Sale Day in antebellum South Carolina: Slavery, law, economy, and court-supervised sales

"Sale Day in antebellum South Carolina: Slavery, law, economy, and court-supervised sales" is a legal, economic, and social history of South Carolina judicial sales between 1820 and 1860, which included sheriffs', probate, and equity court sales. The most important finding is that South Carolina courts conducted fifty percent of all slave sales.;Chapter 1 describes the courts as South Carolina's largest slave auctioneering firm. The chapter presents empirical data for about 2,100 slave sales held between 1823 and 1861. These data come from the manuscript sale books of court officials.;The sales that chapter 1 describes took place in each county on the first Monday of every month. Chapter 2 describes the community on "Sale Day" and examines the bidding behavior of the crowd gathered before the courthouse. Chapter 2 shows that creditors who exploited the powerful advantages of their legal and economic positions risked community opprobrium.;Chapter 3 is an empirical study of trial court activity. The chapter details the close link between the courts and credit transactions and concludes that creditors operated the courts as extensions of their own enterprises.;Considered together, chapters 2 and 3 depict a tension between the community and creditors. The creditors dominated activity within the courthouse; but outside, the community restricted their power.;The dissertation's final chapter scrutinizes slave prices at sales by operation of law. Comparison of commercial and court sales reveals that despite lower prices at court sales, the aggregate return was higher than at commercial sales. Average individual sale prices for slaves sold in groups were substantially lower than for slaves offered individually. Compared with commercial sales, slaves sold at court sales were four times more likely to have been sold individually, rather than in a group. Aggregate court sale proceeds exceeded commercial returns because more slaves were sold individually.;Judicial slave sales exemplified South Carolinian James Henry Hammond's "mud-sill" theory. The destruction of slave families released capital and allowed creditors and the community to avoid conflict. Throughout the process, law served an ideological function that concealed the agency of those who conducted the sales.