Manifest Destiny-Path to Civil War

North and South

Ideologies

Ideology•  a systematic body of concepts

especially about human life or culture

Northern IdeologyFREE 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 IdeologyMORAL 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 NORTHWealth 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 IDEOLOGYEconomy• Dominated by cash crops

–Tobacco (VA, NC)–Rice (SC, GA)–Cotton–Sugar (LA)–SOUTH HAS VIRTUALLY A ONE

DIMENSONAL ECONOMY AGRICULTURE

SOUTHERN IDEOLOGYCOTTON 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 SOCIETYRich

Lower Rich

Upper Middle

Middle

Lower Middle

Non-Land Owners

Slave Labor

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!