Mike, while I agree with much of your analysis I have to take issue with the characterization of slavery as a capitalist phenomenon. Slavery has been prevalent in non-capitalist societies for the simple reason that if there’s little or no capital available to be invested in productivity-enhancing ways, slavery offers the only means whereby to achieve a greater output than the slave-owner could achieve on their own. That’s why slavery was endemic throughout human history precisely until the Industrial Revolution and faded rapidly (in the West) thereafter.

The Greeks had slaves, the Romans had slaves, the Phoenicians had slaves, and almost all African tribal societies had slaves. Indeed the slave trade, which for many hundreds of years was largely organized by the Arab world in conjunction with tribal chiefs, was in existence for centuries before Western Europeans appeared on the scene and began to take advantage of it.

The Southern US States were pre-industrial, which is why they had to rely on slave labor; the North in contrast didn’t need slaves because capitalism was the dominant economic model and capitalism increased productivity via mechanical means. In short, capitalism is what killed slavery. Slavery was never a capitalist phenomenon.