What is the topic being discussed in this document? The Impact of Disease
The charge of genocide is largely sustained by figures showing the precipitous
decline of the Indian population. Although scholars debate the exact numbers,
in Alvin Josephy's estimate, the Indian population fell from between fifteen and
twenty million when the white man first arrived to a fraction of that 150 years
later. Undoubtedly the Indians perished in great numbers. Yet although
European enslavement of Indians and the Spanish forced labor system extracted
a heavy toll in lives, the vast majority of Indian casualties occurred not as a
result of hard labor or deliberate destruction but because of contagious
diseases that the Europeans transmitted to the Indians. The spread of infection
and unhealthy patterns of behavior was also reciprocal. From the Indians the
Europeans contracted syphilis. The Indians also taught the white man about
tobacco and cocaine, which would extract an incalculable human toll over the
next several centuries. The Europeans, for their part, gave the Indians measles
and smallpox. Since the Indians had not developed any resistance or immunity
to these unfamiliar ailments, they perished in catastrophic numbers.

from the religious point of view, the conflicts began because of the enmity between catholic and protestants. in 1649, at the insistence of baltimore, the colonial assembly approved the act of religious tolerance, the first law in the colonies granting freedom of worship, though only for christians. in 1654, however, with the protestants of maryland in the majority, the act was revoked. the almost civil war broke out and order was not restored until 1658, when lord baltimore was returned to power.

on the issue of class conflict, the chesapeake region offered few economic opportunities to contract employees who had served their term of obligation. even with the small amount of capital needed to grow tobacco, former hired servants at best became subsistence farmers, a mature class for those called to rebellion, such as those proposed by nathaniel bacon. as the number of new hired workers declined because of limited chances of progress and reports of severe treatment, they were replaced by african slaves.

from the racial point of view, after 1660, the chesapeake colonies imposed laws that defined slavery as a lifelong and hereditary condition based on race. this made slaves profitable because planters could rely not only on their work but also on their children. the slave population, which numbered four thousand in virginia and maryland in 1675, grew significantly by the end of the century.

a. by accepting the election of president abraham lincoln in 1860 and convincing other southern states to do the same