FWIW Here is an interesting review-article that deals with some of the topics that come up in these Civil War arguments:
The quotes about half-way down show how little interest Southern planters had in industrializing. That's not to say that there were no factories in the old South, but the culture didn't encourage it the way it did in the North.
Also, for all the wealth the big planters had, many cotton growers were caught in a cycle of debt. They borrowed to expand operations, got into debt, and then struggled to get out of it. Fluctuating cotton prices and unsafe banks didn't help many cotton growers much.
I can't claim to understand the process, but here's somebody's thesis if any of you are interested.
Failure's Frontier: Ambition, Indebtedness, And Insolvency In Antebellum Alabama by Franklin C. Sammons.
Thanks! I'm probably guilty of accepting on good faith more of our Lost Causers' "quotes" than they deserve.
But some sound so "off" even I can't buy them.
Thanks, I'll try to read it but am put-off by the opening paragraphs suggesting its a big anti-capitalist screed.
Not much interested in that, maybe our Lost Causers would like it?