Slave rebellions were a serious fear in the South. Many believe that the fear of reprisals is what convinced slave owners to stand firm and demand that the US Constitution allow slavery back in 1789. In fact, the year after it was ratified (1792) all the slaves in Haiti rebelled, tortured, and killed everyone who was white or even 1/8 white. There had been several smaller attempts at slave rebellion in the South as well. Given the choice to keep slavery or to risk being butchered in retaliation, most powerful people in the South chose to keep slavery. John Brown’s raid shocked the people in the North, but in the South, it spread terror.
Read the paragraph above. It explicitly states that the South insisted on maintaining slavery as a choice between keeping slaves or risking being butchered in retaliation and that the South insisted that the new Constitution allow slavery because of fear of rebellion. How else should this paragraph be interpreted other than as an argument that the South maintained slavery mainly because of fear of reprisals. This is demonstrably false. If the South wanted to, they could have sold their slaves to owners of sugar plantations in the Carribean or just sent them back to Africa. They did not do so because they weren’t keeping slaves because they feared reprisal, but because their economy and social structure relied on slavery.
The Southern states didn't have to insist on the US Constitution allowing slavery. At the time the constitution was written All 13 colonies allowed slavery. Slavery died out in the Northern states very slowly mostly because they couldn't grow the labor intensive but highly profitable cash crops slavery was well suited for, and because industrialization was not suited to slavery.
Well I agree with that view, but the issue I took with you was this earlier statement from message 9.
The author seems to be implying that the South would have voluntarily rid itself of slavery except for fear of slave revolts.
I said I did not get that impression at all. I don't know how you read that into what the author said.
Yes, he mentions fear of slave rebellion, but I don't recall him saying *THAT* was the only reason they kept slaves, which is what I think you are implying.
It is unquestionable that they feared slave rebellions, and I believe there were actually a few that happened, but of course they kept slaves for the profit. That's the only reason anyone ever got into that business.
Also, don't forget the fact that the North's economy was making a hell of a lot of income from slavery too, and by that I mean not just the Northern slave states like New Jersey, Delaware, etc, but the North was making a lot of money off of the Southern slaves.
My reading says 60% of the total slave revenue went to the North. 72% of DC's tax income was from Slavery.
People always forget how profitable slavery was for the Northern states. Or maybe they never knew about it.