Analysis Of Senator James Hammond's King Cotton Speech

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Senator James Hammond delivers the King Cotton Speech and begins his speech by saying “In all social systems there must be a class to do the menial duties, to perform the drudgery of life.” He is talking about the work of a slave or the work of a low-class man. During this time there was a big debate about if all men are equal. Leading up to this speech in past years there were mini wars on slavery. Hammond said, “I will not characterize that class at the North by that term, but you have it; it is there, it is everywhere; it is eternal.” He was essentially saying that there will always be a need for salves and a need for low-class workers. In the society we live in today, it is ideal that we are all equal. We like to think that social class …show more content…

Senate. In June of 1858, Lincoln gave a speech titled “The House Divided”. In Lincoln’s speech, he made the point that the country can’t be half for slavery and half against it. Unlike the points made by Hammond. Hammond said, “we use them for our purpose, and call them slaves.” Lincoln believed that slavery was morally wrong, unlike Hammond. Lincoln said in his Address Before the Wisconsin State Agricultural Society that “Free Labor says ‘no!’ Free Labor argues that, as the Author of man makes every individual with one head and one pair of hands, it was probably intended that heads and hands should cooperate as friends…” Lincoln believes that there should not be free labor, he thinks that a man needs to earn a living no matter the type of work he does. Hammond believes that a slave is a slave and that is all they will ever be. Nothing more than a farmhand or an object. In Hammond’s King Cotton speech, he talks a lot about money and income. He takes the reports written by Secretary of the Treasury and tells the exported income of the domestic product. He then splits the amount between the North and the South. After that Hammond goes into the goods and costs of what is sent from the South to the North. He is trying to make a statement that the reason that the South was able to have that income was that they had slave labor to increase production and without that, they would not have had that

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