InQuizitive: Chapter 11: The Peculiar Institution

Which of the following regions were enslaved populations the least concentrated around 1860?

1. The Appalachian Mountains
2. Northern Missouri and Virginia

In the South it was illegal under any circumstances, even self-defense, for an enslaved person to kill a white person.

True.

This 1850 map shows that enslaved populations were most concentrated around the Mississippi River. What was the likely reason for this arrangement?

To give every planation direct river access.

Most enslaved people who succeeded in escaping slavery, like Fredrick Douglass, came from the Upper South states like Virginia, Maryland, and Kentucky.

True.

How did enslaved people acquire knowledge of current events?

1. Privileged enslaved people and skilled craftsmen helped to spread news of local and national events.
2. Enslaved people created neighborhood networks that transmitted news of local and national importance between plantations.

Select on the map the states in which insurrection or conspiracy occurred.

1. Virginia
2. South Carolina
3. Louisiana

Select the two regions on the map that land had the highest concentrations of enslaved peoples in 1860.

1. Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana
2. Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, and Florida

Identify why the following Bible stories and folktales were popular with enslaved people.

1. Brer Rabbit: glorifies the weak outwitting stronger foes like the bear and the fox.
2. Exodus: God chooses Moses to lead the enslaved Jews out of Egypt into a promised land of freedom.
3. David: defeats Goliath, who appears to be the unbeatable, all-powerful giant.

Select on the map the eight states that made up the Upper South.

DE, MD, Virginia, North Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri, and Arkansas.

Identify the methods used to control enslaved people and force them to work for their masters.

1. The threat of sale.
2. Whipping enslaved people and other physical punishments.
3. Prohibiting relations between house servants and field hands to prevent collaboration against the master.

Identify examples of the forms of "day-to-day resistance" that enslaved people performed.

1. Breaking tools, doing poor work, abusing animals.
2. Leaving gates open and removing rails from fences.

Identify which statements are true about what set the American practice of slavery apart from other slave-keeping practices, both ancient and modern.

1. Slavery in the American South was unique in that it was tied to large-scale agricultural output.
2. Slavery in the American South was unique in that the differentiating factor between free and enslaved people was physical: skin color.

Identify the following statements that correctly describe how the nineteenth century's "cult of domesticity" did not apply to enslaved women.

1. Enslaved women were expected to work in the fields with men.
2. Since Black men could not provide economically for their families, Black women could not perform the complementary duties of homemaking.

Identify the statements that are true about enslaved populations in the South in 1860, as reflected by the map.

Enslaved populations were concentrated in areas with access to national markets.

What does it reveal about the slave population in 1860?

1. South Carolina had the highest concentration of enslaved people.
2. Slave ownership was not evenly distributed throughout the South but was concentrated around areas with fertile soil and easy access to national and international markets.

Identify the statements that describe the religious life of enslaved people.

1. Slave religion was a mix of African tradition and Christian beliefs practiced for the most part in secret.
2. Although it was illegal for enslaved people to gather without a white person present, every plantation appeared to have its own Black preacher who would hold church services exclusively for the enslaved population.

Identify the key differences between slavery in the United States and slavery in Brazil.

1. In the American South, states set limits on voluntary manumission, requiring such acts be approved by the legislature.
2. At the point of emancipation in Brazil, more than half of the enslaved population had already gained its freedom, where only 10 percent of enslaved people in the United States had gained their freedom by emancipation.

Which of the following conclusions can be drawn from the information provided by these tables?

1. The elite planter class was a small proportion of antebellum society.
2. In the year 1850, there were almost ten times as many enslaved people in the South as there were slaveholders.
3. The members of the elite planter class were outnumbered by the enslaved people on the plantation as well as in society at large.

What was the status of slavery in the Western Hemisphere during the mid-nineteenth century?

By 1840, slavery had been outlawed in most of SPANISH AMERICA and the British empire. Defenders of slavery in the United States charged that British emancipation had been a failure because its SUGAR production declined. Only the United States, Puerto Rico, Cuba, and BRAZIL had significant slave systems in the hemisphere by mid-century.

What role did "plantation mistresses" play in the lives of enslaved peoples?

"Plantation mistresses" supervised care for enslaved people when they were SICK. These white women directed the DOMESTICS SERVANTS on the plantation. Plantation mistresses were known to punish the enslaved women who were SEXUALLY EXPLOITED by their husbands.

Identify the statements about the population of free Blacks in 1860 that are supported by the data in the following table.

1. Free Blacks lived in every state in the United States in 1860.
2. Maryland had the largest free Balck population of any state.

Identify the demographic differences in slavery in these regions.

1. American South: The number of enslaved men and enslaved women were about the same.
Marriage among enslaved people in this region was much more common, leading to a greater possibility of creating family life.
2. West Indies: The number of enslaved men outnumbered the enslaved women.

What can be inferred about populations of free Blacks in 1860, referring to the map?

1. Many free Blacks lived along coastal areas.
2. Some states in the Lower South had almost no free Blacks.
3. There were more free Blacks in the Upper South than the Lower South.

What does the table reveal about the free Black population?

1. The entire Black population in the North was free.
2. The largest number of free Blacks remained in the South.

Identify the obstacles faced by enslaved attempting to escape.

1. Often bonds between family members and friends were enough to deter enslaved people from leaving the plantation.
2. There were regular slave patrols, law enforcement, and a legal system designed to ensure enslaved people did not escape from their masters.
3. Enslaved people had little or no sense of geography, making it difficult to determine a direction for their escape or where to go after securing their freedom.

Identify the following slave rebellions and revolts in the nineteenth-century Atlantic World.

1. Gabriel's Rebellion: The first of four major slave conspiracies in the beginning of the nineteenth century that was led by a literate blacksmith who planned a large slave rebellion around Richmond.
2. Louisiana: An uprising that occurred on sugar plantations north of New Orleans; some 500 men and women marched on New Orleans shouting "Death or Freedom."
3. Slave ship Creole: A ship seized by 135 enslaved people being transported from Norfolk to New Orleans; they changed its course to the British Bahamas where they were given refuge.
4. Slave ship Amistad: A celebrated incident in which fifty-three enslaved people took control of their ship and tried to redirect it to Africa.

How did agriculture and slavery shape the southern economy before the Civil War?

Most southern cities became centers for shipping COTTON, rather than centers for industrial manufacturing. Southern banks existed primarily to finance PLANTATIONS. Southern RAILROADS were mostly used for distributing agricultural goods to ports for export.

Identify the statements that describe the Underground Railroad.

1. Harriet Tubman was the most famous "conductor" of the Underground Railroad.
2. "Stations" on the Underground Railroad were hideouts maintained by abolitionists to help fugitive enslaved people.
3. The Underground Railroad was not a single, centralized system, but rather a series of interlocking local networks involving Black and white abolitionists helping enslaved people reach safety.

Identify the statements that describe the Second Middle Passage.

1. Slave trading within the United States between 1820 and 1860 was a visible, established business.
2. Many commercial districts in southern cities contained the offices of slave holders, complete with signs reading "Negro Sales" or "Negroes Bought Here."

Match each of the following statements to the type of labor organization they describe.

Gang Labor: Groups of enslaved people were supervised as they did their work.
This system of fieldwork was known to be more violent than the other.
Common on plantations in southern Louisiana where sugarcane was cultivated.

Task Labor: Enslaved people were given a series of daily jobs to be done at their own pace.
Common on plantations producing rice along the coasts of South Carolina and Georgia.

What arguments does Ce Bow make in attempt to demonstrate that the Bible sanctions slavery?

1. Slavery appears in both the New and Old Testaments of the Bible.
2. If the servant of God, Abraham, had enslaved people, then slavery is not morally wrong.

North American slave culture drew very little African heritage. This was due to the fact that so many enslaved Americans were American-born and heavily influenced y white Christianity, political beliefs, and music.

False.

Identify the statements that describe the Old South.

1. In 1860, the South produced less than 10 percent of the nation's manufactured goods.
2. Southern railroads tended to be short lines designed to bring cotton to ports rather then integrate the South into a larger national network.

Identify the statements that describe the southern planter class.

1. The planter class wielded significant political influence in the South because of its wealth and power.
2. The "planter class" was a term for the families who owned twenty or more enslaved people, and as a result, produced the most profit.

Select the passages in which the author argues that the Bible does not in any place expressly denounce slavery.

1. "Yet no one of them condemns it in the slightest degree...that God wished all men to be equal?"
2. "We find, that both the Old and New...expressly allow it or create it."

What facts does the following map illustrate about the size of slaveholdings in the South in 1860?

1. Some of the largest plantations were concentrated along the Mississippi River.
2. In general, the average number of enslaved people per slaveholding was higher in South Carolina than in Tennessee.

While there were no traditional gender roles when it came to enslaved peoples' forced labor, in their private lives enslaved people did take on traditional gender roles, with women caring for the home and men providing for the family.

True.

Identify the outlook of slavery described in this passage.

Paternalism.

Determine whether the following statements better describe antebellum slave culture in the United States or the patterns of slave-keeping in South America and the Caribbean.

Brazil or the West Indies:
Slave rebellions were common and large-scale.
Plantation owners tended not to live on their plantations.
Plantation owners in this society would occasionally free their slaves as a reward for good work or in honor of rites of passage like marriage.

The antebellum South: Slave rebellions were fairly rare.
There were few free Blacks in this society; those who were free had few rights.
Enslaved persons in this society had better living conditions and longer life expectancies.

Slave revolts in the United States were much larger and more frequent than in Brazil and the West Indies.

False.

Identify the statements that describe Fredrick Douglass's critique of slavery.

1. Douglass put forward a powerful critique of slavery by pointing out that the practice of slavery went against America's professed value of liberty.
2. Douglass said that the enslaved had a better understanding of American values in their quest for freedom than slaveowners in their attempts to maintain slavery.

Identify the statements that describe the restrictions under which free Blacks lived.

1. They were not allowed to testify in court against whites.
2. They could not strike a white person, even in self-defense.
3. They were prohibited from owning dogs, firearms, or liquor.

Identify the legal status and restrictions put on enslaved people in the American South.

1. Under the law, enslaved people were seen as property.
2. It was illegal to teach an enslaved person to read and white.
3. Enslaved people could not testify in court against white persons, sign contracts, or acquire property.

Drag each crop to the state where it was produced.

1. Missouri: Hemp
2. Virginia: Tobacco
3. Alabama: Cotton
4. Louisiana: Sugarcane

Identify the justifications used by white Americans for the practice of slavery.

1. Christianity
2. Blatant racism
3. Slavery is the best condition for all labor.