Consequences..............

 

     Over time, first the Spanish, then the French, then the British stepped into the African marketplace that the Portuguese had created.  Although the word "capitalism" had not yet entered the lexicon, The Atlantic Slave Trade flourished for one elemental reason: it was the most lucrative investment available for Europe's merchants, bankers, and landed aristocracy.  And until late in the game—the middle years of the eighteenth century—one would be hard pressed to hear any criticism of such a flourishing enterprise.  Moral blindness made eminent economic sense.

-Joseph J. Ellis, The Great Contradiction: The Tragic Side of the American Founding