Notes 16 Part 2 359 -370 and Varying Viewpoints
Life Under the Lash
White Southerners often Romanticized the “Happy Life” of Slaves and the slave system… Later seen in
movies like “Gone with the Wind,” and is later a key ingredient in the turn of the century “Lost Cause
Mythology,” which blames abolitionists and greedy northern industrialists for the Civil War…
How did the Slaves actually Live? The book claims no simple answer, I fiercely disagree….read the slave
narratives…read the interviews with poor southern whites ….it does not take a brain surgeon to make a
general claim…being a slave sucked, period.
However, it is complicated by; geography, the nature of the owners, whether or not you lived on a large
plantation or were a single slave of a white farmer…. The nature of the overseer or driver…how often
they used the whip….The breakers certainly do use it often…as Frederick Douglass portrays in his slave
narrative…Over ½ of the slave population by 1860 lived in 5 states; SC, LA, Ala, GA, and Miss… other deep
south states such as Florida and Texas had many slaves as well. This was the heart of the exploding
“Cotton Kingdom.” The work was certainly hotter and harder in most cases, “down the River.”
Slaves, despite their difficulties, had families, most living with their two parents for some of their
lives…Marriage vows often included the phrase, “until death or distance do you part.”
Amazingly a durable and distinct African Culture exists and survives the horrors of Slavery… The
2nd Great Awakening brought religion to slaves, though certainly one different than the planters
worshipped… focusing on narratives such as Exodus.
The Burdens of Bondage
Slaves were denied an education because reading brought ideas, and ideas brought discontent. ALL
southern states made it illegal to educate slaves, most at the penalty of DEATH, especially after
1832. 90% of adult Blacks were illiterate at the end of the Civil War…one of the main motivations for the
evangelical abolitionists after the war was to set up schools to educate both adults and children. Huge #’s
of workers come south to raise the educational level of former slaves… and were successful in many
ways, as we will learn later.
Slaves resisted every day every where….whether by slowing their work (gave rise to the MYTH of
laziness) poisoning their master’s food, the SAMBO MYTH, sabotaging equipment, running away
(underground railroad) stole food and goods, and did ANYTHING THEY COULD TO RESIST.
MAJOR SLAVE REBELLIONS OCCUR OFTEN…MUCH MORE THAN IS DOCUMENTED IN OUR TEXT.
1 Martin and Gabriel Prosser in Richmond, Va. in 1800
2 New Orleans Slave Riot (over 500 killing on march) in 1811
3 Denmark Vesey in SC in 1822
4 Nat Turner in Va. in 1831-32
After Nat Turner’s this changes the South…FEAR…led to many changes…such as; a new argument in favor
of slavery- being a positive good, approved by the Bible, slaves being better off than the free workers in
the North…AND Toughened conditions for free blacks in the South, requiring some to wear tags, all
southern communities form patrolling militia’s- gave them an initial advantage in the War, Many
southern legislatures forbade manumission and asked free blacks to leave their states….
Whites after the Turner Rebellion lived in a state of imagined siege; from slaves, from abolitionists,
FROM THE WORLD – THE LAST BASTION OF SLAVERY THAT EXISTED IN THE INDUSTRIAL WESTERN
WORLD…and general FEAR that they would be murdered in the beds while sleeping. THIS BOLSTERS AN
IRRATIONAL BELIEF IN THE THEORY OF BIOLOGICAL SCIENTIFIC RACIAL SUPERIORITY (HERRENVOLK
DEMOCRACY) …AND TURNS THE SOUTH INTO CRAZY BACKWATER IN AN ERA OF PROGRESS IN THE
USA…
Early Abolitionism
The 1st Anti-Slavery Societies were formed just before and after the Revolutionary era driven by
religion (Quakers in Penn the 1st) and due to immediate and gradual emancipation occurring in the North
at this time… SOME POWERFUL MEN –(CLAY, MONROE) believing that free blacks and whites could not
live together…form the AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY in 1817, that paid for former slaves to
return to Africa… this was very popular initially but as time passed MOST BLACKS WERE AMERICANS,
BORN HERE, AND DO NOT LEAVE (APPX. 13,000)… Liberia and the capital city of Monrovia, named after
James Monroe (Pres.) is founded with the help of the British in Africa just for this purpose… Later even
Abraham Lincoln entertains the idea of purchasing the modern day country of Panama from Columbia to
settle slaves (Free Black leaders like Douglass and others called to the White House to discus this
immediately shoot this idea down, for the reason mentioned earlier) 13, 000 former slaves do leave
however… a small small #.
The 1830’s with Nat Turner’s Rebellion and the 2nd Great Awakening’s STRONG influence motivates a
new energy into EVANGELICAL ABOLITONISM… Britain ends slavery in its West Indian colonies IN
1833 and further encourages the MINORITY of Abolitionists in America to push for change.
Theodore Dwight Weld, supported by Tappan Brothers, goes to the Lane Theological Seminary…where
led by the Beecher’s (Lyman, Harriet, Henry and others) he forms in 1834 a massive 18 day debate on
Slavery… the Group was called the LANE REBELS… THEY FAN OUT ACROSS THE NORTH GIVING
SPEECHES AND PUBLISHING PAMPHLETS IN OPPOSITION TO SLAVERY… one particular pamphlet is
entitled, “American Slavery as it is,” published in 1839 … It becomes one of the most influential
documents of the Abolitionist movement and period….and greatly influences another Beecher, Harriet
Beecher Stowe’s, “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.”
Radical Abolitionism
William Lloyd Garrison, without question the most significant White abolitionist in
history, shakes up the world… publishing his 1st edition of his abolitionist newspaper, “The
Liberator,” on Jan. 1st, 1831…. ON EVERY EDITION…AT THE TOP….(THE MASTHEAD) IT
STATED THIS…..
“I will be as harsh as truth and as uncompromising as justice….I am in
earnest—I will not equivocate—I will not excuse---I will not retreat a single
inch---and I WILL BE HEARD!”
THIS LASTED FOR OVER 30 YEARS…Garrison was a tireless evangelical immediate abolitionist….
IN 1831, ALONG WITH THE “Abolition’s Golden Trumpet,” WENDELL PHILLIPS, and many others THEY
FORM, “THE AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY,” without question the most influential
abolitionist society in America.
Black Abolitionists worked in concert with the above group…even some going so far as to advocate for a
violent overthrow of the slave system…such as DAVID WALKER, later murdered for his writings, “Appeal
to the Colored Citizens of the World,” (1829)…Henry Highland Garnett and many others…like
“Isabella,” or Sojurner Truth… who traveled the Country speaking about Abolition and Women’s
Rights..and Martin Delaney, who advocated a mass recolonization of Africa… The Slave Narrative
became a KEY WEAPON for Black Abolitionists to fund and BRING TO THE WHITES ATTENTION THE
HORRORS OF SLAVERY… like Harriet Jacobs, Solomon Northrup, and the most famous of all Black
Abolitionists FREDERICK DOUGLASS, CALLED THE GREATEST OF ALL….
FD spoke, wrote, met with Presidents, Congressmen, etc…. one famous speech before he purchases his
freedom in the later 1840’s begins, “ I appear before you this evening as a thief and a robber, I stole this
head, these limbs, this body from my master.” WOW>>>> He publishes his classic autobiography,
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass in 1845.
FD was different from Garrison, in that HE BELIEVED A POLITICAL
SOLUTION WAS POSSIBLE TO FREE THE SLAVES… He and others split with the
Radical Evangelical Abolitionists in the 1840’s over this issue… Garrison and his group
burned the CONSTIUTION PUBLICLY denouncing it as an agreement with
the devil… FD and the Political Abolitionists attempt to make change using the political
process…leading to 3 DISTINCT POLTICAL PARTIES FORMING TO at minimum
OPPOSE THE SPREAD OF SLAVERY… The Liberty Party in 1840, the Free
Soil Party in 1848, and finally the Republican Party formed in 1854 – ALL
HAD AS THEIR PRIMARY OBJECTIVE THE ENDING OF SLAVERY (at
minimum…the opposition to the spread of slavery into the new
territories in the west)
The key question for all abolitionists became this, “ WHEN IS EVIL SO ENORMOUS THAT IT MUST BE
DENOUNCED, EVEN AT THE RISK OF PRECIPITATING BLOODSHED AND BUTCHERY?”
The South Lashes Back
****Before Nat Turner’s rebellion in 1831-32…. AMAZINGLY… the South actually had more AntiSlavery Societies than the North.
The Mason-Dixon Line that separated literally Maryland and Pennsylvania became after the early
emancipation efforts of the North after the revolutionary war… Figuratively, after NTR in 1832, this
becomes[ Mason-Dixon or 36-30 lines] the split between two distinct societies… [Seward’s,
“Irrepressible Conflict,” speech for example, 1858.
Pro-Slavery whites, as we have read, began after NTR to begin to argue for Slavery as a POSITIVE
GOOD..no longer agreeing with TJEFF that it was a necessary evil…they began to use the Bible and
comparisons with workers (WAGE-SLAVES) in the North…as well as many FALLACIOUS… arguments to
somehow convince the rest of the World in the West who had ALL already ended slavery in their
countries…as well as to counter THE GROWING ABOLITIONIST-FREE SOIL arguments of the North, as
well as using SCIENTIFIC RACISM as PROOF that they were correct….THIS ONLY WIDENS THE CHASM
THAT WAS DEVLOPING AND PAINTED THE SOUTHERNERS AS DESPERATE AND DEFENSIVE… AND
THE SOUTH BECAME HOTLY INTOLERANT OF ANY DEBATE….it was embarrassing.
They went so far as to prohibit the discussion of slavery in Congress beginning in 1836 with the
GAG RESOLUTION…in 1835 they also make it a crime for any Southern Postmasters to distribute
Abolitionist literature in the South…CLEARLY A VIOLATION OF THE CONSTITUTIONS GUARANTEE
OF THE FREEDOMS OF THE PRESS AND SPEECH.
The Abolitionist Impact in the North
During the 1830’s and 1840’s abolitionists, always a small minority all
the way until the war begins in 1861 and really after, WERE VERY UNPOPULAR in
the North…countless examples of violence chased these extremists; THE BROADCLOTH MOB
in Boston, textile workers who feared for their jobs, put a rope around
the neck of Garrison and dragged him through the streets in 1835…. The
Tappan Brothers New York House was destroyed in 1834, and Elijah P. Lovejoy, an Illinois newspaper
editor was MURDERED in 1837..became one of the first MARTYRS OF THE ABOLITION MOVEMENT.
REMEMBER THAT THE LORDS OF THE LOOM (and bankers and shippers)
in the North WERE TIED TO THE LORDS OF THE LASH…
BY THE 1850’S THIS BEGINS TO CHANGE DUE TO THE FIGHT OVER THE SPREAD OF SLAVERY INTO
THE NEWLY ACQUIRED TERRITORIES FROM MEXICO… and the COMPROMISE OF 1850’S –NEW
HARSHER FUGITIVE SLAVE LAWS… AND THE PUBLICATION OF “UNCLE TOM’S CABIN,” THESE
EVENTS BRING SLAVERY INTO THE EVERYDAY LIVES OF NORTHERNERS AND THEY ARE FORCED
TO CONSIDER SLAVERY REALLY FOR THE 1ST TIME…IN A REAL WAY…this slowly brings more and
more people to consider really how BACKWARD an HATEFUL…THE SOUTH REALLY WAS….and attempt
to end THEIR SINNING AND HORRIFIC WAYS…. Conflict MANY BELIEVED WAS
INEVITABLE…. We will see for ourselves how inevitable 
Remember NEVER is their even close to a majority of Northerners who believe in the
immediate end of slavery everywhere…. BUT a GROWING # of Northerners DO BEGIN TO
BELIEVE THAT TO SPREAD THIS SYSTEM TO THE WEST WAS JUST PLAIN WRONG…. This will lead to
War…The churches split first, then the political parties, then THE NATION.
You need to read Varying Viewpoints…and know at minimum the answers to the questions I posted in
the Reading Questions for Chapter 16 part 2 
VV notes:
By the early 1900s a “romantic” view of the Old South—was conveyed through literature, myth,
and increasingly scholarship. “The LOST CAUSE” MYTH—Supports a nation at this time grappling
with “new imperialism,” “Scientific Racism,” and Jim Crowism becoming entrenched throughout
the West and South…This is all in support of the Nation coming together to fight in the SpanishAmerican War and to support arguments of our Nation’s new imperial desires to expand in the
World—to help uplift those unfortunate heathens in the third world [many supposed
motivations]
Ulrich Phillips (1918) had three key arguments to support “The Lost Cause Mythology.”
1 Slavery by 1860 was a dying economic institution, unprofitable to the slave owner and an
obstacle to economic development of the South as a whole.
2 Slavery was a “benign” (kind) institution and that the planters treated their slaves
paternally (like kind fathers) and that Abolitionists were wrong.
3 That Blacks were inherently inferior and submissive by nature and did not have any
problems with slavery, in fact were better off as slaves.
Historians over the next many decades debated Phillips and his assertions AND BY THE
1970s HAD COMPLETELY “DEBUNKED” PHILLIPS ASSERTIONS. However,
“The American Memory,” would take many more decades to wash away
the lingering effect of “THE LOST CAUSE.”
-Economic Historians have demonstrated that slavery was a viable, profitable, expanding
economic system and that slaves were a worthwhile investment.
-Stanly Elkins in, “Slavery,” (1959) compared slavery with Nazi Concentration Camps in WWII.
Both he claimed were “total institutions,” supported by the Government.
-Eugene Genovese, more recently, contends that Slavery was “Paternalistic,” in that it created a
system that reflected the need to control the work of slaves—through reward and
punishment…classic conditioning. Within this system, Black Slaves could find a way to create their
own “Cultural Space,” in which to develop a unique social system that managed to survive despite
the harsh measures that actually existed.
-Kenneth Stampp, more recently, stresses the frequency and resistance of slaves to the system…
and with other historians claims that the childlike view of the slave was actually a way for slaves
to fool the masters without incurring punishment, and that this effort was part of the varieties of
methods of slave resistance that occurred and was used by slaves to resist the worst aspects of
slavery.
Gender, also studied more recently by, Elizabeth Fox-Genovese and others has been looking at the
ways that slavery differed for Men and Women, both Slaves and Slaveholders. Black women had
the unique task, according to these historians, of negotiating an identity out of their varied
responsibilities; plantation laborer, caretaker of White women and children, and anchor of their
own Families. They have also studied the effect that the slave system had on the conceptions of
Masculinity and Femininity with Southern Society further distinguishing its culture from the
North.