AP US History

Chapter 16The South and the Slavery Controversy

Introduction

1793 – Eli Whitney introduces the cotton gin, enabling the wide-scale cultivation of short-staple cotton

Cotton became the dominant southern crop and created an insatiable demand for labor, reinvigorating southern slavery

“Cotton is King” The Cotton Kingdom (Cotton Planters in South) started producing

lots of cotton making quick profits and drawing more planters. They then bought more slaves and land to buy still more slaves and land.

Northern Shippers reaped large part of profits from cotton trade: · Loaded bales of cotton at Southern Ports

· Transport them to England & sell for pounds sterling · Buy needed manufactured goods for sale in the U.S.

Basically, slaves carried the prosperity of the North and South

Cotton accounted for ½ the value of all American exports after 1840

South produced more than ½ of the world’s supply of cotton, sort of holding other nations in partial bondage · Britian’s single most important manufacture in 1850’s was cotton cloth for 1/5 of it’s population · 75% of it’s cotton supply came from the South

South was aware that Britain depended on them for cotton giving them a sense of power thus the term “Cotton is King”

The Planter “Aristocracy” The South was not so much a democracy but an oligarchy

· Oligarchy – a government run by the few; in this case heavily influenced by a planter aristocracy

1850 – Only 1,733 families owned more than 100 slaves each The planter aristocrats enjoyed most of the wealth thus:

· Educated children in finest schools · Virginia & others, produced higher

proportion of front-rank statesmen before 1860 than the North

Dominance by this aristocracy widened the gap between rich and poor and it hampered tax-supported public education (rich planters sent their kids to private institutions)

The plantation system shaped the lives of southern women: · The mistress commanded a large household staff which were mostly female slaves (cooks, maids, seamstresses, etc.)

Some slave women had status of “member” of the household

Still, no slaveholding women believed in abolition and didn’t protest when their slave’s husbands + children were sold

Slaves of the Slave System

Plantation agriculture was wasteful because King Cotton and planter aristocrats despoiled the good earth

Quick profits lead to excessive cultivation (i.e. “land butchery”) which caused people to move West and Northwest.

Southern economy became monopolistic: As land became scarce, small farmers sold their holdings to more prosperous neighbors to go West or North making the big bigger and the small smaller

The plantation system was financially unstable as planters tended to overspeculate in land and slaves. Slaves represented a heavy investment of capital (maybe $1,200 each) and some might injure themselves or run away.

Southern planters hated watching the North grow rich because of them as commissions and interest flowed to northern middlemen, bankers, agents, and shippers.

The Cotton Kingdom repelled large-scale European immigration as Germans and Irish were discouraged by slave labor competition and high cost of good land which caused the South to be the most Anglo-Saxon part of the nation.

The White Majority Less Wealthy Slave Owners: In 1850 totaled to some 345,000

families and over 2/3 of these families (255,268) owned fewer than 10 slaves each. Only 1/4th of white southerners owned slaves.

Non-Slave Owners: By 1860 there were 6,120,825 whites (about ¾ of all southern whites) that owned no slaves at all. They were pushed off by the wealthy planters and made a simple living and the Cotton Kingdom was just a dream.

These red-necked farmers didn’t really participate in the economy, they raised corn and hogs and were isolated from society except during religious camp meetings.

They were even scorned by slaves as “poor white trash,” “hillbillies,” “crackers,” or “clay eaters” and often described as dumb and ugly. Later is was revealed that they just suffered from malnutrition and parasites.

Although they had no slaves, they defended slavery because of the dream of buying some slaves and becoming rich as well as racial superiority, knowing that they were at least better than the African American slave.

Mountain Whites: Lived in the valleys of the Appalachian range from western Virginia to northern Georgia and Alabama.

They were isolated and still retained Elizabethan speech forms and habits.

They were independent small farmers that had no slaves and hated the South slave owners.

These people were an important part of the Union side in the Civil War and helped cripple the Confederacy.

Less than half of all slave owning families owned more than 4 slaves. About 98% of all slave owners owned less than 50 slaves each. Therefore, just a small group owned a large majority of the slaves in the South.

Slave Owning Families in 1850

1,733

6,196

29,733

54,59580,765

105,683

68,820

0 20,000 40,000 60,000 80,000 100,000 120,000

100+ Slaves

50-99 Slaves

20-49 Slaves

10-19 Slaves

5-9 Slaves

2-4 Slaves

1 Slave

Free Blacks: Slaves Without Masters

In the South there were 250,000 free blacks by 1860.Upper South: Free from emancipation inspired by the idealism of

Revolutionary days.Lower South: Free because they were mulattoes (emancipated

children of a white planter and black mistress) Other free blacks purchased freedom with after hour labor earnings and

many free blacks owned property, especially in New Orleans. Some even owned slaves such as William T. Johnson, the “barber of Natchez”

Free blacks were like “third race” and were:- Forbidden from testifying against whites in court- Prohibited from working in certain jobs- Vulnerable to being hijacked back into slavery by slave traders

Another 250,000 lived in the North and were also hated against, esp. by the Irish immigrants which they competed with for menial jobs.

Several states forbade their entrance, denied them the right to vote, and barred blacks from public schools.

Hate for blacks was stronger in the North and the reason for not wanting slavery in new territories in the 1840’s and 1850’s was out of prejudice and not from humanitarianism.

South hated the race but liked the individual but the North liked the race but hated individual blacks.

Plantation Slavery In the South of 1860 there were nearly 4 million black

human chattels which had quadrupled because of the cotton economy which demanded more slave labor.

Congress outlawed slave imports in 1808 so it was illegal to import African slaves into America and the penalty was death.

Blacks were being smuggled though and although several traders were caught, southern juries kept acquitting them. N. P. Gordon was the only slave trader to ever be executed.

However, the slave population was increasing not from imports but from natural reproduction!!

Planters regarded slaves as investments worth $1,800 by 1860 and were the primary form of wealth in the South. Ergo, they were cared for and sometimes spared dangerous work. - If a neck was going to be broken they preferred it be a wage-

earning Irish laborer. Slavery was profitable for the great planters but staggered the economic

development in the region. In 1860 the Deep South states (South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisiana) each had a majority of blacks and accounted for ½ of all slaves in the South.

Women who had 13 or 14 babies were prized and some were promised freedom when they had 10. It was common for white masters to get jiggy with their female slaves, making a large mulatto population.

Slaves were sold at auctions like cattle and families were separated from each other very often, usually for economic reasons.

Separation of families was the most horrible thing about slavery and this theme was put into the plot of Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

Life Under the Lash Life conditions varied with region and master but slavery was still

work, ignorance, and oppression. Slaves:- Worked dawn to dusk under the watch of a white-overseer- Had no civil or political rights (other than minimal protection from illogical murder or unusually cruel punishment). Some states offered more protection like: banning the sale of a child under age 10 away from his/her mother. Laws were difficult to enforce because slaves couldn’t testify in court

Whipping was common and strong-willed slaves were sent to “breakers” who mostly just whipped them even more. They were not beat on a regular basis though, for this made sullen laborers and lash marks hurt resale value.

In 1860, most slaves were in the “black belt” of the Deep South (from South Carolina and Georgia into the new southwest states of Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana)

Most blacks lived on larger plantations with 20 or more slaves. Blacks accounted for more than 75% of the population in some communities of the Deep South.

On smaller plantations and upper South, the forced separations of spouses, parents and children were more common.

Still, slaves managed to sustain family life and most were raised in two-parent households.

African roots were displayed by the slaves in that they:

- Avoided marriage between first cousins unlike the common intermarriage of the planter whites - Although heavily Christianized, they added African elements to religion such as: Emphasizing the captivity of the Israelites (similar in situation), and the “responsorial” preaching style where they punctuate the minister’s statements with “amen” and “halleluiah”

The Burdens of Bondage Slavery denied the blacks dignity and sense of responsibility, as well as

an education (reading brought ideas, and ideas brought discontent). Many states passed laws forbidding their instruction so about 9/10 of all adult slaves before the war were illiterate. The “American Dream” was nothing but a sham for them.

Slaves would always try to make trouble for slavery such as:- Slowed labor pace to the bare minimum (thought as lazy)

- Stole food from the “big House” and other goods- Sabotaged expensive equipment thus stopping work till

repaired - Occasionally, they even poisoned their master’s food Yearning for freedom, many slaves ran away, frequently searching for

separated family members, and others rebelled but never successfully (in 1800 a rebellion led by slave named Gabriel in Richmond, Virginia was ruined by informers and the leaders were hanged)

Other rebellions were:- Denmark Vesey (a free black) led a rebellion in Charleston,

South Carolina in 1822. Betrayed by informers, he and 30 followers were publicly hung from the gallows.

- Nat Turner (a black preacher) led an uprising in 1831 that slaughtered 60 Virginians that were mostly women and children.

Whites were also affected by the darkness of slavery in that:- It advanced whip brutality, the bloodhound, and the branding iron- They thought that slaves could rebel at any moment thus forcing them to degrade themselves along with blacks (Booker T. Washington (black leader and former slave) once said that whites could not hold blacks in a ditch without getting down there with them.)

Early Abolitionism The inhumanity of slavery created antislavery societies in which some:

- Focused on transporting blacks back to Africa like the American Colonization Society (founded in 1817) and in 1822 the Republic of Liberia (capital Monrovia) was established for former slaves. Here some 15,000 free blacks were transported over 40 years but they didn’t want that after being Americanized (no longer Africans); this idea appealed to Abraham Lincoln.

In the 1830’s, the abolitionist movement grew even more, affected by:- In 1833, British slave owners freed the slaves in the West Indies- The Second Great Awakening agitated abolitionists against the sin of slavery. Important among them was Theodore Dwight Weld (self-educated, simple in speech and manner, spiritually inspired by Charles Garndison Finney in 1820’s) who appealed to his rural audiences of untutored farmers. He was materially aided by two rich and devout NY merchants, bro’s Arthur and Lewis Tappan.

He went to Lane Theological Seminary in 1832 in Cincinnati, Ohio and was expelled with many other students 1834 for organizing an 18-day debate on slavery. He and his fellow “Lane Rebels” filled with passion fanned across the Old Northwest preaching their ideals. Weld also made a strong propaganda pamphlet, “American Slavery as It Is” in 1839 and its arguments were the most effective abolitionist tracts. (Also influenced Uncle Tom’s Cabin)

Radical Abolitionism On New Year’s Day in 1831, William Lloyd Garrison (abolitionist;

1805-1879) published in Boston The Liberator, an antislavery newspaper, triggering a 30 year war of words and in a sense firing one of the first attacks of the Civil War. He despised slavery, demanding to stamp it out as seen weekly in his newspaper.

In 1833 other abolitionists founded the America Anti-Slavery Society:- Wendell Phillips (a Boston patrician a.k.a “abolition’s golden trumpet”) was one of them and he ate no cane sugar and wore no cotton cloth which was produced by Southern slaves.

Other abolitionists were black:- David Walker wrote the Appeal to the Colored Citizens of

the World (1829) which promoted a bloody end to white domination.

- Sojourner Truth (a freed black woman in NY) fought tirelessly for black emancipation and women’s rights. (also called Isabella)

- Martin Delaney took seriously the idea of mass recolonization of Africa and in 1859 he visited West Africa’s Niger Valley

for a good site to relocate.

- Frederick Douglass was the greatest of the black abolitionists. He escaped bondage in 1838 and at 21 was “discovered” after

giving an impromptu speech at an antislavery meeting in Massachusetts. From then on he fought for his cause despite beatings and death threats and in 1845 he published Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an autobiography.

Lloyd Garrison demanded the secession of the North from the South (didn’t mention how it would end slavery though) and denouncing

politics, he burned a copy of the Constitution on the 4th of July in 1854. Critics and some former supporters thought he was just making agitating America’s moral wound rather than try to make it better.

Douglass however, thought politics could end slavery and backed the Liberty party in 1840, the Free Soil Party in 1848, and later the Republican party in 1850’s.

In the end, abolitionists came to believe that the only way for emancipation was through war.

The South Lashes Back In the 1820’s there were more antislavery societies south of the Mason-

Dixon line than north but after 1830 their voice was gone. The Virginia legislature debated about slavery one last time and eventually crushed emancipation proposals in 1831-1832. Turning Point!! From then on, all slave states reinforced slave codes and prohibited emancipation of any kind.

In 1831, hysteria spread in the South after Nat Turner’s rebellion and Garrison was condemned as a terrorist and inciter of murder for it was thought he was connected with it because his Liberator came out at the same time. Georgia offered $5,000 for his arrest.

Proslavery whites justified slavery (despite South’s previous doubts) by saying that the Bible and Aristotle supported it (good for Africans because they are civilized and have Christianity).

They also said that master-slave relationships were like family and that South slaves were happier than North slaves:

- South: Blacks worked in fresh air and sunlight, didn’t have to worry about slack time or unemployment, provided with a jail-like form of Social Security and were cared for in sickness and old age.

- North: Blacks were worked in dark and stuffy factories, worried about slack times and unemployment, and were left to themselves when they weren’t useful anymore.

The Abolitionist Impact in the North The South owed the North $300 million by the late

1850s, and northern factories depended on southern cotton to make goods.

Many abolitionists’ speeches provoked violence and mob outbursts in the North, such as the 1834 trashing of Lewis Tappan’s New York House.

In 1835, Garrison miraculously escaped a mob that dragged him around the streets of Boston.

Yet by the 1850s, abolitionist outcries had been an impact on northern minds and were beginning to sway more and more toward their side.

The End