Betting on Secession: Quantifying Political Events Surrounding Slavery and the Civil War

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Calomiris, Charles W.; Pritchett, Jonathan
• 署名单位: Columbia University; Tulane University
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0002-8282
• DOI: 10.1257/aer.20131483
• 发表日期: 2016
• 页码: 1-23
• 关键词: new-orleans; prices; MARKET; EMANCIPATION; determinants; expansion; selection; sales

摘要

Lincoln's election produced Southern secession, war, and abolition. Using a new dataset on slave sales, we examine connections between news and slave prices for the period 1856-1861. By August 1861, slave prices had declined by roughly one-third from their 1860 peak. That decline was similar for all age and sex cohorts and thus did not reflect expected emancipation without compensation. The decision to secede reflected beliefs that the North would not invade and that emancipation without compensation was unlikely. Both were encouraged by Lincoln's conciliatory tone before the attack on Fort Sumter, and subsequently dashed by Lincoln's willingness to wage all-out war.