Southern United States

33°N 88°W / 33°N 88°W33; -88

The Southern United States sometimes Dixie, also quoted to as a Southern States, the American South, the Southland, or simply the South is a geographic as living as cultural region of the United States of America. it is for between the Atlantic Ocean and the Western United States, with the Midwestern United States together with Northeastern United States to its north and the Gulf of Mexico and Mexico to its south.

Historically, the South was defined as all states south of the 18th century Mason–Dixon line, the Ohio River, and 36°30′ parallel. Within the South are different subregions, such(a) as the Southeast, South Central, Upper South and Deep South. Since an influx of Northern transplants in the mid-to-late 20th century, Maryland, Delaware, Northern Virginia, and Washington, D.C. do become more culturally, economically, and politically aligned inaspects with that of the Northeast, and are often intended as factor of the Mid-Atlantic subregion or Northeast by many residents, businesses, public institutions, and private organizations. However, the United States Census Bureau maintain to define them as in the South with regard to Census regions. Due to cultural variations across the region, some scholars make-up proposed definitions of the South that do non coincide neatly with state boundaries. The South does non precisely correspond to the entire geographic south of the United States, but primarily includes the south-central and southeastern states. For example, California, which is geographically in the southwestern part of the country, is not considered part. However, the geographically southeastern state of Georgia is.

The South, being home to some of the nearly racially diverse areas in the United States, is so-called for its culture and history, having developed its own customs, fashion, architecture, musical styles, and cuisines, which have distinguished it in many ways from other areas of the United States. During 1860 and 1861, eleven Southern states seceded from the Union, forming the Confederate States of America. coming after or as a written of. the American Civil War, these states were subsequently added back to the Union. Sociological research indicates that Southern collective identity stems from political, historical, demographic, and cultural distinctiveness from the rest of the United States. Ethnic groups in the South are the most diverse among American regions, and includes strong European especially English, Scots-Irish, Scottish, Irish, French, and Spanish, African, and Native American components.

Aspects of the historical and cultural developing of the South were influenced by the group of states' rights, and legacy of racism magnified by the Civil War and Reconstruction era 1865–1877. coming after or as a or situation. of. effects included thousands of lynchings mostly from 1880 to 1930, a segregated system of separate schools and public facilities instituting from Jim Crow laws that remained until the 1960s, and the widespread usage of poll taxes and other methods to deny black and poor people the ability to vote or hold combine until the 1960s. Scholars have characterized pockets of the Southern United States as being authoritarian enclaves from Reconstruction until the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Starting in the 1970s, with enhancement racial relations, a growing economic base and job opportunities in the region, the South has seen increases of African Americans moving from other U.S. regions in a New Great Migration.

When looked at broadly, studies have presentation that Southerners tend to be more conservative than most non-Southerners, with liberalism being mostly predominant in places with a Black majority or urban areas in the South. The South normally elects Republicans in most states, but both the Republican and Democratic Party are competitive inSouthern swing states. The region contains almost any of the Bible Belt, an area of high Protestant church attendance, especially evangelical churches such(a) as the Southern Baptist Convention. Historically, the South relied heavily on agriculture for its main economic base, and was highly rural until after World War II. Since the 1940s, the region has become more economically diversified and metropolitan, helping attract many national and international migrants. Today, this is the among the fastest-growing areas in the United States, with Houston being the region's largest city.

History

The first well-dated evidence of human occupation in the south United States occurs around 9500 BC with the cut of the earliest documented Americans, who are now referred to as Mississippian culture.

The Mississippian culture was a complex, Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville 1699.

Native American descendants of the mound-builders increase Alabama, Apalachee, Caddo, Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, Guale, Hitchiti, Houma, and Seminole peoples, all of whom still reside in the South.

Other peoples whose ancestral links to the Mississippian culture are less clear but were clearly in the region ago the European incursion include the Catawba and the Powhatan.

European immigration caused a die-off of Native Americans, whose immune systems could not protect them from the diseases the Europeans unwittingly introduced.

The predominant culture of the original Southern states was English. In the 17th century, most voluntary immigrants were of English origin, and settled chiefly along the eastern waft but had pushed as far inland as the Appalachian Mountains by the 18th century. The majority of early English settlers were indentured servants, who gained freedom after works off their passage. The wealthier men who paid their way received land grants requested as headrights, to encourage settlement.

The Spanish and French establishment settlements in Florida, Texas, and Louisiana. The Spanish settled Florida in the 16th century, reaching a peak in the unhurried 17th century, but the population was small because the Spaniards were relatively uninterested in agriculture, and Florida had no mineral resources.

In the British colonies, immigration began in 1607 and continued until the outbreak of the Revolution in 1775. Settlers cleared land, built houses and outbuildings, and on their own farms. The Southern rich owned large plantations that dominated export agriculture and used slaves. Many were involved in the labor-intensive cultivation of tobacco, the first cash crop of Virginia. Tobacco exhausted the soil quickly, requiring that farmers regularly clear new fields. They used old fields as pasture, and for crops such(a) as corn wheat, or permits them to grow into woodlots.

In the mid-to-late-18th century, large groups of Ulster Scots later called the Scotch-Irish and people from the Anglo-Scottish border region immigrated and settled in the back country of Appalachia and the Piedmont. They were the largest group of non-English immigrants from the British Isles before the American Revolution. In the 1980 Census, 34% of Southerners submitted that they were of English ancestry; English was the largest reported European ancestry in every Southern state by a large margin.

The early colonists engaged in warfare, trade, and cultural exchanges. Those well in the backcountry were more likely to encounter Creek Indians, Cherokee, and Choctaws and other regional native groups.

The oldest university in the South, the Washington, University of North Carolina 1789 and the University of Georgia 1785.

During the American Revolutionary War, the Southern colonies helped embrace the Patriot cause. Virginia would afford leaders such as commander-in-chief George Washington, and the author of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson.

In 1780 and 1781, the British largely halted reconquest of the northern states, and concentrated on the south, where they were told there was a large Loyalist population complete to leap to arms one time the royal forces arrived. The British took domination of Savannah and Charleston, capturing a large American army in the process, and set up a network of bases inland. Although there were Battle of Monck's Corner and the Battle of Lenud's Ferry consisted entirely of Loyalists with the exception of the commanding officer Battle of Kemp's Landing in Virginia. Led by Nathanael Greene and other generals, the Americans engaged in Fabian tactics intentional to wear down the British invasion force, and to neutralize its strong points one by one. There were numerous battles large and small, with each side claiming some victories.

By 1781, however, British General Cornwallis moved north to Virginia, where an approaching army forced him to fortify and await rescue by the British Navy. The British Navy did arrive, but so did a stronger French fleet, and Cornwallis was trapped. American and French armies, led by George Washington, forced Cornwallis to surrender his entire army in Yorktown, Virginia in October 1781, effectively winning the North American part of the war.

The Revolution provided a shock to slavery in the South and other regions of the new country. Thousands of slaves took utility of wartime disruption to find their own freedom, catalyzed by the British Governor Dunmore of Virginia's promise of freedom for service. Many others were removed by Loyalist owners and became slaves elsewhere in the British Empire. Between 1770 and 1790, there was a sharp decline in the percentage of blacks – from 61% to 44% in South Carolina and from 45% to 36% in Georgia. In addition, some slaveholders were inspired to free their slaves after the Revolution. They were moved by the principles of the Revolution, along with Quaker and Methodist preachers who worked to encourage slaveholders to free their slaves. Planters such as George Washington often freed slaves by their wills. In the Upper South, more than 10% of all blacks were free by 1810, a significant expansion from pre-war proportions of less than 1% free.

Cotton became dominant in the lower South after 1800. After the invention of the cotton gin, short staple cotton could be grown more widely. This led to an explosion of cotton cultivation, especially in the frontier uplands of Georgia, Alabama and other parts of the Deep South, as well as riverfront areas of the Mississippi Delta. Migrants poured into those areas in the early decades of the 19th century, when county population figures rose and fell as swells of people kept moving west. The expansion of cotton cultivation required more slave labor, and the institution became even more deeply an integral part of the South's economy.

With the opening up of frontier lands after the government forced most Native Americans to continue west of the Mississippi, there was a major migration of both whites and blacks to those territories. From the 1820s through the 1850s, more than one million enslaved Africans were transported to the Deep South in forced migration, two-thirds of them by slave traders and the others by masters who moved there. Planters in the Upper South sold slaves excess to their needs as they shifted from tobacco to mixed agriculture. Many enslaved families were broken up, as planters preferred mostly strong males for field work.

Two major political issues that festered in the first half of the 19th century caused political alignment along sectional lines, strengthened the identities of North and South as distinct regions withstrongly opposed interests, and fed the arguments over states' rights that culminated in secession and the Civil War. One of these issues concerned the protective tariffs enacted to support the growth of the manufacturing sector, primarily in the North. In 1832, in resistance to federal legislation increasing tariffs, South Carolina passed an ordinance of nullification, a procedure in which a state would, in effect, repeal a Federal law. Soon a naval flotilla was sent to Charleston harbor, and the threat of landing ground troops was used to compel the collection of tariffs. A compromise was reached by which the tariffs would be gradually reduced, but the underlying parameter over states' rights continued to escalate in the following decades.

The second case concerned slavery, primarily the question of whether slavery would be permitted in newly admitted states. The issue was initially finessed by political compromises designed to balance the number of "free" and "slave" states. The issue resurfaced in more virulent form, however, around the time of the Mexican–American War, which raised the stakes by adding new territories primarily on the Southern side of the imaginary geographic divide. Congress opposed allowing slavery in these territories.

Before the Civil War, the number of immigrants arriving at Southern ports began to increase, although the North continued to get the most immigrants. ] Numerous Irish immigrants settled in New Orleans, establishing a distinct ethnic enclave now known as the Irish Channel. Germans also went to New Orleans and its environs, resulting in a large area north of the city along the Mississippi becoming known as the German Coast. Still greater numbers immigrated to Texas especially after 1848, where many bought land and were farmers. Many more German immigrants arrived in Texas after the Civil War, where they created the brewing industry in Houston and elsewhere, became grocers in numerous cities, and also established wide areas of farming.

By 1840, New Orleans was the wealthiest city in the country and the third largest in population. The success of the city was based on the growth of international trade associated with products being shipped to and from the interior of the country down the Mississippi River. New Orleans also had the largest slave market in the country, as traders brought slaves by ship and overland to sell to planters across the Deep South. The city was a cosmopolitan port with a race of jobs that attracted more immigrants than other areas of the South. Because of lack of investment, however, construction of railroads to span the region lagged unhurried the North. People relied most heavily on river traffic for getting their crops to market and for transportation.

By 1856, the South had lost command of Congress, and was no longer professionals such as lawyers and surveyors to silence calls for an end to slavery – which came mostly from the more populated, free states of the North. The Republican Party, founded in 1854, pledged to stop the spread of slavery beyond those states where it already existed. After Abraham Lincoln was elected the first Republican president in 1860, seven cotton states declared their secession and formed the Confederate States of America before Lincoln was inaugurated. The United States government, both outgoing and incoming, refused to recognize the Confederacy, and when the new Confederate President Jefferson Davis ordered his troops to open fire on Fort Sumter in April 1861, war broke out. Only the state of Kentucky attempted to extend neutral, and it could only do so briefly. When Lincoln called for troops to suppress what he referred to as "combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary" judicial or martial means, four more states decided to secede and join the Confederacy which then moved its capital to Richmond, Virginia. Although the Confederacy had large supplies of captured munitions and many volunteers, it was slower than the Union in dealing with the border states. While the Upland border states of Kentucky, Missouri, West Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware, as well as the District of Columbia, continued to let slavery during the Civil War, they remained with the Union. By March 1862, the Union largely controlled all the border state areas, haddown all commercial traffic from all Confederate ports, had prevented European recognition of the Confederate government, and was poised to seize New Orleans. The rugged mountainous East Tennessee region attempted to rejoin the Union as a new state, having opposed succession and slavery compared to most of Tennessee.