"In When Slavery Was Called Freedom, author John Patrick Daly astutely dissects the evangelical defense of slavery at the heart of the nineteenth century's sectional crisis. He brings a new understanding to the role of religion in the Old South and the ways in which religion was put to use in the Confederacy. Southern evangelicals argued that their unique region was destined for greatness, and their rhetoric gave expression and a degree of coherence to the grassroots assumptions of the South.".

"The North and South shared assumptions about freedom, prosperity, and morality. The ferocity of the slavery debate and the war reflected each region's struggle to control strikingly similar identities. Though the two sides drew different practical conclusions. Daly explains that antislavery and proslavery emerged from the same evangelical roots. Both Northerners and Southerners interpreted the Bible and Christian moral dictates in light of individualism and free market economics."--BOOK JACKET.