Lesson Plans

The American Journey: A History of the United States ©2000

by David Goldfield, Carl Abbott, Virginia DeJohn Anderson, Jo Ann E. Argersinger, Peter H. Argersinger, William L. Barney, Robert M. Weir

Focus Lesson 10

Chapter 13: "Slavery and the Old South, 1800–1860"

AP* Course Description

• Nationalism and Economic Expansion
  • Economic revolution
    • The cotton revolution in the South
    • Commercial agriculture
• Sectionalism
  • The South
    • Cotton Kingdom
    • Southern trade and industry
    • Southern society and culture
      – Gradations of white society
      – Nature of slavery: "peculiar institution"
      – The mind of the South

Key Components

• Instructor's Manual: pp. 87–92
• Study Guide, Vol. I to 1877: pp. 96–103
• Test Item File: pp. 151–162

Key Web Sites

• Documenting the American South: North American Slave Narratives
• Been Here So Long: Selections from the WPA Slave Narratives
• University of Georgia: African Americans in History
• The Museum of African Slavery
• PBS: Africans in America

Key Words and Terms

Suggested Pacing

Test Strategy

Key Concepts

• Defending slavery
  From considering slavery as a necessary evil left over from earlier generations, by the 1830s Southerners began to openly defend the institution. The impetus was Nat Turner's rebellion and the beginning of the abolitionist movement. Southerners spurred by the arguments of their politicians, intellectuals, and evangelical ministers began to claim that slavery was a positive good. They compared it to the factory system of the North in which workers were paid a wage that did not meet their needs and when ill or when bad economic times hit were thrown out of work. Conversely, slaves always had a roof over their heads and food on their tables even when they were too old or too sick to work. Although the majority of Southerners did not own slaves, they, too, took up the defense of slavery. The influence of evangelical ministers was vastly important in this movement to justify slavery.
  
  
• Slave uprisings
  Students should be aware of the forms of resistance that enslaved Africans used against slave owners including working slowly, losing tools, and running away. Students should also know the circumstances of the major rebellions, Nat Turner's rebellion, Gabriel Prosser's rebellion, and Denmark Vesey's conspiracy.
  
  
• Social structure of the South
  Students may find the information on the table describing the structure of the free South, that is, the nonslave-owning population of the South, to be surprising. They may believe that the majority of Southerners were slave owners and many of those of the stature of Tara's owners in Gone with the Wind. This is part of the myth of the antebellum South. In reality, there were hundreds of thousands of small farms whose owners lived at the subsistence level.

Summing Up Student Understanding

• The following activity will help students connect the spread of slavery throughout the South with the region's agricultural development. It will also give them practice in analyzing and drawing conclusions from visuals. Refer students to map 13–1, p. 369, "The Spread of Slavery: New Slave States Entering the Union, 1800–1850." Ask students how many slave states entered the Union after 1800 and where the majority of the states were located. What can they infer from the map concerning cotton production and westward movement?
  
  Next, have students look at Figure 13–1, p. 370, "Slavery and the Old South, 1800–1860." Ask them to analyze the data and draw conclusions about cotton production by 1850. Then, refer students to the map "Cotton and Other Crops in the South, 1860," p. 374, which indicates the diversity of Southern crops. Ask them to compare the Upper South to the Lower South for differences in crops.
  
  Finally, have students read "America's Journey from Then to Now, The Economic Legacy of Slavery," p. 382. Ask students what the key difference was in economic investment between the North and the South prior to the Civil War and have them speculate about how this affected the Southern economy.
  
  
• Another skill students should be practicing during the AP* course is the ability to analyze primary source documents. Have students split into pairs to read and discuss "American Views, A Letter From an Escaped Slave to His Former Master," p. 382. Prior to the activity, review with students the Underground Railroad, the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, and the Border States. Use the questions on p. 382 as a guide for students, but also have them answer the following questions:
  • What is the origin of the letter?
  • Is it a truthful document or is it biased? Why or why not?
  • What is the purpose of the letter?
  Reconvene the class to debrief on the discussions.

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

• American Issues: Vol. I to 1877, edited by Unger and Tomes—Chapter 14
• Constructing the American Past, Vol. I, edited by Gorn, Roberts, and Bilhartz—Chapter 8