The Imperial Age with the Resurgence of Han Style

Chapter 364: Abolition
At six o'clock in the evening on November 1735, 11, a group of people gathered in a three-story building in Port Ryan. They came from various trading posts or prosperous trading ports in the Caribbean. They were far away from the hustle and bustle of the Indian Ocean world and probably had no interest in the disputes and wars of the empire.

Yet they represent an imperial drive as powerful as strategic and civilizational expansion: profit.

There were fifteen people in the spacious and luxurious room, along with a clerk. They sat around the table as if they were holding a shareholders' meeting. They had serious expressions and looked weathered. Most of them looked like haggard "island people".

The room was comfortable and solemn, with incense lingering in the room. On the table against the wall were rolls of leather-bound meeting minutes and account books. On the table were pens, several bottles of ink, and an inkstand.

The chief manager and the heads of each branch would spend a long time thinking carefully and choosing their words before speaking. All conversations revolved around many issues such as trade ratios, available inventory, profit growth, employee promotions, and profit distribution.

The clerk's pen made a constant rustling sound on the paper, and page after page of large paper was filled with writing.

When the meeting was temporarily over, they would file the minutes, sign their names and ranks at the bottom of the page in plain handwriting, and then follow the chief treasurer out into the corridor.

The door at the other end of the corridor was opened by the waiter, and the air was immediately filled with the intoxicating aroma of wine and baked goods.

These people are the regional managers, branch managers, general agents and major trading partners of the Caribbean Trading Company. They are holding an annual meeting at the regional headquarters in Ruian Port to summarize the operating results of the past year and build a business expansion plan for the next year.

From the beginning, the Caribbean Trading Company had no ambition for overseas conquest, but it continued to establish diplomatic relations with European colonists in the region, collect intelligence, explore and establish trade routes. In a sense, the trading company was actually doing the affairs of the state.

As Qi's colonial territories expanded to the Caribbean, the trading company began to seek a new position in "national affairs," and the relationship between trade and colonial rule became increasingly complex.

But deep down, the trading companies have a consensus that the advantageous position that Qi has established worldwide is their unparalleled profit opportunity.

Investors and financiers in China were also keenly aware that the empire's colonial territories scattered around the world - most of which were spoils of war - might play as big a role in trade as in military strategy.

This may be an important reason why they always actively support the empire when it promotes colonial expansion policies or launches overseas wars.

"I heard that the Governor is ready to accept the French apology and thus resolve the regional dispute caused by the stabbing of the envoy?" Niu Xuehong, the regional manager of the Caribbean Trading Company, put down his chopsticks, picked up a white towel from the table, wiped his mouth, turned to the middle-aged man next to him and asked.

"Yes, the Governor General does not want to have a bad relationship with the French, so as not to cause regional conflicts and threaten the safety of Rui'an." The head of the Caribbean Trading Company in Rui'an also stopped eating and replied respectfully: "However, in order not to lose face, the Governor General will increase the compensation amount from one thousand yuan to two thousand yuan."

"Haha..." Niu Xuehong sneered twice, "When did the lives of us Qi people become so cheap? Two thousand yuan, I'm afraid the deceased's family won't survive for more than 20 years!"

"If they spend frugally, the family can still support themselves for 20 years." Liu Gengsheng, the transportation manager of the Caribbean Trading Company, smiled and took over the conversation. "If the deceased's family uses the money to buy some land and hire a few slaves, they may not become rich, but at least they can have a comfortable family."

"What do you know?" Huang Xuzhi, the sugar business manager of the Caribbean Trading Company, immediately refuted when he saw the face of the shopkeeper visibly darkened. "In our Da Qi country, if a senior craftsman died in a factory, we would have to pay a compensation of at least a thousand or eight hundred yuan. How come an official of our Da Qi overseas colonial territory was killed by the French, and the compensation is only two thousand yuan?... What kind of thing is this! It's simply a naked humiliation to us!"

"Hey, what Old Huang said is really a bit humiliating. The French first instigated the Maroons in the mountains to attack our immigrant settlements and sugarcane plantations, and then directly killed the envoys we sent to negotiate. This is really too much. They simply don't take our Great Qi seriously!"

"The French said it was an accident." Liu Gengsheng said without realizing it. "Moreover, they promised to severely punish the murderer and sent someone to apologize to us. They are sincere. If the Rui'an Governor's District gets into a fight with the French, once a war breaks out, with the current strength, I'm afraid it will suffer a great loss and more people will die. In this case, it is better to endure it temporarily, accept the French apology and compensation, and choose to keep things quiet..."

"Master Liu is still a kind-hearted and good-natured man!" Niu Xuehong picked up the wine glass on the table, took a few sips, and said with a slightly sarcastic tone: "But, in this overseas territory far away from the mainland, it's not easy to be a good man!"

"..." Liu Gengsheng looked at the slightly gloomy expression of the shopkeeper and suddenly realized that he seemed to have misunderstood and said the wrong thing.

What does the chief manager want to do?
"The father of our governor was also a soldier. How come he is less courageous when facing the humiliation of the French?" Niu Xuehong shook his head and sighed, "Back then, during the reign of Emperor Taizu, the Japanese shogunate killed the people of Da Qi without reason, which led to a massive retaliation from the empire. In addition to forcing them to admit their guilt, they also forced the shogunate to cede land and pay compensation, thus greatly demonstrating the power of the empire. Now, the French are using the excuse of an accident to cover up their evil act of killing our envoy, which is really unacceptable. If this is started, the French will definitely despise us, and maybe they will do more excessive things to humiliate Da Qi in the future."

Hiss, the manager wants to use this to start a war between our Great Qi and the French!

Yes, once the Qi-France war breaks out, our Qi country, in addition to attacking French coastal towns, will inevitably rely on its superior naval power to seize French overseas colonial territories, thereby weakening their war potential.

France owns many territories in the Caribbean, including many lucrative "sugar islands" such as Saint-Domingue, Guadeloupe, Saint-Lucia, and Tobago...

If Qi State seized these "sugar islands", the Caribbean Trading Company would be able to take over the French sugar industry and become the main sugar supplier in the North Atlantic region.

During this period, sugarcane represented huge wealth.

The pursuit of wealth is the nature of businessmen.
-
"...Abolition?" Lin Mingjiu, the civil affairs officer of the Ruian Governorate, looked at Governor Zhu Bingnan in disbelief and said in astonishment: "Governor, you know that once the Ruian Governorate announces the abolition of slavery, it will definitely cause an uproar and will likely be strongly opposed by the sugarcane plantation owners. Now, because our Ruian envoy died unexpectedly in Cape France, we are in a tense confrontation with the French. If there is any internal trouble and the situation becomes unstable, the French will take advantage of it. ... Governor, think twice!"

Although the Governorate of Rui'an was a small place, there were sixty or seventy sugarcane plantations of various sizes, employing black slaves ranging from forty to fifty to hundreds. Even several sugar factories and many other workshops in the city had more or less black slaves.

Even some colonial officials and businessmen kept black slaves in their homes to serve them in their daily food, drink and entertainment.

If the Governor ordered the abolition of slavery and prohibited plantations, factories, and families from keeping black slaves, he would probably be spit upon by countless people.

"Mingjiu, let me ask you, are there any slaves in the Governor's District of Rui'an?" Zhu Bingnan asked with a smile. "Why not? Uh, the Governor's intention is..."

"Rui'an Governorate is an overseas territory under the jurisdiction of our Great Qi, so it must naturally abide by the laws of our Great Qi." Zhu Bingnan smiled, "Then does the law of our Great Qi allow slavery?"

"...Not allowed." Lin Mingjiu shook his head and said seriously: "Therefore, all the blacks introduced by our Rui'an Governor's District are free people and legally employed laborers. However, Governor, given the current situation in Rui'an, I'm afraid the French will not believe us if we abolish slavery!"

"It doesn't matter whether the French believe it or not." Zhu Bingnan waved his hand and said, "What's important is that if even half of the more than 300,000 black slaves in the hands of the French believe it, it will cause chaos in Saint Domingo."

"Did the Governor overestimate the role of those black slave workers?"

"If we rely on the black slaves to do things on their own, there is naturally no hope." Zhu Bingnan said: "More than a month ago, we sent troops to raid the Maroons (escapee black slaves) in the Central Cordillera Mountains. In addition to capturing two French priests, didn't we also capture more than 50 Maroons? I think we have an obligation to give them some support so that they can rescue more African compatriots."

Fellow Africans?

Lin Mingjiu couldn't help but smile. These black slave laborers had no concept of "compatriots" at all!

It's nothing more than having the same skin color, going through the same experiences, and having the same goals.

Whether they were slave workers on the plantations or the Maroons who escaped into the mountains and became free men, they had no common language and no common sense of belonging. The only way they communicated with each other, apart from using gestures with their hands and feet, was in simple French or Spanish.

It can be said that it was the evil colonists who brought them together from different regions and tribes in Africa, and eventually these blacks gradually formed a common belief, a common language, and a common "nation."

"In fact, for us Qi people, if there was no slavery in the Caribbean and even the entire Americas, and if there were no huge numbers of black slaves, do you think that Europeans could expand their colonies so easily? If there were no black slaves, would the various materials needed by the European continent be so cheap? If there were no black slaves, even the sugar cane shipped from Southeast Asia would have a great price advantage. If there were no black slaves, would the European countries not dare to easily set up many obstacles to our Qi products?"

Although, with the spillover and spread of Qi's industrial revolution during this period, many countries also began to slowly advance their own industrialization process, Qi still relied on its huge first-mover advantage to firmly hold its leading position in the field of industrial production, and crushed the European countries both in terms of industrial production scale and industrial production technology.

If countries around the world fully respect and accept the "free trade" principle advocated by Qi, then their fragile industrial base will inevitably suffer a devastating blow and they will completely become a dumping market for Qi's products.

The Qi-England War that broke out several years ago was a desperate attack by the Kingdom of England in order to defend its own trading rights and prevent its weak cotton textile industry base from being suppressed by the State of Qi.

Therefore, in the face of the economic invasion of Qi, European countries such as Britain, France, Spain, Austria, and Portugal were pretending to be compliant, showing some resistance in their promises and some caution in their cooperation. They were all trying their best to protect their own markets from complete erosion and control, while at the same time they continued to increase their efforts to suck blood from overseas colonial territories in order to feed back and strengthen their own industries.

Relying on the cruel slavery system, European countries were able to obtain a steady supply of cheap industrial raw materials from their colonial territories, thereby effectively promoting local industrial development.

It is precisely because of the existence of plantations and mines where slaves are the main labor force that industrial products from some European countries have a relative price advantage over Qi's goods.

In Qi State, with the establishment of large-scale industrial production by machines, labor productivity increased dramatically, and the demand for labor became less urgent.

Machines can do many things instead of humans, so the demand for labor will naturally decrease accordingly, and the demand for slaves will also decrease - but there are still a large number of disguised slave laborers in some of Qi State's more dangerous and environmentally harsh mines and transportation construction projects.

So, what does Qi need?
market!

A market with unlimited purchasing power!

But look at what the Atlantic economic circle is like?
Africa was just a place where slaves were produced, and America was just a place where slaves were sold. For tens of thousands of plantation owners, slave owners, and mine owners, slaves were just walking tools that engaged in agricultural and mining production for them, served their lives, gave birth to more little slaves, and then repeated the cycle. There was no need to save money to buy things.

Can you imagine that in such a large territory in Spanish America with a population of nearly 10 million, Qi's annual sales of goods in the region were less than 1 million yuan, less than half of Qing's annual total sales.

Why?

There were so many slaves that they could not afford even a nail.

If these nearly ten million people were all free people, no matter how poor they were, they would be able to scrape together a little money to buy some cloth or a few pieces of candy.

If the average sales per person is fifty cents, that’s a total of five million!
More importantly, if the European countries did not have the cheap raw materials produced by slavery, their industrial development would inevitably be full of difficulties and they would no longer be able to cope with the competition from Qi's goods.

In addition, if the Great Qi wants to become the world leader, it must occupy the moral high ground and resolutely oppose slavery, a backward and ignorant social production system.

The power generated by Qi's mechanization enabled it to increasingly use the entire world as its stepping stone. Therefore, when considering certain major issues, it naturally had to face the whole world.

Therefore, whether it was to cause trouble for French Saint-Domingue or to cater to the needs of local industrial and commercial capital, the abolition movement should start with Ryan.

(End of this chapter)