Nineteenth-century intellectuals justified continued African slavery as preferable to presumed massacre

Evidence

Although acknowledging that the trade worsened considerably with the arrival of Europeans on the coastlines of Africa, al-Inklïzï says that abolition of the trade is impossible as long as Africans remain ignorant, uneducated, and without religion. Only when they accept true religion and learn the skills of civilized countries will they be able to give up a trade that has become second nature. Until such a time, al-Inklïzï says, it is better that they enslave each other than massacre each other. — Eve M. Troutt Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism_…, 282

Categorization

• QUESTION: Did this lesser-of-two-evils justification for slavery circulate widely in mid-nineteenth-century British antislavery debate, or is it distinctive to this source?