The American Revolution cost Virginia and Maryland their tobacco markets and for a period of time after the Revolution the future of slavery in the United States. Most of the northern states abolished slavery and even Virginia debated whether or not to abolish it as well. The invention of the cotton gin in 1793 gave slavery a new life in the United States. Between 1800-1860, the cotton that was produced came from slaves that were from South Carolina and Georgia, reaching to the colonized lands west of the Mississippi. Slavery was an essential part to the national economy in exploring the production of cotton in the South. The invention of the cotton gin helped to make cotton production easier. Cotton was a labor intensive business
In the original thirteen colonies, slavery was legal but not necessarily moral. As decades passed the North and South grew further and further apart morally. The South held onto slavery because it was so profitable for the South. The North worked toward an industrial future while the South continued improving their machinery to improve its farming community. Eli Whitney was an important inventor for the farmers in the South. He was the inventor of many tools to help the South but the most important one was the cotton gin. With Eli Whitney's invention of the cotton gin, there was less work for the slaves and more money for the slave owners. As time went by the South added tobacco crops to their farms. By adding tobacco to the southern plantations, the work became more intense
Before the cotton gin was invented there weren’t need for many slaves. They cotton business wasn’t a money making business because of how long it took to produce cotton and seeds. I once was in Georgia and picked a big garbage bag full of it took me a year to remove the seeds from half the bag. Since the cotton gin removed all the seeds and took less time there was need for more slaves to speed the process of picking from the fields. The cotton gin made this business a moneymaker causing increased need for slavery.
Slavery played a huge role in the colonies in developing the economy. Colonies depended on slaves for the economy as well as for the society and even their own personal needs. Southern colonies economic development was based on agriculture and the manufacturing of profitable goods such as tobacco, cotton, and sugarcane. In American colonies, the people who were successful often made their profits from the hard work of numerous enslaved Africans. Tobacco plantations used the largest percentage of African slaves imported into the United States. When the cotton gin was invented, it gave a rise to slavery
1. The invention of the cotton gin affected slavery in the United States by increasing the amount of slaves needed to work the cotton gin. The more slaves a plantation had the more cotton could be produced and exported. Because of this the value of slaves increased making the owning of slaves increase.
Great post. The invention of the cotton gin immensely changed the American economy. Southern cotton farmers planted larger crops, while Northern textile factories grew up to take advantage of the sudden cheapness of cotton. By 1860, the American South provided roughly two-thirds of the cotton sold worldwide, shipping it from its flourishing ports such as New Orleans and Charleston. However, in order to harvest and process those crops, Southerners needed more workers. The population of enslaved workers increased by 1850, and a higher ratio worked in the cotton fields than ever before. By the time of the Civil War, the invention of the cotton gin had led to an American South heavily dependent upon slavery for its
The economy in the south depended on slavery for the cotton growing areas and slave trading. Slavery played an important role in all of the Southern colonies. Southern
The crops grown on plantations and the slavery system changed significantly between 1800-1860. In the early 1800s, plantation owners grew a variety of crops – cotton, sugar, rice, tobacco, hemp, and wheat. Cotton had the potential to be profitable, but there was wasn’t much area where cotton could be grown. However, the invention of the cotton gin changed this - the cotton gin was a machine that made it much easier to separate the seeds from cotton. Plantation owners could now grow lots of cotton; this would make them a lot of money. As a result, slavery became more important because the demand for cotton was high worldwide. By 1860, cotton was the main export of the south. The invention of the cotton gin and high demand for cotton changed
With its warm climate and fertile soil, the South became an agrarian society, where tobacco, rice, sugar, cotton, wheat, and hemp defined the economy (“Colonial Economy”). Because of a labor shortage, landowners bought African slaves to work their massive plantations. Even small-scale farmers often used slave labor as a means to help increase their production rate ("John C. Calhoun's Defense of Slavery"). After the invention of the cotton gin by Eli Whitney, cotton could finally be mass produced (“Slavery”). However, in order to pick all the cotton, slave labor would be needed, thus the reason for hundreds of thousands of imported slaves during the 1700s. In the United States, a stronger case can be made that slavery played a critical role in economic development. Cotton, grown primarily with slave labor, provided over half of all US export earnings. By 1840, the South grew sixty percent of the world's cotton and provided about seventy percent of the cotton consumed by the British textile industry. (“Colonial Economy”). In addition, due to the South specializing in cotton production, the North developed a variety of businesses that provided services for the slave South, including textile factories, a meat processing industry, insurance companies, shippers, and cotton brokers (“Colonial Economy”). By the time the Civil War erupted, 4.9
In this chapter, we learned about slavery. After the war of 1812, Isaac Hopper, Robert Vaux, and Benjamin Lundy was in a religious group’s that pressing for legal abolition nationwide using the strategy of moral suasion (page 21). They try to shame the slave owner to manumitting the slave, and convince the northern people to abolition with the god for America. They wanted to pass gradual emancipation laws in the south. In addition, they wanted to be educated in preparation before freedom be emancipated (page 21). The big consider was how to accomplished gradualism. One option was, they could pass state laws at a later date, for example, foreign slave trade clause in the united constitution. The second option, slave children who were born after a certain
Case, John Brown 's Raid, and the passage of the fugitive slave act that held
In addition to the history of slavery in the U.S. Foner also talks about not only the South 's dependence on slavery, but the North as well. Even though the Northern states abolished slavery, cotton was necessary for making textiles in the industrial factories in the North. As slavery continued so did the need for it, and the economy began to rely on it. It was especially important in the 19th century. Even with the North against slavery, the South kept it, because it was important to make money.
With Eli Whitney’s invention of the cotton gin in 1793, cotton became very profitable. This machine was able to reduce the time it took to separate seeds from the cotton. However, at the same time the increase in the number of plantations willing to move from other crops to cotton meant the greater need for a large amount of cheap labor, i.e. slaves. Thus, the southern economy became a one crop economy, depending on cotton and therefore on slavery. On the other hand, the northern economy was based more on industry than agriculture. In fact, the northern industries were purchasing the raw cotton and turning it into finished goods. This disparity between the two set up a
Economic and social differences between the north and the south was one of the events of slavery leading up to the Civil War. When the cotton gin was invented in 1793, cotton became a very profitable crop. Before the invention of the cotton gin, it would take one slave a day to remove the seeds from two pounds of cotton. After the invention of the cotton gin, it could be used to clean two pounds of cotton in just half an hour. With the invention of the cotton gin came an increase in the number of plantations willing and wanting to move from other crops to cotton. The south raised rice, sugar, and indigo, but cotton was its main crop. This move from other crops to cotton would cause for a greater need for a larger amount of laborers, meaning a greater need for slaves. The south, becoming a one crop economy, then became more dependent on cotton, thus more dependent on slaves. The north, on the other hand, was less focused on crops and
The economic elements played an important role during the time period 1800-1824. Technological innovation greatly contributed towards the economic elements with improved firearms production, steam engines, and the invention of the cotton gin. The cotton gin, created by Eli Whitney, easily removed the seeds that adhered tenaciously to the cotton. The average adult slave by himself could only clean up to a pound of cotton a day, while with the help of the cotton gin a single slave could clean up to 50 pounds a day. Without the cotton gin, the South could only produce 3,000 bales of cotton, but after the invention the production sky rocketed to 178,000 bales of cotton, and again almost doubled to 334,000 bales after the War of 1812. Whitney’s
The growth of the cotton industry impacted America economically and socially. “The domestic slave trade exploded, providing economic opportunities for whites involved in many aspects of the trade and increasing the possibility of