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Southern Culture and Slavery

Chapter 16

Early Emancipation in the North

Missouri Compromise, 1820

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Characteristics of the Antebellum South

1.  Primarily agrarian.

2.  Economic power shifted from the “upper South” to the “lower South.”

3.  “Cotton Is King!” * 1860à 5 mil. bales a yr. (2/3 of total US exports).

4.  Very slow development of industrialization (making about 15% of nation’s manufactured goods by 1850).

5.  Rudimentary financial system.

6.  Inadequate transportation system.

Cotton Gin

•  Invented by Eli Whitney, ties Southern economy to “King Cotton”

•  Plantation system •  Only plantations

could afford gins, so gap between rich and poor was wide

Southern Agriculture

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Changes in Cotton Production

1820

1860

Southern Cotton

•  Half of our country’s exports by 1840 •  Largest producer of cotton in the world

–  U.S. produced over half of the world’s cotton

•  75% of England’s cotton came from U.S. South

•  Benefit to Northern textile mills •  Tied Southern economy to cotton. •  Very little industry

Value of Cotton Exports As % of All US Exports

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Southern Economy Chained to Cotton

•  Quick profits •  Lots of bountiful land •  Very reliant on slavery

– Number of slaves in 1820: 1.5 million – Number of slaves in 1860: 4 million – 75% in agriculture (55% cotton) – Domestic servants, mining, industry

The Cotton System

•  Relied on international markets •  Heavy investment in slaves •  Dangerous to depend on one-crop

economy – Lots of land speculation – Lots of debt

Southern Society (1850) “Slavocracy”

[plantation owners]

The “Plain Folk” [white yeoman farmers]

6,000,000

Black Freemen

Black Slaves 3,200,000

250,000

Total US Population à 23,000,000 [9,250,000 in the South = 40%]

“Hillbillies”

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Southern Hierarchy

•  1850: 1700 families owned 100 or more slaves

•  Controlled political and social leadership

•  Rich often sent kids to private school

Slave-Owning Families (1850)

Yeoman Farmer

•  70% of farmers owned less than 100 acres •  2/3 of hog raising in South •  75% of southern whites owned no slaves and

lived on family farms •  Resembled northern farmers •  Worked the land along side slaves •  Many forced to sell land to plantations and

move West or North

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A Group Below Yeoman Farmers

•  Sometimes called “Hillbillies”, “Dirt Eaters”, “Poor White Trash”

•  Lived in marshes, barrens of South OR the Appalachian Mts (“Mountain People”).

•  Grew vegetables, fished, hunted, hired themselves as farm hands

•  Poor diet, bad living conditions •  Higher rate of disease •  School attendance rates were lower •  Perception of being lazy

Whites Without Slaves

•  Protected system •  Some wanted to own slaves •  Protect “racial superiority” •  Some who lived in Appalachian Mountains

were detached from slavery and cotton plantations –  Some of these would be abolitionists –  Some just detested slavery and the plantation

system

Free Blacks

•  250,000 in South –  Many were mulatto –  Purchased freedom –  Racism limited job opportunities –  Denied civil rights

•  250,000 in North –  Mulatto, born into freedom, ran away –  Purchased freedom or ran away –  Racism limited job opportunities –  Denied civil rights

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Plantation Slavery •  4 million slaves in 1860 •  Southerners invested nearly

$2 billion into slavery by 1860 –  Average slave was worth

$2,000 in 1860 –  South had less capital than

North to invest in industry •  Slaves

–  Work from dusk til dawn –  No civil or political rights –  Punishment for not

working hard

Southern Population

Slave Families

•  Most had 2-parent households in Deep South

•  More likely to form African-American culture on plantations

•  Smaller farms meant more contact with whites, separation from families

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Early Abolition

•  By 1820: 120 abolitionist groups in the U.S.

•  Most advocated a slow, moderate ending of slavery (“Gradualists”)

•  Payment to slaveholders •  Did not advocate equality for blacks

Abolitionist Movement e  1817 à American Colonization Society created (gradual, voluntary emancipation.

British Colonization Society symbol

Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, John Marshall, James Monroe

Abolitionist Movement

e  Create a free slave state in Liberia, West Africa. e Capital was Monrovia

e  No real anti-slavery sentiment in the North in the 1820s & 1830s. e Second Great Awakening inspired many to believe slavery was a sin e Great Britain freed slaves in W. Indies in 1833: influenced many in U.S.

Gradualists Immediatists

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William Lloyd Garrison (1801-1879)

e  Slavery undermined republican values.

e  Slaves were Americans, not Africans

e  Deserve equal rights

e  Immediate emancipation with NO compensation.

e  Slavery was a moral, not an economic issue.

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The Liberator

Premiere issue à January 1, 1831

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Black Abolitionists

David Walker (1785-1830)

1829 à Appeal to the Coloured Citizens of the World

• Fight for freedom rather than wait to be set free by whites. • Outlawed in most states.

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Anti-Slave Pamphlet

Southern Pro-Slavery Propaganda

Slave Rebellions in the Antebellum South:

Nat Turner, 1831

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Nat Turner’s Revolt (1831)

•  Bloodiest slave rebellion in American History

•  Turner and 60 slaves attack plantations of Virginia

•  55 whites killed •  Turner’s men were captured or lynched •  Anti-slavery propaganda and

abolitionists blamed

Frederick Douglass (1817-1895)

1845 à The Narrative of the Life Of Frederick Douglass 1847 à “The North Star”

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Slave Resistance •  Refusal to work hard.

•  Isolated acts of sabotage.

•  Escape via the Underground Railroad.

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Harriet Tubman (1820-1913) e  Helped over 300 slaves

to freedom. e  $40,000 bounty on her

head. e  Served as a Union spy

during the Civil War.

“Moses”

The Underground Railroad

Leading Escaping Slaves Along the Underground

Railroad

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Runaway Slave Ads

Abolitionist Impact on North

•  Unpopular at first –  North dependent on South –  South owed Northern creditors $300 million

•  Propaganda began to change some Northern attitudes

•  Many did not want slavery expanded into territories

•  Republican party formed in 1850s •  “Free-Soilers” growing in strength and

numbers

Opposition to Abolitionists Grows

•  Many felt ending slavery would hurt Southern economy and society

•  Abolitionist propaganda made illegal •  “Gag Rule” in House (1836) •  Attacks on Abolitionists

–  Considered outside agitators •  Some Northerners did not want job and

housing competition –  Mainly working class whites