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Title: The Persistence of de Facto Power: Elites and Economic Development in the US South, 1840-1960

Citation Type: Miscellaneous

Publication Year: 2012

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Abstract: I examine how the historical planter elite affected economic development between 1840 and 1960 using county-level variation within the US South. To capture the planter elites potential to exercise de facto power, I construct a new data-set on the personal wealth of the richest Southern planters before the American Civil War. I find that counties with a relatively wealthier planter elite before the Civil War performed significantly worse in the post-war decades and even after World War II. I argue that this is the likely consequence of the planter elites lack of support for mass schooling. My results suggest that when during Reconstruction the US government abolished slavery and enfranchised the freedmen, the planter elite used their de facto power to maintain their influence over the political system and preserve a planter-friendly regime. In fact I find that the planter elite was better able to sustain land prices and the production of plantation crops during Reconstruction in counties where they had more de facto power.

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Authors: Ager, Philipp

Publisher: Universitat Pompeu Fabra

Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Education, Other

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