«Give to the labor of America, the market of America»: Marketing the old south's sugar crop, 1800-1860

Abstract

Before the United States Civil War, Louisiana’s sugar production grew from barely noticiable amounts to 264.000 Tons due to an increase in both domestic consumption and output capacity. It proved unable, however, to counteract the expansion of Caribbean exports. This study contends that the slave-owning «hacendados» had to operate in a very dynamic market in which they were culturally ill-prepared to compete. Their ethics based on individualism and sense of independence deriving from their slave-owning condition, was an obstacle for associative efforts. Thus they acted on an article-by-article trade strategy, causing demand saturation and price dumping which led to the weakening of their individual and collective position in the sugar trade.