Understanding and Teaching the Roots of the Civil War, part 2

EDS 112 Summer Institute 2009

Jenny Wahl Economics Department

Carleton College

2

Number of Fugitive Slaves by State, 1850 and 1860

Year Total AL AR DE FL GA KY LA MD MI MO NC SC TN TX VA1850 1011 29 21 26 18 89 96 90 279 41 60 64 16 70 29 831860 803 36 28 12 11 23 119 46 115 68 99 61 23 29 16 117

Source: Table Bb236-251, Historical Statistics, Millennial Edition.

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Prices, Prime Male Slaves, Various Markets, 1830-1860

400

600

800

1000

1200

1400

1600

1800

2000

$

year

Richmond

Charleston

Mid-Georgia

New Orleans

Source: U.B. Phillips, Life and Labor in the Old South, as estimated by Evans, The Economics of Negro Slavery, corrected by Hummel and Weingast (WP).

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Effect of Escape Probability Upon Slave Price

Probability of escape Price0% 12000.01% 11990.10% 11871% 10805% 76010% 540

Assumptions: 10% rate of return, constant probability of escape, discount by premium proportional to probability of loss

5

Percent of Permanent Fugitive Prime Males by State, 1850 and 1860

1850 1860DE 5.6769 3.3370MD 1.5437 0.6595MO 0.3432 0.4307KY 0.2275 0.2639VA 0.0878 0.1192average 0.3150 0.2510

TX 0.2493 0.0438FL 0.2289 0.0891AR 0.2229 0.1260LA 0.1838 0.0693TN 0.1462 0.0526GA 0.1166 0.0249NC 0.1109 0.0921MS 0.0662 0.0779AL 0.0423 0.0414SC 0.0208 0.0286average 0.0999 0.0563grand average 0.1580 0.1016

Source: US Census, appears in Hummel and Weingast

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[I]t was necessary to offer a greater reward, and such as would probably be sufficient to induce men to consult their own interests, regardless of the public sentiment around them. . . . [N]ot only [are] fugitives . . . more frequently now than formerly returned to their owners, but [also] the difficulty of final escape has had some tendency to prevent others from attempting it.

-- Elliott v. Gibson, 10 B. Mon. 438, 442 (Ky. 1850, referring to a statute requiring owners to pay $100 to captors of fugitive slaves.