I. ?Cotton Is King!? Eli Whitney aided to rise of slave use in the South Quick profits drew planters to the bottomlands of the Gulf states Planters bought more slaves and more land in order to buy more slaves and more land Northern shippers made profit from the trade Cotton accounted for half of American imports after 1840 and the South produced more than half of all the cotton in the world- Britain highly depended on this cotton II. The Planter ?Aristocracy? The government of the South was more run by a planter aristocracy The planter aristocrats enjoyed large shares of wealth, able to educate their children in the finest schools