Slavery: Cause And Catalyst Of The Civil War?

In Southern history slavery has been of mammoth economic importance. The South used the slaves in growing cotton. The cotton picked by the slaves made up over 80% of the exports from America (U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service. Slavery: Cause and Catalyst of the Civil War, 1). The cotton export was the most important business in America, for both the south and the north. Slavery was one of the most cost effective means of production to earn money in a labor intensive environment, and without slavery the great wealth of this country couldn’t be obtained. (“Causes of the Civil War,”5/19/2014). The money the south earned from slave labor paved the way to ignite the Civil War, this happened because the more money the south …show more content…
The leader of this revolt was a black man named Nat Turner. His revolt started in April 21, 1831, the revolt spread, and a group of 70 people fought. 60 white men were killed in this revolt. The local militia retaliated by killing almost 260 people. The militia overpowered the revolting slaves with almost 3000 people. The revolt caused the slave states to create laws that prohibited the slaves from learning to read and write, in order to limit the access to the knowledge of the prevailing concepts of freedom. In 1850 the South also created a low that paid federal commissioners twice as much to return a slave than to free them. All these restricting laws and acts riled up people in the North until they were at war. (U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service. Slavery: Cause and Catalyst of the Civil War, 11) The North viewed the laws and the acts in the South as an act of economic aggression and as a mean to control the new …show more content…
They couldn’t imagine a world without slaves, but the North did. The North was getting an abundance of immigrants that would work for very little money. Many emigrated as a result of the potato famine in Ireland, and many needed a new start. The South has produced 80% of the exports in America, but the North wanted to move into a new industrial age. Slavery was one of the many obstacles that was holding the North back from doing so. The slave states had an increased influence over the government, this was possible due to their demographic superiority, each slave was counted 3/5 of a white person and there were over 4,000,000 slaves. The Southern masters were engaged in breading slaves as the inbound traffic of slaves was dwindling. The slaves were a commodity as well as a currency, they could be used as money to pay off debt, or they could also earn money for the master with their labor. Depending on the skills of the slave (sewing, farming, metal working, etc.) the masters could use them as labor to earn money, or be converted to cash if the masters wished to sell them. To Southerners slaves were like dogs. They would be hit if they were perceived to be doing something wrong. The masters were limiting the slaves education and at the same time considering them ignorant and stupid. The Southerners thought that the their economy depended on slavery. They feared that without slaves their way of life