The British slave trade was abolished by an Act of Parliament passed on March 25, 1807. Launching the commemoration of the bicentenary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act, the Prime Minister said that “racism, not the rights of man, drove the horrors of the triangular trade”.

On the other hand, the late Dr Eric Williams, Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, in his thesis on capitalism and slavery, argued that, “slavery was not born of racism; rather racism was the consequence of slavery”. What I believe is unarguable, is that racism is one of the main legacies of slavery and the slave trade.

The law has had some impact in changing people’s attitude, but racism remains with us today. Those who traded in slaves and benefited from it, showed no respect for the dignity of the African, which is a fundamental right. Furthermore, the common law — part of our shared inheritance — regarded Africans not as human beings but as commodities to be bartered and traded on the stock exchange.

It is fitting that the Prime Minister should give this bicentenary such national prominence at a time when the European Convention on Human Rights is incorporated into our law — Article 4 provides that no one shall be held in slavery or servitude and Article 3 prohibits degrading and inhuman treatment. The Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott, is leading the commemorations.

Britain entered the slave trade in 1562 but was not a significant player until it established colonies in the Caribbean and introduced the sugar industry. By the end of the civil war in 1660 it had developed a more substantial role, and the company of Royal Adventurers of Africa was incorporated in 1663 and granted a monopoly to trade in slaves for a period of one thousand years. The monarchy was very much involved in the slave trade and, after the Royal Adventurers of Africa was wound up in 1672, a new company — the Royal Africa Company — was created.

Slaves were property to be owned and the biggest property-owning club in the country was Parliament. By 1720, the list of shareholders in the South Sea Company — a company contracted to trade in slaves, among other things — included 462 members of the House of Commons, 100 members of the House of Lords and most of the Royal Family. According to the historian Robin Blackburn, during the 47-year period of 1761 to 1807 — from the industrial revolution to the abolition of the slave trade — British ships made 5,693 voyages across the Atlantic, carrying a total of 1.5 million slaves at an average price of £42 each, bringing a total gross receipt of just over £60 million to the British economy.

Parliament was not ready to recognise the human rights of the Africans while they were profitable as property. The justification by the British for the inhuman treatment of Africans was provided by the simple expedient of denying their humanity. The only concern for them was as property, and whether they would retain their value at the end of the journey and, if not, whether any loss would be indemnified by the insurers.

In 1772, a writ of habeas corpus was filed for James Somerset, a slave, to prevent him from being deported to Jamaica by his “master”. Lord Mansfield, the Lord Chief Justice, released him from detention. The case inspired the Quakers to join with Granville Sharp and Thomas Clarkson to form the abolitionist committee in 1787. The movement influenced people from all occupations, all classes and all religious denominations to submit Petitions to Parliament in the cause of abolition. The abolition movement could therefore be regarded as the first mass philanthropic movement in the country, leading to a new radicalism that fed directly into the formation of socialist ideas in 19th-century Britain and the eventual birth of the Labour Party. In fact, most of the leading abolitionists in the 18th century were Tories.

William Wilberforce, the MP for Hull, agreed to champion the cause of the abolitionists in Parliament. He, like Sharp, Clarkson and members of the “Clapham Sect”, was a committed abolitionist, but events abroad strengthened the hands of the antiabolitionist.

In 1791, the uprising of slaves on the Caribbean island of San Domingo (now Haiti), led by the slave Toussaint L’Ouverture gave the antiabolitionists the propaganda they needed. In that same year Wilberforce presented to Parliament his first Bill to abolish the slave trade, but it was defeated by 163 votes to 88. However, the inhumane treatment of the African struck a chord with the nation and Wilberforce’s next Bill to abolish the slave trade was passed and became law in March 1807.

The lasting legacy of the abolitionists is the inspiration they gave us for the respect of human dignity. This legacy is enshrined in the Human Rights Act 1998, which not only confers fundamental and positive constitutional rights upon everyone in the country but also imposes a duty on all public authorities and commands courts and tribunals to interpret existing and future legislation in a way that is compatible with rights guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights. The newly created Commission for Equality and Human Rights hopefully will help to act as a guardian of those rights.

Lincoln Crawford, OBE, is a barrister at 12 King's Bench Walk and a member of the Deputy Prime Minister's advisory committee on the bicentenary commemmoration A longer version of this article appears in Counsel magazine, out today

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