American slavery was a system of unfree labor used to produce cash crops for profit. Slaves in Texas were generally profitable as a business investment for individual slaveholders and unfortunately, at that time that was the system that brought riches. Slavery certainly promoted development of the agricultural economy; it provided the labor for a 600 percent increase in cotton production during the 1850s. On the other hand, the institution may well have contributed in several ways to slowing commercialization and industrialization. Planters, for example, being generally satisfied with their lives as slaveholders, were largely unwilling to involve themselves in commerce and industry, even if there was a chance for greater profits. Slavery may
