Some dumb guy on the Internet is saying that it reminds him of a time when he was actually happy. Now, he's obviously racially dogwhistling, but it really occurred to me that I don't really know what life was like for a non-slave, non-rich person back then. Obviously, it was hell on earth for slaves, and probably pretty good for the super rich (just like every other time). Was it better or worse for a free, working class person than the northern states? Better or worse than the US right now?
Well the south was famously un-industrialized compared to the north. So while there were a few proletarian whites, the majority of the non-slave owning white people were still small farmers. How was it for them? Well the aristocratic plantation class basically rigged the Southern political system to keep them out of the process. They were all gerrymandered so that their votes didn't matter compared to the votes of the planters and of course the planters used racism to keep the poor whites on their side.
These poorer whites were also forced onto the marginal farming land in the mountains and hills while the plantations got the best flatland. These farmers often struggled to turn a profit in these crappy areas which is way so many of them were eager to move west and kill native peoples and take their land. This inequality did produce a level of resentment between the white classes in the south. You were looked down upon as a "hill billy" by the planters and a poorer white couldn't enter that community. Even if you got rich you wouldn't have the right family connections. The poor whites thought that the system was rigged against them (it was) and that they couldn't compete with slave labor.
When the civil war broke out many Pro-Union irregulars (19the century guerilla fighters ) were recruited out of the mountain areas to fight the slavers. Not necessarily out of a desire to see slaves free, though some did want that, but because these poor whites knew that they were being marginalized and wanted more political representation and more fair treatment. But also a lot of poor whites totally bought the "fighting for muh rights" shit and died for the slavers in the thousands.
Andrew Johnson was actually one of these poor southern whites from the mountains. He always desired to enter that upper class of planters but they never accepted him. So he sided with the union during the war. The reason he was such a shit president is because he thought if he gave the slavers pardons they would accept him as one of their own. They didn't.