increased rapidly, and in the Northern States they acquired such civil
rights as industry, thrift, and integrity commanded. Here and there
colored persons of unusual gifts distinguished themselves in various
callings and were even occasionally entertained in white households.

The industrial revolution in England, with its spinning jenny and
power loom, indirectly influenced the position of the negro in
America. The new machinery had an insatiable maw for cotton. It could
turn such enormous quantities of raw fiber into cloth that the old
rate of producing cotton was entirely inadequate. New areas had to be
placed under cultivation. The South, where soil and climate combined
to make an ideal cotton land, came into its own. And when Eli
Whitney's gin was perfected, cotton was crowned king. Statistics tell
the story: the South produced about 8000 bales of cotton in 1790;
650,000 bales in 1820; 2,469,093 bales in 1850; 5,387,052 bales in
1860.[10] This vast increase in production called for human muscle
which apparently only the negro could supply.

Once it was shown that slavery paid, its status became fixed as
adamant. The South forthwith ceased weakly to apologize for it, as it
had formerly done, and began to defend it, at first with some
hesitation, then with boldness, and finally with vehement
aggressiveness. It was economically necessary; it was morally right;
it was the peculiar Southern domestic institution; and, above all, it
paid. On every basis of its defense, the cotton kingdom would brook no
interference from any other section of the country. So there was
formed a race feudality in the Republic, rooted in profits, protected
by the political power of the slave lords, and enveloped in a spirit
of defiance and bitterness which reacted without mercy upon its
victims. Tighter and tighter were drawn the coils of restrictions