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Old 03-10-2017, 03:03 PM
 
11,989 posts, read 5,254,521 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by PedroMartinez View Post
My mother's family comes from Cullman Alabama with many from Winston County.

Two family members died in Confederate prison. Several others were send to prison but survived. One direct great great great grandfather had his wife die and two children at the time adopted off while he was in a military prison camp. Rumor has it that after release he murdered the man who was the local Confederate draft coordinator (or whatever he would have been called). Many of them lost family farms and did not get them back following the end of the war.

Not every southerner supported the war or slavery.

The reason passed down in my family for refusing to fight in the Confederate army was because they felt slavery was a sin and that the war was to keep slavery.

The war may have meant different things to different people at the time, but my relatives believed it was about slavery.

My father's family were damn furaners at the time with no dog in the hunt.

I'm actually not sure how I feel about the issue. I can see valid arguments on both sides. If I was forced to vote one way or another, I guess I'd have to side with removing the statues, but it would come with much trepidation.
I read somewhere there were over 100,000 white southerners who fought for the North in the Civil War. Coupled with blacks the total reached 300,000 men. That was a lot of manpower for an already outnumbered Confederacy to lose.

If it had not been for the issue of slavery, there would not have been a war. All of the other issues are offshoots of the South's defense of their "peculiar institution." As far as monuments are concerned, certainly no one is talking about removing monuments in cemeteries or desecrating the resting place of the vanquished. I think I read that there was a case in Memphis, about something honoring Bedford Forest, who after the war formed the Ku Klux Klan, that was located in a section that was now overwhelming black. It might have been the name of a place rather than a monument per se, but due to public pressure it was changed. It's a sensitive issue, but I think it needs to be approached on a case by case basis and consideration be given to the people living in those areas now, not what the public sentiment was in the 1870's.

 
Old 03-10-2017, 03:18 PM
 
9,613 posts, read 6,882,110 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by green_mariner View Post
Actually, the Colosseum is a ruin, and a monument of what used to be. Besides, after the fall of the Roman Empire, the people living there started hacking at it for stone. In a way, the Roman Colosseum already met kind of a demise.

Robert E. Lee got off lucky. Had he been tried as a traitor, things would have been different. Considering what he did, he should have been tried as a traitor. As for reconciliation, the only true reconciliation would have been this: The former Confederate states should have admitted that they were wrong. That is what it is. They were wrong. They started a war. They fired the first shot. They fired the first shot because they were desperate to keep and maintain slavery. Their way of life, cotton, antebellum mansions, it was based on buying and selling of human beings. It was based on white supremacy. William Tappan Thompson, the founder of the Savannah Morning News, said that the fight was to maintain white supremacy and slavery.



The Confederate states started this, period. The CSA was at fault, period. You don't "reconcile" that. The guilty party must understand that.
You're taking this way too personally. First off the entire country was founded on slavery. The slave trade was based out of New England. The families who made the most wealth from the slave trade were based out of Newport Rhode Island. It was their wealth that funded the first United States Navy to fight the British. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newport,_Rhode_Island
The powerful export economy the South's slavery based cash crops provided to the early United States brought in badly needed foreign currency that allowed the wealth of the United States to grow. Without slave based exports, the US wouldn't be what it is today. If you're ancestors were the slaves that made this happen, then thanks because the US is an awesome country today and its made both our lives better than if I were still in Europe and you were still in Africa.

As for Robert E Lee, you really should read up...https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert...#After_the_war
For the cliff notes...
" In his public statements and private correspondence, Lee argued that a tone of reconciliation and patience would further the interests of white Southerners better than hotheaded antagonism to federal authority or the use of violence. Lee repeatedly expelled white students from Washington College for violent attacks on local black men, and publicly urged obedience to the authorities and respect for law and order.[131] In 1869–70 he was a leader in successful efforts to establish state-funded schools for blacks.[132] He privately chastised fellow ex-Confederates such as Jefferson Davis and Jubal Early for their frequent, angry responses to perceived Northern insults, writing in private to them as he had written to a magazine editor in 1865, that "It should be the object of all to avoid controversy, to allay passion, give full scope to reason and to every kindly feeling. By doing this and encouraging our citizens to engage in the duties of life with all their heart and mind, with a determination not to be turned aside by thoughts of the past and fears of the future, our country will not only be restored in material prosperity, but will be advanced in science, in virtue and in religion."

Lee was not only a proponent of reconciliation, but for advancing free education for blacks in general, long before it was popular to do so. It was Lee's popularity among Southerners that enabled reconciliation to take place at all, otherwise the South could have easily descended into perpetual guerilla war on the North. That was Plan B for most organized Southern armies.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guerri...ican_Civil_War
 
Old 03-10-2017, 03:25 PM
 
11,989 posts, read 5,254,521 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cheesesteak Cravings View Post
Most of the revisionists and "Lost Causers" are generally just ignorant and try to say things like "black people fought for the South too!" and "Most white folks were poor and didn't even own slaves!" and the classic "it wasn't about slavery, but state's rights!".

All documentation of the southern states secession had absolutely everything to do with slavery as one of the main focal points. To their point yes, the Constitution at that time, did guarantee their "right" to own slaves, but it had been a point of contention essentially since the founding of the United States.

Louisiana did not publish a declaration of secession but here is an address by George Williamson to Texas:

All of the declarations of secession cite the preservation of slavery as the main motivator.

As for the poor white folk that still fought? As we know Southerners are deeply connected to their churches, and there are records of church sermons spreading preaching the validity of slavery, and the horrible things that would happen if african slaves were freed. The idea of african slaves being "equal" to poor white men was abhorrent.

As far as "state's rights", that argument goes out the window when you look at the provisions of the Fugitive Slave Act. Southern states wanted to utilize the powers of the Federal government to overrule northern state's abolition laws and guarantee (at tax payer's expense) the return of their "property". So to say the South had any regard for "state's rights" is an absolute LIE.
What I find interesting also in the document you posted was the over the top, clash of civilizations rhetoric used. It's tone isn't that different from some of the white nationalist rhetoric you see now, more than 150 years later.
 
Old 03-10-2017, 03:32 PM
 
9,613 posts, read 6,882,110 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Bureaucat View Post
I read somewhere there were over 100,000 white southerners who fought for the North in the Civil War. Coupled with blacks the total reached 300,000 men. That was a lot of manpower for an already outnumbered Confederacy to lose.

If it had not been for the issue of slavery, there would not have been a war. All of the other issues are offshoots of the South's defense of their "peculiar institution." As far as monuments are concerned, certainly no one is talking about removing monuments in cemeteries or desecrating the resting place of the vanquished. I think I read that there was a case in Memphis, about something honoring Bedford Forest, who after the war formed the Ku Klux Klan, that was located in a section that was now overwhelming black. It might have been the name of a place rather than a monument per se, but due to public pressure it was changed. It's a sensitive issue, but I think it needs to be approached on a case by case basis and consideration be given to the people living in those areas now, not what the public sentiment was in the 1870's.
I've always wondered but never got a straight answer on why the North cared either way. The South essentially became a foreign country. The North obviously didn't actually care about slavery in general otherwise they would have invaded Cuba, Brazil or any number of African countries. Contrary to popular opinion, the North wasn't a bunch of progressive humanitarians looking to make the world a better place.
While the Civil War was raging, they were committing atrocities on Native American's that even Nazis would be ashamed of: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sand_Creek_massacre
Of course the Emancipation Proclamation didn't apply to states that remained in the union, only those in rebellion. After the Civil War, freedmen weren't exactly welcome in the North either.

Why the North wanted to devastate the south and force to remain in the union makes no sense. It would be like if California seceded, and we burn it to the ground just to keep it from leaving even though its now producing nothing of value.
 
Old 03-10-2017, 05:19 PM
 
Location: Texas
3,251 posts, read 2,536,326 times
Reputation: 3127
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ziggy100 View Post
All this is negligible. Today the war could be fought over carbon taxes or health care. The overall point was if region permanently loses parity at the federal level, and the federal government is bent on destroying the basis of your economy is it time to break away and become your own country?
This is too difficult of a concept for those who hung up on slavery itself. If that's all you get out of this particular history lesson, you'll be doomed to repeat the issues that caused the war in the first place. Slavery is simply an interchangeable term in this case.
In this case of the war itself, the North gave up on the high road and reduced themselves to brutal terror campaigns against civilians. That's what turned Confederate soldiers heros. If you don't want the enemy idolized, then don't act worse than the enemy.
Haha, "negligible" facts. Good deflection.

The fact of the matter is the South wanted the Northern states to accept their institution of slavery in complete disregard for Northern abolitionist and freedmen laws. Under many Northern state's laws, a slave crossing their border were automatically freed. Southern slave owners did not like that they could not risk traveling into Northern states without the risk of legally losing their slaves under the "Once Free, Always Free" doctrine that many northern states adopted. I'm sure you're familiar with the Dredd Scott case.

Under the Fugitive Slave Act, any person could be deputized anywhere in the Union to apprehend fugitive slaves or risk fines and jail time. All law enforcement and courts were required to abide by this law as it was a Federal law.

The fugitive slave act was dubbed a "kidnapping act" since there was absolutely not legal recourse for blacks under the law anywhere in the United States to prove they were not fugitives, or even ex-slaves. A free black man born in Maine and residing in Maine could be detained and sent back South to be sold into slavery. If that's not an act of "terror" I don't know what is.

Under the CSA's constitution no Confederate state was allowed to pass any kind of anti-slavery act of any kind (remember State's rights).
Quote:
Sec. 2. (I) The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States; and shall have the right of transit and sojourn in any State of this Confederacy, with their slaves and other property; and the right of property in said slaves shall not be thereby impaired.
 
Old 03-10-2017, 05:25 PM
 
9,613 posts, read 6,882,110 times
Reputation: 6842
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cheesesteak Cravings View Post
Haha, "negligible" facts. Good deflection.

The fact of the matter is the South wanted the Northern states to accept their institution of slavery in complete disregard for Northern abolitionist and freedmen laws. Under many Northern state's laws, a slave crossing their border were automatically freed. Southern slave owners did not like that they could not risk traveling into Northern states without the risk of legally losing their slaves under the "Once Free, Always Free" doctrine that many northern states adopted. I'm sure you're familiar with the Dredd Scott case.

Under the Fugitive Slave Act, any person could be deputized anywhere in the Union to apprehend fugitive slaves or risk fines and jail time. All law enforcement and courts were required to abide by this law as it was a Federal law.

The fugitive slave act was dubbed a "kidnapping act" since there was absolutely not legal recourse for blacks under the law anywhere in the United States to prove they were not fugitives, or even ex-slaves. A free black man born in Maine and residing in Maine could be detained and sent back South to be sold into slavery. If that's not an act of "terror" I don't know what is.

Under the CSA's constitution no Confederate state was allowed to pass any kind of anti-slavery act of any kind (remember State's rights).
What does this have to do with anything?
Replace "slavery" with "carbon tax" or whatever. You're wrapped up in details and not seeing the forest through the trees. Might work for Jeopardy, but history has otherwise taught you nothing.
 
Old 03-10-2017, 05:41 PM
 
Location: Texas
3,251 posts, read 2,536,326 times
Reputation: 3127
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ziggy100 View Post
What does this have to do with anything?
Replace "slavery" with "carbon tax" or whatever. You're wrapped up in details and not seeing the forest through the trees. Might work for Jeopardy, but history has otherwise taught you nothing.
If you remove slavery from the equation the entire Civil War and the Secession of the Southern states makes no sense.How do you learn from history if you omit so much of it?
 
Old 03-10-2017, 05:49 PM
 
9,613 posts, read 6,882,110 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cheesesteak Cravings View Post
If you remove slavery from the equation the entire Civil War and the Secession of the Southern states makes no sense.How do you learn from history if you omit so much of it?
No. You're trying to make this a dried out argument over what the war was fought over. I'm telling you it doesn't matter. If all you get out of the war is it was about slavery or good vs evil or whatever narrative you want to create to match your high school history test, then you learned nothing at all. Plenty of civil wars have nothing to do with slaves. I personally don't care one way or the other. Slavery wasn't the worse thing our ancestors have done.
 
Old 03-10-2017, 05:56 PM
 
Location: *
13,242 posts, read 4,886,150 times
Reputation: 3461
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ziggy100 View Post
No. You're trying to make this a dried out argument over what the war was fought over. I'm telling you it doesn't matter. If all you get out of the war is it was about slavery or good vs evil or whatever narrative you want to create to match your high school history test, then you learned nothing at all. Plenty of civil wars have nothing to do with slaves. I personally don't care one way or the other. Slavery wasn't the worse thing our ancestors have done.
Re: bold: Is this the crux of your argument?
 
Old 03-10-2017, 06:10 PM
 
626 posts, read 378,506 times
Reputation: 370
Quote:
Originally Posted by ChiGeekGuest View Post
Re: bold: Is this the crux of your argument?
You're really struggling with this aren't you...

The left has turned the Civil War into one issue, slavery. In reality, it was much more than that and happens in plenty of countries for different reasons besides slavery. Boiling the Civil War down to just slavery makes us doomed to repeat it.

And I liked the analogy that it was basically like us burning California to the ground after they tried to secede for no reason other than to just do it.
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