4. Restrictions in Georgia. In Georgia we have an example of a community whose philanthropic founders sought to impose upon it a code of morals higher than the colonists wished.  The settlers of Georgia were of even worse moral fibre than their slave-trading and whiskey-using neighbors in Carolina and Virginia; yet Oglethorpe and the London proprietors prohibited from the beginning both the rum and the slave traffic, refusing to “suffer slavery (which is against the Gospel as well as the fundamental law of England) to be authorised under our authority."[1] The trustees sought to win the colonists over to their belief by telling them that money could be better expended in transporting white men than Negroes; that slaves would be a source of weakness to the colony; and that the “Produces designed to be raised in the Colony would not require such Labour as to make Negroes necessary for carrying them on."[2]

This policy greatly displeased the colonists, who from 1735, the date of the first law, to 1749, did not cease to clamor for the repeal of the restrictions.[3] As their English agent said, they insisted that “In Spight of all Endeavours to disguise this Point, it is as clear as Light itself, that Negroes are as essentially necessary to the Cultivation of Georgia, as Axes, Hoes, or any other Utensil of Agriculture."[4] Meantime, evasions and infractions of the laws became frequent and notorious.  Negroes were brought across from Carolina and “hired” for life.[5] “Finally, purchases were openly made in Savannah from African traders:  some seizures were made by those who opposed the principle, but as a majority of the magistrates were favorable to the introduction of slaves into the province, legal decisions were suspended from time to time, and a strong disposition evidenced by the courts to evade the operation of the law."[6] At last, in 1749, the colonists prevailed on the trustees and the government, and the trade was thrown open under careful restrictions, which limited importation, required a registry and quarantine on all slaves brought in, and laid a duty.[7] It is probable, however, that these restrictions were never enforced, and that the trade thus established continued unchecked until the Revolution.

5. Restrictions in South Carolina.[8] South Carolina had the largest and most widely developed slave-trade of any of the continental colonies.  This was owing to the character of her settlers, her nearness to the West Indian slave marts, and the early development of certain staple crops, such as rice, which were adapted to slave labor.[9] Moreover, this colony suffered much less interference from the home government than many other colonies; thus it is possible here to trace the untrammeled development of slave-trade restrictions in a typical planting community.