The southern plantation system resembled an _______ (rule of the few) with its monopoly on “King Cotton.” Though blacks accounted for 75% of the population in some parts of the deep South, only about 1 in 4 white southerners actually owned slaves or belonged to a slaveholding family.
The enslaved had no political or civil rights, were forbidden to testify in court. They were not allowed to read and write because masters believed that reading brought new _______ that might lead to discontent.
Most of the enslaved were raised in stable, two-parent households (though the law did not legally recognize these marriages). The enslaved often fought the system of slavery by slowing down the pace of their labor, banding together to rebel, and _______ to escape to the North where slavery was illegal.
