The Cotton Gin
The cotton gin was an invention that contributed largely to American history. 1793 was the year when Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin, the machine designed to remove the seeds from the cotton plant after it was harvested. The cotton gin was a very simple invention which did not require much effort on the part of the human workforce because the machine did all of the work. The agricultural South in America consisted mainly of farmers and slaves who worked in the cotton fields and were responsible for the harvest and production of cotton.
Farmers knew that the cotton crop was a tricky one, where the separation of the cotton seeds from the actual crop required a long time and the only way that separation was possible was if it were done by hand. At the same time, however, the South became one lucrative region where agriculture flourished. Hence, slavery was common in that area because of the workforce required working in the fields. However, the invention of the cotton gin meant that the work of probably 20 slaves needed at one time was reduced to only two. This meant that cotton became the one cash crop that gave huge profits to the South and farmers decided to make the best of it in order to gain a good profit. Thus, the farmers knew that they needed more land to harvest more of the cotton crop. This land for their cotton was bought from Native Americans. When the land was bought, the farmers then needed more workers to sow the seeds and work on the fields. Hence, slaves were the cheapest and readiest form of labor available, and they decided to make the best use of them. Moreover, slaves were the free market that would cost them nothing to produce large amounts of cotton. Thus, the South began to make use of the cotton gin that led the region to become the most lucrative region, which also affected Northern America. However, there were certain disadvantages the region faced as well.
As history records it, the South was not very rich in the capital because its capital was tied to slavery and their use in the harvest of the cotton. At the same time when North America was building more and more textile mills and industries for utilizing their own cotton, England was a country that also built more textiles and mills that imported its cotton from the South. Yet, the South itself was not able to build its own mills and industry because of the low capital, neither did the South have any roads, transport or means of building up its own industry because its capital was linked to the use of slaves in cotton production.
In the light of ethics, the cotton gin was made as a tool to speed up production and to decrease the amount of work that was required to be done on the part of the slaves that were working in the fields. The cotton fiber that took one slave about two months to be produced could now, with the help of the cotton gin, be produced by the help of two slaves in one day. However, at the same time, America became a country that began to support slavery to a very large degree. From just 700,000 slaves in the year 1790, the number of slaves rose to 3,200,000 in the year 1850. This created a sentiment as the country being one that sought its main help from discrimination and the treatment of people with lower status as their slaves. Whereas this was going on with other countries, America was a country which was supposed to be beyond these concepts.
Socially, the cotton gin changed society for the worst. The world, as a whole began to shift toward competition in business and moved from its idealistic state to the state of slavery becoming rampant and widespread. Division in society was ever more widespread, and it caused about more than one-third of the South. Also, the land that was needed for cultivation and the price of slaves went so high, that the growth of cities and industries in the South fell low.
Works Cited
“Civil War.org.” Civil war History: How the cotton gin contributed to the civil war. Accessed 10
“Teaching US History.” The impact of the cotton gin. Accessed 10 Feb 2016.
http://www.teachingushistory.org/lessons/pdfs_and_docs/documents/theimpactofthecottongin.html
“The Cotton gin-eration.com.” The Cotton gin’s impact. Accessed 10 Feb 2016.
http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html
“U.S history.” Cotton and African-American Life. Accessed 10 Feb 2016.
http://www.ushistory.org/us/22b.asp
