And at the end or terme of ten yeares to sett them free, as
the manner is with the English servants. And that man that will not let
them goe free, or shall sell them away elsewhere, to that end that they
may bee enslaved to others for a long time, hee or they shall forfeit to
the Collonie forty pounds."[29]
This law was for a time enforced,[30] but by the beginning of the
eighteenth century it had either been repealed or become a dead letter;
for the Act of 1708 recognized perpetual slavery, and laid an impost of
L3 on Negroes imported.[31] This duty was really a tax on the transport
trade, and produced a steady income for twenty years.[32] From the year
1700 on, the citizens of this State engaged more and more in the
carrying trade, until Rhode Island became the greatest slave-trader in
America. Although she did not import many slaves for her own use, she
became the clearing-house for the trade of other colonies. Governor
Cranston, as early as 1708, reported that between 1698 and 1708 one
hundred and three vessels were built in the State, all of which were
trading to the West Indies and the Southern colonies.[33] They took out
lumber and brought back molasses, in most cases making a slave voyage in
between. From this, the trade grew. Samuel Hopkins, about 1770, was
shocked at the state of the trade: more than thirty distilleries were
running in the colony, and one hundred and fifty vessels were in the
slave-trade.
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