What is Slave Power?
'''Slave Power''', also called the '''Slave Power conspiracy''' and '''Slaveocracy''', was a term first used by [[abolitionist]]s in 1839 and was in common use by the 1850s.<ref name=Nye262>Russel B. Nye, 'The Slave Power Conspiracy: 1830-1860', ''Science & Society'', Vol. 10, No. 3 (Summer, 1946), pp. 262–267</ref> It [[wikt:refer|refer]]red to the [[economic]], [[social]] and [[political]] [[influence]] held by [[Slavery|slaveholders]] in the [[Southern United States]].<ref name=defspwrDH>{{cite web |url=http://americans-history.blogspot.com/2013/05/definition-of-slave-power.html |title=Definition of Slave Power |website=American History |publisher=Digital History |access-date=16 November 2016}}</ref> Southern slaveholders had a great deal of power in [[Congress of the United States|Congress]] and many other [[Federal government of the United States|federal]] offices up to and including the [[President of the United States|presidency]].<ref name=defspwrDH/> This is in spite of the fact that they made up only a small [[minority]] of the [[population]] of the nation. These few very powerful men used their influence to maintain the [[Slavery|institution of slavery]]. The fear in the [[Northern United States|North]] was that the slave power conspiracy intended to not only to spread slavery to the [[Western territories]] but to all the states in the North.<ref name=comingcwAF>{{cite web |url=https://www.learner.org/series/biographyofamerica/prog10/transcript/page03.html |title=The Coming of the Civil War |website=Annenberg Learner |publisher=Annenberg Foundation |access-date=16 November 2016 |archive-date=15 September 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150915105406/https://www.learner.org/series/biographyofamerica/prog10/transcript/page03.html |url-status=dead }}</ref> == Background == [[Slavery in the United States]] began in the [[British North America|English colony]] of [[Jamestown, Virginia|Jamestown]] in 1619.<ref name=AmslaveryHIST>{{cite web |url=http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/slav