USA HISTORY

Read the section “A huge trade network."Enslaving Africans began as a way to make money. But racist ideas kept it alive for more than 200 years.Slavery created a huge trade network across the Atlantic Ocean. Many slaves and natural resources moved back and forth. Europeans used the profits from this network to create settlements in the New World. Then the settlements made them even richer. Slave traders became more efficient at their evil work. They wanted to make as much money as possible. This meant moving the most slaves at the lowest price. Zoom-inThe image at right shows how slave traders crammed human bodies onto a ship. They also show the chains slave traders used during the long journey. Crossing the Atlantic took six to 12 weeks.We know that Britain finally outlawed the slave trade in 1833. The image was printed about 10 years before that. This could mean the people who built the ship wanted to show others how to transport slaves efficiently. Or it’s possible that it was used by people against slavery. They might have printed it to show how horrible the slave trade was.There is no doubt that the Atlantic slave trade was evil. This evil allowed Europeans to begin producing new goods and sell them. It allowed Europeans to get rich.Which sentence gives a reason why the slave trade continued for so long?