In the excerpt “The Rice Revolution in the Lowcountry”, Ira Berlin describes the relationship between slaves and slave-masters and how slavery operated in South Carolina. The demand for slaves in the lowcountry was significantly higher than the demand for slaves in the Chesapeake area. There were also harsher conditions and larger plantations found in South Carolina. The masters pushed the slaves very hard to increase rice and indigo production. To make sure the masters held the power in the slave/slave-master relationship the masters became deeply involved in slave relations and settled slave disputes themselves to show dominance and importance. The slaves created small communities of their own on plantations and formed their own family/village life. The creation of slave families both threatened and helped slave-masters. …show more content…
On the other hand, this helped slave-masters by making the slaves more content and happy of their situation on the plantations. Slaves in the lowcountry kept their African traditions alive more than slaves from other regions most likely because of the communities they created with other slaves. Although the slaves created small communities within plantations, a single black society never emerged from the lowcountry. After the production of rice increased, slaves became essential to the economy. The number of slaveholders was so great in South Carolina that government was almost solely made up of the planter class. These planters ruled through a long chain of command. Slaves were vital to the mercantilist economy of this time period. The Carolina colony was known for a profitable plantation economy ran by the African