Lincoln/Douglas Debates

Question 1
Slaves provided cheap and abundant labor to those owners who used them in the extensive cotton plantations, particularly in the South. Slavery was never promoted in the North because the region was industrialized and hence needed people irrespective of the race or place of origin to work in the factories. On the other hand, the Southerners viewed slavery as the primary source of their livelihood. The invention of the cotton gin meant that the productivity of cotton factories will increase and that required a constant supply of cotton from the plantations. Thus, the many slaves were needed during cultivation and harvesting in order to produce quantities of cotton that would much the demand in the foreign markets. Some slave owners also engaged in the slave trade were slaves were hired or bought depending on the amount and urgency of labor a plantation owner needed. Moreover, they could use slaves as security of securing loans to finance other operations and expenses.
The subject of slavery was a critical matter that attracted occasional disputes between the South and the North. The Southerners maintained that slavery determined their livelihood in entirety. This is because their vast cotton farms required abundant labor especially during cultivation and harvesting of cotton. The absence of slaves would imply that they could no longer manage their vast plantations, and that could hurt their cotton-based economy. On the other hand, the Northerners were of the divergent view. They argued that slavery was against human rights, dignity, and freedom. According to them, all men were equal and thus deserved equal treatment. There was no need for viewing other people as inferior human beings that deserved to work for the others under duress. The northern proponents argued that given an opportunity, the Africans could accomplish the tasks as efficiently as the Whites. Thus, slavery was a sensitive issue that divided the North and the South right in the middle.Question 2
Abraham Lincoln was born in a slave state of Kentucky at a time when America was still in the infantry. Throughout his life, Lincoln detested the institution of slavery. In most of his speeches and commentaries, he openly showed how slavery was an inhuman act that deserved no place in independent America. Lincoln became a smart politician who knew how to handle the subject of slavery in public so that he does not attract many negative sentiments from the public. However, he did not stop with his sensitization of the masses on the issue of slavery. On the issue of racism, Lincoln maintained that as far as the constitution still included the provision of "all men are equal", it ...