Cotton gin The invention of the cotton gin by Eli Whitney in 1794 was one of the most effective and important inventions of the Industrial Revolution in the United States. The cotton gin is a machine that removes the seeds from cotton. Before the cotton gin was invented, cotton required manual labor to separate the seed. The invention led to much greater and faster productivity of cotton and also led Southerners to grow more cotton, so the economy of the South grew a lot. The use of the slaves to grow cotton produced tension between the North, where people were anti-slavery, and the South, where people were mostly pro-slavery due to its economic benefits. Without the invention of the cotton gin, the level of slavery might have had to increase further, or Southern economy would have stayed less developed. However, either way, sectional tensions would have increased. If the cotton gin had not been invented, the Southerners would have needed more slaves to do the machine work of the cotton gin. The gin is a mechanical machine …show more content…
So, without the cotton gin, the economy of the South would stay less developed. Even though South could use slaves to do the work the cotton gin did, eventually their manual speed would decrease, as they tired. A machine did not get tired. However, the Southern planters would still have grown cotton, because it was a cash crop. Cotton was used in many states in the United States in variety of different ways. Cotton was used to make clothes, furniture, and etc. Also the cotton seed was used to make oil used in cooking. Many slaves were involved in producing Southern cotton, and their use increased the tensions between North and South. Another big market for Southern cotton was England, which bought a lot of it. Indeed, during the Civil War, the Northern embargo of Southern ports to keep the cotton from going to England was one of the events that helped defeat the