Open Wound: The Long View of Race in America

5. The Old South's Triumph

65 Chapter 5 The Old South’s Triumph The War for Independence created the United States. But by 1820 it was apparent that it had actually created the disunited states. A line that two surveyors drew separating Maryland and Pennsylvania, the Mason-Dixon Line, was now looming ever larger as the boundary between two societies. But the Mason-Dixon Line also separated a prosperous South that was enjoying a vigorous resurgence of its plantation export economy of colonial days from a North that, since the Revolution, had been suffering a troubled transition from a colonial economy to a national economy. The South had recovered quickly from the Revolution. The war had resulted in defeats for the Indians and the opening up of vast stretches of the southern backcountry to southern pioneers. Their open-range livestock production was flourishing as never before. In long drives, they delivered thousands of cattle for slaughter in the ports of Charleston and Savannah, and the export of salted or smoked meat and tanned hides greatly expanded. Events in Europe were driving a demand for southern exports. In Great Britain, industry and population were growing rapidly. Also, the British were involved in the wars of the French Revolution and Napoleon. They were supplying both their own wartime needs and the armies of their European allies, eagerly buying southern naval stores, animal products, rice, tobacco, and, especially and increasingly, cotton. Even better, the Southerners were selling to both sides. For shippers, these wars brought high profits but also the risk of having their ships destroyed or confiscated. For Southerners, since the European rivals carried away the exports in their own vessels, the wars were all profit and no risk. Even the Chesapeake South was now prospering. In the 1770s the surplus of slaves had been for Chesapeake planters a liability. But now the economic boom in the Deep South had given rise to a thriving domestic slave trade and spiraling prices. Onetime surpluses had turned into tidy fortunes. To be sure, soil exhaustion had forced many planters and farmers to convert from tobacco to wheat. Yet, with the European wars, never had wheat brought such prices. Even the wheat of central and western Pennsylvania was being marketed, not in Philadelphia, but in the more convenient Chesapeake port of Baltimore. The North’s Slow Recovery The adjustment of the North to independence, on the other hand, was slow and painful.1 It was not easy for northern shippers and exporters to reenter the British-controlled Atlantic commerce. While the British eagerly bought southern commodities, they now favored their still loyal colonies in Canada for their lumber and salt cod. The British also regarded northern shipbuilders and shippers as competition to their own industries, and these were not welcomed back into the British commercial network. Indeed, Americans were largely excluded from the lucrative imperial carrying trade, and they were charged discriminatory duties in the many Atlantic ports the British controlled. The tiny navy of the young republic could offer little protection to American ships from seizure either by the British or their European rivals or by pirates.2 The difficulties of independence were giving rise to a new northern economy , but slowly. With the languishing of the Atlantic-oriented businesses of colonial days, some northern investors began to transfer their capital to textile manufacturing and other enterprises, which, because they produced for the home market, could operate independently of the British imperial economy.3 But the road to economic independence was difficult. The home market was restricted by a primitive transportation system. American manufacturers did not have technical experts comparable to those in Britain.4 Also, only in New 66 part 2: the antebellum republic England was there a labor surplus sufficient to stimulate industrialization since elsewhere, land was cheap and the labor force was busy on family farms. At times, during the wars of the French Revolution, the British needed American shippers and relaxed their restrictions. A precarious war boom came to the northern ports. But in 1805, the British, after their great naval victory at Trafalgar, once again tightened their restraints. Britain now “ruled the waves.” And its government did so in ways that threatened not only the North’s maritime prosperity but the nation’s sovereignty as well.5 From the earliest days of the republic, southern leaders turned their strong economic position to political advantage. One issue was the location of the nation...