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To me the biggest tragedy is how this bit of history still tears some present day Americans apart. Some southerners hate northerners based on it, some northerners hate the south based on it... I hope we finally get over it and be completely unified some day.
Honestly, at times, I can't help but think those still "angry" about it are the types that just look for things to be angry about... I mean I could certainly understand descendants of a well-to-do southern family that became impoverished after the war and remain so to this day, but can't help but think that's a large dose of blaming others for your own problems...
Half of my family is from Connecticut and the other half owned a plantation in Kentucky... Neither cares much about it.
I think "discussing" the war brings about anger mainly due to intellectual disagreement moreso than a feeling of personal stake... Sure, there are some in the South that really do need to let the anger go, but again, you'll notice they usually get riled up only when the discussion is brought to them... At least in my experience.
I seriously doubt that even had the South won the war, there would have been two countries for long. They'd have found a way to re-integrate, probably within 10 years. There was just too much that tied the two parts together.
Eh, I don't know... I can't imagine that after fighting a war in order to govern themselves (and adding up associated losses in doing so) that they would be too anxious to give up their independence from the North again....
MY theory has always been that at least a second war would have been waged over territory in the West, however....
NJGOAT---C'mon man, you're smarter than that. To believe that slavery was the reason for secession, one would have to believe that Lincoln was going to abolish slavery immediately upon his inauguration. That wasn't about to happen.
No, it wasn't over the abolishment of slavery, that never really became a war aim until after Antietam and the Emancipation Proclamation. However, it was very much about the expansion of slavery to the territories and the political power that brought with it.
The South was dependent upon the 3/5th's compromise to prop up their position in the House of Represenatives, though they were still the minority there. What they were really dependent on was their position in the Senate where each state gets equal representation.
As the country expanded a very conscious effort was made to add states that maintained the status quo, one slave state gets added, one free state gets added and vice versa. This kept the balance of power in the Senate. What the South was concerned with was actions regarding territories that were being settled that would upset this balance. Hence a series of "Compromises" and "Acts" that attempted to walk the line.
It was the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854 that allowed popular vote in a territory on whether to be slave or free that proved the tipping point. The Republican Party was formed and rapidly rose to power in the North on a platform of containing slavery where it existed.
Lincoln's election ended a long running string of pro-South President's and it seemed power had swung to the North and containment of slavery became a real possibility. If that happened, the South would rapidly lose the balance of power in the Senate which would make possible the abolition of slavery.
So, the war was not about the abolishment of slavery, but it was about slavery vis-a-vis the political power associated with it. Hence my statement that the war was about slavery is entirely correct. The issue of "states rights" and "northern aggression" was merely a convenient excuse for the Southern power elite to get the majority of the population that were poor white farmers to side with their cause.
If the war was about States Rights as some claim, then we are left with the absurd proposition that the South seceeded for the purpose of proving that they could.
States Rights was employed as one of the legal justifications for secession, it did not cause secession, it wasn't the reason that the Southern States felt a need to depart.
If the war was about States Rights as some claim, then we are left with the absurd proposition that the South seceeded for the purpose of proving that they could.
States Rights was employed as one of the legal justifications for secession, it did not cause secession, it wasn't the reason that the Southern States felt a need to depart.
Now, define the war from the Northern perspective...
They admittedly weren't fighting to end slavery, so then what was it?
"To preserve the Union". (ie. A denial of a state's right to leave the Union).
Secession was most certainly about slavery. A war was fought over the question of State's Rights.
Now, define the war from the Northern perspective...
They admittedly weren't fighting to end slavery, so then what was it?
"To preserve the Union". (ie. A denial of a state's right to leave the Union).
Secession was most certainly about slavery. A war was fought over the question of State's Rights.
Suppose that your personal situation deteriorated to a point so desperate that you decided to rob a bank rather than have your family starve.
In the process of that attempt, alarms go off, the police arrive and a gun battle erupts.
Now, we may say that the cause of the gun battle was the bank robbery, but a larger and more accurate understanding tells us that the major cause of it all was your impoverished and desperate situation. You were not robbing the bank to try and establish your right to rob the bank.
So, if you wish to go about saying that the cause was the bank robbery, you are not incorrect, you are incomplete, you are ignoring the larger picture.
The South, with a minority of the nation's population, was for a long time able to exercise politcal power equal to the North which had three times as many free citizens, because of the structure of the Senate and the commonality of slave interests. When that became threatened, they decided to walk out.
So..was the true cause of the war the threat to their political power, or was it their walking out to try and preserve that political power? Walking out was the means, preserving political power was the cause.
Last edited by Grandstander; 05-19-2011 at 10:29 AM..
If the South was truly and deeply concerned with the issue of States Rights, it it was some principle held so dear by them that they would invest blood and treasure to preserve it, how does one account for their behavior in relation to the Fugitive Slave law?
If, as the Southern doctrine insists, States have individual rights to nullify laws which they deem immoral or unconstitutional, why in the billy blazes were they so enraged by the Northern states which were practicing a defacto nullification of that law by refusing to cooperate with it? Why wasn't their attitude..."Well, I'd like to recover my runaway slaves, but Ohio has a right to ignore that Fugitive Slave law, so, that is that."
And of course one could hold up the same mirror of hypocrisy to the North and point out that the Federalists were not so very Federal when it came to that one particular national law.
In truth, these arguments over doctrine are a waste of time because throughout history, doctrines get ignored or forgotten when promoting them will cause harm to those promoting them.
They are good doctrines when it is others who are being hurt by them, bad doctrines when it becomes personal pain. People who were strong advocates of the three strikes laws, suddenly see the need to make an exception when it is a family member facing some 25 year sentence because of three minor felonies. The Catholic Church condemns homosexuality, but when it was their own priests indulging in the practice with minors, they went with the cover up route. Northerners who villified the South for its treatment of the freed slaves, didn't go so far as to welcoming them up North and treating them as full citizens there.
Doctrine is most frequently our rationalization, our official permission as it were, to do something which comes at the expense of someone else.
Suppose that your personal situation deteriorated to a point so desperate that you decided to rob a bank rather than have your family starve.
In the process of that attempt, alarms go off, the police arrive and a gun battle erupts.
Now, we may say that the cause of the gun battle was the bank robbery, but a larger and more accurate understanding tells us that the major cause of it all was your impoverished and desperate situation. You were not robbing the bank to try and establish your right to rob the bank.
So, if you wish to go about saying that the cause was the bank robbery, you are not incorrect, you are incomplete, you are ignoring the larger picture.
The South, with a minority of the nation's population, was for a long time able to exercise politcal power equal to the North which had three times as many free citizens, because of the structure of the Senate and the commonality of slave interests. When that became threatened, they decided to walk out.
So..was the true cause of the war the threat to their political power, or was it their walking out to try and preserve that political power? Walking out was the means, preserving political power was the cause.
I like this example. You can't take one piece of the chain of events even if it was the one immediately preceeding the war and make that the sole cause.
Yes, the North went to war to preserve the Union, which can be construed as a battle over the right of a state to secede. However, doing so ignores the reason there was a secession in the first place, which was all about political power and the way it related to slavery.
I think a lot of folks arguing the South's case choose to ignore the chain of events as it paints the South as a spoil sport, trying to take their ball and go home if you will. Focusing solely on the war being about the right to secede lends far more credit to the Southern cause than saying the slave owner aristocracy felt their political clout was threatened which could have led to their economic wealth being threatened.
If the South was truly and deeply concerned with the issue of States Rights, it it was some principle held so dear by them that they would invest blood and treasure to preserve it, how does one account for their behavior in relation to the Fugitive Slave law?
If, as the Southern doctrine insists, States have individual rights to nullify laws which they deem immoral or unconstitutional, why in the billy blazes were they so enraged by the Northern states which were practicing a defacto nullification of that law by refusing to cooperate with it? Why wasn't their attitude..."Well, I'd like to recover my runaway slaves, but Ohio has a right to ignore that Fugitive Slave law, so, that is that."
And of course one could hold up the same mirror of hypocrisy to the North and point out that the Federalists were not so very Federal when it came to that one particular national law.
In truth, these arguments over doctrine are a waste of time because throughout history, doctrines get ignored or forgotten when promoting them will cause harm to those promoting them.
They are good doctrines when it is others who are being hurt by them, bad doctrines when it becomes personal pain. People who were strong advocates of the three strikes laws, suddenly see the need to make an exception when it is a family member facing some 25 year sentence because of three minor felonies. The Catholic Church condemns homosexuality, but when it was their own priests indulging in the practice with minors, they went with the cover up route. Northerners who villified the South for its treatment of the freed slaves, didn't go so far as to welcoming them up North and treating them as full citizens there.
Doctrine is most frequently our rationalization, our official permission as it were, to do something which comes at the expense of someone else.
This may not be a good enough answer, but I always felt it was a sort of "Disrespect of property rights", even if that property was blacks that alot of people went up in arms over in the South.
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