Semester of Graduation

Spring 2026

Degree

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

History

Document Type

Thesis

Abstract

This thesis argues that New Orleans’s skilled laborers profited alongside or from enslaved laborers. Proponents of free labor ideology, largely relegated to the North, charged that the skilled mechanic was the prototypical “free laborer.” In contemporary and modern portrayals, the systems of free and enslaved labor were considered antithetical. This thesis posits that these views are incorrect. Free and enslaved labor flourished together in the Crescent City. Despite their absence in historical understandings of the antebellum South, skilled laborers succeeded in New Orleans. I track societal debates across Louisiana’s newspapers concerning the status and success of mechanics across the state. Louisianan elites wrote voluminous articles detailing the issues of placing free white artisans in competition with convict or enslaved labor, even as many of these elites took advantage of the system. Ultimately, tension within southern social structures did not break the system. The third section argues that the New Orleans Mechanics’ Society’s membership provided a form of assimilation to the Society’s largely non-Louisianan backgrounds/births. New Orleans’s elites lauded the city’s mechanics, and the Society consisted of mechanics who used or prospered alongside enslaved laborers. The fourth section uses brief biographies of the Society’s key members to depict their ability to adapt to southern class and social structures. These members used free and enslaved labor to succeed in New Orleans. Last, I track the politics of the Society’s members. Many members voted for or ran as Democratic candidates, thereby revealing their assimilation into New Orleanian society. New Orleanian elites vied for the votes of mechanics, signifying their importance as a voting bloc in the urban South.

Date

3-2-2026

Committee Chair

Sheehan-Dean, Aaron

LSU Acknowledgement

1

LSU Accessibility Acknowledgment

1

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