Deck 11: Cotton, Slavery, and the Old South

Question 1

Prior to 1860,the center of economic power in the South

A)was in Charleston,South Carolina.
B)remained as it had been primarily within the upper South.
C)remained as it had been primarily within the lower South.
D)shifted from the lower South to the upper South.
E)shifted from the upper South to the lower South.

Answer 1

shifted from the upper South to the lower South.

Question 2

Southern whites who did not own slaves

A)rarely married into the families living on large slave plantations.
B)openly opposed the planter elite.
C)were forced to move west to maintain a livelihood.
D)generally opposed the institution of slavery.
E)were largely dependent on the plantation economy.

Answer 2

were largely dependent on the plantation economy.

Question 3

Short-staple cotton

A)helped to keep the South a predominantly agricultural region.
B)was less coarse than long-staple cotton.
C)was easier to process than long-staple cotton.
D)was more susceptible to disease than long-staple cotton.
E)was only grown in the coastal regions of the upper South.

Answer 3

helped to keep the South a predominantly agricultural region.

Question 4

Prior to 1860,southern white women

A)had about the same access to education as northern white women.
B)were not expected to engage in manual labor,whatever their social standing.
C)generally lived lives that were isolated from the wider world.
D)had a birth rate that was lower than the national average.
E)were more likely to see their children grow to adulthood than northern white women.

Question 5

Prior to 1860,southern women differed from northern women in that southern women

A)tended to have more formal education.
B)were expected to be more subordinate to men.
C)had fewer children.
D)generally had a lesser engagement in the economic life of the family.
E)were more likely to take a role in public activities.

Question 6

In the late 1850s,many of the great landholders of the lower South were

A)still first-generation settlers.
B)part of a wealthy leisure class.
C)from longstanding aristocratic families.
D)rooted to one plantation for many generations.
E)former Old World aristocrats that emigrated from Europe.

Question 7

The South failed to develop a large industrial economy due to all of the following factors EXCEPT

A)the humid climate.
B)little access to liquid capital.
C)the profitability of cotton.
D)the cultural values.
E)a shortage of labor.

Question 8

By 1860,the textile manufacturing sector of the American South

A)was nonexistent.
B)had increased threefold in value over the previous twenty years.
C)had declined in value throughout the 1840s and 1850s.
D)was equal to one-third of the value of cotton exported that year.
E)had come to dominate the South's economy.

Question 9

Which of the following statements about the southern aristocratic ideal is FALSE?

A)Wealthy southern whites adopted an elaborate code of "chivalry."
B)Dueling became a prominent facet of southern planter life.
C)Wealthy southern whites prided themselves on their egalitarianism.
D)Wealthy southern whites pretended to avoid such "coarse" occupations as trade and commerce.
E)Wealthy southern whites often gravitated toward the military.

Question 10

Southern white lower-class resentment of the aristocratic system was most likely to be found in

A)the cities.
B)river and ocean port towns.
C)the upper South.
D)the mountain regions.
E)the Deep South.

Question 11

A typical white southerner

A)grew cotton and other crops for market.
B)was a subsistence farmer.
C)was passionately antislavery.
D)depended on subsistence farming despite attaining a high level of education.
E)worked on a large plantation alongside slaves.

Question 12

Most white southerners owned

A)no slaves.
B)one slave.
C)two slaves.
D)three to five slaves.
E)six to ten slaves.

Question 13

Rice and sugar production in the antebellum South

A)had short growing seasons.
B)were concentrated in a relatively small geographic area.
C)had difficulty sustaining profits for growers.
D)was in considerable decline by the 1850s.
E)threatened to overwhelm cotton production in the lower South.

Question 14

During the first half of the nineteenth century,the "cotton kingdom"

A)was already losing ground to other staples,such as rice and tobacco.
B)saw wealthy planters outnumber small planters.
C)did not rely on large numbers of slaves imported directly from Africa.
D)was the dominant source of the income of the lower South.
E)still had not adopted the cotton gin,despite the time and resources it saved.

Question 15

Prior to 1860,affluent southern white women

A)had created the most significant challenge to slavery in the South.
B)occupied a significantly different role from their northern counterparts.
C)commonly held income-producing jobs.
D)typically played an important role in public activities.
E)centered their lives in the home.

Question 16

Sexual relationships between white southern men and female slaves was

A)virtually unheard of.
B)against the law in all slave states.
C)encouraged by proponents of slavery such as George Fitzhugh.
D)an accepted cause for divorce in the southern court system.
E)a common practice.

Question 17

The historian who wrote "The South grew,but did not develop" prior to the Civil War meant

A)the southern population increased but new technology had bypassed the region.
B)agriculture remained the leading industry of the South,but the plantation system was declining.
C)the South had failed to move from an agrarian to an industrial economy.
D)the South had expanded as a geographic region but had developed little prosperity.
E)the South had created a prosperous plantation system but had not expanded its borders.

Question 18

Between 1840 and 1860,the American South's slave population

A)could not meet labor needs.
B)changed little.
C)moved from the upper South to the cotton states.
D)declined in overall numbers.
E)moved from the cotton states to the upper South.

Question 19

By the time of the Civil War,cotton constituted nearly ________ of the total export trade of the United States.

A)one-fourth
B)one-tenth
C)one-third
D)half
E)two-thirds

Question 20

Tobacco cultivation in the antebellum South

A)was easy on the soil.
B)was gradually moving westward.
C)enjoyed a stable market.
D)was centered in the lower South.
E)never made a profit.

Question 21

Perhaps the single strongest unifying factor of pre-Civil War southern whites was their

A)kinship relationships.
B)contempt of northern capitalism.
C)perception of white racial superiority.
D)fear of federal authority.
E)intense national pride.

Question 22

Which of the following statements regarding slave life is true?

A)Slaves had to grow all of their own food.
B)Slaves were not given medical care except by their own efforts.
C)Slave children did no work until they turned twelve years old.
D)It was uncommon to divide slave families for long periods of time.
E)Slave mothers had large families,but death rates among black children were high.

Question 23

One actual slave revolt in the nineteenth-century South was led by

A)Nat Turner.
B)Denmark Vesey.
C)Gabriel Prosser.
D)Frederick Douglass.
E)Harriet Tubman.

Question 24

The conditions of a slave's life

A)depended in part on the size of the plantation.
B)were generally the same throughout the slave states.
C)were explicitly determined by the slave codes.
D)were defined by the largest plantation owner within a region.
E)were generally more restricted in large cities.

Question 25

Religious services for American slaves

A)were not allowed,by law,to mention freedom.
B)were often more emotional than white services.
C)were generally more despondent and melancholy than white services.
D)denied all references to their African heritage.
E)emphasized subservience and submission to God.

Question 26

Which of the following statements regarding urban slavery is FALSE?

A)Some urban slaves were skilled trade workers.
B)Urban slaves were prohibited from having contact with free blacks.
C)Urban slaves were less supervised than rural slaves.
D)Urban slaves had little working competition from European immigrants.
E)The line between slavery and freedom in cities was less distinct.

Question 27

The "peculiar institution" was a southern reference to

A)the plantation.
B)manufacturing.
C)capitalism.
D)slavery.
E)democracy.

Question 28

The slave codes of the American South

A)defined anyone with a trace of African ancestry as black.
B)legalized slave marriages.
C)were rigidly enforced.
D)considered it a crime for an owner to kill a slave.
E)banned blacks from attending church.

Question 29

The name given to the effort by whites and blacks to help runaway slaves escape was

A)the Frederick Douglass road.
B)the underground railroad.
C)the Fugitive Slave Act.
D)Cumberland passage.
E)Second Middle Passage.

Question 30

Regarding religion,American slaves

A)were expected to worship in black churches separate from whites.
B)had mostly converted to Islam by the early nineteenth century.
C)were usually not allowed to attend a church at all.
D)shunned Christianity in favor of the polytheistic traditions of Africa.
E)often incorporated African features into their Christianity.

Question 31

In 1839,53 Cuban slaves took control of the ship Amistad; after being captured by a United States Revenue Service ship,most of the slaves were

A)returned to Cuba under order of the United States Supreme Court.
B)enslaved in the United States.
C)returned to Africa with funding from American abolitionists.
D)allowed to enter the United States as free men,pursuant to a ruling of the United States Supreme Court.
E)killed upon capture.

Question 32

Most enslaved blacks lived

A)on small farms.
B)on medium- to large-size plantations.
C)in urban areas.
D)in rigidly controlled circumstances.
E)in Virginia and the Carolinas.

Question 33

Of the following,the most common form of resistance to slavery was

A)group rebellions.
B)arson.
C)running away.
D)subtle defiance.
E)poisoning.

Question 34

Which of the following statements about the poorest class of white southerners is FALSE?

A)They often felt affinity with slaves as members of another oppressed class.
B)They were known variously as "crackers" or "sand hillers."
C)They supported themselves by foraging or hunting.
D)They suffered from pellagra,hookworm,and malaria.
E)They were forced to resort at times to eating clay.

Question 35

In general,slaves had more privacy and a social realm of their own

A)on large plantations.
B)on small plantations.
C)as household workers as opposed to field workers.
D)in rural areas as opposed to urban areas.
E)in the western territories.

Question 36

Within the American South,the institution of slavery

A)isolated blacks and whites from each other.
B)created a unique bond between masters and slaves.
C)encouraged blacks to develop a society and culture of their own.
D)created a unique bond between masters and slaves,while isolating blacks and whites from each other and encouraging blacks to develop a society and culture of their own.
E)None of these answers is correct.

Question 37

Prior to 1860,free blacks in the South

A)were concentrated in the Deep South.
B)were required by law to leave the South.
C)increased in number in the 1850s as laws encouraged owners to free "surplus" slaves.
D)occasionally attained wealth and prominence and owned slaves themselves.
E)avoided urban centers such as New Orleans or Natchez where they might attract attention.

Question 38

A runaway slave making a successful escape from the American South was

A)highly likely.
B)likely.
C)unlikely.
D)highly unlikely.
E)impossible.

Question 39

To "manumit" means to

A)purchase.
B)punish.
C)work by hand.
D)deny.
E)set free.

Question 40

In 1850,outside of the United States,slavery in the Western Hemisphere existed in

A)Colombia.
B)Brazil.
C)the Virgin Islands.
D)Haiti.
E)no other country.

Question 41

Prior to 1860,southern aristocratic ideals were largely myths.

Question 42

The southern planter class was quite similar to the landed aristocracies of Europe.

Question 43

Southern women generally had final authority on issues related to the home and children.

Question 44

In the South,small farmers,often as much as great planters,were committed to the plantation system.

Question 45

James De Bow argued that the South should pursue agricultural development,while relying on the North for industrial goods and capital.

Question 46

The South had an inadequate transportation system and only a rudimentary financial system as late as the middle of the nineteenth century.

Question 47

Southern white women had less access to education than their northern counterparts.

Question 48

In the South,the most significant opposition to the slave system came from the poorest of southern whites.

Question 49

Which of the following is true of American slave families in the antebellum South?

A)A child of a slave could not be sold after he or she had reached three years of age.
B)Blacks typically had weaker family ties than did whites,due to the uncertainties of their lives.
C)Up to one-third of families were broken apart by the sale of family members.
D)Most slaves who ran away did so to avoid punishment.
E)Newly arrived slaves to a plantation were often shunned by the black community.

Question 50

In the American slave family,

A)most couples did not formally marry.
B)the women typically began bearing children later than white women.
C)premarital pregnancy was uncommon.
D)extended kinship networks were strong and important.
E)premarital cohabitation was frowned upon.

Question 51

During the first half of the nineteenth century,the South underwent a much less fundamental transformation than did the North.

Question 52

Ways in which slaves expressed elements of their African heritage included

A)singing songs and playing musical instruments such as the banjo.
B)keeping family diaries and other written personal records.
C)wearing clothing that incorporated traditional African designs or colors.
D)speaking in their native African languages when out of the presence of whites.
E)celebrating traditional African feasts and rites of passage,in defiance of white law.

Question 53

The slave system may have created separate spheres for blacks and whites,but each race was nonetheless dependent on the other.

Question 54

Approximately one-third of southern whites owned slaves.

Question 55

The central ideology of slavery,and the vital instrument of white control,was

A)fraternity.
B)maternalism.
C)paternalism.
D)sorority.
E)egalitarianism.

Question 56

During the first half of the nineteenth century,the center of economic power in the South shifted from the upper South to the lower South.

Question 57

The mountain regions were the only parts of the South to resist the movement toward secession when it finally developed.

Question 58

The North,unlike the South,experienced great economic growth in the mid-nineteenth century.

Question 59

By the mid-nineteenth century,slavery in the Western world existed only in the American South.

Question 60

The southern planter class exercised power far in excess of its numbers.

Question 61

Most enslaved black couples married with formal wedding vows.

Question 62

The typical white southerners who were not great planters or slave-owners were known as "________."

Question 63

In southern cities,slave tasks might include mining,lumbering,blacksmith,or carpentry.

Question 64

For the most part,slaves rejected Christianity.

Question 65

Shipboard slave revolts like the one on the Amistad became increasingly common throughout the 1850s.

Question 66

Slave spirituals were written down and passed on to generations of African Americans.

Question 67

Most often,resistance to slavery took the form of open rebellion.

Question 68

Evidence suggests that slaves preferred to live on smaller,rather than larger,plantations.

Question 69

Household servants were often the first to leave plantations of their former owners when emancipation came after the Civil War.

Question 70

The most important new product in the South during the mid-nineteenth century was ________ cotton.

Question 71

It was common for slaves to hold an entirely hostile attitude toward their owners.

Question 72

It was said that the South "grew,but it did not ________."

Question 73

Within the slave family,women had special burdens but also a special authority.

Question 74

The domestic slave trade was essential to the growth and prosperity of the slave system.

Question 75

From the 1830s on,state laws governing slavery became gradually less rigid.

Question 76

On the eve of the Civil War,________ was the major means of transportation in the South.

Question 77

The banjo became an important instrument in slave music.

Question 78

To the degree that the South developed a nonfarm commercial sector,it was largely to serve the needs of the ________.

Question 79

Slaves were expected by their owners to attend church.

Question 80

Slave codes prevented slaves from owning property,but they encouraged slaves to marry.