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The institution of slavery has been a part of human history for thousands of years. That Europeans imported it to the New World in both South and North America is not surprising; that the institution lasted so long in the southern United States is. While governments abolished or abandoned slavery through much of the world, humans, exclusively Africans, were kept in bondage in one of the world’s great democracies. This institution was eventually a cause of a great civil war breaking out in 1861. By this point, the system had been in place for more than two hundred years and was the natural state of affairs for Southerners. In the face of increasing criticism from abolitionists, Southerners vehemently provided three main justifications for holding slaves: slavery was necessary to improve the American economy; they were, in fact, protecting Africans from lives of misery; and, finally, slavery was simply natural.
The first point only has some basis in fact since the South did provide great financial windfalls with its agricultural produce, the cash crops of cotton, tobacco, and rice, all of which flourished in the hot, muggy climate of the South. Slave owners asserted that these crops were a great benefit to the American economy and the slaves were needed to work the land. Northerners countered that free men working for wages would do just as well. As far as the Southerners were concerned, the so-called free men of the North were also nothing more than slaves, slaves to the necessity of earning a wage or being homeless and starving to death. In fact, the northern industrial centers produced far more income for the country than the mainly agricultural South. The North also had great agricultural lands, which were not worked by slaves, but by free landowners.
The second point was one made time and again by Southerners. Slaves were dependent on their masters for food, clothing, and shelter, which the master provided in return for their labor. This reciprocal relationship ensured that all would have a means of survival. If slavery was abandoned, then all the slaves, some four million by the 1860s, would be at the mercy of the cruel fates of life. A Slavery was good for the African blacks because the masters cared for them from cradle to grave. B In fact, when Northern soldiers invaded the South during the Civil War, they discovered that most Africans were kept in the meanest conditions possible, living in hovels and wearing threadbare clothing. C Economically, the slaves were more of a drain than wage earners would have been since the master was obliged to care for the nonproductive Africans, which included the young, aged, and infirm. D
Finally, the slave owners justified slavery by saying it was the natural order of events and that the Africans’ place in the world was as a slave. For thousands of years, with few exceptions, who was or was not a slave had not depended on race but on the misfortune of the individual. In ancient Greece and Rome, anyone could become a slave in the right circumstances. This bothered philosophers for ages, being unable to explain why one man should be a slave and another a master. In the Africans, Southerners found a reason: race. By nature, according to the pseudo-science of racial classification, Africans were deemed inferior, unintelligent, and unable to care for themselves, and they therefore needed the white race’s help.
Of course, all this was nonsense, as proven by the great number of free Africans living in the North, many well-educated and well-off in the hustle and bustle of the world Southerners tried to save them from. Many Southerners knew it was nonsense, but their whole world depended on the institution. It is estimated that fewer than 10,000 Southerners actually owned slaves in the pre-Civil War period. They were the richest and most politically powerful, and, when the time came to defend their rights against the North, they dragged the rest of the South into a war that lasted four long years and killed more Americans than all of its other wars combined. Eventually, the slaves were free, but, for the Africans, it would take another hundred years for them to be the equals of the whites in not only the South but all of America.
windfalls: amounts of money that someone receives unexpectedly
1. According to paragraph 2, the South provided some benefits to the United States’ economy through
A its industrial output of manufactured goods
B agricultural products grown by free land owners
C its providing protection for millions of Africans
D high income earning crops grown with slave labor
2. It can be inferred from paragraph 2 that the South
A had absolutely no centers of industrial manufacturing in its states
B was equal to the North in terms of the industrial output of its factories
C had some centers of industry, but fewer than there were in the North
D had an economy that was totally based on agricultural exporting
3. The word reciprocal in the passage is closest in meaning to
A common
B mutual
C unequal
D beneficial
4. According to paragraph 3, slavery was economically worse than employing free wage earners because
A the wage earners had to pay for their own food and housing
B the wage earners worked harder and longer than the slaves
C slaves had no incentive to work hard or to help their masters
D masters had to care for their slaves even if they could not work
5. Look at the four squares [■] that indicate where the following sentence could be added to the passage.
In addition, many slaves were abused, tortured, or murdered, and plantation owners kept large packs of bloodhounds for chasing runaway slaves.
Where would the sentence best fit?
Click on a square [■] to add the sentence to the passage.
6. The author describes the condition in which the Northern soldiers found the Southern slaves in paragraph 3 in order to
A indicate that many slave owners were not terribly concerned with their slaves’ welfare
B show that slavery was an evil institution that had to be ended by any possible means
C relate the economic backwardness of the South, which could not take good care of its slaves
D explain that the war had destroyed the Southern economy and their ability to care for their slaves
7. Which of the sentences below best expresses the essential information in the highlighted sentence in the passage? Incorrect answer choices change the meaning in important ways or leave out essential information.
A Free Africans in the North did not fare as well as free whites, thereby proving the Southerners’ ideas true.
B Free Africans in the North proved the Southerners’ ideas false by being both learned and successful.
C Only in the North could Africans get an education and be saved from the Southerners.
D The Southerners believed that no African could become educated or achieve any status except that of a slave.
8. According to the passage, Southerners justified having slaves for all of the following reasons EXCEPT:
A They did not have anyone else to work the land.
B They provided welfare for the enslaved Africans.
C Slavery was the way that things were supposed to be.
D The United States’ economy benefited from slavery.
9. According to paragraph 5, in the American Civil War, the number of the dead was
A very few compared to other American wars
B the greatest ever experienced in American history
C equal to all of the other wars of American history
D greater than all of the wars of history combined32113.png
10. Directions: An introductory sentence for a brief summary of the passage is provided below. Complete the summary by selecting the THREE answer choices that express the most important ideas in the passage. Some answer choices do not belong in the summary because they express ideas that are not presented in the passage or are minor ideas in the passage. This question is worth 2 points.
The South’s justifications for slavery as a benefit to the American economy, as a protection for millions of Africans, and as the natural order of things, have many contradictions when examined closely.
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A African slaves were supposedly protected by their masters but were in fact often kept in miserable conditions and were often punished.
B The Civil War was mainly caused by the powerful slave-owning class, who refused to give up their way of life.
C Despite having some benefits to the American economy, the institution of slavery was unsound economically when compared with the labor of free wage earners and farmers.
D Although they were freed by the Civil War, the former slaves and their descendants had to wage a hundred-year battle to earn their rights as equals in America.
E Slavery as an institution had disappeared in much of the world by 1861, but, in the American South, it was still deemed necessary for mainly economic reasons.
F Some former slaves in the North proved their equality with whites by acquiring education and success in many different fields.
Drag your answer choices to the spaces where they belong.
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