Slavery Was Dying, Revisted.

wausaubob

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In 1860 the ratio of slave states to free states was 15:18. Kansas had been admitted as a free state and the next most likely state was Nebraska. Nevada was actually admitted ahead of Nebraska. Both were admitted as free states.
At a ratio of 15:20 slavery was still constitutionally protected. However at that ratio it was no longer legislatively protected, and if the slave states could not control the presidency, it would, within 8-10 years lose its judicial protection.
The percentage of families that owned slaves was down to 3% in Delaware, 12% in Maryland and 13% in Missouri.
Though slavery was well entrenched on the Atlantic coast, and had only recently vanished as significant fact in New Jersey, slavery was subject to democratic abolition in these three states.
If it disappeared in these 3 states, the ratio could change to 12:23, with 12:24 possible.
Any move against the Fugitive Slave Act, and such a move was likely after 1860, would have weakened slavery in Virginia and Kentucky. A change which makes abolition more likely could easily start a sell off in these two states. Virginia and Kentucky already had large areas which had no slaves. A more rapid sell off would not only decrease prices, but could endanger the political viability of slavery in those two states. The same argument applies to a lesser extent in North Carolina and Tennessee.
If the sell off proceeds too quickly, within 8 years slavery disappears in Kentucky and Virginia. The ratio of slave to free states could change to 10:26. At that point four more free states were necessary to eliminate the constitutional protection of slavery. Those states would be Nevada or Nebraska, Colorado, Washington and Utah. With Congress controlling admission of new states, and Congress in control of the Republican party, all would be free states. If a state did not want to be a free state, Congress did not have to admit it.
Although it seems these changes would take time, if the fact that slavery was on a course to eventual extinction was established, as soon as the demand for slaves in Texas and Arkansas was satisfied, slave prices would slide downwards and a panic sell off was possible. In Louisiana, the slave population was not self sustaining. In Louisiana, slave violence was the grave threat.
Did anyone think that the U.S. could put slavery on the course to ultimate extinction? Secession supports to the conclusion that the slave owners thought it could. Was a panic reaction to that threat possible? Secession also proves that an irrational response to threat was possible.
As far as slavery being economically profitable, in cotton it was profitable. To the Southerners it seemed that slavery was necessary to grow and pick cotton. However it was the South's expertise in growing, handling and shipping cotton, that made the U.S. dominant in the market. Although that dominance was going to continue, as other producers competed that was going to hold prices down, but more importantly, as Texas and Arkansas grew more cotton, over supply was likely. The last few years of the 1850's were highly profitable, but growth at that rate was not likely.
As an economic system, slavery looked entrenched, but free labor systems can easily force people to work long hours under cruel conditions to maintain their families. Cotton was probably safe without slavery, though sugar production was likely going to change.
As far as a social control system, it was more effective than Jim Crow, because it meant the work force was not mobile. But black codes were sufficient for suppressing African-American voting rights.
In the modern world, with newspapers, railroads and telegraph wires, the interstate slave trade was not viable. The trade, from border states southward, and from states on the Atlantic coast westward, was cruel beyond description. It was this element of slavery that the slave states could not admit to themselves, and which could not be discussed outside the South with provoking disgust among non-slaveholders in the North and in Europe.
I would agree that the slave holders thought of themselves as later day cavaliers, but the rest of the western world thought of them as later day Romans.
They may have thought they could protect slavery in a closed system, but the time had already passed.
Within 20 years the age of steel and high speed locomotives would arrive. The modern age was arriving and slavery had not place in that modern age.
I think they, people like Wade Hampton, knew slavery was doomed. They wanted to control the exit strategy and eventually, the Southern states did get control of the transition.
 
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