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You had better teachers than some of us. That is advanced thinking for high school history, because they tend to teach to the lowest level of ability to absorb the teachings.
The quote above is the best informed or at least best expressed post in this thread. If you want to boil it down to ridiculously simplistic generalizations - the war was about "You cannot tell me what to do" Slavery was a trigger for many people not for all, but the real issue was who was in charge of everyone else.
. We are going there again it seems. The extremists are loud and divisive while the majority in the middle just get carried along. I doubt it was any different then. We are divided now not because of gay marriage, or wedding cakes, or Immigration, or abortion, or human impact climate change, but because one side does not want the other side to have control and neither side will listen to the other. That is the bottom line. Everyone's specific trigger issue is different and often changing. We are once again divided by the concept that we do not want the other guys to be in charge of us. We criminalize, dehumanize ridcule the other side without listening at all to what they say or thinking about their reasons. I frequently hear or see "I stopped listening after the third word he said" or similar. No one will listen. I am right and they are wrong. If they utter one word contrary to my sides beliefs, they are bad and evil and deserve death and should burn in hell.
We can point to one trigger issue or another, now or then, but the real issue is who is in charge of everyone else.
Look at all the current talk of splitting up the country or secession. It is not because of any one trigger issue, it is because extremists on one side simply cannot tolerate the idea of extremists on the other side being in charge of them. Sure slavery was a trigger with a huge moral component, but so is abortion (one side sees it as the mass murder of babies the other says they are not human - sound familiar?), some would say so is Gay marriage and wedding cakes and the right to sue employers who fire gay people (one side says it is protecting persons who are oppressed and treated like subhumans, the other says there is not problem or they do not deserve protection - sound familiar?). But the real issue today, as then, is who gets to say what the others must do and think.
The talk today is not all that different from the 1830s - 1850s. How many states have made noise about succession already? (two that I am aware of, (California and Texas)). Are we headed for another split in 30 - 50 years? Look through Citydata and you will find many threads about people wanting to move from a red or blue state to a red or blue state. We are separating further and further every month. No one I know has ever seen divisiveness like we have today, not even older people, but I would bet people from 1850 would find it hauntingly familiar.
Did they really think the country could split apart over the issues? From what I read - no. until shortly before the war, no one thought it would actually go that far, but many people thought maybe it should. Still it seems it was a shock to many people when it happened.
If the country splits or explodes again, in 150 years people will be trying to say it was all about abortion or all about gay marriage, or all about climate. They will be only partially correct. The westsideboys of the future will come along and say it was all about "You cannot tell me what to do" - they will be correct.
Excellent post! You're saying it better than I am.
The personal liberty laws of the northern “free” states, enacted between 1780 and 1859, protected African-Americans from kidnapping and from being claimed as fugitive slaves. Slave-holding states complained that the laws violated the Fugitive Slave Clause of the Constitution and the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793. Abolitionists responded that a fundamental principle of state sovereignty was that states could define the status of its inhabitants and protect them in their liberty. When secession came in the winter of 1860 and 1861, the slave states that seceded cited the personal liberty laws as evidence of the failure of northern states to uphold their end of the constitutional bargain.
In 1859 the Supreme Court issued a ruling in Ableman v. Booth affirming that the Fugitive Slave Act was constitutional and any state laws contravening it were null and void. The ruling had little effect on abolitionists who continued to use state laws to thwart fugitive slave reclamations.
How can anybody read that and say that Civil War was not about slavery???
All I can say is try looking at the forest through the trees.
What I find interesting about the civil war was how the North with no slaves had a much more efficient and wealthy industrialized economy then the South. Had the South somehow won the Civil War I think the Confederate States would have economically collapsed at some point not far down the road. The Confederacy was fighting for an economic system that by 1860 was already considered to be very old fashioned.
So full disclaimer to get my background where I'm posting from.... I have a "northern perspective and education"
So I've really become interested in the civil war lately and the more I've been learning the more interested I've become.
I remember in school basically being told more or less the war was about slavery and related issues and that's the way it was. Never gave a 2nd thought about it and just thought that's that.
The more I read and learn I'm really challenging what I thought I knew. And I'm curious to get some more opinions on this topic or get some more books or documentaries recommended to me.
I also just visited Gettysburg this year and that's what really got me down the rabbit hole of the civil war.
Looking at everything I've learned so far it seems the cause of the civil war is so much more complex than I realized. Even reading Lincoln's inaugural address in 1861 he specifically mentions not trying to stop slavery in the South and its not his intention (I'm paraphrasing)
And that most people in the South readily admitted that they feel slavery would have naturally ended on its own.
The union still allowed border states like West virginia, Delaware, Kentucky to stay in the union and support the union cause AND remain slave states. That right there says the war did not originally start as a means to end slavery when the union allows its own states to continue on with slavery.
Like 97% of southern soldiers were far to poor to ever have slaves. Even some of the more aristocratic ones, for example Thomas Jackson actually went out of his way to teach slaves to read and write and helped build a Sunday school for them. I couldn't believe when I learned one of the confederates most famous generals was teaching slaves to read and write and with respect. It was quite a surprise for me to learn.
Lincoln only gave the emancipation proclamation addrssing slaves in confederate territory deliberately to undermine the south's economy, and to sow discontent and unrest.
Definitely didn't learn these things in school.
It's really changed how I look at the war.
I am really thinking that American civil war Was the South being angry and feeling mistreated over states rights issues. It's far more complex than I realized. And I am now viewing the confederacy differently than I did before. The North invaded to beat the South back into submission to preserve the union not to stop slavery, that became a method to inflict pain on the southern economy.
I've read/watched all the usuals...the killer angels, God's and generals, gettysburg, glory, (still have to read the last full measure) and I think It's called blue and grey? And others Etc..
If you guys have any interesting points or feedback let me know. I'm always willing to reevaluate and learn.
If you have any book or movie / mini series recommendations let me know
When you say school - is that high school? If so, they barely touch the surface. After I retired I went back to uni and I took more history courses. Courses that focused on one event - civil war for example, the Third Reich, the Great Depression. All very interesting. Some of the things we learned would be too traumatic for young students - in my opinion anyway.
Thanks. I definitely am going to try and plan more battlefield tours
From your response "I can see where this is headed" i can't help but wonder what you mean. Did this thread just open up a can of worms?
yes - I only read your first few sentences before I made my first reply. I've gone back and read it all and yes, you know where you are going with this.
It's impossible to say that it's 100% anything
but the main was clearly the fact that northern states were not abiding by Federal laws to return runaway slaves to the South.
So how was secession going to result in an improvement in this situation. The south sent slave catchers into northern states to apprehend runaways. Do you think that would have been allowed after secession? The number of runaways was quite small. Missouri was surrounded on three sides by free states and did not have a tremendous number of runaway slaves. Crossing into Illinois or into Iowa was not that difficult.
So how was secession going to result in an improvement in this situation. The south sent slave catchers into northern states to apprehend runaways. Do you think that would have been allowed after secession? The number of runaways was quite small. Missouri was surrounded on three sides by free states and did not have a tremendous number of runaway slaves. Crossing into Illinois or into Iowa was not that difficult.
I'm not the one the seceded from the union because North states weren't returning slaves
They are the ones that did
I'm sure they would have put military on the border and possibly built a wall
What I find interesting about the civil war was how the North with no slaves had a much more efficient and wealthy industrialized economy then the South. Had the South somehow won the Civil War I think the Confederate States would have economically collapsed at some point not far down the road. The Confederacy was fighting for an economic system that by 1860 was already considered to be very old fashioned.
It was efficient out of necessity. The industrial revolution was just getting underway and the North was inhospitable to cash crops. So if you can’t grow cotton, you mine coal, make steel, or work in a factory. For dangerous jobs, using a slave would be too costly as the owner is financially invested in the welfare of the worker. For free labor, you can hire some immigrant for a $1 a day and if they die, just get another one. It was the end of one evil and the beginning of another. From the industrial revolution, labor revolts and communism were spawned.
It's impossible to say that it's 100% anything
but the main was clearly the fact that northern states were not abiding by Federal laws to return runaway slaves to the South.
Give me a break, because South Carolina had an issue with the Federal government 25 years before the civil war, you are going to tell me that the civil war started because the South was for State Rights. Those are unrelated events.
No, don't put words in my mouth. I believe as I said before the primary reason for the Civil War was slavery.
However, I am open minded to see there maybe other factors. And it is interesting that South Carolina was threatening secession and even raising an army of 20,000 men 30 years before the Civil War. And the issue was not slavery but States Rights and their right to "nullify" a tariff that they think discriminated against their state.
For Southerners, by the time of the Civil War there was 60-70 years of arguments with the Northern states about slavery and other issues. Most of us heard of the Missouri Compromise of 1820, that was just one of a long line of debates, controversies and battles between the North and South that was going on for generations. Increasingly, Southerners began to see themselves as a people apart.
But then came the election of 1860 where Abraham Lincoln won without winning a single Southern state. At the same time, Republicans also had control of both houses of the 37th Congress. And the President nominates Justices to the Courts, including the Supreme Court.
So to some Southerners in late 1860, it may have seemed that the North had overwhelming control of their lives.
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