Picture a world that is so corrupt, that one group of people control the world economy This group has all of the power and will do anything that it takes to keep themselves happy. In this type of world the majority of people would be poor and unable to live successful lives. This type of government not only existed in the past, but remains present in some countries today. It is my belief, that this is the world’s future unless the human race works to change their ways and becomes less selfish. Economic problems were the major driving forces behind Bacon's Rebellion , and shaped the world as we know it today.
From the beginning of the Jamestown colony its main purposes were to develop as a well functioning colony with a strong economy. From the inception of life in this new land it was seen as a means to get rich quick. There were vast acres of fertile land ripe for farming unlike the environment in England where every piece of land was already owned. Initially the settlers were unsuccessful at farming and many of the early citizens died of starvation. Eventually they discovered a profitable crop know as tobacco. Once found, the colonists began to grow massive amounts, which in turn made the Jamestown economy flourish. Soon there was a huge separation between the rich tobacco plantation owner and the poorer farmers.
During this time of new settlements, many economic problems started to occur. "These problems included declining tobacco prices, weather problems; including hailstorms, floods, dry spells, and hurricanes, growing commercial competition from Maryland and the Carolinas, an increasingly restricted English market, and the rising prices from English manufactured goods caused problems for the Virginians” (http://www.nps.gov/archive/colo/Jthanout/BacRebel.html,) as this source states these problems continued plaguing the colonist’s economy blow after blow. These facts demonstrate how there are so many factors that can cause the economy to fail. I believe that this was a major contributing problem that influenced the start of Bacon’s rebellion. These problems affected the large tobacco farmers dramatically, but poorer farmers like Bacon were the ones who really suffered the most economically. If the economy at that time was prosperous then I believe Bacon’s group would never have had a problem with the order of things. With this huge inequality Bacon and his men were forced to find ways to not only improve their own plight but to improve the whole colonies economy as well.
With the economy diminishing Bacon and his followers thought it was time to act and soon the rebellion began. It started with Bacon’s people trying to find a way to blame someone else for their misfortunes. The unlucky people they chose were the Indians. Instead of them trying to work harder on their own land they started to think that everything would be easier if they could take more land. So Bacon’s people started at first by just spreading over past the land that was theirs and into the Indians land. This caused the Governor at that time to intervene. Soon the colonist were fighting between following the land treaties and trying to just make everyone’s lives more profitable. It ended in Bacon’s people getting defeated. Our history book says “The ruling elite concluded that it was safer for the colonists to fight Indians rather than each other, and the government made little effort to restrict encroachment on Indian lands. (The American Promise page 93). I believe that the book did not go into how significant this decision truly was. It did not talk about how this decision came to be or what the aftermaths of making it would be. My opinion is that this decision was one of the most important ones in shaping the future of the Chesapeake society.
This Decision to break Indian treaties and do what was best for the colonies own needs, caused economy to improve not only in the Chesapeake area but all over east coast. As Joshua Cleveland says “Bacon’s Rebellion was a turning point in Virginia and in colonial history.” (http://www.wm.edu/niahd/journals/index.php?browse=entry&id=4124). As Cleveland states here this whole rebellion had much more effect on the world then just in Jamestown. It actually started to change the way in which colonists would take and use their land. This is because once the Englishmen started to break Indian land treaties they started to have even more land for which they could grow crops. In the end the new land they acquired made the economy only improve dramatically. Soon after the rebellion land started to be farmed more without any borders in the way. This caused Virginia and other east coast colonies to be one of the largest assets to England economy. This is one of those parts of history that people say was not morally right. But they simply need to understand that almost all of the actions of these early colonists were for economic profit and without a good economy the world is nothing. In my opinion I think that our world always has been based around creating this good economy and without one everything just crumbles to dust. So I think that even though the colonists broke their land treaties and killed many Indians, if the economy improved then it was all worth it
This style of do anything for the good of the economy is still present all over the world today. One example is how people in third world countries are getting paid slave wages making goods that the world depends on. While these people are getting treated terribly we must ask ourselves what we would do without these goods. The truth is that right now the way the world runs is based primary on who ever has the most money has the most power. This is the main problem with not only America but the whole entire world. The truth is that economy as it is now is based around making one group of people incredibly rich and the rest very poor. So we must accept that this is how the world works and there is no way it will change anytime soon so I say forget your morals and just do whatever is in your best economic interest. Now that you understand this we can go back and compare today’s world with Bacon’s rebellion. If you do this then you will obviously see that both in the past and still today the world is based off of one simple thing, that thing is economic profit. With out it there is no world that could exist.
Without economy there is no world. This is a statement that I have spent many hours contemplating over and over again. In the end I believe that I came to the conclusion that the world as we know it is doomed. I came to this conclusion by realizing that without money right now there is no way to live a successful life. With this being the way things are more then half of the population of the world is suffering. My hope is that some day the human race will evolve past their greedy ways, and then maybe we will finally have a world that I would be proud to live in. Bacon’s Rebellion was just one of these examples of economy causing people to turn into greedy monsters. Hopefully people will someday be able to learn from these past events and then start to try and change the world to a state of peace.
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