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Line 41: − THOSE NIGGERS WERE OURS AND THOSE COMMIES HAD NO RIGHT. THE SOUTH SHALL RISE AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1[http://thedailyvoice.com/voice/images/robert_downey-tt.jpg]+ + + + + + + + + +
→Slavery: in reverting vandalism some legitimate parts were removed, one obviously sick piece of vandalism remained.
===[[Slavery]]===
===[[Slavery]]===
[[Image:Whippedslave.JPG|thumb|150px|right|Unknown slave prior to 1860, showing the scars of one, or more, brutal whippings.]]
Before the Civil War, the individual states, particularly in the South, shared a belief that each state was sovereign. Sovereignty included jurisdiction over, and the handling of, each state's affairs, which invariably included their own public and private institutions.
The peculiar institution cited more often than anything else in defending states' rights was slavery. Africans had been present as slaves in the American colonies since the early 17th century; over the years the South began to rationalize it less as an evil and more of an economic necessity; so ingrained into the fabric of society had slavery become that Vice President John C. Calhoun was to say in 1838:
{{cquote|'''Many in the South once believed that slavery was a moral and political evil. That folly and delusion are gone. We see it now in its true light, and regard it as the most safe and stable basis for free institutions in the world.''' (TL 1, pg 40)}}
Slaves for the most part were treated brutally. Born in bondage, a slave usually began his first work in the fields at the age of twelve. They would work in the fields from the light of day until, in the words of a Louisiana slave, "until it is too dark to see, and when the moon is full, they often labor until the middle of the night" (TL, pg 48). They were fed and clothed poorly, usually in rags; shoes were uncommon. Disease was rampant; only four out of 100 lived past age 60. Absolute subservience to whites was enforced. Punishment for infractions was severe, involving stocks, pronged neck collars, and whippings where salt water was used to clear infection, with the resulting pain so excruciating a slave recollecting it wrote "the flesh crawls upon my bones" (TL 1, pp 49-58)
[[Eli Whitney]] patented the cotton gin in 1793. Prior to that, slaves were harvesting cotton, pulling the seed from the boll, and packing it by hand for market at a rate of 100 bales a week. The gin did the hard work of separating the boll, enabling bales of cotton at a rate of over 1000 a week, often more. The result was the number of annual cotton harvests increased to three, which saw a concurrent rise in profits made by plantation owners; the number of slaves needed for the fields and other tasks increased as well, climbing from 300,000 in 1790 to over three million by 1860.
===Political machinations and compromises===
===Political machinations and compromises===