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DISCLAIMER: I do not condone the slave trade and I do not advocate mass-murder of ethnic groups. I do not hold bigoted nor hateful opinions about other people.

Inspired by a question on Quora: How would the USA look if there wasn’t black slavery but instead, Asian slaves?

What if the European colonists used slaves from Asia instead of Africa? What would the effects be like in the altered timeline?

The Point of Divergence (PoD) begins when the Valladolid debate (1550-1551) hosted by de las Casas extended to African slaves. Due to the success of the debate, Spain and Portugal passes the alternate New Laws, banning the practice of enslaving American Indians and Africans and restricts the power of the encomienda system.

The ban on slavery and the restrictions of the encomienda system causes a shortage of labor in the Spanish and Portuguese colonies in America. A economic depression occurs as the colonists are forced to free their slaves and the production of sugarcane and the mining of gold and silver grinds into a halt.

However, Magellan's landing on the Philippines (1521), Portuguese conquest of Malacca (1511) and the European expeditions into Indonesia, the opening of the Nanban trade (1543), Dutch Spice Trade, Portueguese Macau ( and the European outposts in India opens up opportunities for slave labor in the American colonies.

Exploiting a loophole in the alternate New Laws which says slavery of Africans and Native Americans are banned but does not say Asians can be enslaved - the colonists open up the earliest alternate companies for the sole purpose of trafficking and smuggling slaves originating from Asia into the American colonies.

What could be the possible implications of Asian slaves in 16th century America?
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