The SOCIETY OF THE SOUTH in the Early Republic [APUSH Review Unit 4 Topic 13] Period 4: 1800-1848

The video introduces the topic of Southern culture in the Early Republic, focusing on the period between 1800 and 1848.

Despite common perceptions, most white farmers in the South were yeoman farmers who did not own enslaved laborers. While generally supporting slavery, some, particularly on the western frontier, advocated for its gradual abolition due to its economic disadvantages to them. However, their influence was limited by the dominance of cotton in the Southern economy.

The global movement to abolish slavery, notably Britain's emancipation in 1834, spurred the American abolitionist movement and made Southern plantation owners uneasy. Despite this, the elite strategically unified the larger white population to preserve slavery.

Planters consolidated their power through the Three-Fifths Compromise, which gave slaveholding states disproportionate political influence. They also created economic dependencies by offering loans, employing poor whites, and transporting yeoman farmers' crops to market, making white society reliant on the planter class.

From the 1830s, white planters actively promoted white supremacy to unite all white social classes. Thinkers like Thomas Dew argued for the 'positive good' of slavery, a stark contrast to the ambivalence of earlier figures like Washington and Jefferson.

John C. Calhoun, a prominent South Carolina figure and Vice President, articulated a strong defense of slavery. He argued that it was a 'positive good,' essential for a wealthy and civilized society, and the 'most solid and durable foundation' for political institutions in the South, based on the supposed mastery of the white race over the black race.

Calhoun’s ideology, justifying slavery on both economic and moral grounds, solidified the planter elite's bonds with lower white classes and established a firm stronghold on Southern culture.