in section LXIV that “nothing in this Act contained doth or shall extend to any of the Territories in the Possession of the East India Company, or the Island of Ceylon, or to the Island of Saint Helena.” Furthermore, as noted in section LXV, while broadly enacted on August 1, 1834, the act was not to take effect until four months afterward within the colony of the Cape of Good Hope and until six months afterward in Mauritius. The act's immediate direct application was in Bermuda, the Bahamas, Jamaica, Honduras, the Virgin Islands, Antigua, Montserrat, Nevis, Saint Christopher, Dominica, Barbados, Grenada, Saint Vincent's Tobago (as it was then called), Saint Lucia, Trinidad, and British Guyana.

Social Welfare

Regarding the social alteration period of 1834 to 1840, certain clauses in the act address the welfare of those previously enslaved. As stated in section VII, once former slaves were registered as apprentices, their former masters were liable “to provide for the maintenance” of the individual. While on the one hand this obliged former slave masters to physically look after their apprentices—with the act granting, for example, the provision of medication and food and freedoms such as access to medical assistance—the decree also deals with matters relating to the mental well-being of liberated slaves. The act states in section IX that the lawful transfer of newly registered apprentices from one estate or plantation to another should not “be injurious to the health or welfare” of the apprentices. One way in which freed people's contentment was to be ensured was through the maintenance of family units. A laborer, his or her spouse, their children, and other immediate family members could not be separated. In addition, with respect to the moral welfare of those liberated, clauses of the act encourage the promotion of habits of industry, good conduct, and piety. For instance, the act states in section XXI that an apprentice would be able to undertake religious worship on Sundays “at his or her free Will or Pleasure … at full liberty so to do without any Let, Denial, or Interruption whatsoever.”

Freedom and Social Control

In managing the mental and emotional well-being of emancipated persons, such as by granting freedom of worship, the act indicated a fundamental transition in governmental attitudes among the British colonizers toward those they colonized. Incidentally, the act thus established a number of channels that also allowed for the social control of the colonized populations. To begin with, by offering freedom of worship, which basically meant the right to go to church, the British were legally promoting the Christianizing of local populations. Christianity played another vital role in helping to link the colonizer with the colonized by educating all parties to the benefits of freedom, which among other effects encouraged the workforce to toil with great spirit and diligence, which, it was believed, would make them much better off and happier.

Of prime significance to the British process of supporting the provision of liberty in its colonies was the apprentice system, which, in light of the structure of the 1833 act, offered previously enslaved individuals freedom but in a highly regulated way. The British placed so much importance on the apprentice system in part owing to their lack of empirical knowledge relating to the freeing of slaves; that is, the British did not know how the completely open process of liberating slaves was going to turn out. Hence, they created a law that immediately awarded not complete free will but rather a limited sense of independence, which after a short period of time (in 1840) would indeed be replaced by a social and economic system granting even fewer restrictions. Relevant in this regard was the British desire to preserve plantation economies and maintain the stable, industrious workforces upon which the colonies so greatly relied. The challenge, therefore, was to compose an act that could allow freedoms while concurrently indoctrinating freed persons with industrious work habits and prevalent social values, which would then be internalized. Toward this end, the act endeavored to placate both slaves and plantation owners, a colonial class who feared the demise of their authority in a social and economic system founded upon the discontinued institution of slavery. Likewise, the British wanted the freed slaves to grow accustomed to working for wages under British law in the new post-enslavement social and economic structure. Religion and the apprentice system were crucial means of promoting this agenda.