Answer: Slavery was an important part of their economy
Step-by-step explanation:
Southern America at the time relied heavily on plantation farming to produce many goods that they exported to the rest of the world and also the North. Crops such as cotton and indigo were in high demand.
Farming these crops was gruesome work and required hard labor. This is why the South used enslaved people. They also wanted to keep labor costs at a minimum and enslaved people were not paid so slavery kept costs down. It was simply too important to their economy.