The market revolution promoted both slavery and freedom. As the 1800s progressed, American society changed from a subsistence society to one that produced commercial products. This development was furthered by the use of the steam engine. New machines were used to make and to transport products.

Many Americans gained more freedom because they were more easily able to move to new areas to start new businesses or to start new farms. They had many opportunities to get land cheaply in order to start these new business ventures or to begin farming. The country grew as Americans moved westward. The economy also grew as a result of these changes.

In the South, the use of machines, especially the cotton gin, promoted the use of slavery. With the use of the cotton gin, more cotton could be used to make clothes. As cotton farming expanded in the South, so did the use of slaves. As northern industries used new machines to make cotton clothes quickly, the demand for cotton rose. Additionally, other countries increased their demand for cotton grown in the southern part of the United States. Thus, more slaves were needed and were used in the South.

The market revolution created much tension as explained by Pohnpei, because different events were pulling the state of affairs in different directions. The North and Europe had abolished slavery and were actively pressurizing the South to do the same. This eventually worked to stop the slave trade but not slavery itself, especially in the South. There was increasing need for products such as cotton by the industries in the North from the plantations in the South. Ironically, while the Northerners were against slavery, they did fuel its survival because of their increasing demands on the South, who relied mostly on slaves to work in the plantations. Slaves, on the other hand, fought their way to the North in pursuit of the highly available industrial jobs, and those that succeeded supported those left in the South in the fight against slavery. These different forces brought about the tension between slavery and freedom during the market revolution period.

The market revolution demanded and promoted both freedom and slavery, bringing them into greater tension.

On the one hand, the market revolution promoted freedom.  It gave people the opportunity to break away from traditional ways and find new ways of making money and living life.  It also needed freedom because it needed people who could move around to find work and who had the mental freedom to devise new businesses and ways of doing business.

At the same time, it demanded more slavery.  One thing that it did was to create higher demand for clothing.  This demand was filled in large part through cotton from the South.  This created more of a demand for slaves.