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Old Southwest
Region covering western Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Texas, where low land prices and fertile soil attracted hundreds of thousands of settlers after the American Revolution. -
slave codes
Ordinances passed by a colony or state to regulate the behavior of slaves, often including brutal punishments for infractions. -
peculiar institution
A phrase used by whites in the antebellum South to refer to slavery without using the word slavery. -
plain white folk
Yeoman farmers who lived and worked on their own small farms, growing food and cash crops to trade for necessities. -
Cotton Kingdom
Cotton-producing region, relying predominantly on slave labor, that spanned from North Carolina west to Louisiana and reached as far north as southern Illinois.