I95 / PARADOXES OF FORCED LABOR.

regions of the South. On average, the plantations of the
newer, or slave-Euyin , states were 29 percent more eflicient
than those of the older, s1ave—selljng states. The free farms
of the Old South virtually matched the efficiency of free
northern farms. The slave plantations of the Old South
exceeded the efliciency of free northern farms by I9 per-
cent, while the slave plantations of the newer southern
states exceeded the average efficiency of free northern farms
by 53 percent.

It therefore appears that the main assumptions of the
economic indictment of slavery were without foundation
in fact. Southern agriculture was more, not less, efficient
than northern agriculture. While it is true that large plan-
tations using slave labor made better use of their resources
than the small southern farms that relied exclusively on
free labor, this was not because the whites of these small
enterprises were “driven to indolence, carelessness, indiffer-
ence to the results of skill, heedlessness,” and “inconstancy
of purpose.” For family-sized southern farms, and those who
labored upon them, were more efficient in 1860 than their

orthern counterparts. It was, rather, because the large
slave plantations had achieved, on average, a degree of‘
efficiency that was unmatched by any other major subsector
of American agriculture, North or South, during the ante-
bellum era. _

Similarly, the superiority of farms in the slave—buymg
states relative to those in the selling states does not imply
that the farms of the older states were inefficient. The farms
of Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and the other selling
states were more efficient than those of the North, but they
were not able to capture the benefits of large-scale organiza-
tion to the same degree as those in the buying states.

There is a sense in which this failing may be attributed
to differences in land quality. But these were not the
differences in land quality that were emphasized by Olmsted
and Cairnes. There is no clear evidence that land in the

 

 

RELATIVE EFFICIENCY OF SLAVE AGRICULTURE / I97

older states was being depleted, that the average quality of
soil or land yields was declining. The statistical analyses of
data on land yields and land values that have thus far
been performed are arnbiguous. But even if one interprets
these findings in a marmer most favorable to the hypotheses
of Olmsted and Cairnes, they indicate only a slight deteriora-
tion in yields as plantations aged — on the order of one
half of one percent per annum. This deterioration was more
than offset by investment in farm capital, transportation
improvements, and other factors which affected the over-
all productivity of agriculture hi the selling states. In other
words, the assertions of Olmsted and Cairnes on these
matters were unfounded. Far from declining, between 1850
and 1860 the average value of farm lands and irnprove-
ments in the three chief exporting states (Virginia, North
Carolina, and South Carolina) increased by 60 percent -
nearly as much as the increase (79 percent) experienced by
the three chief slave-importing states (Alabama, Mississippi,
and Louisiana). This is not to say that there were no aban-
doned farrns in the selling states. There were abandoned
farms in all states — North and South — astehanging eco-
nomic conditions led farmers to leave enterprises on mar-
ginal land which had been profitable under one set of
relative prices but did not remain profitable under later sets
of relative prices. Olmsted and Cairnes exaggerated the ex-
tent of abandonments, converting the atypical into the
general case.

To some extent Olmsted and Cairnes were misled by the’?
widespread concern among southern planters with the prob-
lem of maintaining land fertility. This concern was not \
misplaced. For, as already noted, the sandy nature of 3
southern soils, the heavy rainfalls, and the relative absence
of winter freezes all worked toward underminin g the fertility
of southern soils. Great care was therefore necessary to
maintain soil fertility. This point was continually empha-
sized by leading southern agriculturalists as well as by)