slaveholding

1. (uncountable) The institution or practice of owning slaves.Examples: "The slaveholding way of life continued until 1865, when the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was passed following the end of the Civil War between the Northern and the Southern states"; "Defenders of Southern slavery employed religious rhetoric to justify the system, selecting biblical passages that appeared to condone the practice of slaveholding and the relation between master and slave."uncountable

2. (countable) An owning of one or more slaves.Examples: "On the other hand, the Mountain South also contained some Lower South counties, thereby permitting internal comparisons between differently sized slaveholdings, between crop specializations, and between agricultural and nonagricultural producers."countable