WI: Northwest ordinance permits slavery

My main source for this is a couple of books I have on the ACW that have general discussions of slavery in the US. Both note that contemporary studies done showed that slavery was less efficient per capita than free farmers (again, with the exception of cotton and tobacco). Food crops per acre were lower with slave labor, livestock weights were lower, etc. Sadly, neither lists the exact source of those studies. Industry is discussed some; slaves in the south would sometimes be used in factories due to the lack of immigrant labor, but it was more expensive, and some slave holders were reluctant to do so out of fear that the slaves would organize themselves. They were used for select public works as well... digging (but not blasting), for example. They were not allowed to load cotton bales onto barges or drain malarial swamps.. basically, anything that was dangerous.

BTW, Dave, can you try to remember the titles of these books? I realize that my knowledge on antebellum cotton farming may not be up to spec, and also, I guess it'd be nice just to have that resource in general: one can find a fair bit of decent info on Google Books these days.
 
BTW, Dave, can you try to remember the titles of these books? I realize that my knowledge on antebellum cotton farming may not be up to spec, and also, I guess it'd be nice just to have that resource in general: one can find a fair bit of decent info on Google Books these days.

one is 'None Died in Vain' by Robert Leckie. Another is the massive Time Life "US Civil War" multi-volume collection, which goes into the ACW in incredible detail, and has a discussion about US slavery in one of the first volumes. And for a good general overview of slavery, there is "Slavery: A World History" by Milton Meltzer, which looks at not just slavery in the US, but in ancient and medieval times as well. Those are the ones I have after a quick look at my bookcase... I probably have more somewhere if I look a little deeper... :)
 
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