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GS is very correct regarding the rail roads and issues of moving the food. The tax issue is way more complex, but again GS is correct. The wealthiest tended to actually pay their taxes when asked and many did far more by investing on CSA bonds. There were many hurdles to financing the war for the south.
Your point is also valid though as it was not until the very end of the war that slaves were to be counted for purposes of taxation. It was legalese regarding the method within the CSA to levy a direct tax and then the ability to conduct the census that held it up. All of which would support your argument that it was quickly viewed as a "Rich man's war and a poor man's fight" (as all wars generally are). However, it was not lack of willingness to pay, or hiding from paying that drove it.
You originally wrote that the wealthy refused to pay their taxes. Now you have changed that to they didn't want to have their taxes raised.
And this contradiction on your part is followed by a bunch of snarky remarks from you. Get the sack before you do the sack dance.
No, you are wrong again. I never wrote the wealthy southerners refused to pay their legal taxes. As you previously quoted me "The Southern wealthy class refused to pay the taxes that would have been required for the South to win the war." Then I provided references to back that up. The South desperately needed increased tax revenue to fight the war. Confederate President Davis could make no headway with the wealthy slave owners.
Last edited by Graywhiskers; 08-16-2017 at 04:26 PM..
I think the war was started by southern elitists who got their pantys in a wad when they lost an election and saw that the artificial out sized political influence they had enjoyed since the signing of the constitution was eroding away. They led their fellow countryman in rebellion against the legitimate government and got everything they deserved.
No.
You'r not answering my question, just injecting your personal opinion as if it's current event.
I want know exactly why somebody wants to "preserve a union" that is in ruins and at the cost of over 600k lives. Most importantly, would that same "sense of preservation" be true today knowing in retrospect the full cost of such effort.
The Union had overwhelming advantages in everything, but most importantly in manpower, food and manufacturing capacity. One of the little known facts is that the north...not the south...contained the nations primary "breadbaskets" that produced the nations food supply and food exports. Southern agriculture was largely dedicated to cash crops like cotton and food production was secondary. Combine that with a much larger population being reinforced by immigration and true manufacturing capacity and it's a miracle the south lasted as long as they did.
It really wasn't "aggression" as much as it was the north finally applying all of their major advantages and locking the south into a war of attrition on their home soil.
While our country has far less factory workers than we did say 50 years ago, we actually are producing vastly more than we did 50 years ago. The US is the second largest manufacturing nation on Earth. China only just edged out the US in total manufacturing output in 2010 and their lead has only recently expanded beyond a rounding error. Even then, the US leads the world in virtually all complex and high tech manufacturing categories. This whole "we lost our manufacturing" is simply untrue. We lost the need for hundreds of thousands of people to do those jobs, but we produce more than we ever have. It's not China, Mexico and trade deals gutting the manufacturing workforce. It's automation.
Absolutely. That's really the story.
The north was about preserving the union, not abolishing slavery. The view was simple, the south was in the midst of rebellion and that rebellion needed to be put down. No different than any other rebellion. Eventually the cause of ending slavery became tied into the war, but it was never the primary goal. Ending slavery was a result of the civil war, not its purpose.
The south was about preserving slavery and saw the writing on the wall in regards to the political shift in the country. Basically, slavery would be contained to where it existed and would eventually whither and die as the south lost it's political power as the nation expanded into new free territories.
That's the typical narrative, but what does the North get out of "preserving the union".
The south lost bc the goal of the North was morally superior .
Then the North turned to the annihilation of Native Americans. Let's not pretend the North was a morally just society.
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