Southern society mirrored European society in many ways, one such example is that of a lavish lifestyle. When slavery originated it was made up of indentured servants, yeomen, and the wealthy plantation owners. Indentured servants were mostly from England and came over to America in the 17th century. The wealthy plantation owners were families that were slave owners. They made their money by making slaves complete tasks in which returned great profits. The turned wealthy plantation owners were using this for their benefit; they were able to pay the slaves very little in exchange for the mass amount of crops they could produce. This being said the numbers of slaves in demand were rapidly increasing because of the rise of cotton in the lower south. The cotton area of the lower south were using slaves and depending on them much more than the upper south with the tobacco industry. To keep up with the lower south, the upper south starting focusing more slave trade to help build their framings. The slave prices were increasing and due to high demands in the lower south, the upper south had a decline in the tobacco industry. Since the upper south was failing with Tobacco, slave trade took off.
During the 18th and 19th centuries slavery was economically efficient, but more importantly a social aspect of almost everyone’s life. There was an extreme importance depending on the existence of slavery in the majority of white land owners and also the South’s economy. Slaves also greatly contributed and were an important role to America’s history. Another important aspect of slavery was the nature of their life in America, their culture, and how this intertwined into the slave’s relationship with their master. Culture contributed a great deal in their religion and family as well. As many slaves as there were, conflict would very easily ignite with other slaves, but even more so with a master, which often lead to slave revolts or slave resistance. Slaves not only left a historical footprint on early America, but they also formed an important foundation for the country we know today.
This research paper will serve to examine the development of slavery in the United States, starting from the 17th century by the colonists of Virginia. It will analyze the spread of slavery throughout the American colonies, and identify the disagreements between the North and the South. The paper will explain the daily lives of slaves, and argue how oppressing black slaves was unjust, introducing the Civil War and how it began. It will also express the Emancipation Proclamation along with the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments. This will lead to apprehend how the slaves attained their freedom.
When reading about the institution of slavery in the United States, it is easy to focus on life for the slaves on the plantations—the places where the millions of people purchased to serve as slaves in the United States lived, made families, and eventually died. Most of the information we seek is about what daily life was like for these people, and what went “wrong” in our country’s collective psyche that allowed us to normalize the practice of keeping human beings as property, no more or less valuable than the machines in the factories which bolstered industrialized economies at the time. Many of us want to find information that assuages our own personal feelings of discomfort or even guilt over the practice which kept Southern life moving
Slavery and the Old South are tied together like peas and carrots. The Antebellum South had a symbiotic relationship with slavery from its very onset. Starting with indentured servants it was then picked up by African blacks brought into the colonies by ship. The relationship with slavery was ingrained into the country side by the planters who used slaves to farm cash crops of tobacco and then cotton. This relationship along with southern nationalism eventually leads the newly formed nation into a bloody war that masqueraded as States rights battle, but really was about slavery. It is this fundamental relationship between slavery and the South that James Oakes explains in his book, Slavery and Freedom; An Interpretation of the Old South. Oakes takes us on a tour of his thoughts of the Old South and his fundamental reasons of why it all happened. The book does establish Oakes’ thoughts on not only slavery in the American South, but how it relates to
In 1860 was the year Abraham Lincoln was elected as the president of USA, Lincoln was strongly against slavery and that was the main reason for the Civil war. In the southern states the slaves was an important income for their economy because they were relying on agricultural work instead of industrial work they produced almost all of the nation’s rice which was about 225 bushels, and if they lost their slaves their economy would fall. This didn’t affect the northern states too much because the northern states owned 91% of the country’s industrial capacity. The northern states had 101,000 while the southern states only had 21,000 and the Border States had 9,000 factories. The Union was producing 30 times more shoes and boots 13 times more iron and 32 times more firearms. So South Carolina a southern state decided to secede from the Unites States of America together with 10 other states which included Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee, Mississi...
The economy in the South was prosperous from the production and sale of cotton called the Cotton Economy.Cotton was their main income of money in the south and it is how they made their livings. Slavery was cheap so they had a major role in the economy as well. The south did not want to change their ways because they would take a big hit in the economy and go broke if the slavery was abolished. With the North pushing to change the ways of the south the south did not like it. They began to rebel in the South and prepare for war.(Nardo)
The South experienced the same growth as the North, but it did not develop like the North. The South based its economy and growth from the agricultural work the slaves were doing. The slaves cultivated tobacco, wheat, rice, and cotton. Although by the nineteenth century, the cultivation of tobacco began to decline. That is then when the short-staple cotton was introduced into the cultivation. It became very popular in all of the South. The cotton production was very successful and raised the export trade. Men and women began to purchase land in the south for plantation. But of course, the work demanded for a lot more slaves, causing a higher increase in slavery. The slaves either traveled with their masters to the plantation fields, or they were sold to other planters. The slaves were ,more often than never, separated from their families. Not many whites actually owned slaves in the South, according to statistics. Yet, those who owned slaves were usually the head of a family that was, most of the time, made up of around five people. The planter aristocracy influenced the economy, politics and lifestyle of the Southern region. Those white southerners felt powerful, almost like the aristocracies of the Old World. To the white southerners, the institution of slavery was special and unique. The South was the only region in the Unit...
Slavery allowed the American economy to flourish for over 300 years. It allowed many Southern states to grow at a furious pace without significantly diversifying their economy. The South relied on the harvesting of cash crops such as tobacco and cotton, which were very labor intensive. Without much cheap labor, slaves were relied on to harvest the crops; this provided enormous value to farmers and plantation owners in the region. However, the institution of slavery was challenged in the 18th century by decades of Enlightenment thought, newfound religious ideals, and larger abolitionist groups. After the American Revolution many states would ban the practice of slavery completely and only a few would maintain the “peculiar institution”.
The “Public Sale of Negroes, by Richard Clagett, depicts a typical auction in 1883. Although, it is important to note that “typical” in the 1800’s is very far from the typical of today. What is interesting or peculiar about this auction and many others in this time is that they were auctioning and selling people. The “Institution of Slavery” or chattel slavery, or even simply slavery, was the mistreatment of people as personal property and objects, where they were bought and sold and forced to perform work and labor. This “institution” was entirely legal, recognized at the writing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776 and ended by legal abolishment December 1865, through the 18th amendment. This institution lasted for more than 100 years effecting up to 4-5 generations of people and families.
The South was built politically, culturally, and economically on slavery. In the Antebellum South, the most important factor was not wealth but power. One theme of the Antebellum South was white supremacy and slavery ensured this through the control of labor which also worked as a system of racial adjustment and social order. Slave ownership elevated the status of the wealthy planters and this allowed the institution of slavery to be accepted due to the paternalistic culture of the South. This paternalistic master-slave relationship was important for slaveholders to maintain their power. The wealthy planters set the tone for the Southern society which maintained this idea of white supremacy through the exercising of hegemony. This infatuation
Many parties played a part in the existence of slavery in the colonial America; the most notable was the impact that it had on the personal and financial growth of the people and the nation. In the United States of America for instance, capitalism has always been a double edge sword. It began as a driving force in pushing along the economical growth, but it came at the price of the African society who were captured as slaves. History explains that it was implied and enforced that Africans were a lesser class through the means in which they were used by slave owners to advance their wealth and stature. It was seen that the larger the plantation, the wealthier and more successful people were. It means that the more one would have more slaves, the higher chances he would be prosperous. The slaves were the one who were seen to be in the position of working in the hot sun. Such condition made the slavery to be a necessity, more so to the large firm owners. The African slaves were regarded as a significant as a large, dependable and permanent source of cheap labor because slaves rarely ran away and when caught they were severely punished . The creation of the plantation system more so in America, where the assertation factors in maintaining the idea of
In the later 1700’s to 1863, slavery was an intricate part of the South. Slaves were needed for plantation work like planting, caring for, and harvesting crops to maintaining the land. After Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin, more slaves were needed to keep up with the increased cotton production. In the South their belief was African-Americans were property. On the other hand, the North’s economy was based on industry and manufacturing powered by European immigrants. They believed slavery was wrong and inhumane and African-Americans are just as human as everybody else. These two different views are one of the major reasons that led to the Civil War.
Within the economy a great development had been achieved when the upper south handed its power to the lower south all due to the rise of an agricultural production. This expansion was led by the excessive growth of cotton in the southern areas. It spread rapidly throughout America and especially in the South. During these times it gave another reason to keep the slavery at its all time high. Many wealthy planters started a ‘business’ by having their slaves work the cotton plantations, which this was one of a few ways slavery was still in full effect. Not only were there wealthy planters, at this time even if you were a small slave-holder you were still making money. While all of this had been put into the works, Americans had approximately 410,000 slaves move from the upper south to the ‘cotton states’. This in turn created a sale of slaves in the economy to boom throughout the Southwest. If there is a question as to ‘why’, then lets break it d...
Slavery was a practice in many countries in the 17th and 18th centuries, but its effects in human history was unique to the United States. Many factors played a part in the existence of slavery in colonial America; the most noticeable was the effect that it had on the personal and financial growth of the people and the nation. Capitalism, individualism and racism were the utmost noticeable factors during this most controversial period in American history. Other factors, although less discussed throughout history, also contributed to the economic rise of early American economy, such as, plantationism and urbanization. Individually, these factors led to an enormous economic growth for the early American colonies, but collectively, it left a social gap that we are still trying to bridge today.