THE SECTIONS GO THEIR WAYS

1. THE SECTIONS GO THEIR WAYS Chapter 13 The American Nation, 12e Mark. C. Carnes and John A. Garraty

2. THE SOUTH • South less affected by urbanization, European immigration, transportation revolution, and industrialization • Region was predominantly agricultural and cotton was king • By 1859 1.3 million out of 4.3 million bales were grown beyond the Mississippi • Upper south Virginia was leading tobacco producer but states beyond the Appalachians were raising more than half then crop, encouraged by introduction of Bright Yellow • Older sections of Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina shifted to the type of diversified farming associated with Northeast

3. Changes in Cotton Production 1820 1860

4. Slaves Using the Cotton Gin

5. THE ECONOMICS OF SLAVERY • Increased importance of cotton strengthened the hold of slavery on the region • Price of slaves rose • 1850’s prime field hand was worth as much as $1,800 • 3x as much as cost in 1820 • Crop value per slave jumped from less than $15 early in century to more than $125 in 1859 • Slaves in Deep South brought several hundred dollars more per head than in the older regimes • Mississippi took in 10,000 slaves a year • By 1830 black population exceeded white • Transfer of more than a million slaves from seaboard states to west

7. THE ECONOMICS OF SLAVERY • Slave trading became big business • 1850s there were about 50 dealers in Charleston and 200 in New Orleans • Impact on slaves was disastrous • Husbands and wives, parent and children were separated • One study suggests one-third of all first “slave” marriages in upper south were broken by forced separation • Nearly half of all children were separated from at least one parent • As slaves became more expensive, ownership of slaves became more concentrated • In 1860 only about 46,000 of 8 million white residents of slave states had as many as 20 slaves

8. ▲ This painting of a slave auction highlights an awkward aspect of slavery. The slave woman has light skin, which suggests that her father was likely a slave owner. Those men bidding on her stare with an intensity portending that she will likely share her mother’s fate.

9. Slave Auction: Charleston, SC-1856

10. Slave Accoutrements Slave MasterBrands Slave muzzle

11. THE ECONOMICS OF SLAVERY • Most efficient size of plantation worked by gangs of slaves was 1,000 to 2,000 acres • Majority of farmers in south cultivated no more than 200 acres • Many cultivated fewer than 100 acres • On eve of Civil War only one family in four owned any slaves at all • Yeoman farmers: grew staple crops, owned a few slaves, worked besides them in the fields, hardworking, self-reliant, and moderately prosperous • “Poor white trash” of pine barrens and remote valleys of Appalachians scratched a meager subsistence from substandard soils and lived in ignorance and squalor

12. Slave-Owning Population (1850)

13. Slave-Owning Families (1850)

14. THE ECONOMICS OF SLAVERY • Well managed plantations yielded annual profits of 10% or more • Money invested in southern agriculture earned at least moderate return • After allowing for the cost of land and capital, average plantation slave “earned” cotton worth $78.78 in 1859 • $32 a year to feed, clothe and house a slave • 60% of product of slave labor was expropriated by the masters

15. THE ECONOMICS OF SLAVERY • South failed to develop locally owned marketing and transportation facilities • 1840 cost $2.85 to move a bale of cotton from the farm to a seaport • Additional charges for storage, insurance, port fees, and freight to a European port exceeded $15 • Most of this money earned by middlemen outside of south • Middlemen also supplied most of foreign goods purchased by planters • Nearly everyone in New England could read and write while over 20% of white Southerners could not

16. ANTEBELLUM PLANTATION LIFE • Medium to large operation employing 20 or more slaves • Master’s house with complement of barns and stables • Kitchen • Smokehouse • Washhouse • Home for the overseer • Perhaps a schoolhouse • A grist mill • A forge • Slave quarters • Husbands and wives did not function in separate spheres though functions were different and gender related

17. ANTEBELLUM PLANTATION LIFE • Planters purchased fine clothes, furniture and china, as well as other manufactured goods • Plantations were also busy centers of household manufacture • Clothes for slaves (except shoes) • Everyday clothing of their own children • Bedding and other textiles • Spinning, weaving, and sewing were women’s work • Food was raised on the plantation except for coffee, tea, and a few other food items

18. ANTEBELLUM PLANTATION LIFE • Master was in charge—system paternalistic • Wife had immense responsibilities • Supervising servants • Nursing the sick • Taking care of vegetable and flower gardens • Planning meals • Seeing to the education of her own children and training of young slaves • Generally married in their teens so had to learn by doing

19. ANTEBELLUM PLANTATION LIFE • Majority of slaves of both sexes were field hands who labored on the land from dawn to dusk • Household servants and artisans, any slave but old and infirm, might be called on for such labor when needed • Slave women were expected to cook for their own families and do other chores working after working in fields

21. Down in the quarters every black family had a one- or two-room log cabin. We didn't have no floors in them cabins. Nice dirt floors was the style then, and we used sage brooms. We kept our dirt floors swept . . . clean and white.-- Millie Evans, former slave from North Carolina

22. ANTEBELLUM PLANTATION LIFE • Children, free and slave, were cared for by household servants • Infants were brought to their mothers in the fields for nursing several times a day • Slave children were not put to work until they were 6 or 7 years old and until 10 they were only given small tasks • Slave cabins were simple and crude: single dark room with a fireplace

23. Slave Quarter, Hermitage Plantation, Savannah, Georgia • Housing for slaves varied from plantation to plantation, but nearly all slaves lived in organized family units, sometimes in extended families. Some slaves lived in fairly well-built structures such as these, while others lived in ramshackle huts. The quality of housing was completely at the discretion of the slaveowner. • Why did owners prefer to keep slaves in family units? • 2. Why did slaves create extended families? • 3. What role did the concept of family play in the slaves' ability to endure their bondage?

24. Slaves posing in front of their cabin on a Southern plantation.

25. THE SOCIOLOGY OF SLAVERY • Whipping • 20 lashes for ordinary offenses: shirking work or stealing • 39 for more serious offenses: running away • Sometimes slaves were whipped to death, though by 1821 master could be charged with murder if caused slave death through excessive punishment (conviction resulted in relatively minimal fine) • Most owners provided adequate housing, clothing, and food • Infant mortality among slaves was twice that of whites • Life expectancy was five years less

26. A slave burial service, painted by John Antrobus in 1860. In an inversion of power relations, a slave preacher leads the mourners while the white overseer and the plantation owners watch uneasily, shunted (literally) to the sides.

27. THE SOCIOLOGY OF SLAVERY • U.S. only country in western hemisphere where slave population grew by national increase • After ending of slave trade in 1808, black population grew at nearly same rate as white • From founding of Jamestown to Civil War, only slightly more than 500,000 slaves were imported (5% of slaves carried to New World) yet in 1860 there were 4 million blacks in U.S. • Slaves had no rights • Marriages had no legal status

28. THE SOCIOLOGY OF SLAVERY • Slave religion mixture of African and Christianity • Religious meetings provided slaves with the opportunity to organize • Sustained sense of own worth • As price of slaves rose and northern opposition grew, slave system hardened • 1822 after conspiracy of Denmark Vesey was exposed, 37 slaves executed and 30 deported though no overt act had occurred • Louisiana 16 slaves were decapitated after an uprising • Nat Turner uprising in Virginia in 1831 cost 57 whites their lives • White southerners treated runaways almost as brutally as rebels

29. THE SOCIOLOGY OF SLAVERY • After Nat Turner revolt interest in abolishing slavery vanished in white south • Southern states made it increasingly difficult for masters to free slaves • During 1859 only about 3,000 were given their freedom (.00075%) • Slavery did not flourish in urban settings and cities did not flourish where slavery was important • Southern cities were small • Slave labor minor since harder to control in urban setting

30. Quilt Patterns as Secret Messages The Monkey Wrench pattern, on the left, alerted escapees to gather up tools and prepare to flee; the Drunkard Path design, on the right, warned escapees not to follow a straight route.

31. THE SOCIOLOGY OF SLAVERY • Southern whites considered existence of free blacks undesirable • Undercut notion that blacks helpless on their own • Set bad example for slaves • Set limits on them but, in the end, needed their labor • 54,000 slaves were brought to U.S. illegally after end of slave trade • U.S. Navy seized more than 50 suspected slavers 1840-1860

32. PSYCHOLOGICAL EFFECTS OF SLAVERY • Slavery had a corrosive effect on the personalities of southerners, black and white • Bore heavily on all slaves’ sense of self worth • Most slaves appeared resigned to their fate • Slaves had strong family and group attachments and a complex culture of their own • By a mixture of subterfuge, accommodation, and passive resistance, slaves erected defenses against exploitation, achieving a sense of community that helped sustain the psychic integrity of the individuals • Slavery discouraged, if not extinguished, independent judgment and self-reliance

33. Did slaves and masters form emotional bonds?

34. PSYCHOLOGICAL EFFECTS OF SLAVERY • Whites were also harmed by slavery • Associating working for others with servility discouraged many poor white Southerners from hiring out to make a stake • Slavery provided the weak, shiftless, and unsuccessful with a scapegoat that made their own situation easier to bear but harder to escape • Patriarchal nature of slave system reinforced tendency toward male dominance over wives and children • Power of ownership could be brutalizing • Slavery caused basically decent people to commit countless petty cruelties

35. Harriet Tubman • Unable to read and write, Harriet Tubman used daring tactics in the Underground Railroad to free slaves and deliver them to safety, often all the way to Canada. • Thought Questions: • Were there many runaway slaves during the Colonial period? • 2.Why or why not? • 3.What dangers did slaves face as they fled to the North? • 4.How successful was the Underground Railroad?

36. MANUFACTURING IN THE SOUTH • Small flour and lumber mills flourished • Rope making plants in Kentucky • Commercial cotton presses existed in a number of southern cities • Iron and coal were mined in Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee • 1850s Tredegar Iron Works in Richmond did an annual business of about $1 million

37. MANUFACTURING IN THE SOUTH • Availability of raw materials and abundance of waterpower on Appalachian slopes made it possible to manufacture textiles profitably • 1825 thriving factory in Fayetteville, North Carolina • William Gregg’s factory at Graniteville, South Carolina, established 1846, was employing 300 people by 1850 • Yet in 1850 all of South Carolina employed fewer than 900 in textile manufacturing • The town of Lowell, Massachusetts, had more spindles in 1860 than the entire South • Less than 15% of all goods manufactured in United States came from the South

38. Tredegar Ironworks, Richmond - Slave Labor • The small number of slaves who were not employed in agriculture worked primarily in mills, ironworks, tobacco factories, and saltworks. In port cities, slaves might be dock workers or longshoremen. The Tredegar Ironworks in Richmond, Virginia, was one of the South's largest industrial users of slave labor. • Was there a danger in letting slaves work in industry? • Why weren't slaves used more extensively in other occupations? • Note the location of this mill. Is it typical for the 19th century?

39. THE NORTHERN INDUSTRIAL JUGGERNAUT • Immediately after War of 1812 the United States was manufacturing less than $200 million worth of goods annually • In 1859 northeastern states alone produced $1.27 billion of national total of almost $2 billion • Factory system made great strides • Development of anthracite coal mines fields in Pennsylvania • Great receptivity to technological change

40. THE NORTHERN INDUSTRIAL JUGGERNAUT • With skilled labor in short supply, pressure to replace labor with machines was great • By 1850, the U.S. led the world in the manufacture of goods that required the use of precision instruments • Clocks, pistols, rifles, and locks were outstanding • Every year new natural resources were discovered and made available • Expansion of agriculture produced an ever larger supply of raw materials for mills and factories

41. THE NORTHERN INDUSTRIAL JUGGERNAUT • Eight of the ten leading industries relied on farm products • Flour milling • Cotton textiles • Lumber • Men’s shoes • Men’s clothing • Leather • Woolen goods • Liquor

42. THE NORTHERN INDUSTRIAL JUGGERNAUT • By 1850s prejudice against corporation had broken down • By end of decade northern and northwestern states had all passed incorporation laws • Corporations made possible the larger accumulation of capital • Illustrating shift: National Academy of Science refused federal charter in 1840 but easily granted one in 1863

43. THE NORTHERN INDUSTRIAL JUGGERNAUT • Industrial growth led to increase in demand for labor • Skilled artisans, technicians, and toolmakers earned good wages and found it relatively easy to become independent craftsmen or small manufacturers • Expanding frontier drained off much agricultural labor that might have gone into industry • New towns of west absorbed eastern artisans • Pay of unskilled worker was never enough to support a family decently • New machines weakened the bargaining power of artisans by making skill less important • Immigration increased rapidly in the 1830s and 1840s

44. THE NORTHERN INDUSTRIAL JUGGERNAUT • Growth of capital • European investors poured large sums of money into booming American industry • American savings • Gold from gold rush • Other important factors • Improvements in transportation • Population growth • Absence of internal tariff barriers • Relatively high per capita wealth

45. A NATION OF IMMIGRANTS • “Immigrant” only developed as a term after the creation of the United States and nationalism associated with it • “Native” population disliked immigrants • Immigrants developed their own prejudices • Irish disliked blacks—often competed for same jobs • Most immigrants adopted views of local majority • Unskilled immigrants caused serious disruptions of economic patterns wherever they appeared • By 1860 Irish immigrants made up more than 50% of the labor force in New England textile mills

46. HOW WAGE EARNERS LIVED • Many wage earners lived in urban slums with extremely crowded conditions • City streets were littered with trash • Recreational facilities were almost non-existent • Police and fire protection were inadequate • Early factory towns families had supplemented incomes with gardens but not a choice in industrial slums • Horace Greeley figured minimum weekly support for a family of 5 in 1851 was $10.57 while a factory hand rarely made $5 • Wife and children therefore also had to work

47. HOW WAGE EARNERS LIVED • Unions • Relatively few workers belonged • Most unions were craft unions • Was a National Trades Union prior to Panic of 1837 • Skilled workers improved lot in 1840s & 1850s • Working day declined from 12 and one half hours to 10 to 11 hours • Many states passed 10 hour laws and laws regulating child labor (poorly enforced) • Effective mechanic’s lien laws • Commonwealth v. Hunt(1842, Massachusetts) established legality of labor unions

48. HOW WAGE EARNERS LIVED • Flush times of 1850s revived labor unions • Strikes and national organizations • Panic of 1857 ended most of this • Why Unions not very successful • Craftsmen took little interest in unskilled workers • Few common laborers considered themselves part of a permanent working class • Wage labor seemed un-American, a violation of republican values of freedom and independence

49. PROGRESS AND POVERTY • Prior to Civil War, United States was a land of opportunity; a democratic society with a prosperous, expanding economy and few class distinctions; people had a high standard of living compared to Europeans • Within this country existed a class of miserably underpaid and depressed unskilled workers who were worse off materially than almost any southern slave • In 1848 more than 56,000 New Yorkers (1/4 population) was receiving some form of public relief • Police drive in New York in 1860 brought in nearly 500 beggars • Economic opportunities were great and taxation was little so the rich got richer • While political opportunity for white men was equal, economic opportunity was increasingly skewed

50. FOREIGN COMMERCE • Imports and Exports • Increased erratically in the 1820s and 1830s • Leapt forward in next 20 years • Remained primarily exporter of raw materials and importer of manufactured goods and mostly imported more than exported • Cotton still most valuable export • 1860 = $191 million out of total $333 million • Textiles number one import followed by iron products • Great Britain both best purchaser and best supplier • 52 packets operated between New York and Europe in 1845 • Accelerated tendency for trade to concentrate in New York and a few other port cities (Philadelphia, Baltimore, New Orleans)