Manifest Destiny-Path to Civil War
North and
South
Ideologies
Ideology
• a systematic body of concepts
especially about human life or
culture
Northern Ideology
FREE LABOR IDEOLOGY
• Hard work is the way to Heaven
and the American dream
– You are in control of your life
– Heaven and wealth for all-not just the elite
– Everything is up to you
Free Labor Ideology
SELF MAKING
• The way to succeed in life both
financially and religiously
Free Labor Ideology
MORAL CODE
•
•
•
•
Self Discipline
Self Control
Moralizes Work
Revolves around will power
Free Labor Ideology
• Belief that anyone can get out of
wage labor and be successful
• Belief that this would create an
equal society which was
considered to be vital for
democracy to succeed
Free Labor Ideology
• Free Labor Ideology depended on
two factors to be present to
succeed:
–Available cheap land
–No aristocracy-no elite to stop
people from self making
Free Labor Ideology
YOUR FINANCIAL
SUCCESS
REFLECTED YOUR
MORALITY
REALITY IN THE NORTH
Wealth is getting more and more
concentrated
• 1820 10% of population owned 50% of
wealth
• 1860 10% of population owned 73% of
wealth
People are inheriting wealth and not self
making
REALITY IN THE NORTH
• Industrial Revolution is moving
quickly
• Wage labor is becoming permanent
• Each year cities are getting bigger
and bigger
• Less land available
WHAT IS THE
SOLUTION???
MANIFEST DESTINY
• The idea the United States must
expand its boundaries to the
Pacific Ocean.
• Idea that this was America’s right
and duty
MANIFEST DESTINY
• Move West to find new land
where people can self make
• Northerners did not want slavery
in new states-saw slavery as
competition to their self making
Most Northerners are
not opposed to slavery
for moral reasons, they
are opposed to it
ECONOMICALLY.
SOUTHERN
IDEOLOGY
SOUTHERN IDEOLOGY
Economy
• Dominated by cash crops
–Tobacco (VA, NC)
–Rice (SC, GA)
–Cotton
–Sugar (LA)
–SOUTH HAS VIRTUALLY A ONE
DIMENSONAL ECONOMY
AGRICULTURE
SOUTHERN IDEOLOGY
COTTON IS KING
• Almost a guaranteed profit
• Invention of the Cotton Gin (1793)
makes cotton extremely profitable
• By 1840 50% of all U.S. exports is
cotton
The Cotton Gin
Cotton is King
• Profitability of cotton rejuvenates
slave system
–1820 1.4 million slaves
–1860 4 million slaves
–Slaves make up 40% of the South’s
entire population by 1860
SOUTHERN IDEOLOGY
Southern Self Making
1.BUY LAND
2.BUY SLAVES
3.GROW COTTON
SOUTHERN SOCIETY
Rich
Lower Rich
Upper Middle
Middle
Lower Middle
Non-Land Owners
SOUTHERN IDEOLOGY
• Two different Souths
–BLACK BELTS
–WHITE BELTS
BLACK BELT VS. WHITE BELT
BLACK BELT
• Heaviest cash crop production
• All money tied up in land and
slaves
–1860: value of all Southern land
2.4 billion
–1860: value of all slaves 3
billion
BLACK BELT
• SLAVES WORTH MORE THAN
THE LAND THEY WORKED
• Most slaveholders only have
small number of slaves
BLACK BELT
• Racial fears hold whites together
–They dehumanize African
Americans in order to rationalize
their enslavement
BLACK BELT
• Fear of slave uprising
–Whites are outnumbered
–1831 Turner Rebellion (VA)-55
whites killed
–Feeds panic
–Makes all whites have interest in
keeping African Americans
enslaved
Positive Good Argument
• Became popular in the 1830s,
argued that slaves wanted to be
slaves.
• Southerners argued that slavery
benefitted the slave because the
slave owner provided food and
protection.
Positive Good Argument
• Before the 1830s slaveholders
saw slavery as necessary evil,
after 1830s they saw slavery as
positive for slaves.
Coercion
• the use of force or threats to
make somebody do something
against his or her will.
• This was how slaves were kept in
bondage.
BLACK BELT VS. WHITE BELT
WHITE BELT
• Less slave concentration
• Economy not entirely dependent on
cash crops
• Whites are not outnumbered
• LESS COMMITTED TO SLAVERY
AND WILLING TO CONSIDER
GETTING RID OF IT
BLACK BELT AND WHITE BELT
• BLACK BELT EXTREMELY
CONCERNED THAT WHITE BELT WILL
NOT SUPPORT SLAVERY IF IT COMES
TO A CONFLICT
• Black Belt becomes obsessed with
keeping White Belt loyal: #1 political
concern
– Creates political crisis with North in
order to test where White Belt will go
BLACK BELT AND WHITE BELT
Black Belt attempts to
control White Belt is
crucial cause of the
Civil War!