Chapter 13- The Slave South 1820-1860

In 1834, South Carolina slaveholder Charles Colcock Jones, the leading missionary to the slaves, published his

"Catechism for Colored Persons," on which it instructed slaves "to count their Masters 'worthy of all honour,' as those whom God has placed over them in this world." But slaves laughed up their sleeves at such message. (413)

The French political observer Alexis de Tocqueville made this statement of Southerners and Northerners...

"that most all the difference which may be noticed between the character of the Americans in the Southern & Northern states have originated in slavery." (395)

What was the hope of typical plantation belt yeoman of the nineteenth century?

Becoming a large planter. Yeomen may have envied or even resented wealthy slaveholders. However, most planters made an effort to reach out to their poorer neighbors by providing services and avoiding direct exploitation of slave-less whites. As a result, most yeoman farmers aspired to enter the planter class (416)

Who was responsible for the majority of cotton production in the antebellum period?

Black slaves. The southern cotton boom was dependent on the labor of slaves. Plantation slaves grew 75 percent of the world's cotton supply, most of them working in field gangs under the direct supervision of whites (395, 401)

Who worked the majority of the farms in the antebellum southern upcountry?

Family members. In the upcountry, there was little in the way of commercial agriculture; the region was dominated by small farms on which families worked to achieve self-sufficiency and independence. All family members worked, performing tasks assigned on the basis of age and sex, with husbands and sons laboring in the fields and wives and daughters in the home (416)

Where did the majority of southern slaves work by 1860?

On plantations. By 1860, close to half a million slaves (one in eight) were not employed in agriculture, and slaves could be found in practically every skilled or unskilled occupation. However, some 52 percent of slaves lived and worked on plantations (401)

What did all nineteenth-century political candidates share in common, whether they were Whigs or Democrats?

Politicians declared support for republican equality. As southern politics became aggressively democratic, candidates of both parties responded by presenting themselves as defenders and servants of "the people." They engaged in vigorous and direct campaigns in which they denounced their opponents as rich, selfish, and antidemocratic and pledged to defend the people's liberty (421)

What did antebellum planters do to most slave boys and girls when they reached the age of eleven or twelve?

Sent them to the fields to work. Masters wanted work out of their slaves. Very small children performed simple chores, but by the time children reached the age of eleven or twelve, they were seen as capable of moving into more adult work. Most of them were sent to the fields, where they learned agricultural tasks alongside their parents.

Which region experienced a brief flurry of emancipation during the post-Revolutionary era?

The Upper South. The postwar ideological assault on slavery coincided with a deep depression in the tobacco economy of the Upper South. Some slaveholders freed their slaves outright, while others allowed favorite slaves to work after hours to accumulate money with which to purchase their freedom(419)

What was the most frequent cause of the ending of slave marriages?

The death of one of the spouses. No laws recognized slave marriages, so neither masters nor slaves had to honor the bond. In practice, however, slaves established what were often long-lasting marriages. The leading cause of the end of slave marriages was death, as was also true in white families, but the second leading cause was the sale of one of the spouses, something white families did not have to fear (412)

Most antebellum white Southerners accepted which popular planters' argument?

The slave system allowed every white man into the South's ruling class. Slave holding white Southerners often worried that non-slaveholders were not fully committed to slavery. However, most whites accepted the planters' argument that the existing social order served all Southerners' interests, giving even the poorest whites membership in the racial elite and providing the means by which anyone could advance into the ranks of the planter class (420)

What did nineteenth-century planters mean when they characterized the master-slave relationship as paternalistic?

They defined slavery as a set of reciprocal obligations. The concept of Christian guardianship, or what historians call paternalism, envisioned slavery as a reciprocal relationship. Slaves gave their masters their labor and obedience, while masters provided basic care and guidance to their slaves. Southern planters often claimed that they were paternalistic out of a sense of obligation to their slaves, but in reality they had an economic stake in making sure that their slaves were healthy enough to continue working and, at least as important, to reproduce (404)

How did planters have time to concentrate on marketing, finance, and general plantation affairs?

They hired overseers to watch the slaves in the fields. While small planters had to manage their slaves themselves, larger planters hired overseers—professionals who made a career out of supervising slaves. Because the overseers went into the fields with the slaves, planters could concentrate on the business side of the plantation's economy (404)

Why did Southerners move west during the first half of the nineteenth century?

To find more land for growing cotton. Slaveholders began moving west in large numbers in 1815, after the Creek War of 1813-1814 had initiated the government campaign to remove Indians to the West. Because cotton grew well in a wide variety of climates and conditions, it spread quickly throughout the Lower South. By 1860, the South produced three-fourths of the world's cotton supply (395)

Who was Nat Turner?

a Southampton County, Virginia born slave that together with Hark, Henry, Sam, Nelson, Will and Jack intended to punish slave holders by killing them; they all killed more than 57 whites including women and children (393, 414)

By 1860, the slave population of the South surpassed that of

all New World slave societies combined. With the spread of cotton agriculture, the slave population in the South grew at an enormous rate. There were fewer than 700,000 southern slaves in 1790, about 2 million in 1830, and almost 4 million in 1860. This was an increase of nearly 600 percent in seventy years (395)

By the early 1850s, in response to the political reforms that had swept the nation in the previous half-century, every southern state had extended suffrage to

all adult white males. By the 1850s, southern states had removed the wealth and property requirements that had previously limited political participation. Suffrage was extended to all white men over the age of twenty, regardless of their property or wealth, and most states abandoned property requirements for holding state office as well (420)

In the 1820s and 1830s, state legislatures in the South took steps to

curtail or reduce the growth of the free black population. To stem the growth of the free black population, southern legislatures passed laws that denied masters the right to free their slaves. At the same time, other laws were passed to humiliate and restrict free blacks through special taxes, annual registration, and the denial of interstate travel, schooling, and political participation (419)

In Boston, Massachusetts on January 1, 1831, abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison had published the

first issue of the "LIBERATOR" (393-394)

Relationships on nineteenth-century southern plantations were

governed by hierarchical roles. On most plantations, there was a hierarchy of roles and duties that governed inhabitants' relationships with one another. The master was at the top of the hierarchy, ruling over his wife, children, and slaves, none of whom had many legal rights and all of whom were designated by the states as dependents (404)

Cotton became commercially significant in the 1790's that dramatically increased the cotton raw production after the invention of a

new cotton gin by Eli Whitney (401)

What did influential Southern Politician, John C. Calhoun declared in respect to black slaves?

the African slaves where in better condition than the free black slaves in every respect because black slavery encouraged southern whites to unify around race rather than to divide them (400)

In 1829 this freeborn black man living in Boston has published his Appeal...to

the Coloured Citizens of the World, an slave invitation to rise up in bloody rebellion, and copies had fallen into the hands of Virginia slaves (393)

In the 1820's and 1830's, southern efforts to strengthen slavery often led to

the punishment of owners who did not discipline their slaves. After 1820, attacks on slavery by abolitionists in the North and blacks in the South made southern slaveholders painfully aware that the slave system was vulnerable. Many states responded by constructing slave codes that required slaves to submit completely to owners and to white society in general, and upheld the authority of all whites over all blacks (397)

In the nineteenth-century plantation belt, small farmers' cotton crops

tied them to large planters. Small farmers grew mainly food crops but also devoted some of their land to growing cotton; however, they could neither afford the machinery to gin and bale their crops, nor were they linked to merchants in port cities. Thus, they relied on large planters to loan them the use of their cotton gins and baling presses and to ship and sell their cotton.

For nineteenth-century southern slaves, working in the big house

was seen as a privilege with serious drawbacks. Working in the big house provided certain advantages, including less physically demanding work, better food, and more comfortable quarters. However, house servants were constantly on call, and most bore the brunt of white frustration and rage.

By 1810, free blacks in the South were growing more numerous and were

worrying white Southerners. By 1810, there were more than 100,000 free blacks within the southern population. With the southern cotton boom underway, however, white Southerners wanted more slaves, not an increase in the free black population (419)

Small farmers who owned their own land were

yeomen, but mostly "plain folk" in 1860 (Pg. 415)