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Dew Vs Thomas Jefferson Slavery

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Debates on abolition existed from 1783 well into the nineteenth century. One of the last influential debates was between Thomas Dew’s opposition to Thomas Jefferson’s view of slavery. Dew and Jefferson both discussed slavery’s economic, moral, and public order in the United States and showed how southerners justified an evil practice. Dew’s distorted view of how the black race could not function without masters shows the southerner’s desperation to defend their practice when confronted with Thomas Jefferson’s true beliefs on the practice. These two politicians provide incite on how the politics in southern government. Thomas Jefferson Believes that slavery was an everlasting practice since humans are prone to imitating the previous generation. This means that slavery was passed down by the elders in southern towns therefore it became a cultural norm. Slavery allowed half of society to revoke the other half’s rights and exploit them for personal gain. The oppressed group lost their amor patriae, or love for their …show more content…

The southern cotton kingdom was equal to the nations railroads, banks and factories in economic profit (313). This created a southern “slaveocracy” which allowed the rich southern planters to dominate the common class (317). The economy of the south depended on slavery since the cotton industry hindered industrial development and technological growth (315). It was true that slaves had better diets and lower mortality rates in American slavery compared to other countries with slavery, but the practice was dwindling worldwide, therefore there were only a few small countries to compare America to (322). Some smaller scale slave owners worked the fields alongside slaves and some had house slaves, but the majority worked in the Deep South on cotton plantations where they knew a slave drivers punishment better than their master’s companionship

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