Slavery has been around for many years beginning from the Egyptians through to modern time in America.There is no doubt that slavery has brought great wealth to many countries and that the slave traders, ship owners and plantation owners all benefited and were the cause of the continuation of the slave trade for many hundreds of years.
The owners of the plantation were able to become very rich after paying only small amounts of money for slaves who work for them for many years. These vast amounts of money gave many lots of power and influence. Banks were opened up due to the profits from the slave trade. Many arguments were used to defend slavery and show how important it was. People lied about how well the slaves were treated. Reports said that they all had plenty of room, fed up to eight times a day and only shackled for their own protection if they were rebellious. Also many who profited from slavery argued that Britain did not engage in the slave trade then others would do it anyway and their country would become more prosperous than Britain.
There were lots of arguments against slavery used by Wilberforce to the Government in the Houses of Parliament. Wilberforce gave a speech providing evidence that the African slaves suffered by being removed from their homeland and proved to Parliament that they were whipped ill- treated and punished and often preferred death to life as a slave or on board the ship.
Unfortunately slavery took a long time to become abolished in Britain but if it had not been for the work of Wilberforce many more millions of lives would still be suffering from slavery.