The dawn of the 18th century came with new reforms in free America. It had to contend with the abolitionist movement that had begun in South America and Western Europe to stop the slave trade and emancipate those people already in slavery (Abraham 1989). In the United States of America, the population of slaves had been estimated to be four million. This was an institution that was powerful both socially and economically since it was very vital in agriculture. When Abraham Lincoln became president in 1860, he supported the abolition of slavery and this threatened the split of America into North and South which had come together under the union. This essay seeks to reveal the sub-regional differences between the North and the South due to the opposing points of view as to the abolishment of slavery.
The southern colony was located in Virginia with its center being James town (Abraham1989). This place was rich in agriculture and the colonists grew tobacco which yielded very high profits while the Northern colony was made up of Christians who had their religious point of view for instance the Quakers and puritan dissenters who had escaped persecution in England. This place was not productive agriculturally and economically non-viable.
Englishmen later took over New York from the Dutch after a series of Anglo-Dutch wars of the 1660s. They developed New York into a key shipping center. The Northern people had built the center for shipping timber and fur while the south developed agricultural centers where they grew cotton, rice tea, and other crops. These differences in productivity of both regions also spurred political, religious, cultural, and social disparities between the views of the two.
The South was always in constant friction with the North. The Southern people were opposed to tariffs while the northern people supported tariffs that were associated with the taxation system in 1860. Very few farmers in the South did not have slaves. The Southerners fully supported the slavery institution because it gave them free labor while the Northerners were against this system of human emancipation. The Northern social structure was less patriarchal and stratified than the Southern state which was founded on the plantation slavery system. However, the irony was that about 8% of the farmers in the south of the high class kept about two-thirds of the slaves (Don 1989). These elite plantation owners had many slaves, were the greatest benefactors of the economies of scale because they planted cotton which is a labor-intensive crop, and very profitable because they produced it in large quantities. These so-called ‘slave magnates’ were the same who ruled in politics versus the poor farmers and resisted the abolition of slavery from society something that the Northerners opposed greatly.
The South resisted any democratic change that may stop the slavery institution. In the South, all farmers regarded racism as a normal virtue because they had a certain code of conduct that slaves were to observe failure to which they would be killed, whipped, or maimed. They maintained an attitude of white supremacy and felt that slavery was a legitimate affair and a vital commodity for any civilized society. They had prestigious ‘slave overseers’ whose main role was to punish slaves both free and bound who threatened the law. The market economy of the South served as a link between the rich and poor farmers so the latter never opposed the slavery system for the fear of consequences in their livelihoods.
The Northerners produced loans and manufactured goods for the south but they supported the abolitionist movement. The southerners had to face the movement and have to contend with the expanding free labor. Northerners considered slavery an immoral act and the southerners wanted a Republican to be President who would support slavery. The southern people opposed any legislation that would ruin the slavery system and their cotton industries which were now under threat. William L. Garrison the founder of the Liberator together with Harriet B. Stowe inspired the fight against slavery (Don 1989). Slavery supporters argued that there was an economic inequality between the north and south. They argued that slavery was the only one that will close this gap. They also felt that slaves provide better humane labor than the industrial labor that the north had.
The south believed that slaves were essential because they made them have a slow leisurely life in comparison to the north. The North did away with slavery, begun the industrial revolution which later resulted in urbanization. Because the North did not support slavery, 90% of the slaves moved north to work in industries and banks. this rate of modernization and modernization itself was rippled by the southerners who defended their behavior claiming that they are conservative and hate new ideologies. This made the difference between the north and the south to be greater because they had different norms on social-cultural life, morals, political issues, and economic growth.
Politically, the north supported a republican candidate who supported modernization while the south clung to their old ideologies of values and traditional rights (Abraham & Don 2008). This led to the emergence of tension in the social life of both. Another effect was the emergence of politics that was mass in nature and so many parties were formed with a voter turnout of more than 80%.
The economic value of slavery in the Southern States was projected to be valued at $3 billion in 1860. The growth of one crop in the south led to the exhaustion of the soil and this made the slave magnates move to the western states of Alabama, Mississippi among others carrying and spreading slavery with them. In these states, they had small farms. The north began trading with the western states and avoided the plantation south which led to a lack of unity and resulted in war.
The southerners still defended their slavery institution because they found it to yield more positive good than bad. Being protestant, they supported their ideologies of slavery using the King James Version of the Bible claiming that Abrahan supported it because he had servants in his household as seen in Genesis (Chapter 26 verse 23-14, chapter 24 verse 35-36) (King James Version Bible 2006).
References
Abraham L. & Don E. F. (2008). Abraham Lincoln: Speeches and Writings 1859-1865: Bicentennial Jacket. Library of America
Don, E. F. (1989). Lincoln: Speeches and Writings 1832-1858. New York, Library of America.
Abraham L. Lincoln: Speeches and Writings : 1859-1865. 5 th ed. Library of America. 1989
King James Version Bible. (2006). Thomas Nelson Inc.