Slavery's Opponents and Defenders

Guiding Questions What were the leading arguments against slavery in the antebellum era? How did the advocates of American slavery defend the "peculiar institution"?

I. Exposing slavery Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852) Abraham Lincoln He was said to have remarked, "Is this the little woman who made this great war?" Such was the impact Stowe's novel had in exposing the inhumanity of slavery Selling 300,000 copies in its first year of publication the book's popularity in the North revealed the growing sentiment against forcing people to live as chattel human property that could be worked and disposed of practically at will.

II. Slavery’s Defenders Southern justification Social grounds South Carolina Senator John Calhoun in calling it a "positive good." Nat Turner, a well-treated, literate slave who instigated a rebellion in 1831 Resulted in the massacre of nearly sixty white men, women, and children before his capture, and the deaths of almost two hundred blacks at the hands of white mobs.

slavery was indeed the "wolf by the ears," to use Jefferson's expression, that could not be safely let go.

Economic grounds The Southern economy was built on the labor of African American slaves Of the four million slaves working in the South in 1860 About one million worked in homes or in industry, construction, mining, lumbering or transportation The remaining three million worked in agriculture, two million of whom worked in cotton.

“God bless you massa. you feed and clothe us “God bless you massa! you feed and clothe us. When we are sick, you nurse us, and when too old to work, you provide for us!”

Assignment Compare and contrast the life stories of slavery's opponents and defenders by going to the websites link on Mr. Calder’s webpage to obtain information about their lives. A matrix for recording answers to questions about each viewpoint has been provided