for this type of work. By 1960, in the key states of Alabama,
Louisiana, and Mississippi, almost half of production had
become mechanized. Just as blacks became harder to
trap in the South, they also became no longer
indispensable for the plantation owners. There was thus
less reason for elites to fight vigorously to maintain the old
extractive economic institutions. This did not mean that they
would accept the changes in institutions willingly, however.
Instead, a protracted conflict ensued. An unusual coalition,
between southern blacks and the inclusive federal
institutions of the United States, created a powerful force
away from southern extraction and toward equal political
and civil rights for southern blacks, which would finally
remove the significant barriers to economic growth in the
U.S. South.
The most important impetus for change came from the
civil rights movement. It was the empowerment of blacks in
the South that led the way, as in Montgomery, by
challenging extractive institutions around them, by
demanding their rights, and by protesting and mobilizing in
order to obtain them. But they weren’t alone in this,
because the U.S. South was not a separate country and the
southern elites did not have free rein as did Guatemalan
elites, for example. As part of the United States of America,
the South was subject to the U.S. Constitution and federal
legislation. The cause for fundamental reform in the South
would finally receive support from the U.S. executive,
legislature, and Supreme Cou