Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II
by: Douglas A. Blackmon
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In this groundbreaking historical exposé, Douglas A. Blackmon brings to light one of the most shameful chapters in American history—an “Age of Neoslavery” that thrived from the aftermath of the Civil War through the dawn of World War II.
Under laws enacted specifically to intimidate blacks, tens of thousands of African Americans were arbitrarily arrested, hit with outrageous fines, and charged for the costs of their own arrests. With no means to pay these ostensible “debts,” prisoners were sold as forced laborers to coal mines, lumber camps, brickyards, railroads, quarries, and farm plantations. Thousands of other African Americans were simply seized by southern landowners and compelled into years of involuntary servitude. Government officials leased falsely imprisoned blacks to small-town entrepreneurs, provincial farmers, and dozens of corporations—including U.S. Steel—looking for cheap and abundant labor. Armies of “free” black men labored without compensation, were repeatedly bought and sold, and were forced through beatings and physical torture to do the bidding of white masters for decades after the official abolition of American slavery.
The neoslavery system exploited legal loopholes and federal policies that discouraged prosecution of whites for continuing to hold black workers against their wills. As it poured millions of dollars into southern government treasuries, the new slavery also became a key instrument in the terrorization of African Americans seeking full participation in the U.S. political system.
Based on a vast record of original documents and personal narratives, Slavery by Another Name unearths the lost stories of slaves and their descendants who journeyed into freedom after the Emancipation Proclamation and then back into the shadow of involuntary servitude. It also reveals the stories of those who fought unsuccessfully against the re-emergence of human labor trafficking, the modern companies that profited most from neoslavery, and the system’s final demise in the 1940s, partly due to fears of enemy propaganda about American racial abuse at the beginning of World War II.
Slavery by Another Name is a moving, sobering account of a little-known crime against African Americans, and the insidious legacy of racism that reverberates today.
In this groundbreaking historical exposé, Douglas A. Blackmon brings to light one of the most shameful chapters in American history—an “Age of Neoslavery” that thrived from the aftermath of the Civil War through the dawn of World War II.
Under laws enacted specifically to intimidate blacks, tens of thousands of African Americans were arbitrarily arrested, hit with outrageous fines, and charged for the costs of their own arrests. With no means to pay these ostensible “debts,” prisoners were sold as forced laborers to coal mines, lumber camps, brickyards, railroads, quarries, and farm plantations. Thousands of other African Americans were simply seized by southern landowners and compelled into years of involuntary servitude. Government officials leased falsely imprisoned blacks to small-town entrepreneurs, provincial farmers, and dozens of corporations—including U.S. Steel—looking for cheap and abundant labor. Armies of “free” black men labored without compensation, were repeatedly bought and sold, and were forced through beatings and physical torture to do the bidding of white masters for decades after the official abolition of American slavery.
The neoslavery system exploited legal loopholes and federal policies that discouraged prosecution of whites for continuing to hold black workers against their wills. As it poured millions of dollars into southern government treasuries, the new slavery also became a key instrument in the terrorization of African Americans seeking full participation in the U.S. political system.
Based on a vast record of original documents and personal narratives, Slavery by Another Name unearths the lost stories of slaves and their descendants who journeyed into freedom after the Emancipation Proclamation and then back into the shadow of involuntary servitude. It also reveals the stories of those who fought unsuccessfully against the re-emergence of human labor trafficking, the modern companies that profited most from neoslavery, and the system’s final demise in the 1940s, partly due to fears of enemy propaganda about American racial abuse at the beginning of World War II.
Slavery by Another Name is a moving, sobering account of a little-known crime against African Americans, and the insidious legacy of racism that reverberates today.
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Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
Rating: 
- Just what I needed
This book is not only a reminder but is evidence that there are many people who appear to be kind but are really not, and who will go to extreme lengths to justify themselves.
Rating: - Neoslavery anyone?
This is a hard book to read because it uncovers a secret ugliness that white American has been unwilling to face for decades.Recently, I went into decent bookstores looking for histories of the Jim Crow era and come away virtually empty.Sure there are books about slavery and the Civil War and the civil rights era but the period in-between was ignored.
This book tells you why.The period after 1880,in some ways a more brutal time for African Americans than slavery."Slavery by Another ... Read More
Rating: - Should be required reading for all
I recognize the irony in advocating the forced reading of a book about post-Thirteenth Amendment slavery.But I think that altogether too many people in this country indulge in a fantasy that slavery in the United States ended so long ago that it is no explanation for and should have no bearing on anything today.In other words, that slavery's a sad but currently inconsequential chapter in American history.Blackmon's very well researched tome will smash any such delusions.
Slavery by Another ... Read More
Rating: - This Ought to Make Your Blood Boil!
Do you think it is outrageous for an Hispanic woman to say she might have insights about certain matters that would not occur to many white males?
This book is even more relevant today than when it was first published. When we listen to the salvos of "racism" fired by white males, many of whom are clearly identifiable as Southern, we should remember the lessons of this powerful work.
Might a Japanese-American have special insight into detainment without habeas corpus?Might a lesbian ... Read More
Rating: 
- Truth finally comes to light of a very dark, hidden practice.
I read "Slavery by Another Name" by Douglas A. Blackmon after I heard his review of the book on Book Events.There have been times when I have purchased a book after hearing an author and was disappointed in that the author told his story better than he wrote it.I was not disappointed with Mr. Blackmon's expose' of these horrific practices.I am aware that even during WWII, Blacks in our military were treated differently from the Whites.
One fact that solidly hit me was that the North abandoned the South after ... Read More
- Just what I neededThis book is not only a reminder but is evidence that there are many people who appear to be kind but are really not, and who will go to extreme lengths to justify themselves.
- Neoslavery anyone?This is a hard book to read because it uncovers a secret ugliness that white American has been unwilling to face for decades.Recently, I went into decent bookstores looking for histories of the Jim Crow era and come away virtually empty.Sure there are books about slavery and the Civil War and the civil rights era but the period in-between was ignored.
This book tells you why.The period after 1880,in some ways a more brutal time for African Americans than slavery."Slavery by Another ... Read More
- Should be required reading for allI recognize the irony in advocating the forced reading of a book about post-Thirteenth Amendment slavery.But I think that altogether too many people in this country indulge in a fantasy that slavery in the United States ended so long ago that it is no explanation for and should have no bearing on anything today.In other words, that slavery's a sad but currently inconsequential chapter in American history.Blackmon's very well researched tome will smash any such delusions.
Slavery by Another ... Read More
- This Ought to Make Your Blood Boil!Do you think it is outrageous for an Hispanic woman to say she might have insights about certain matters that would not occur to many white males?
This book is even more relevant today than when it was first published. When we listen to the salvos of "racism" fired by white males, many of whom are clearly identifiable as Southern, we should remember the lessons of this powerful work.
Might a Japanese-American have special insight into detainment without habeas corpus?Might a lesbian ... Read More
- Truth finally comes to light of a very dark, hidden practice.I read "Slavery by Another Name" by Douglas A. Blackmon after I heard his review of the book on Book Events.There have been times when I have purchased a book after hearing an author and was disappointed in that the author told his story better than he wrote it.I was not disappointed with Mr. Blackmon's expose' of these horrific practices.I am aware that even during WWII, Blacks in our military were treated differently from the Whites.
One fact that solidly hit me was that the North abandoned the South after ... Read More
