Final answer:
Slavery was legally established in the American colonies with the arrival of Africans in Jamestown in 1619 and became legally codified in the early 1700s. By the mid-1700s, the enslaved population was about 350,000, a core part of the economy across all colonies. The South's population of slaves grew from over 650,000 in 1790 to 1.1 million by 1810.
Step-by-step explanation:
Slavery was officially established in the colonies during the early 17th century, with the arrival of the first Africans in Jamestown in 1619. This event marked the beginning of a practice that would spread throughout the American colonies. By the late 17th century, South Carolina had a black majority population, and slavery's legal status was firmly entrenched by the early 1700s following the adaptation of the Barbados slave codes.
By the mid-1700s, slavery had become a vital part of the economy not just in the South, but also in Northern colonies. In 1760, there were approximately 350,000 enslaved blacks, with a significant number living in Virginia, Maryland, South Carolina, and Georgia. The rest were distributed across the northern colonies, notably in New York and New Jersey. By this time, slavery was a core element of the national economy and instrumental in fostering the wealth and political power of plantation owners.
In the South, by 1790, four years post the ratification of the Constitution, 654,121 slaves made up a sizable portion of the population, mainly concentrated in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and the Southwest Territory. This number had grown to over 1.1 million slaves by 1810 as the agrarian Southern economy expanded.