LogFAQs > #942316575

CommonJoe posted...

I dont think that played a factor. The Founders faced an emergent nation that as it was was only just holding together, and that unity remained tenous up until the post Civil War era when the US as a single nation finally became an accepted part of American identities.

A lot of the Founders early decisions were based around appeasing the South to maintain unity. A good example: The "militia" lines in the Second Amendment? There to ensure the South that their militias wouldnt be disbanded in favor of the national army.

The North needed the South to do what it wanted to do, but the same wasnt true in reverse. We have to remember that when we judge the Founders.

I think it did play a factor in the slave economy seeing a boom. The cotton gin is an invention that made cotton plantations much more profitable, and one that the founders couldn't have foreseen 20 years earlier.

But, yes, a lot of the political decisions they made before, during, and after the revolution required compromise with the states that were pro-slavery. I stated as much already. Without the southern states, there really would have been no chance at a successful revolution.

Refraining from freeing the slaves, with the intention to revisit the issue later, was probably the best choice they could have made at the time to maintain what unity they could. The early years of the US had a lot of disagreement over what form and direction the new nation would take.