In the Wikipedia article, it presents the area as the most, historically and presently, progressive part of the country. Is that true? What are the downsides?
In the Wikipedia article, it presents the area as the most, historically and presently, progressive part of the country. Is that true? What are the downsides?
Earliest industrial areas and not saddled with the historical brainworms of southern plantation slavery or manifest destiny coloniaist mindset
Why were they pro-abolition, or against "manifest destiny"? What made them different?
The economy of the northeast centered around commercial trade, finance, and manufacturing, while the south developed an economy around plantation agriculture. This meant that northerners had a preference for Whiggish internal improvements over land-grabbing expansion. But this had its own problems and contradictions- the northern oligarchy made a lot of money from the southern political economy, and had an interest in keeping the two of them enmeshed together, which is basically why they kept bending over backwards to appease the increasingly-unappeasable Planter class. Although, as craven as the Yankee oligarchs were, they were ultimately a lot smarter than the Planters when it came to seeing the big picture of their class interests. Anyway, that's basically why abolitionism arose in the northeast first.
I mean they physically weren't where those things were happening, so the culture of the area didn't develop in a way that was steeped in those ideologies.
I'm dumb and am blanking on why the north/south divide was a thing in the first place, probably just the industrialization again, but it happened and that has lasting effects
So, they didn't need slavery or settler colonies? I guess #NotAllAmerica was bad.
It's all pretty bad and based on stolen land, but I think it's unfair to discount the differences between the earliest northeastern settlers actually having some difficulty surviving and having some need to interact with the native people, and then being the area that developed into an industrialized/non-slave economy which is the exact nexus Marx predicted would form the proletariat. Vs the psychotic racist/classist divide instilled by the slave economy of the south, and the explicitly settler-colonialist westward expansion of an established state (and killing all the natives in the way)
Thanks for this explanation. I didn't know these northeast colonies didn't expand westwards at all. That's pretty interesting and does make them different, in addition to industrialization, of course. I guess they still carry some of that cultural history.
I mean the country as a whole expanded westard from that starting point, but obviously not everyone went west. The people who went vs the people who stayed are going to have different material interests and as a result, cultures.
Woah! No. The upper class of the area were anti-slavery in appearance but their businesses and finance still heavily benefited from the slave trade for quite some time. And most of the abolitionists were of the 'free the black people and kick them out' variety.
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