“You said that there wasn’t enough demand for Southern goods in the North to make it a profitable market for them. So which is it?”
Prior to the Civil War, the main product the North bought from the South was cotton (which was used in the New England textile mills, especially in Lowell, MA: Remember, Northern industries wanted to compete with European industries). But that was a fraction of the quantity the South exported to Europe. Moreover, some of the Southern plantations were owned by Northern bankers and investors, so any cotton from those operations that went to New England mills would have equated to Northerners paying themselves rather than paying Southerners or Southern interests. Also, many Southern plantations were insured by Northern insurance companies (who didn’t have to pay off when the plantations were burned or destroyed by Union troops).
A very interesting book that addresses much of this is “Complicity: How the North Promoted, Prolonged, and Profited From Slavery,” by Anne Farrow. She and a couple others began their project to research the reparations-demanding activists’ claim of insurance companies making money off of slavery, and thus those companies should pay descendants of slaves reparations (you know, the old Jesse Jackson shakedown). Anne Farrow (and sorry, but I forget the other author or authors; I remembered her name because it reminded me of the Fay Raye character’s name in “King Kong”: Ann Darrow) was very surpised at what the research uncovered; specifically, that Northern interests were VERY much involved in slavery, up to and even during the Civil War.
Agreed. Which means that 4CJs claim that the tariff revenue went up because the North had to replace all that stuff they bought from the South prior to the rebellion can't be true. They got little other than agricultural products, mainly cotton, and there was no other source that they could replace it with. Even the UK, with their alternate sources, couldn't.
...that Northern interests were VERY much involved in slavery, up to and even during the Civil War.
Again, I agree. The South produced little other than agricutural produce. They didn't establish their own financial sector or retail sector or transportation sector, they chose to rely on others for that. The Southern plantation owner borrowed money for his seed, land and slaves from Northern bankers, insured them through Northern insurance firms, sold the cotton to brokers many of whom were Northern, shipped their goods on Northern ships and on railroads built and run on rails and equipment produced in the North. They could not operate without services provided by Northerners. And Northerners, in turn, made a lot of money off an industry dependent on slavery.