Chapter XVI: The South and the Slavery Controversy

REVISED

  1. Why did many Southerners believe that "Cotton was King"? Why did they err in their projections of economic power?
  2. Describe the Social Pyramid of the South in 1850. What were the chief differences form the social structure found in the Northeast?
  3. How did the distribution pattern of slaves in the South compare with the center of cotton production in 1820? In 1860?
  4. Describe the situation of the Free Blacks in the South. How did it contrast with the lives of the Free Black in the North?
  5. If you were a slave on a plantation in the South, What kind of Plantation would you hope it to be? Why? What sorts of conditions did slave families especially dread in their lives?
  6. On a plantation, what sort of social structure existed within the slave community? How did most slaves respond to the institution of slavery? Who were the exceptions and why did they behave as they did?
  7. If you had decided to become a fugitive slave, why would you have found your efforts to escapes to freedom to be enormously difficult? What happened to most of the fugitives? Why?
  8. What was William Lloyd Garrison's opinion about slavery? Who agreed with him and who disagreed?
  9. Explain the difference between a radical abolitionist and a gradualist? Which type of reformer had a greater chance of achieving their goal? Why?
  10. Why was Frederick Douglass such an exceptional abolitionist? How was his life complicated by his early background?
  11. Give three Southern defenses of the Peculiar institution? Incidentally, why did the Southern refer to slavery as the Peculiar institution anyhow?
  12. Create a bar graph, which portrays northern opinions on slavery in 1850. Include the following groups of people in your chart: Radical Abolitionists, Moderate Abolitionists, Free Soiler, Neutral, indifferent, Pro-slaveries.
  13. Identify:
    • Gag Resolution
    • Nat Turner
    • Gabriel Prosser
    • Denmark Vessey
    • Liberia
    • Wendell Phillips
    • Kenneth Stampp
    • Dixie
    • American colonization Society
    • "Sold down the river"
    • "Poor White trash"
    • Liberty Party
    • Underground Railroad
    • Harriet Tubman
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