The Lost German Slave Girl by John Bailey Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

The Lost German Slave Girl by John Bailey - Essay ExampleGerman families in the New Orleans area claimed that shot was in particular the child of immigrants who had died and that the girl was subsequently indentured by an unscrupulous owner and later sold into slavery. The main question raised by the piece is whether Sally really was a German girl or whether she was just a clever slave who was grabbing at her once chance for freedom.The event that the color of a persons skin was the bag of whether they could be enslaved or not shows the racism that was at the heart of this culture. It is fascinating that the case revolved around the fact of whether Sally was German, and thus not deserving of slavery rather than the fact that slavery was morally objectionable per se.The idea that color and slavery were indelibly link up was starting to be threatened by the inter-breeding that had been occurring in the midst of slaves and whites for generations. By this time, just a decade before the the Statesn Civil War would end slavery, umteen slaves looked as white as their masters. and so the very basis of slavery - the supposed inferiority of black races - was called into question by the continuum of color that then existed in America.The lack of certainty as to race was reflected within the legal system, in which slaves were regarded as property and yet, paradoxically, could also have legal representation within trials. Thus if a slave was accused of murder he/she had the right to legal representation, although as the author shows, the degree to which this right was enforced depended very much upon case-by-case circumstances and the judge who was available. Bailey essentially shows a society that is ripe for change. The mysterious origin of Sally Miller reflected the complexity of race that was characteristic of America by the mid nineteenth-century. The simple duality of slave and master was increasingly being challenged on an ethical and legal basis. Slaves cou ld buy their freedom and many tried to drop their way to Northern states where slavery was already abolished. The idea that the identity of a person was set as slave or non-slave is shown to be too simple by the case of Sally Miller. If Miller was indeed of German origin, then a person could move from non-slave to slave because of bad luck and unethical businessmen. If a slave was lucky, earned enough money or had an enlightened master, he could become a non-slave. To conclude, the fact that the case was never resolved in a concrete manner shows the history is often not as certain as many people would like. The actual origin of Sally Miller testament probably never be known now, any more than it was proved in the court case. What emerges is the terrible manner in which immigrants were treated in America at this time, even those from supposedly privileged countries such as Germany. The book also shows the complex legal environment of America at the time, and gives a consider of t he legal position of slaves that has seldom been considered before. Ultimately the book shows the mystery of human nature and identity, especially racial identity. If a slave is more white than her master, what is the basis for the slavery if it is based upon the supposed superiority of whites over blacks The answer was that slavery was based upon cruelty and exploitation rather than any rationally identified differences between races.