Defending Slavery in America Essay Example

the beginning of the eighteenth century, slave trade had started taken a different direction especially after the American Revolution. A number of colonists started making a link between the black slaves and their own oppression by the British. This made them to call for abolishment of slavery (Guelzo, 2005). In the eighteenth century, the land that was used to grow tobacco was almost finished and a crisis emerged in the south and the issue of slavery in American soil was highly in doubt. Textile industry in England grew with the introduction of mechanization.

Mechanization led to a bigger demand for cotton which was supplied from America. The harvest of cotton was said to be so hard because of the process of removing seeds by hand. In 1793, the cotton gin was invented by a schoolteacher but only increased the demand for slaves (Guelzo, 2005). Most people in the south did not quit slavery but in the north, most states abolished slave trade. The local trade went on and leading to a high increase in the number of slaves in the United States. By 1860, the total number of salves had reached four million with most of them making a stay at the best cotton producing states.

The south highly supported the issue of slavery by arguing that it meant a major contribution to the economy of the country and that it was a major aspect of the rising of consumerism in Britain. Plantation aristocracy was one of the main sources of revenue that America had but the most of the southerners did not support it. There was an idea of contradiction on why they would defend slavery

but fail to support plantation aristocracy. The south wanted to have slaves around them because they needed the labor that they provided but did not want to pay those (Rose, 1999).

Through this, they could save enough money to buy new land, pay taxes and even buy more slaves. The American civil war started due to this mistreatment of the southern slaves. The difference between the north and the south is that the north owned companies that they owned and controlled while the south mainly worked on cotton and tobacco. The south believed that if slaves were taken away from them then their tobacco would dry up in the field and the profit they used to get from rice would be no more.

According to Rose (1999), the south used some of their slaves as soldiers in the army hence giving them some military power. They kept their best slaves but send the uncontrollable to war. They reached a place where they could send the slaves to factories and in a way of making them feel appreciated and honored, they offered them freedom if they fought well in war.

In the eighteenth and nineteenth century, slavery was legal and most people were satisfied with the law that governed slavery. It is slavery that led to slave trade in most parts of the world due to their increase in demand to work in farms. The end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century faced the coming up of individuals and committees which were against the idea of slave trade (Rose, 1999). They claimed that all human beings were equal and that it was inhuman to treat

slaves the way they were being treated. Many parliamentarians and states supported the idea and slave trade was abolished.

The only thing that remind was the issue of slavery which many people found it hard to fight against. The main reason why slavery was preferred by many people is because the slaves provided a cheap source of labor and they helped many countries to run their economies well. This made it hard for activists and governments to abolish slavery. Some of the Africans who had been taken in for slavery did not even feel offended to be in America because in some way they knew that they will later end up being free men and could freely live in America rather than going back to Africa.

References

1. Botkin, B. A. (1945). Lay my burden down: A folk history of slavery (Vol. 24). University of Chicago Press.
2. Rose, W. L. N. (Ed.). (1999). A documentary history of slavery in North America.University of Georgia Press.
3. Guelzo, A. C. (2005). Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation: The End of Slavery in America. Simon and Schuster.
4. Domar, E. D. (1969). The causes of slavery: a hypothesis.