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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jd Smith1" data-source="post: 7868514" data-attributes="member: 6998052">You would be doing an incredible amount of harm to a lot of people, including the slaves themselves. Destroying the economy of an entire region in the hope that it would bring an end to slavery is a very poor method; even if worked, which I doubt, it would also strand the ex-slave population in a region without jobs or the hope of feeding themselves.Keep in mind that the cotton industry in the South was hardly the only use of slaves, and that the institution of slavery was older than the USA itself. I'm not defending the practice, but the major slave owners had, for the most part, inherited family businesses which required slave labor. The abolitionist movement was demanding that these people throw away their livelihood without compensation.Also keep in mind that half of the slave population was owned by small businesses, farms, and families. The only peaceful path to individual freedom would be through some sort of compensation scheme such as the UK used.  The great tragedy of the abolitionist movement is that after freedom was secured for the slaves, they then abandoned the ex-slave population in a region which blamed the ex-slaves for the economic devastation, and consigned them to the better part of a century of economic slavery. Like so many failures on social modification, the abolitionists foolishly set a singular goal, with no follow-through plan.</blockquote>

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