The right answer is C.the plantation system. There were only a few giant plantations in each southern state, their owners exercised a disproportionately powerful influence in economic, political, and social life. If to be called a planter, one had to own twenty slaves, only one out of every thirty whites in the South in 1860 was a planter. Yet this privileged elite exercised disproportionate social and political influence. Throughout the antebellum era, the South became increasingly committed to a cotton economy, which in turn was dependent upon slave labor. Despite efforts to diversify the economy, the wealth and status associated with cotton prompted the westward expansion of the plantation culture.
