The Interest In Slavery Of The Southern Non-Slaveholder

[hellboy30]

I am currently reading Stephanie McCurry's "Confederate Reckoning: Power and Politics in the Civil War South", & it is a fantastic book so far. One of the more fascinating things I came across was the early chapter on secession. Now secession was NOT a foregone conclusion as some would have you believe. In fact, the one's who wanted it the most (the wealthy slaveowners) had to come up with some good reasons to convince the non-slaveholders to join their "side" of things. To that end, the Fireeaters came up with a propaganda machine that would make some of the recent election stuff that was continously pumped out on the TV & the Internet look tame. These Fireeaters formed a group called "1860 Association" that sought to unify the public opinion on secession. To that end, they produced a series of pamplets or tracts on the subject. They distributed over 166,000 pamplets in the Fall of 1860-which in those times was quite a bit. One of those tracts, number 5, was called "The Interest In Slavery Of The Southern Non-Slaveholder" by J.D.B Debow. Here is a link to the entire tract:
http://www26.us.archive.org/stream/i...2debo_djvu.txt

What I find REALLY interesting is the first part of it. Time & time again, we hear the argument that the number of slave owners in the South was tiny.....only 8% (sometimes that number will keep going down in debates & other posted places). Therefore we get the inevitable "See, the war had nothing to do with slavery as 92% of Southerns didn't even own a slave" argument. Yet that ignores the fact that you must include the entire family & those in direct connection with it. Those numbers shoot up. And yet, they continue to go back to those numbers. The problem is, that wasn't the gist of the argument in 1860. In 1860, the Fireeaters & secessionists were trying to convince all the non-slaveholders that they needed to side with them to leave the Union. They needed to play the "see, we are all in the same boat" card & this tract does a fantastic job of it. These same arguments can used by modern day Historians to pin those "it wasn't about slavery" folks to the floor. Take a look at this portion of it:

Nashville, Dec. 5, 1660.

My dear Sir: — Whilst in Charleston recently, I adverted, in
conversation with you, to some considerations affecting the ques-
tion of slavery in its application to the several classes of popula-
tion at the South and especially to the non-slaveholding class,
who, I maintained, were even more deeply interested than any
other in the maintainance of our institutions, and in the success
of the movement now inaugurated, for the entire social, industrial
and political independence of the South. At your request, I
promised to elaborate and commit to writing the points of that
conversation, which I now proceed to do, in the hope that I may
thus be enabled to give some feeble aid to a cause which is worthy
of the Sydneys, Hampdens and Patrick Henrys, of earlier times.

When in charge of the national census office, several years
since, I found that it had been stated by an abolition Senator
from his seat, that the number of slaveholders at the South did
not exceed 150,000. Convinced that it was a gross misrepresen-
tation of the facts, I caused a careful examination of the returns
to be made, which fixed the actual number at 347,255, and com-
municated the information, by note, to Senator Cass, who read it
in the Senate. I first called attention to the fact that the number
embraced slaveholdinor families, and that to arrive at the actual
number of slaveholders, it would be necessary to multiply by the
proportion of persons, which the census showed to a family.
When this was done, the number was swelled to about 2,000,000.

Since these results were made public, I have had reason to
think, that the separation of the schedules of the slave and the free,
was calculated to lead to omissions of the single properties, and
that on this account it would be safe to put the number of families
at 375,000, and the number of actual slaveholders at about two
million and a quarter. «

Assuming the published returns, however, to be correct, it will
appear that one-half of the population of South Carolina, Mississippi,
and Louisiana, excluding the cities, are slaveholders, and that



one-third of the population of the entire South are similarly cir-
cumstanced. The average number of slaves is nine to each
slave-holding family, and one-half of the whole number of such
holders are in possession of less than five slaves.

It will thus appear that the slaveholders of the South, so far
from constituting numerically an insignificant portion of its peo-
ple, as has been malignantly alleged, make up an aggregate,
greater in relative proportion than the holders of any other spe-
cies of property whatever, ; n any part of the world; and that of no
other property can it be said, with equal truthfulnes, that it is
an interest of the whole community. Whilst every ot^ier family
in the States I have specialb^referred to, are slaveholders, but
one family in every three a™ a half families in Maine, New
Hampshire, Massachusetts and Connecticut, are holders of agri-
cultural land ; and, in European States, the proportion is almost
indefinitely less. The proportion which the slaveholders of the
South, bear to the entire population is greater than that of the
owners of land or houses, agricultural stock, State, bank, or other
corporation securities anywhere else. No political economist
will deny this. Nor is that all. Even in the States which are
among the largest slaveholding, South Carolina, Georgia and
Tennessee, the land proprietors outnumber nearly two to one, in
relative proportion, the owners of the same property in Maine,
Massachusetts and Connecticut, and if the average number of
slaves held by each family throughout the South be but nine,
and if one-half of the whole number of slaveholders own under
five slaves, it will be seen how preposterous is the allegation of
our enemies, that the slaveholding class is an organized wealthy
aristocracy. The poor men of the South are the holders of one to
Jive slaves, and it would be equally consistent with truth and jus-
tice, to say that they represent, in reality, its slaveholding interest.

The fact being conceded that there is a very large class of per-
sons in the slaveholding States, who have no direct ownership in
slaves; it may be well asked, upon what principle a greater
antagonism can be presumed between them and their fellow-
citizens, than exists among the larger class of non-landholders
in the free States and the landed interest there ? If a conflict
of interest exists in one instance, it does in the other, and if
patriotism and public spirit are to be measured upon so low a
standard, the social fabric at the North is in far greater danger
of dissolution than it is here.

I highly recommend reading the entire thing as it is very enlightening.

[B7B Southern]

She appears to be well educated in History.

http://www.history.upenn.edu/faculty/mccurry.shtml

[Nickuru]

Nice read Hellboy, I won't lack for reading materials visiting this site.

[Savez]

Originally Posted by B7B Southern

She appears to be well educated in History.

I feel like I could study the average 19th century New Yorker or the average 19th century midwestern farmer for years and years but I don't think I could really ever understand what those people were really like because I'm a southerner from the deep South. I've never understood how these people become "experts" on something they'll never really understand.

[B7B Southern]

Originally Posted by Savez

I feel like I could study the average 19th century New Yorker or the average 19th century midwestern farmer for years and years but I don't think I could really ever understand what those people were really like because I'm a southerner from the deep South. I've never understood how these people become "experts" on something they'll never really understand.

Savez, I understand what you are saying because my home
is in the Shenandoah Valley. But I find in order to expand
books have to be gaged against each other and talked about.
Look at the thread about 'worst books' and note that folks
read them and gages them against historical facts to make them draw a conclusion.

Marshall