History of slavery in Indiana
The history of Slavery in Indiana is contained between the time of French settlement and 1826, with a few traces of slavery afterwards.
The Northwest Ordinance seemingly prohibited slavery with its passage that stated “that there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory,” but in the Indiana Territory it was an empty law. The Ordinance had allowed for preexisting French-Indian slave arrangements, so many Virginian natives living in the territory felt that they should be allowed to have slaves too. They saw the phrase in the Ordinance that stated that the Virginians “shall have their possessions and titles confirmed to them, and be protected in the enjoyment of their rights and liberties.” Therefore, many decided to keep slaves. Fear of French rebellion kept the courts from acting against slavery, as did the violent actions of those who would “kidnap” escaped slaves. A ruling in a court in the Michigan territory in 1807, which stated that preexisting slavery could still exist under the Northwest Ordinance, validated Hoosier slaveholding, or least did in the opinions of the slaveholders.[2] It was foolish for a fugitive slave to come to Indiana. Fugitive slave William Trail thought he would be safe by moving to Brookville to be with people he knew from South Carolina; his South Carolinian owner was notified of his location and Trail was soon recaptured. It was only by a lucky escape that Trail avoided continued enslavement.[3]
Indiana courts never ruled on the Ordinance/slavery issue during the territorial period. When the issue of slavery was in courts, it “was always treated as an existing institution and its legality went unchallenged.”[4] Hoosier slaveholders understood that no pre-existing law could possibly prevent itself from being rescinded. A new law could surely override an older law. Hoosier tried three times (1803, 1807, and 1809) to have the Northwest Ordinance’s sixth article, which outlawed slavery, “suspended”, but all three efforts failed.[5]
From the creation of the territory came many immigrants originally from the South. These settlers were mostly farmers from the Upland South, who were forced out of their prior lands down south due to the rapid growth of cotton plantations. Southern immigrants who were particularly against slavery settled in Ohio, the rest went to Indiana.[6] When they relocated to the Indiana Territory, they brought what few slaves they owned with them. An 1810 census recorded 393 free blacks and 237 slaves in the Indiana Territory.[7] Knox County, in which the territorial capital of Indiana, Vincennes, was located, was the center of Indiana slavery. A young Army officer named Charles Larrabee, who was serving in Governor William Henry Harrison’s army, summed the Vincennes populace as “chiefly from Kentucky and Virginia…slavery is tolerated here.”[8]
For a Northern state, Indiana was strongly in favor of slavery. Most of its southern immigrants may have left the South in order not to compete with those that held slaves, but they still saw slavery as the natural state for blacks. An 1803 law established that those in service to another, when brought into Indiana, must fulfill their obligations. Until the Illinois territory separated from the Indiana territory in 1809, a series of laws were passed to ensure that “indenture” (slavery)[9] remained in effect until Indiana gained statehood. Indiana passed strong laws against interracial intercourse. Someone was initially considered Negro in Indiana if they had at least ¼ Negro blood; this would eventually become 1/8 Negro blood. White males would be fined $100 for having sex with a black; white women were jailed for 10-day periods.[10]
When Indiana sought statehood in 1816 there was talk of it entering as a slave state, as illustrated in the March 2, 1816 edition of the (Vincennes) Western Sun where a “citizen of Gibson” stated, “the best interests of humanity required the admission of slavery into the state.” The eastern half of the state saw much debate over the slavery issue. While the state constitution did outlaw slavery and indentures, this was due to the fact that the Northwest Ordinance was still in effect and there were more southerners from common stock in Indiana than those from plantations. Of the 43 men who wrote the constitution, 34 were either born or had once lived in the South, and the constitution was a virtual copy of the Kentucky constitution, save for the absence of slavery.[11]
Even with statehood, there was still slavery in Indiana. Despite slavery/indentures becoming illegal in 1816 due to the state constitution, the 1820 federal census listed 190 slaves in Indiana. Many Hoosier slaveholders felt that the 1816 constitution did not cover preexisting slavery; others just did not care if it was illegal. In eastern Indiana nearly all slaveholders immediately freed their slaves. But the majority of slaveholders in western counties, especially in Knox, decided to keep their slaves. The Vincennes newspaper Western Sun had numerous times advertised “indentured negroes and other slaves”, a sign of the approval of slavery in the area. [12] “In Knox County, virtually all of the (slave) suits were denied by the County Court in 1817 and 1818.” A black woman known as Polly was held slave by French trader Hyacinthe Lasselle of Vincennes. Polly sued in 1820 for her freedom, but was denied in the Knox County Court. She appealed to the Indiana Supreme Court, who ruled in her favor that she should be free. But even after this decision, there was slavery in Indiana. The federal census of 1830 still showed three slaves in Indiana: one each in Orange County, Decatur, and Warrick. A separate local census in Knox County in 1830 showed the presence of 32 slaves. Even in 1840 there were three slaves listed in the federal census as being in Indiana: a girl in Putnam and a man and girl in Rush.[13]
Even with the true end of slavery in the state, Hoosiers were supportive of the South’s right to hold slaves, expressed by the help Indiana gave to those who sought fugitive slaves. The Indiana General Assembly passed a law in 1824 that allowed for warrants to be given to slaveholders or their agents to directly go retrieve their slaves. A traveler from New York, Dr. Samuel Bernard Judah, described Vincennes in 1829 as having many blacks, making the observation of them being “generally poorly clad…poor miserable race”.[14] Indiana Governor Noah Noble spoke with pride in December 1837 on how Indiana helped slaveholders recapture their escaped slaves. When Kentucky expressed displeasure at how some Hoosiers helped runaways, the Indiana legislature passed a resolution that stated acts by Northerners to interfere with the capture of runaways was “unpatriotic and injurious to the stability of the Union.”[15]
References
- ^ http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/imh/101.4/madison.html
- ^ Dean, Jacob Piatt. Indiana: a redemption from slavery. 220, 224, 226.
- ^ Carroll, Joseph C. William Trail: An Indiana Pioneer. The Journal of Negro History (Oct., 1938). 422.
- ^ Dean 237
- ^ LaFollette, Robert. Interstate Migration and Indiana Culture. The Mississippi Valley Historical Review (Dec., 1929). 350.
- ^ Davis 204.
- ^ Rosenberg, Morton M. The Politics of Pro-Slavery Sentimental in Indiana 1816-1861. (Ball State University, 1968). 1-2.
- ^ McCord, Shirley S. ed. Travel Accounts of Indiana 1679-1961. (Indiana Historical Bureau, 1970). 63.
- ^ Rosenberg 5
- ^ Monahan, Thomas P. Marriage across Racial Lines in Indiana Journal of Marriage and the Family (Nov., 1973). 633.
- ^ Rosenberg 6
- ^ Known slave ads in the Western Sun were made on October 12, 1816; February 8, 1817; September 6, 1817; June 27, 1819; and October 16, 1819.
- ^ Rosenberg 7
- ^ McCord 134
- ^ Rosenberg 10