BLACK SOCIAL HISTORY: WHITE SLAVERY IN AMERICA :

The 17th and 18th century " economists " advocated the enslavement of poor whites because they saw them as cheapest and most effective way to develop the colonies in the New World and expand the empire. As the plantations system expended in the southern states of America planters demanded the legalization of the practice of kidnapping poor whites. Even if they attained their freedom, dirty-poor whites were forced to compete against negro slave labor. Jobs were few and southern planters sat idly as poor whites died of malnutrition for want of food and medicine. Negro slaves were expensive , to protect their investments, white aristocrats usually treated their negro slaves well providing for adequate food, clothing, and medication even as poor whites in the same town sickened and died from disease and malnutrition

Try to envision the 19th century scene, yeomen southern whites, sick and destitute watching their children dying while enduring the spectacle of negro slaves from the jungle of Africa healthy and well fed, thanks to the generosity of their fabulously wealthy white owners who cared little or nothing for the local " White Trash"  .