"Cotton is King"
The South's predominant economic principle before the War of Northern Aggression was "Cotton is King." The South, as it was known around the turn of the 19th century, was solely dependent upon its cotton production. Low prices, unmarketable goods, and over-used land were driving the necessity for slavery and the need for cotton production out. Were it not for a Yankee's ingenuity, the South as we study it now may have been vastly different.
As the South lacked the ability to process raw cotton, they were faced with a nearly insurmountable obstacle. They produced too little cotton to be able to cover the costs of shipping it to a processing plant, most likely in the North or England, their primary consumers. Yielding little return on the high-maintenance King (Queen?) of the South, her cotton production spiraled into decline in the years leading up to the 1800's. However, ironically, a Yankee named Eli Whitney helped the South's dependency on slavery to......
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