Here's some terrific history, including mention of deliberate efforts to use race to drive groups apart for political purposes.
- Click here for the article.
It was the first rebellion in the American colonies in which discontented frontiersmen took part (a somewhat similar uprising in Maryland involving John Coode and Josias Fendall took place shortly afterwards). The alliance between European indentured servants and Africans (many enslaved until death or freed), united by their bond-servitude, disturbed the ruling class. The ruling class responded by hardening the racial caste of slavery in an attempt to divide the two races from subsequent united uprisings with the passage of the Virginia Slave Codes of 1705.
While on the subject, here's info from the entry on the Virginia Slave Codes of 1705.
- Click here for that article.
The Virginia Slave Codes of 1705 were a series of laws enacted by the Colony of Virginia's House of Burgesses regulating activities related to interactions between slaves and citizens of the crown colony of Virginia. The enactment of the Slave Codes is considered to be the consolidation of slavery in Virginia, and served as the foundation of Virginia's slave legislation.
These codes effectively embedded the idea of white supremacy into law by the following devices:
- Established new property rights for slave owners
- Allowed for the legal, free trade of slaves with protections granted by the courts
- Established separate courts of trial
- Prohibited blacks, regardless of free status, from owning arms [weapons]
- Whites could not be employed by blacks
- Allowed for the apprehension of suspected runaways
The law was devised to establish a greater level of control over the rising African slave population of Virginia. It also served to socially segregate white colonists from black slaves making them disparate groups hindering their ability to unite. A unity of the commoners was a perceived fear of the Virginia aristocracy which had to be addressed, and who wished to prevent a repeat of events such as Bacon's Rebellion, occurring 29 years prior
