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I agree. The Industrial Revolution actually facilitated the spread of slavery as the cotton gin and the mechanical reaper allowed planters the opportunity to cultivate more land which increased the volume of cotton produced per square acre. Of course the increased volume required more slaves to warehouse the cotton etc…but in the end, the technology would have made the need to maintain large numbers of slaves counter productive. Slavery would have continued in the form of hand and maidservants for the household, but the need for “gangs” would have ceased all together.
It was a dying institution by the mid-1800 s. Slaves were expensive and required maintainence year round and beyond their working lives. Technology would have eventually phased out the practice. How long that would have taken is anyone’s guess.
H.H. Buggfuzz
I believe that a number of European countries had already begun to outlaw slavery during the early- to mid-Nineteenth Century. So yes, the tide was turning through the world by the time the Civil War broke out in the States.
I think it is important not to underestimate the inertia of society in general. The tendency of most cultures is to distract themselves from the things which are the most important and pertinent to their daily lives and long-term health. Look at ancient Rome: the overwhelming political corruption and what amounted to bribery of the masses with free bread and daily gladitorial combat. In a perfect world, a few influential people with wisdom and foresight could have reversed Rome’s decline and fall. In the real world, people are lazy, and would much rather maintain status quo than make helpful changes, however slight. All this is simply to say that slavery, both in gangs and in smaller home-based settings, probably could have continued in pockets until quite recently, simply through routine, rote, custom and resistance to gradual change. If slaves were never emancipated, and that emancipation not reasonably well enforced, I think it would have taken the US a very long time to completely remove slavery. Interestingly, even a delay of 40 or 50 years would put the civil rights movement smack dab in the present.
Alternate histories are fun aren’t they?
I agree that pockets of slavery would likely have lasted well after 1865 had there been no war. As an institution, Southerners had strong attachments not only to that way of life, but they seem to have been a very “proud” people (still are today). The South Carolina secession document, for example, echoes that sentiment. They would not have wanted others telling them what they could and could not do.
However, the Civil War occurred in the era of the Transportation Revolution, and mechanical engineering was beginning to take flight. Indeed, the world was entering the “Second Phase” of the Industrial Revolution. Slavery, as an institution, would gradually have been needed less.
I do think, however, that the integration of black America into the larger white society would have been stunted, and the whole civil rights movement would have turned out much differently than it actually did.
Yes, alternate history is a blast. And we haven’t even started a thread on what would have happened if England would have surrendered to Germany in WWII. Someone ought to do that. 😛
Donnie, I was reading over an old thread over at americanhistoryforum. One of your posts contains the following in regard to the natural demise of slavery [bold is mine]:
I would say slavery would have been abolished since the vast majority of Southerners did not own slaves, and the trend toward more sexual freedom and other relaxed social taboos, would have made slavery medieval if not archaic.
I’m wondering what exactly you mean by your reference to “sexual freedom” and “social taboos”. Was there such a trend going on around the time of the Civil War? How would this lead to a lessening of slavery’s importance? I’m interested in hearing about this.
Donnie, I was reading over an old thread over at americanhistoryforum. One of your posts contains the following in regard to the natural demise of slavery: “I would say slavery would have been abolished since the vast majority of Southerners did not own slaves, and the trend toward more sexual freedom and other relaxed social taboos, would have made slavery medieval if not archaic.” [bold is mine]I’m wondering what exactly you mean by your reference to “sexual freedom” and “social taboos”. Was there such a trend going on around the time of the Civil War? How would this lead to a lessening of slavery’s importance? I’m interested in hearing about this.
What I was getting at was by the time of the 1920’s when society underwent a sexual revolution and urbanization began to accelerate, I calculated that slavery would have become culturally archaic to the swinging generation. World War I saw the vast incorporation of blacks into the army which further eroded racial barriers albeit in baby steps. Women gaining the right to vote is another factor. I just think slavery would not have been as romanticized by then. It’s really hard to say. It definitely would have been in serious decline in the upper South in states like Kentucky, Missouri, and Tennessee.
