Final answer:
Virginians chose to massacre Natives due to resistance, the threat of retaliation, and the ease with which enslaved Natives could escape or rebel. Black slaves were imported because they were less likely to successfully resist or escape due to unfamiliarity with the land and language barriers. Racist ideologies and the need for a permanent and cost-effective labor force for plantation agriculture cemented African enslavement.
Step-by-step explanation:
Reasons for Favoring African Enslavement over Indigenous Enslavement
The choice to massacre Native Americans instead of enslaving them was influenced by a combination of factors, including resistance and retaliations from Native tribes, the spread of diseases to which Natives were vulnerable, and the difficulty in maintaining control over indigenous populations who were familiar with the terrain and could easily escape or rebel. The European settlers also tried to draw clear legal distinctions between people of European and African ancestry as a solution to the growing underclass of poor White former servants. This led to a system where slavery became associated with African ancestry, as laws were passed that made slavery heritable and treated enslaved people as property.
In contrast, importing Black slaves from Africa provided several advantages to the colonists. Africans were less familiar with the land and thus less likely to escape. Moreover, they often did not speak the same language or share the same cultural bonds as the indigenous peoples or the colonists, thus reducing the likelihood of unified rebellions. Europeans also purposely encouraged the perception of Africans as an inferior race and solely fit for manual labor, further justifying the cruel system of slavery.
Thomas Jefferson's writings, while advocating for the end of slavery, also display the racist assumptions that were prevalent at the time, which contributed to the societal acceptance of African enslavement. The labor needs of the growing agricultural economy, specifically on cotton and sugar plantations, led to an increased demand for a permanent, inexpensive labor force, which the enslaved Africans provided.