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And import duties protected northern manufacturing and tied the south to them as a market. While the south did not pay direct import duties on northern manufactured goods, they did pay indirect duties, in that they were reflected in higher prices. Relaxing tariffs in 1860 was too little, too late, if its purpose was to forestall a war.
The tariff in effect in 1860 was the Tariff of 1857, passed with the support of the southern states and some New England states, reduced the tariff rate to roughly 17% and was enacted primarily in response to a federal budget surplus in the mid 1850's. In comparison, the Tariff of 1846 had an effective rate of 25%, the Tariff of 1842 had an effective rate of about 40%, and the Tariff of 1833 had reduced tariffs to about 20% by 1842. Don't get me started about the fiasco that was the Tariff of 1828, unless you want to hear about how John C Calhoun shot himself in the foot, politically speaking.
Import tariffs had been declining since 1846, fifteen years before the Civil War. And the import tariff in 1860 was routinely evaded by importers, who paid one price for their imported goods, but for tax purposes were provided by their European suppliers with invoices listing much lower prices, allowing the importers to dodge paying the full tariff on their goods. Add in the economic crisis known as the Panic of 1857, which hit the North Eastern states particularly hard while leaving most of the South untouched, and you see a rise in demand for protectionist tariffs from the New England states. Additionally, that same economic downturn, combined with the lower tariffs, nearly drove the federal government into default.
Now if the Southern states hadn't decided to take their ball and go home (along with a lot of stuff that belonged to the federal military), then maybe their representatives and senators would have stayed in Congress and maybe the Morrill Tariff of 1861 wouldn't have passed in its final form; maybe the tariff would be a lesser rate and not as protectionist. But we'll never know.
Additionally, the tariffs always fell more heavily upon those who spent more. The average South Carolina aristocratic planter, with more disposable income and a taste for European goods, certainly felt the bite more keenly than the average North Carolina farmer. The average Midwestern farmers didn't seem to have any issues with tariffs, or at least none that caused them to rebel.
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The notion of Lincoln going to war to force recovery of lost import duties (or any other duties) seems illogical to me. Those duties were already lost in the seceding states and wouldn't be recovered by starting a long war (while the public might have hoped for a short war, I doubt that was Lincoln's expectation).
Some neo-confederates believe that Lincoln went to war to recover lost government revenues.
I do not hold to the neo-confederate belief system.
"The Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as ..."
The south would have waged war against the north anyway, whether any article of the constitution which would have threatened its way of life would have been amended, or not we will never know...
Mario, are you aware that Congress can only propose amendments, that it takes two thirds of both chambers of Congress to propose an amendment, and that it takes three fourths of the states to approve a proposed amendment before said amendment is ratified?
The South badly wanted border states such as Virginian and Maryland to secede. I suspect that Davis was trying to force them off the fence. As we know it worked; within days.
A valid point. If the CSA doesn't assert it's sovereignty, if it keeps being ignored by the USA, then how long before it falls apart.
Mario, are you aware that Congress can only propose amendments, that it takes two thirds of both chambers of Congress to propose an amendment, and that it takes three fourths of the states to approve a proposed amendment before said amendment is ratified?
More hypotheses? If for argument's sake, no attack on FT Sumter took place, and regardless, all southern states "seceded" from the union. The Congress would have simply considered those southern state representatives absent. It would have been unprecedented. The article would have been amended and in theory it would have affected all southern states the most. Now you have a volatile situation where the entire south is on default. Federal troops march to the south to confiscate all Confederate banks and protect the new people taking over their banking system and you have a recipe for disaster. All this highly speculative on my part, of course.
The tariff in effect in 1860 was the Tariff of 1857, passed with the support of the southern states and some New England states, reduced the tariff rate to roughly 17% and was enacted primarily in response to a federal budget surplus in the mid 1850's. In comparison, the Tariff of 1846 had an effective rate of 25%, the Tariff of 1842 had an effective rate of about 40%...
Which is still a relatively high tariff. Lowering the tariff might have been reflective of northern industries and mills being less in need of protection than earlier. The history of protectionist tariffs dating back several decades certainly added to Southern resentments.
I agree that the Morrill Tariff Law of 1861 should be more correctly considered to be an effect of Secession, rather than a cause, in that it was the absence of seceding senators that enabled its passage.
Which is still a relatively high tariff. Lowering the tariff might have been reflective of northern industries and mills being less in need of protection than earlier. The history of protectionist tariffs dating back several decades certainly added to Southern resentments.
Gotta ask, a relatively high tariff, compared to what? A 17% relative tariff was certainly lower than all previous tariffs going back to 1828, and that rate still wasn't enough to fund a pre-Civil War federal government.
And yes, there was a political struggle between the Southern aristocracy and the New England manufacturers with regards to tariffs and protectionism, going back to George Washington's first administration, with Alexander Hamilton leading the charge for protectionism. Still, protectionism wasn't the cause of secession, despite attempts to nail it onto the list of grievances.
More hypotheses? If for argument's sake, no attack on FT Sumter took place, and regardless, all southern states "seceded" from the union. The Congress would have simply considered those southern state representatives absent. It would have been unprecedented. The article would have been amended and in theory it would have affected all southern states the most. Now you have a volatile situation where the entire south is on default. Federal troops march to the south to confiscate all Confederate banks and protect the new people taking over their banking system and you have a recipe for disaster. All this highly speculative on my part, of course.
Ah! Something that we finally agree upon!
So as I see it, you're embarked on an imaginary game of 'what-if', wherein anything you can think up becomes a potential alternate history vis a vis the Civil War.
Now unless I'm allowed to mention a battle fleet of Utgardian space ships, hiding in orbit around Jupiter, awaiting Southern secession so that they might ally with the Confederate States of America and together defeat the evil tyrant Abraham Lincoln and his entire subterranean lizard army, I think I'll bow out now.
Ran across this while lurking around the net. An interesting history of the building of Ft. Sumter and the strange tale of how it became in possession of the United States government.
On November 22, 1841, all issues regarding ownership of the fort were cleared up as the Federal Government was granted title to 125 acres of harbor "land" recorded in the office of the Secretary of State of South Carolina.
Now unless I'm allowed to mention a battle fleet of Utgardian space ships, hiding in orbit around Jupiter, awaiting Southern secession so that they might ally with the Confederate States of America and together defeat the evil tyrant Abraham Lincoln and his entire subterranean lizard army, I think I'll bow out now.
What's your problem? The fact that you can't understand that war was inevitable anyway, or the fact that my scenario is less ridiculous than offering an amendment to end secession which would have no point in it, if it were already unconstitutional???
On the other hand, the first shots fired were by the Confederacy at Fort Sumter, so it could be argued that it was the South that was fighting Lincoln (and in many ways still is).
All true, Donk. But those shots were fired when Union forces refused to leave a foreign country. Foreign, because South Carolina had already seceded from the Union, and the CSA had already been established.
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