The work standard set by the plantation slave "master" was extremely high, which included very long hours working in poor conditions using poor equipment, if any at all. This method of slave labor resulted in high profits for the plantation owner because the cost of maintaining the laborers was relatively low. This was typical slavery throughout the southern United States prior to the American Civil War. The southern slaves were plentiful. If a slave were to fall ill or become combative, the plantation owner would simply purchase a replacement slave from the local auction block. In fact, there were so many slaves in the southern United States that their population totaled approximately four (4) million during the 1860's, nearly one third (1/3) of the entire southern population. This was not the standard for all blacks living in the United States, either northern or southern. A small percentage of blacks living in the south were free, but they were not considered to by equals to southern whites. All of the blacks living in the northern states were also free. Although they were still not considered to be equals to the northern whites, they did have a considerably higher level of "freedom" than their southern counterparts. As a result of the significant level of freedom variance, many southern blacks, both slaves and freemen, ventured to the northern states.
After the American Civil War ended in 1865, the United States entered into a period called Reconstruction. Reconstruction was a time in which the federal government prescribed methods, laws and a means for the southern states to reenter the union and install a free labor system. Doing such turned out to much more difficult then predicted. The southern democrats wanted things in the south to be very similar to what they were prior to the war, a "slave" type of working class which allowed the plantation owners to set the rules/laws and enforce them.
