For a period of time, slaves and indentured servants shared very similar rights and statuses. When slaves first arrived, they were treated like indentures servants. No slave laws at the time meant that the slaves were given equal amount of freedom and opportunity. Eventually, that all went away when powerful Maryland and Virginian planters ratified several laws that distinctly separated the white indentured servants from the black slaves. These planter elites went away with “long-standing English legal traditions, such as the right of children to inherit their fathers’ status” (83). This essentially meant that any newborn child born from a female slave would automatically be enslaved from birth. As stated in the book, “Slavery was becoming
