British America: would the Caribbean soak up most of the slaves?

Imagine this scenario. Britain maintains the American colonies and increasingly dominate the Caribbean, potentially grabbing more French and Spanish sugar islands. When the international slave trade is banned circa 1808, slaves can still be sold from Virginia to Jamaica/Guadeloupe/etc.

Given that sugar plantations were far more profitable than cotton plantations, doesn't this mean that Caribbean slavery expands far more, and Deep South slavery expands far less? This seems to have major ramifications:

1) The Deep South mainly depends on indentured white servants, and the planters don't make quite as much money. More whites buy up smaller patches of land to work as free farmers. These societies are far less attached to slavery in their identity.

2) There is a much bigger West Indian lobby that tries to bribe politicians to back slavery. On the other hand, more of the slaver interests are based on islands that are easy for the Royal Navy to defeat in a rebellion.
 
Roughly 10.7 million Africans survived transit to the Americas. Of those 388,000 were transported directly to North America. Most were sent to the Caribbean or Brazil instead. An additional 60k-70k were sent to North America after passing through the Caribbean first. All of this is pre-1808.

The US banned international slave trade in 1808 and after the US Congress made international slave trade equivalent to piracy in 1820 it's unlikely that more than 10k slaves were successfully landed in the US. The US slave trade was almost entirely domestic.

So to answer the prompt it doesn't seem that extending the British prohibition to the thirteen colonies would have a significant impact on slave populations or the economics of slavery in either the US or Caribbean any more than our history. To quote Wikipedia "Slavery in the United States became, more or less, self-sustaining by natural increase among the current slaves and their descendants." In fact it might make it worse if slaves can freely be moved between the Caribbean and US as the market for slaves is now that much larger.
 
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If the suggestion is that America is still politically affiliated with the British Empire at the end of the African slave trade, then there may be some transfer of slaves.

When it comes down to it, the West Indies were the most profitable use of slave labor per capita, even after accounting for the higher death rate. If there was a free movement of slaves between colonies, it is more than possible than some percentage would be shipped south simply based on yields.

By the early 1800's, many of the lands of the Atlantic South were being overused and exhausted by the high nutrient consuming products. The movement west was partially initiated by the surplus of labor as plantation owners moved lock, stock and barrel west to good cotton lands in Arkansas, Texas, etc.

If there was a viable alternative customer base for the over-capacitized plantations of Virginia, South Carolina, etc, then some percentage may move to the Caribbean (Much to the slaves' dismay). I couldn't guess what percentage but it may be significant and even affect the continuation of the slave trade to the west.
 
Imagine this scenario. Britain maintains the American colonies and increasingly dominate the Caribbean, potentially grabbing more French and Spanish sugar islands. When the international slave trade is banned circa 1808, slaves can still be sold from Virginia to Jamaica/Guadeloupe/etc.

Given that sugar plantations were far more profitable than cotton plantations, doesn't this mean that Caribbean slavery expands far more, and Deep South slavery expands far less? This seems to have major ramifications:

I'm not sure it would have made that big of a difference. Slaves were considered private property; the governmental authorities couldn't just seize them and ship them to the Caribbean. They'd have to be bought for a market price, and I'm not sure why plantation owners would necessarily want to sell them in huge numbers. Even if cotton didn't generate quite as much money as sugar, it was still profitable, hence its massive expansion across the South.
 
I'm not sure it would have made that big of a difference. Slaves were considered private property; the governmental authorities couldn't just seize them and ship them to the Caribbean. They'd have to be bought for a market price, and I'm not sure why plantation owners would necessarily want to sell them in huge numbers. Even if cotton didn't generate quite as much money as sugar, it was still profitable, hence its massive expansion across the South.

If it were more profitable for slaves to be sold to the Caribbean then slave breeding would be as common in the Lower South as the Upper South.
 
with more Caribbean demand bidding up prices, the American South might well emphasize other labor sources and/or other agricultural products, other economic activity.

not great for the human beings kidnapped into slavery, per John Green on Crash Course world history, sugar plantations were really awful and often worked people to death during processing season.

but more demand elsewhere would change labor relations in American South, and maybe in positive direction.
 
If it were more profitable for slaves to be sold to the Caribbean then slave breeding would be as common in the Lower South as the Upper South.

If they even got to the Deep South in the first place. Its possible such large Caribbean purchases from Virginia and The Carolinas happen that hardly anyone in the Deep South buys them. Especially if the price is bid up above the lifetime return of a slave in cotton farming.
 
The US banned international slave trade in 1808 and after the US Congress made international slave trade equivalent to piracy in 1820 it's unlikely that more than 10k slaves were successfully landed in the US. The US slave trade was almost entirely domestic.

This source actually suggests that between 250,000 and 300,000 slaves were illegally imported into the United States after 1808.
 
This source actually suggests that between 250,000 and 300,000 slaves were illegally imported into the United States after 1808.

The link kicks off a certificate warning in my browser but in any case a lot of revisionist books are written using questionable data to score political points. It is highly doubtful that many were imported as the penalty was death.
 
The link kicks off a certificate warning in my browser but in any case a lot of revisionist books are written using questionable data to score political points. It is highly doubtful that many were imported as the penalty was death.

I'm not sure why you would get a certificate warning from Google books, but anyway, I've seen the 300,000 figure listed before. This particular book I linked was simply the first source that came up when I searched again.

As for the death penalty for smuggling slaves, I question how much it was actually applied. It's not hard to imagine a lot of people in a pro-slavery region willing to look the other way on slave importation. There was a demand for slaves, and relying only on natural increase could be a slow process.
 
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I'm not sure why you would get a certificate warning from Google books, but anyway, I've seen the 300,000 figure listed before. This particular book I linked was simply the first source that came up when I searched again.

As for the death penalty for smuggling slaves, I question how much it was actually applied. It's not hard to imagine a lot of people in a pro-slavery region willing to look the other way on slave importation. There was a demand for slaves, and relying only on natural increase could be a slow process.

Still damn risky, after all you have no idea who will be on the jury if your ship is boarded by the Coast Guard. Also the bill passed partly because Southern slave owners didn't want new slaves coming in. That would drop the price of their own slaves. Relying on natural increase made sure the price of slaves remained high which is what the people running the South wanted.
 
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Imagine this scenario. Britain maintains the American colonies and increasingly dominate the Caribbean, potentially grabbing more French and Spanish sugar islands. When the international slave trade is banned circa 1808, slaves can still be sold from Virginia to Jamaica/Guadeloupe/etc.

Given that sugar plantations were far more profitable than cotton plantations, doesn't this mean that Caribbean slavery expands far more, and Deep South slavery expands far less? This seems to have major ramifications:

1) The Deep South mainly depends on indentured white servants, and the planters don't make quite as much money. More whites buy up smaller patches of land to work as free farmers. These societies are far less attached to slavery in their identity.

2) There is a much bigger West Indian lobby that tries to bribe politicians to back slavery. On the other hand, more of the slaver interests are based on islands that are easy for the Royal Navy to defeat in a rebellion.

Not really convinced it would change much. The banning of the slave trade in 1807 would still go ahead (thirteen colonies were mostly self-sufficient in slaves - the illegal imports after 1807/1808 were mostly to expand plantations not sustain them). The banning of slavery in 1833 would use the same mechanisms as in real life i.e. the slaves become indentured servants and any shortfall in workers made up by bringing in more indentured workers from the Indian sub-continent.

Politically it would be more difficult and it might delay the 1833 by a few years but sugar beet threatened the sugar industry and tobacco and cotton had other places where they could be grown.
 
Not really convinced it would change much. The banning of the slave trade in 1807 would still go ahead (thirteen colonies were mostly self-sufficient in slaves - the illegal imports after 1807/1808 were mostly to expand plantations not sustain them). The banning of slavery in 1833 would use the same mechanisms as in real life i.e. the slaves become indentured servants and any shortfall in workers made up by bringing in more indentured workers from the Indian sub-continent.

Politically it would be more difficult and it might delay the 1833 by a few years but sugar beet threatened the sugar industry and tobacco and cotton had other places where they could be grown.

I don't see how any of that affects the point I'm making. In our timeline, imports from the USA to the Caribbean were banned from 1807-1833. In this timeline, they would be legal for that period.
 
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