The mechanization of cotton freed Southern elites from paternalist duties toward black labor.

Evidence

12In related work, Alston and Ferrie (1993) argue that certain aspects of Southern economic development should have made Democratic policies more attractive to whites in the region. In particular, the mechanization of cotton production in the 1960s meant that Southern elites no longer needed a large labor force whose loyalty they once ensured in part by informally providing black workers with public goods such as medical care and protection from violent whites and were thus more open to Democratic public safety net programs. — Ilyana Kuziemko and Ebonya Washington, Why Did the Democrats Lose the South?…, 212

Categorization

• XREF: Directly speaks to the threatened-privilege mechanism — mechanization removed the material basis of the paternalist economic arrangement, reshaping the stakes of racial privilege. — connects to: Enslaved cotton cultivation accelerated the factory system and wage labor — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project: A New American Origin…, 581
• SEED: A potential essay angle: how labor-substitution technology (mechanization) dissolves the economic logic of discrimination and reshuffles political alliances.

Broader Connections

• Enslaved cotton cultivation accelerated the factory system and wage labor #expands (0.75) — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project, 581