The Poor Get Poorer, the Rich Get Richer
One of the most intriguing years of American history was 1676. That’s right, not 1776 – which was also intriguing, to say the least – but rather 1676. In that year, Jamestown, Virginia, the first recognized American colony to be settled by Europeans, was the hub of “Bacon’s Rebellion”, a confusing series of affairs which has been scrutinized by historians ever since. Many are the theories about why the rebellion occurred.
Sometimes referred to as the “Virginia Rebellion of 1676”, Bacon’s Rebellion has been tagged by some as a glorious fight against unfair taxation and tyranny, an early signal and precursor of the American Revolution which followed exactly 100 years later. More recently, others have argued that Bacon’s Rebellion was simply a power struggle between a couple of selfish, stubborn leaders, namely Governor William Berkeley and colonist Nathaniel Bacon. Probably the most common interpretation has been that the uprising was a dispute over colonial “Indian policy”.
Indeed, it is generally agreed that the actual violence of Bacon’s Rebellion was ignited when the government tried to calm disputes between Indians and colonists, instead of seeking revenge after Indian raids. However, it was convenient for Indian policy to be used as a scapegoat; while there had been skirmishes with certain groups of Native Americans, there were many other factors leading to the rebellion. For example, Bacon “urged the colonists to ‘see what spounges have suckt up the Publique Treasure.’ He charged that ‘Grandees,’ or elite planters, operated the government for their private gain, a charge that made sense to many colonists.” (Roark, p. 91)
No matter what the actual “cause” of the rebellion, Bacon as a leader would never have gained such following had not the colonists empathized with his justifications. Bacon was able to rally and motivate because his charges against the government – i.e. his justification for rebellion – intellectually and emotionally resonated with colonists. Discontent and thus susceptibility to Bacon’s influence was great, due to political, social, and especially economic distance between Virginia’s wealthy elite and her poor. In fact, the economic distance between wealthy elite and poor resulted in political and social distance; a person’s economic status determined his or her “class”. It was the distance between Virginia’s lower class and her upper class that lead to Bacon’s Rebellion.
The historian T. H. Breen quotes Bacon emphasizing this wide division when he said, “The poverty of the country is such that all the power and sway is got into the hands of the rich, who by extorious advantages, having the common people in their debt, have always curbed and oppressed them in all manner of wayes.” (Breen, p. 10) Breen proceeds to explain that “Although historians may discover the Virginian gentry was not as selfish as Bacon claimed, the leader’s class rhetoric appealed to a large number of colonists.” (Breen, p. 10)
Virginia depended on tobacco plantations as her primary industry and source of income. Through imports and taxation, King Charles II of England also came to depend greatly on the tobacco crops. Requiring huge amounts of labor, the Virginia plantation owners depended heavily on indentured servants. Poor English immigrants were enticed to leave England with free transportation to the other side of the Atlantic, where they were promised cheap land and/or higher wages, following a period of indentured servitude in the tobacco fields.
The promises for a richer life were seldom fulfilled, however. Historian John C. Rainbolt noted this discrepancy in his discussion of the economic distance between the Virginia poor and the wealthy elite (Rainbolt, pp. 413-414):
In their aggressive quest for wealth and the status and gentility that they imagined would accompany it, members of this rising elite engaged in fraudulent practices to secure land and having obtained it concealed quitrent obligations. Indentured servants were exploited during their service and then denied land, part of the freedom dues many had anticipated. The members of the new gentry used their commercial connections and strategic landholdings to engross trade. They ignored the Navigation Acts and engaged in illegal commerce. In short, their striving for land, wealth, and position was intense and, at times, ruthless.
This passage demonstrates that the poor freemen were denied competition with the upper class because the wealthy elite refused to sell established plantation land to them. Freed servants who tried to compete by clearing and developing land on the “outskirts” usually experienced extreme physical and economic hardship, and they feared raids by threatened or angry Indians. Unable to compete with the upper class, the lower class had no economic significance; they were incapable of participating in the production and distribution of wealth. As a result, the poor became poorer, the rich became richer. The aftermath of this phenomenon was social and political discrimination toward the impoverished.
Unable to buy land, the freemen usually became hired workers or “tenant farmers” on the large plantations; as such, they were paid low wages and/or saddled with huge tax burdens. While plantation proprietors could afford to pay the King’s high taxes, tenant farmers first were required to pay half their income to the plantation proprietors and then also pay the King’s taxes. Thus, all the fees and taxes ate the freemen alive, and there was nothing they could do about it.
Until 1670, all freemen were allowed to vote, but in that year, the House of Burgesses (the legislative body for Virginia) voted to allow voting only by men who owned land and were the head of a household. Colonists were accustomed to European monarchies, and they “accepted social hierarchy and inequality as long as they believed that government officials ruled for the general good – so they were willing to tolerate being disenfranchised as long as they felt they were being treated fairly. When rulers violated that precept,” however, “ordinary people felt justified in rebelling.” (Roark, pp. 90-91)
Noted historian William Noel Sainsbury wrote, “The great oppression the people complain of is the great taxes levied on them…and the unequal way of raising them by the poll so that a poor man that hath nothing to maintain himself, wife and child pays as much for his levies as he that hath 2,000 acres of land.” Oppression among the poor came from the burdening taxes of which there was no escape. Having no opportunity for prosperity, the impoverished were left to suffer. These oppressive taxes – levied without any say or form of representation – exemplifies the political distance which gave way to massive discontent throughout the poor of Virginia. If the poor had economic status, they would have been politically recognized.
Similarly, economic status dictated social discrimination. As discussed by T. H. Breen, this phenomenon is reflected in the collaboration of poor and indentured whites with Negroes, “The presence of so many black rebels at West’s plantation provides evidence that many Virginians in Berkeley’s time regarded economic status, not race, as the essential social distinction. Even the gentry seems to have viewed the blacks primarily as a component of the ‘giddy multitude.’” (Breen, p. 11)
T.H. Breen is suggesting that because some poor and indentured whites were treated similarly, if not the same, as blacks, lower class whites felt compelled to assemble with the blacks to form a larger authority in order to confront the elite planters. He is suggesting that class or economic status determined social discrimination. In my perspective, this makes it evident that class discrimination took precedence over racism at this time. As I said before, class is economic status. So, in all actuality, justification of social discrimination was determined by economic status.
Discussion and conclusion will be completed.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Roark, et al, The American Promise: A History of the United States, 2009
T.H. Breen (PhD Yale, 1968), “Labor Force and Race Relations in Virginia
John C. Rainbolt (Ph.D. diss, Washington University, 1970), “The Alteration in the Relationship between Leadership and Constituents in Virginia, 1660 to 1720”
William Noel Sainsbury (1825–1895) “Considerations Upon the Present Troubles in Virginia”
No comments:
Post a Comment