Slavery: Evil of Positive Good? In the years between 1830 and 1860 slavery became a common subject of the moral debate in the United States. The Second Great Awakening of the late 1700s exploded with a need to reform in American civilization. Christians were trying to rid society of the new American ideals based on a market economy. The revival of religion inspired people to analyze the greedy new ways and thoughts Americans were adopting. People began to criticize wrong-doings in the public and strive for change. Many wanted to return to the old Puritan dream of a perfect society. One of the changes they hoped to make was to become that “city on a hill” and eliminate the evil sin of slavery from the South. The Southerners, on the
It was almost impossible to reach. They would be a slave as long as they lived, and even after they died, their children, grandchildren, and so on would continue to live in slavery. The South also argued that the success of southern economy was impossible without slavery. [Doc. B] The Southern market was primarily based on the production of cotton. In fact, slavery was decreasing in America until Eli Whitney’s invention of the cotton gin in 1793. With this new invention, slavery became extremely profitable to the southern plantation owner. In the short time between 1793 and 1840 cotton became half of the income of all American exports. It was an enormous asset to the entire country, including Northern shippers and manufacturers. The only way to sustain this type of profit was for slavery to produce the labor. Although cotton produced a tempting income, some like Hinton helper said that basing an entire economy on one product was very dangerous and should be quickly changed. [Doc. E] The problem was that cotton’s price was based on world conditions, which changed constantly. In other words, a one-crop economy based on cotton was unstable. If cotton suddenly lost its popularity in Europe, the south would be left with a growing supply of cotton and debts, and the north would suffer soon thereafter. Hinton