In the Americas, slavery spread rapidly. In the Spanish colonies, slaves poured into the Caribbean to work on sugarcane plantations. They were also imported into Mexico, where they labored in mines, plantations, and textile factories, although in much smaller numbers than in the Caribbean. In Mexico, they formed about 2% of the population; nevertheless, African cultural traditions influenced dance, food, and music in some areas.

The Spanish typically entered into contracts to have slaves imported into their colonies. The contract was an asiento that gave a country or company a monopoly on the slave trade with Spanish colonies. For instance, England held the asiento from 1713 to 1750. In the Caribbean, Brazil, and the Southern United States, plantation agriculture was practiced.

Plantations were large estates producing cash crops; typical crops were sugarcane, tobacco, cotton, coffee, and indigo. While field labor was very common, other slaves worked in factories, did construction, or were domestic servants. In the American South, where cotton was a key crop, the invention of the cotton gin by Eli Whitney in 1794 helped keep slavery profitable; using the cotton gin, cotton seeds could be cleaned from the cotton up to 50 times faster than they could be removed by hand.

Rebellions were feared by slave owners, as in some places slaves outnumbered the white population. An example is the Stono Rebellion, which took place in 1739 in South Carolina. The rebellion involved about 200 slaves, and the white owners of several plantations were killed. The rebellion was crushed rapidly and the rebels were executed.

In Haiti, the slaves rebelled in 1791 and by 1803, led by Toussaint Louverture, Haiti had achieved independence. Some slaves escaped and formed communities of escaped slaves who were called maroons. An example of such a community is Quilombo dos Palmares in Brazil. However, slaves who tried to escape and were caught were subject to harsh punishments. Those who did not rebel or escape often still resisted. Resistance could take the form of working slowly or deliberately breaking tools.

The process by which slaves were transported to the Americans came to be called the “Triangular Trade”. Ships travelled between Europe, Africa, and the Americas, trading at each stop. The journey between Africa and the Americas was called the “Middle Passage.” On this leg of the journey, slaves were packed tightly together in holds below the decks. The filthy, crowded conditions led to the spread of disease; about 15-25% of slaves did not survive this ordeal.

On the Amistad, in 1839, the slaves revolted; they arrived in the United States and were returned to their home by order of the Supreme Court. In the United States, a range of different groups began to press for the end of slavery. Behind some of these movements lay Enlightenment ideals regarding equality.

By the 1670s, some Quakers were already speaking out against slavery. However, not all anti-slavery activists were Quakers; Jonathan Edwards, the famous religious leader from the Great Awakening spoke against slavery, as did Benjamin Franklin who was the President of the Philadelphia Society for the Relief of Free Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage. In the 1830s, Lucretia Mott, a Quaker activist, advocated for the abolition of slavery and was a founding member of the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society.