Final answer:
By the 1700s, slavery in America had evolved from an ancillary labor system to a centrally significant economic institution. It was codified in law, racially based, and was both supported and questioned due to evolving ideologies surrounding human rights and freedom. The American Revolution further influenced the persistence of slavery, especially in the South, where it became more entrenched as an economic necessity.
Step-by-step explanation:
Changes in Slavery During the 1700s
By the 1700s, the nature and perception of slavery underwent significant changes. Initially part of American life since the seventeenth century, slavery was present in both Southern and Northern colonies, not just as a regional institution but a national one, deeply embedded in the American economy. The transatlantic slave trade differed from prior forms of slavery in its scale, duration, and its basis on the racial dehumanization of African people which led to the legal codification of slaves as property with the Virginia Slave Codes of 1705.
With the Enlightenment and the French Revolution, ideologies questioning the morality of slavery began to circulate, and as the American Revolution approached, colonies such as Pennsylvania and Vermont started integrating emancipation into their state constitutions. The American Revolution itself was seen through the lens of slavery, with parallels drawn between colonial subjugation and enslavement. Post-revolution, the Northern states moved towards emancipation while the South saw an expansion in slavery, especially after the invention of the cotton gin, reinforcing slavery's role as a peculiarly Southern institution.
The decades following the revolution presented a paradox where the ethos of liberty and freedom were vaunted, yet the practice of slavery continued to thrive, particularly in the South. This dichotomy between the growing concepts of human rights and the continuation of enslavement contributed to increasingly stark contrasts between free and enslaved states. The so-called 'peculiar institution' of slavery thus became more entrenched, particularly with the growth of the cotton economy, which solidified the division between slaveholding and non-slaveholding states.