Liberty, Equality, Slavery

Abstract

Abstract: During the winter of 1789–90, contemporaries in Paris observed intense controversy over the future of the lucrative colonial slave trade. The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen, in proclaiming all men free and equal, raised questions about the legality of slaving. Both the abolitionist Society of the Friends of the Blacks and proslavery commercial lobbyists representing France’s chambers of commerce, influenced by developments in Britain and the United States, sought to force the slave trade onto the legislative agenda. Countering a consensus that the French revolutionaries never confronted the problem of the slave trade, this essay looks beyond the floor of the National Constituent Assembly to reveal the high-stakes debates that played out largely shielded from public view: in correspondence, in legislative committees, in the Jacobin Club, and in private meetings. This contest served as a proving ground for France’s new representative government and an engine for political innovation, engaging a broad cast of nonelected political actors in the process of lawmaking. Faced with the threat of bankruptcy, revolutionaries voted overwhelmingly to reconcile liberty, equality, and slavery, establishing precedents for future regimes.