Compensated emancipation

Compensated emancipation was a method of ending slavery, under which the enslaved person's owner received compensation from the government in exchange for manumitting the slave. This could be monetary, and it could allow the owner to retain the slave for a period of labor as an indentured servant. In practice, cash compensation rarely was equal to the slave's market value.

A number of countries (see "Other nations and empires" section below) enacted forms of compensated emancipation. In the United States, however, no nationwide compensation system was ever put in place. Only the District of Columbia, which was under federal control, used compensated emancipation as part of ending slavery in 1862.

Opposition
Owners complained that their compensation was small compared with their loss; they were paid less, often much less, than what the slaveowner could have sold the enslaved person for (the market value). Governments and non-slaveholding citizens complained about the financial burden of compensating the owners, while for the formerly enslaved it seemed ludicrous that those who had all along benefited from slavery should now receive additional compensation, while its victims received no compensation whatsoever.

Historian Eric Foner wrote, "Even Haiti, where slavery died amid a violent revolution, agreed in 1824 to pay a large indemnity to former slaveholders in exchange for French recognition of its independence.... No one proposed to compensate slaves for their years of unrequited toil." Compensation of slaveholders has been viewed as akin to compensating a thief for returning stolen property, or paying ransom to a kidnapper for releasing his victim, and therefore not so much compensation as a reward for committing what should be a crime.

Transition away from slavery
Compensated emancipation was typically enacted as part of an act that outlawed slavery outright or established a scheme whereby slavery would eventually be phased out. It frequently was accompanied or preceded by laws which approached gradual emancipation by granting freedom to those born to slaves after a given date. Among the European powers, slavery was primarily an issue with their overseas colonies. The British Empire enacted a policy of compensated emancipation (about 40% ) for its colonies in 1833, followed by France in 1848, Denmark in 1849, and the Netherlands in 1863. Most South American and Caribbean nations emancipated slavery through compensated schemes in the 1850s and 1860s, while Brazil passed a plan for gradual, compensated emancipation in 1871, and Cuba followed in 1880 after having enacted freedom at birth a decade earlier.

Emancipation via indentured servitude
To be sure, indentured servitude represented for the formerly enslaved an improvement over slavery itself; those indentured could not be forcibly relocated, children and other family members could not be taken away by force, and they could no longer be whipped or raped. However, they were still not free.

United States
Only in the District of Columbia, which fell under direct Federal auspices, was compensated emancipation enacted. On April 16, 1862, President Lincoln signed the District of Columbia Compensated Emancipation Act. This law prohibited slavery in the District, forcing its 900-odd slaveholders to free their slaves, with the federal government paying owners an average of about $300 for each.

The 13th amendment abolished slavery and involuntary servitude in the United States, except as a punishment for crime. It provided no compensation either to owners or to the formerly enslaved.

Other nations and empires
Nations and empires that implemented compensated emancipation:


 * Argentina
 * Bolivia
 * Brazil
 * British Empire
 * Colombia
 * Cuba
 * Danish colonies
 * Dutch empire
 * Ecuador
 * Kingdom of France, 1315, see Louis X
 * French colonial empire
 * Haiti
 * Mexico and Central America
 * Paraguay
 * Peru
 * Puerto Rico
 * Spanish Empire
 * Sweden
 * Uruguay
 * Venezuela
 * Wallachia and Moldavia
 * United Kingdom
 * United States (District of Columbia only)