Abolition Day Puerto Rico

Since the arrival of the first sugar plantations in the sixteenth century in Puerto Rico, and generally throughout the Caribbean, sugar and slavery were synonymous. During the first half of the nineteenth century era, Puerto Rico had the largest number of slaves. In 1846 there were 51,216 slaves. The number of males did not differ much from the number of women, many were of African origin (bozales), even though since September 1817, according to a treaty abolishing the "Black Trafficking" signed by Spain and England, the slave trade from Africa had been prohibited.

Upon arrival to the island by force, the slaves were sold as mere objects in the markets of major sugar towns. During the 1840s, for example, the price of a male ranged between 350 and 400 silver pesos, a female 250 to 300 pesos and a "mulecon" (child) a little less.

Forced to work up to 18 hours a day during the sugar harvest season, soon the slaves protested against their exploitation. They demonstrated their defiance with escapes, protests and conspired to take over the island killing the people, to include their masters. The rebels that were captured were subject to harsh punishment by hanging, whippings, stockade or restrained by shackles.

The first know slave revolt took place in the nineteenth century, in 1812, the great conspiracy broke out in the vicinity of the capital, which stretches northeast from the town of El Roble, Río Piedras, to Añasco in the northwest. In this occasion the slaves believed to have freed themselves.

In 1821, approximately 1,500 slaves mainly from Bayamón, Toa Baja, Toa Alta, Guaynabo and Rio Piedras unsuccessfully conspired against the slave system with the intent to establish the kingdom of Mark Viorro. Over the next year, the slaves of Guayama and Naguabo, joined in a conspiracy that the authorities refer to as the Doucoundray Holstein conspiracy. Four years later, "bozales" slaves conspired during a dance on the Night of Saint Peter in Ponce that had been organized by slaves themselves. After the conspiracy Governor Miguel de la Torre understood that a serious problem was developing threatening the peace of loyal vasallos and consequently decreed a Slave Regulation in 1826. The regulation was preventive in nature, and in that sense, was very different to the last Slave Code of 1789, which, in its introduction, it protected slaves from abuse from their masters. Regulation 1826, by contrast, seeks to protect the owners from abuse of their slaves. There are two basic conditions that explain the differences between these two codes. First, the slave population growth: in 1794 was 17,500 slaves and by 1827 there were 31,874 slaves concentrated mostly in the farms of Puerto Rico, secondly, the fact that there was already a revolutionary movement of the birth of an ex-slaves' republic.

During the period that extended from 1826 to 1840, years that marked the incorporation of Puerto Rica as a mayor sugar producer in the international markets, a period of economic and political stability in Puerto Rico. As a result, this reduces the significance of the confrontation movements with the slave system. However, there were small uprisings, involving the slaves of some farms. These revolts and conspiracies took place in farms located in Guayama, 1828, Vega Baja, 1832, Ponce, 1833 & 1839 and Guayanilla, in 1840.

In the late 1830s, the sugar industry began to suffer a series of problems which causes lie within and outside the island, and that will bloom again the seed of a slave rebellion as in the 1820s. A key is the great conspiracy of Ponce, coordinated with other parties on the island in December 1841. Two years later the "Longoba" slaves seized the town of Toa Baja. Three other rebellions occurred motivated by different causes, such as the rebellion against the "mulatto masters", in Naguabo and Toa Baja, or the slave uprising which enforces the Rules of 1826 in Isabela. In 1848 the salves conducted the last two collective movements of conspiracy: one in Ponce and the other in Cabo Caribe, district of Vega Baja.

The Black Posse 1848 (posse against the black race )

Two months before the slave conspiracy in July 1848 Ponce, Ponce was in a deplorable state of misery. Drought, as noted, had been the main cause. But there were other problems as serious as this catastrophe. The price per 100 lbs. of sugar in the Philadelphia market in the United unsecured loans States, which was the main buyer of Ponce, had dropped to $ 5.14. This was the lowest price paid in the nineteenth century. Finally, the French market, the third largest buyer of sugar, stopped buying sugar as a result of the turbulent political events of 1848. The French Revolution and the establishment of the Second Republic of 1848, a direct impact on the lives of the slaves in the Caribbean, and therefore in Puerto Rico. The interim government abolished slavery in the French colonies of Martinique and Guadeloupe on April 29. In Martinique, the slaves did not wait for the decree and rebelled. Many whites left the island and took refuge in Puerto Rico. On their arrival to the island the French (of privileged classes), described the horrors of the racial war that had just taken place. By July 3rd , the conflict spread to the Danish colony of St. Croix, where the governor, in order to appease the colored rebels abolished the institution of slavery. However, the measure failed because the war continued.

The geographical proximity between the islands of Puerto Rico and St. Croix, and the present economic crisis which hit both the sugar plantations and the slave population of Puerto Rico, made the governor of the island, Juan Prim, to send a contingent of 500 infantry soldiers, 2 pieces of artillery and a platoon of land miners to St. Croix. This time the forces from Puerto Rico, together with the Danish triumphed and succeeded in restoring peace in St. Croix. However, governor Prim, fearing that the slave would rebel again, reaffirmed his belief that violence was the only way to abolish slavery, he needed to convince the Danish authorities and Puerto Rico that the St. Croix decree of abolition was a "dead act" because it had been imposed by force. Prim told to the Danish authorities not to enforce the decree of abolition based on the bad example in Puerto Rico.

Gov. Prim second measure took place in late May 1848, when the governor attacked free blacks and slaves in Puerto Rico. On this occasion issuing a ban against the African race. This proclamation was repressive and punitive and no difference between free or slave African. It was just enough to be African or descendant of, to be included in the provisions of The Posse (El Bando). According to Article I, an offense involving members of the African race, free or slaves, would be tried and punished by the militarily. Article II reaffirmed the law of white supremacy over black African, it stated that any black who took up arms against a white person would "even if it was a justified aggression" will be, if a slave, passed through the arms and if a free slave, will have his right hand cut off. Africans and their descendants will always be perpetrators of the justice. Article III stated that a black African who uses insulting or abusive language or threatens with a stick, stone or otherwise, would be sentenced to five years imprisonment, if a slave and if free, the appropriate penalty for the circumstances. The master was empowered by (Article V) to kill the slave who rebelled in such act.

Apparently, the purpose of the slave code was not clear, Prim himself, nine days later, dictated another explanation of the code in order for it to be carried out without difficulty. Section 1 extended the powers of Articles II, III and V, of The Black Posse to be carried out by the whites in their own properties. Any theft on part of Africans and their descendants, would be tried by a court-martial. Articles VIII, IX and X stated that if the slave stole eight reales (spanish currency) would be bad credit loans handed over to his master, but if he stole from eight to eighty reales would suffer 200 lashes. Whoever set fire to a rural farm or urban site, sugarcane or any other crops would also be judged by a court-martial. Prim was also concerned brawls that the people of color could encounter, free or slave, depending on the weapons used they will would be punished.

Because of the multiple failures of the slaves' conspiracies during the first half of the nineteenth century, from 1850 another collective popular demonstration against the institution of slavery began: the murder of the master, executed by a group of slaves. Since 1840, there were several conspiracies, such as Naguabo, in 1843, and Toa Baja in 1846, whose main purpose was the execution of the master. These two cases foreshadow what would later become the manifestation of rejection of slavery by slaves on the eve of the abolition of slavery in Puerto Rico. Finally, on March 23, 1873 the National Assembly of the Spanish Republic unanimously approved the abolition of slavery in Puerto Rico, ending four centuries of history of the dismal institution on the island. However, there had been for years an intense debate over the abolition of slavery in Puerto Rico.

• On one hand there were some who argued that abolition would not cause any financial crisis and since most estates had a mixed workforce (free and slave).
  
  
• The capital raised through the abolition with compensation could be invested in the improvement of sugar technology.
  
  
• The price of slaves was very high (600 dollars) and the average selling price and what he produced (sugar) had a very low price. It was cheaper to pay a wage than to buy a slave.
  
  
• The theories of capitalist development expressed by Adam Smith pointed to the creation of a free labor market. This in turn pointed out that free labor was more efficient than slave labor. "Two days of free a worker amount to three days of a slave".
  
  
• Spain was the only European metropolis that had not abolished slavery in America. However, others argued as follows: It was true that the slave price was high, but freedom could not be granted on the island because there was no cheap labor force to replace it.
  
  
• Slaves work more than free laborers. "Whip a slave and he will work more hours a day."
  
  
• Day laborers left the workforce especially "that of homalla (boilers)" on the powerhouse of the sugar plantations.
  
  
• Some slaves would be devoted to idle while others rebel against the white population of the country.
  
  
• The abolition with compensation was uncertain.
  
  They could abolish slavery in Puerto Rico alone and not do in Cuba, where slavery was very significant and where there had been a war of independence that would extend for 10 years (1868 to 1878).