Subversion or Cultural Hegemony? Leniency for Slaves Condemned to Death in Virginia, 1800-1860

Abstract

Penal policy towards slaves in Virginia underwent a process of reforms during the decades leading up to the Civil War. Although the code for slaves was excessively severe, in practice, the authorities made it less harsh by constantly commuting death sentences to deportation. Capital punishment became a punishment for only the most serious crimes alone while most of the slaves condemned to death were actually deported. Most of the historians concerned with the American south has interpreted this leniency as part of efforts by the slave-owning class to increase the legitimacy of their social system as well as their cultural hegemony over southern society as a whole. From this perspective,         slave owners were prepared to promote this type of reforms to reduce the criticisms and moral questioning of the principal institution in their society. Beyond external attacks from Northern and European abolitionists, the reforms sought to reduce the space for criticism and internal dissidence and ensure domestic consensus on the preservation of slavery. This article questions the assumptions of “hegemonic interpretation” and through a detailed analysis of various cases of slave crime, suggests that reformist attitudes contained anti-slave ideas and attitudes as well as a certain potential to subvert the southern social order.