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The Effect Of Slavery During The 19th Century

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The Effect of Slavery

Plato, a great philosopher, once stated, “Dictatorship naturally arises out of democracy, and the most aggravated form of tyranny and slavery out of the most extreme liberty.” During the 19th century in America, extreme liberty was exactly what the South had. The South was characterized by slavery not just because Southerners owned slaves, but because slavery directly affected the way of Southern life. Unfortunately, by enforcing the slaveholding liberties of white Southerners, the government was taking away the liberties of African Americans. When someone takes away the humanity of another by enslaving them and deeming them inferior, they are forsaking humanity itself, and become unethical in their thinking. Slavery in the South resulted in Southerners taking quite a different perspective on life than what Northerners might have thought. During the 19th century, the practice of slavery affected the political, economic, social, and cultural aspects of the South.

Because of great support for slavery in the South, southern politics involved laws and principles that maximized the rights of slave owners and minimized the rights of African Americans. Laws called slave codes and black codes were often implemented in order to guarantee that slaves and African Americans in general remained subordinates, and never gained equality with white men. Slaveholders wanted slaves to remain property, and created many laws to treat them as such. For example, if any man

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