The Chapter Introduction Tells the Stories of Several Southerners-Colonel Daniel

The chapter introduction tells the stories of several southerners-Colonel Daniel Jordan; a nameless Texan; Sam Williams and his wife Nancy; Octave Johnson; and Ferdinand Steel-to make the point that

A) the antebellum South was marked by great diversity, but at its core it was unified by its slave-based agricultural economy.
B) the antebellum South had the reputation for being unified in its views of slavery, but actually only a few in the South actively supported the slave-based agricultural economy.
C) the South was unique among the sections of the U.S. because of racist attitudes and the speculative approach to farming that characterized all classes of its citizens.
D) the South was not much different from other sections, except that the income of the majority of southerners came from slave-grown cotton, while elsewhere the majority of Americans grew corn or wheat with their own labor.