CH16 – The South & the Slavery Controversy

Time Frame: 1793-1860

Objectives: At the end of this chapter, you should be able to:

• Describe the economic strengths and weaknesses of the Cotton Kingdom and its central role in the prosperity of Britain as well as the United States.
• Outline the hierarchical social structure of the South, from the planter aristocracy to African American slaves.
• Describe the nonslaveholding white majority of the South, and explain why most poorer whites supported slavery even though they owned no slaves.
• Describe the workings of the peculiar institution of slavery, including the role of the domestic slave trade after the outlawing of international slave trading.
• Describe African American life under slavery, including the role of the family and religion.
• Describe the rise of abolitionism in both the United States and Britain, and explain why it was initially so unpopular in the North.
• Describe the fierce southern resistance to abolitionism, and explain why southerners increasingly portrayed slavery as a positive good.

Assignments

• Two page response to The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

Resources

• The Frederick Douglass Papers
  From the Library of Congress
• The Spread of Slavery
  Animated map with audio explanations