Why they fought the Civil War.

[gafinfan]

gafinfan,

Just to give a bit of my background. I'm an aussie so I've never been indoctrinated with the schoolbooks that seem to offend you, and my reading on the ACW is based on my interest in the subject coming to it as an adult and wanting to know more about the single most important defining episode in the world's most important nation.

I was shocked at the emphasis placed on Slavery in Burns' "Civil War" so I've looked further into that aspect.

I have legal training, although not a lawyer, but I have always found that the best evidence is what people wrote down at the time, so I have looked back into and read the documents created at the time by the people involved in the events. I really don't care what post war historians have said about the issue.

To say that slavery was not THE major driving force behind the Civil War is to deny what the actors in the events were saying themselves. Non-slave owning southerners still wanted slavery to be kept because of their denial of blacks as having the full rights of man, and exactly that same attitude can still be found today in the remnants of the KKK.

We shall agree to disagree. As for being offended, you misread me my friend, saddened yes offended no. I was not there to take part so there could be no offense given or recieved. I love my country, with all of its warts, and I'm here; that being the case I wish to make it better.

[gafinfan]

Ducken, two more links you might enjoy:

http://docsouth.unc.edu/imls/topics.html

And from down under:

http://www.geocities.com/Pentagon/Qu...rey_Links.html

I had to come back and add this from Northern Newspapers of 1861.

http://www.geocities.com/confederate_cause/Quotes.htm

Read below the reasoned thought of the time...

The predicament in which both the Government and the commerce of the country are placed, through the non-enforcement of our revenue laws, is now thoroughly understood the world over....If the manufacturer at Manchester [England] can send his goods into the Western States through New Orleans at less cost than through New York, he is a fool for not availing himself of his advantage...If the importations of the counrty are made through Southern ports, its exports will go through the same channel. The produce of the West, instead of coming to our own port by millions of tons, to be transported abroad by the same ships through which we received our importations, will seek other routes and other outlets. With the lost of our foreign trade, what is to become of our public works, conducted at the cost of many huindred millions of dollars, to turn into our harbor the products of the interior? They share in the common ruin. So do our manufacturers...Once at New Orleans, goods may be distributed over the whole country duty-free. The process is perfectly simple... The commercial bearing of the question has acted upon the North...We now see clearly whither we are tending, and the policy we must adopt. With us it is no longer an abstract question---one of Constitutional construction, or of the reserved or delegated powers of the State or Federal government, but of material existence and moral position both at home and abroad.....We were divided and confused till our pockets were touched. ---New York Times March 30, 1861

The Southern Confederacy will not employ our ships or buy our goods. What is our shipping without it? Literally nothing....It is very clear that the South gains by this process, and we lose. No---we MUST NOT "let the South go." ----Union Democrat , Manchester, NH, February 19, 1861

From a story entitled: "What shall be done for a revenue?"

That either revenue from duties must be collected in the ports of the rebel states, or the ports must be closed to importations from abroad....If neither of these things be done, our revenue laws are substantially repealed; the sources which supply our treasury will be dried up; we shall have no money to carry on the government; the nation will become bankrupt before the next crop of corn is ripe.....Allow rail road iron to be entered at Savannah with the low duty of ten per cent, which is all that the Southern Confederacy think of laying on imported goods, and not an ounce more would be imported at New York; the railroads would be supplied from the southern ports. ---New York Evening Post March 12, 1861, recorded in Northern Editorials on Secession, Howard C. Perkins, ed., 1965, pp. 598-599.

[KB21]

I had to bump this thread up and add my two cents. The War of Northern Aggression is something I've always been interested in. In fact, I live less than 20 miles from Brices Crossroads here in Mississippi where Nathan Bedford Forrest lead his Confederate troops against the Union in Baldwyn, MS.

This war was not fought over slavery. It was fought over money and states rights. The southern states seceeded from the union because the federal government was overreaching their limitations and infringing upon states rights. The kicker to seccession was the Morrill Tariff, and it is quoted by Abraham Lincoln that if the Southern States would pay the 40% tarriff the federal government wanted, the federal government would allow the Southern States to keep their slaves.

Slavery would have eventually ended anyway with the invention of the reaper. The north has put out so much misinformation though that people have a skewed view of what really happened.

The thing is, can you see this coming full circle. Today, we are once again faced with a federal government that has gone far beyond their limitations as they are written into the constitution, and I think people are finally waking up an realizing what this centralized body of government has been gradually doing ever since April of 1865.

History is repeating itself.

Deo Vindice!

[gafinfan]

Deo Vindice!


Indeed Sir,

[KB21]

Deo Vindice!


Indeed Sir,

You know, the more I learn as I grow older, the more pissed off I become at the rubish I was taught in school.

[Ducken]

You know, the more I learn as I grow older, the more pissed off I become at the rubish I was taught in school.

Aint that the truth brother. I am glad you bumped this and added to it. I had forgotten I had started this thread. I have gotten so busy between working full time as an EMT/FF and painting on my off days I don't have the time to spend here as I did. But I will make an effort to visit the history section a little more.

[KB21]

Aint that the truth brother. I am glad you bumped this and added to it. I had forgotten I had started this thread. I have gotten so busy between working full time as an EMT/FF and painting on my off days I don't have the time to spend here as I did. But I will make an effort to visit the history section a little more.

You are an EMT? I was working the ER this evening, and I had a guy that tried to blow his face off with a 12 guage pump shotgun. He blew his anterior mandible completely off. The skin of his chin was over on the right side of his face. He had to be tubed through his trachea, and they did it in the field when they saw some bubbles in the mess. Fortunately, he's probably going to live. He didn't have any head injury, and his carotids were OK.

Well, I guess that isn't for this forum.

[Ducken]

You are an EMT? I was working the ER this evening, and I had a guy that tried to blow his face off with a 12 guage pump shotgun. He blew his anterior mandible completely off. The skin of his chin was over on the right side of his face. He had to be tubed through his trachea, and they did it in the field when they saw some bubbles in the mess. Fortunately, he's probably going to live. He didn't have any head injury, and his carotids were OK.

Well, I guess that isn't for this forum.

LOL that's cool a little diversion every so often never hurts.

I am a NREMT-B that advanced airway stuff is reserved for the NREMT-P (or paramedic). I just got my cards a couple years ago and that was the hardest thing I have ever done in my 27 years in the fire service. Have you done any time in the field? If not I would suggest you do, just to see what the guys in the field have to do. I have yet have a nurse or a doc ride with me, but from the guys that have, said it was an eye opening experience for the nurse/doc. The one comment that seems to be on every ride along is "I never knew".

[KB21]

LOL that's cool a little diversion every so often never hurts.

I am a NREMT-B that advanced airway stuff is reserved for the NREMT-P (or paramedic). I just got my cards a couple years ago and that was the hardest thing I have ever done in my 27 years in the fire service. Have you done any time in the field? If not I would suggest you do, just to see what the guys in the field have to do. I have yet have a nurse or a doc ride with me, but from the guys that have, said it was an eye opening experience for the nurse/doc. The one comment that seems to be on every ride along is "I never knew".

We get to do some ride alongs in one of our rotation months called potpourri. I'm hoping to get to do a fly along as well.

[gafinfan]

I may have posted a few of these before, if so forgive my duplication, I thought y'all just might be interested in these links I've used from time to time.

http://www.37thtexas.org/

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/young8.html

http://www.plpow.com/index.htm

http://www.southernheritage411.com/t...ory.php?th=053

http://americancivilwar.com/authors/...laveowners.htm

http://www.civilwar.com/

http://blueandgraytrail.com/event/Compromise_of_1850

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-...m/927614/posts

http://dixierising.com/Holidays/davis/Davis_dec6.phtml

There is no way anyone can understand the true meaning of the Southern cause
without a study of the History of our Constitution and its meanings.

http://www.constitution.org/cmt/mclaughlin/chus.htm

http://www.slavenorth.com/index.html

And last but surely not least:

http://www.etymonline.com/cw/economics.htm

historian Clyde N. Wilson (in his section of "Slavery, Secession, and Southern History"). "But the plain truth is that [John C.] Calhoun was entirely correct in his opposition to the tariff. Debates about the actual macro- and micro-economic effects of antebellum protection are beside the point. The South, providing the bulk of the Union's exports, sold in an unprotected world market, while all American consumers bought in a highly protected one. And this was to the benefit of one class, no matter how plausibly disguised as a public boon.

[jetssuck]

I think one important bit of information is that of all those that fought for the C.S.A......less than ten percent of them owned slaves.

If you were just a small time farmer, which most of them were, why would you be motivated to fight and die for the bigger enterprises that you had to compete against to feed your family?

I understand that the "little guy" had pretty much no say in the matter, but most did seem motivated to go fight. From what I've read, it appears the seeds of division were planted long before slavery ever became a real issue between them.

[sking29]

Sometimes I feel like I am one of few born southerners who doesn't support the Confederacy.

Which is why I love this topic so much for how it still divides people along lines.

[gafinfan]

Sometimes I feel like I am one of few born southerners who doesn't support the Confederacy.

Which is why I love this topic so much for how it still divides people along lines.

Trust me you're not alone one of my ancesters, on my mom's side, owned a hardware store and was against the war. The GA government took everything he owned for the war effort. He was, as they say, not a happy camper!

[Ducken]

I think one important bit of information is that of all those that fought for the C.S.A......less than ten percent of them owned slaves.

If you were just a small time farmer, which most of them were, why would you be motivated to fight and die for the bigger enterprises that you had to compete against to feed your family?

I understand that the "little guy" had pretty much no say in the matter, but most did seem motivated to go fight. From what I've read, it appears the seeds of division were planted long before slavery ever became a real issue between them.

I believe that is one of the biggest misconceptions of that era, that all the land owners in the South had slaves. Heck most could not afford slaves, and is one of the big reasons you had larger families and extended families living in the same house or on the same property. For the most part these were not some fat southern plantation owner sitting on his front porch sipping sweet tea watching the slaves work the fields. These guys were hard working families that made ends meet.

[sking29]

Trust me you're not alone one of my ancesters, on my mom's side, owned a hardware store and was against the war. The GA government took everything he owned for the war effort. He was, as they say, not a happy camper!

But see how far you have to go back to find someone.

I remember being younger watching Civil War vids and documentaries on the History Channel etc. and rooting for the South and for the South to win the war even though I knew they wouldn't.

It was like a rooting for the home team thing for me, but as I got older and the more I read and saw in addition to my beliefs starting to change and take shape I started drifted towards being a Union supporter. Of course when you think about it the Civil War is an embodiment of political ideology really.



In the end though supporting either side isn't something I am particularly proud of because neither side was free of blood on their hands. I just support the side that was the least wrong in my eyes.

[Dannyg28]

While slavery definitely wasn't THE factor that led to civil war, i think to deny it as being a major factor is incorrect. yes, the vast majority of southern farmers did not own slaves, however, these were the small time farmers that grew food for themselves and sold what little they had left over, they weren't the big time plantation owners who were the ones that grew most of the crops, most particularly cotton, that were being exported. The people who owned slaves, tended to own a massive amount of them, and they used them to create that massive amount of exportation that the South had at the time. You can think of them as akin to the farming corporations of today, minus the more equal distribution of wealth in our current state as oppossed to the 19th century when very few people held all the wealth for the most part.

You cannot have millions of people being slaves and working as free labor, and claim that they didnt serve a huge economic role for those that had slaves, those people being the extremely wealthy. Just like now how wealthy corporations tend to influence congress and local governments, wouldn't you think large plantation owners would try to do the same to southern governments? Their wealth and the economy of the south would have taken a tremendous hit if slavery was outlawed, and as history has proven time and time again, money and the economy are what make the world go round and is what starts wars, however you dont exactly see governments claiming that its the reason they go to war, even when it obviously is. They cite things like bringing or preserving liberty or the rights of the people, not, hey, we are gonna lose money, we dont like that.

and as for why would the 90% of the population that didnt own slaves fight for the confederacy to ensure that slavery would exist, its the same reason as why people now do not want th government to limit how much CEO's make on their salary(im not comparing the 2 acts or the legitimacy of this feeling at all, just the reasoning behind the defense of the feelings), chances are the vast majority of us will never become the CEO of people are never gonna become the CEO of a major corporation, however people hope that perhaps one day they or their children could perhaps make it to that level some day and they feel that to impose such a limit encroaches on what they feel is their rights.
and also, once again, the people fighting the war probably didnt feel like they were fighting for slavery, much like the soilders of the British Empire didnt think they were subjugating and practically enslaving the populous of their various colonies, rather they felt they were spreading civility and the English way of life.

[KB21]

While slavery definitely wasn't THE factor that led to civil war, i think to deny it as being a major factor is incorrect. yes, the vast majority of southern farmers did not own slaves, however, these were the small time farmers that grew food for themselves and sold what little they had left over, they weren't the big time plantation owners who were the ones that grew most of the crops, most particularly cotton, that were being exported. The people who owned slaves, tended to own a massive amount of them, and they used them to create that massive amount of exportation that the South had at the time. You can think of them as akin to the farming corporations of today, minus the more equal distribution of wealth in our current state as oppossed to the 19th century when very few people held all the wealth for the most part.

You cannot have millions of people being slaves and working as free labor, and claim that they didnt serve a huge economic role for those that had slaves, those people being the extremely wealthy. Just like now how wealthy corporations tend to influence congress and local governments, wouldn't you think large plantation owners would try to do the same to southern governments? Their wealth and the economy of the south would have taken a tremendous hit if slavery was outlawed, and as history has proven time and time again, money and the economy are what make the world go round and is what starts wars, however you dont exactly see governments claiming that its the reason they go to war, even when it obviously is. They cite things like bringing or preserving liberty or the rights of the people, not, hey, we are gonna lose money, we dont like that.

and as for why would the 90% of the population that didnt own slaves fight for the confederacy to ensure that slavery would exist, its the same reason as why people now do not want th government to limit how much CEO's make on their salary(im not comparing the 2 acts or the legitimacy of this feeling at all, just the reasoning behind the defense of the feelings), chances are the vast majority of us will never become the CEO of people are never gonna become the CEO of a major corporation, however people hope that perhaps one day they or their children could perhaps make it to that level some day and they feel that to impose such a limit encroaches on what they feel is their rights.
and also, once again, the people fighting the war probably didnt feel like they were fighting for slavery, much like the soilders of the British Empire didnt think they were subjugating and practically enslaving the populous of their various colonies, rather they felt they were spreading civility and the English way of life.

It may have been a factor, however, I do not even think it was a major factor. The South didn't want a war. The South just wanted to be able to be their own nation without the overreaching federal government that the US was quickly becoming at the time. Plus, the South and the North had two completely different cultures. They didn't get along before the war, and the two sides really don't get along today. Rather than trying to force the South's views onto the North, the South just wanted to be left alone.

Most of the plantation owners in the south were getting tired of being exploited by the federal government in an attempt to aid the industries in the north. Basically, it was the first instance of wealth redistribution in the US. The government was taking money from the wealthy in the south and giving it to their special interest groups in the north. That's basically what is happening today. The government is taking money from the tax payers, which they claim is on the wealthy, and giving it to their special interest groups. This money does not benefit the poor. What it does is ensure that the poor stay poor. It also diminishes the middle class, but that's another topic for another forum.

Had the South won, slavery would have still fazed out with the advent of mechanical farming equipment. Jefferson Davis, a true hero unlike Abraham Lincoln, even spoke of this before and during the time he was the President of the Confederate States of America.

Had the South won, I feel this would have been a vibrant country with a largely agricultural economy base, but the economy would have received a big boost from the natural resources that are in the south, such as coal, oil, and iron. I feel race relations would have been much better because we wouldn't have gone through the bogus civil rights act in the 1960s that was nothing more than the government getting more involved in the lives of the people of this nation. I do not feel we would have had unsustainable entitlement programs either.

[gafinfan]

The people who owned slaves, tended to own a massive amount of them, and they used them to create that massive amount of exportation that the South had at the time.

When you say massive amount just what do you mean? I think people tend to forget that most (99.9%) slave owners were field hands too. The lady of the house was not left out either. Remember every one had to be clothed and fed and housed. There were no local Krogers, Walmarts, or Home Depot's to run to. If someone got sick you didn't pick up the cell and get the local Fire Dept. to run you to the Hospital. Life was hard even for the few very rich, it wasn't like Hollywood would like you to think it was. A working farm was just that and everyone worked including the Boss and his wife.

In all of my reading the largest number of slaves owned by anyone was around 150 or so and that was considered very large.indeed. The Custis family owned 167 slaves at Mr. Custis death just before the war and it fell to Mary Custis Lee's husband RE Lee to oversee their release and freedom within the 5 year period called for in the will (Jan. '63). Having read some of Lee's letters of that time period about his feelings I get the impression that it was a task he did not relish or have much time for being that before the war he was in Texas and left that area only because of Virginia's secession and his involvment in the war. So I would hazard a guess that no more than 10 to 20 Families in all the South owned that many slaves.

[Dannyg28]

When you say massive amount just what do you mean? I think people tend to forget that most (99.9%) slave owners were field hands too. The lady of the house was not left out either. Remember every one had to be clothed and fed and housed. There were no local Krogers, Walmarts, or Home Depot's to run to. If someone got sick you didn't pick up the cell and get the local Fire Dept. to run you to the Hospital. Life was hard even for the few very rich, it wasn't like Hollywood would like you to think it was. A working farm was just that and everyone worked including the Boss and his wife.

In all of my reading the largest number of slaves owned by anyone was around 150 or so and that was considered very large.indeed. The Custis family owned 167 slaves at Mr. Custis death just before the war and it fell to Mary Custis Lee's husband RE Lee to oversee their release and freedom within the 5 year period called for in the will (Jan. '63). Having read some of Lee's letters of that time period about his feelings I get the impression that it was a task he did not relish or have much time for being that before the war he was in Texas and left that area only because of Virginia's secession and his involvment in the war. So I would hazard a guess that no more than 10 to 20 Families in all the South owned that many slaves.

how did 10% of the population manage to have 4 million slaves unless they owned a disproportionately large amount of them? especially in states in which the population of enslaved blacks nearly equaled the population of whites?

and as for life being hard, i will say that for the small farmers it most definitely was, however some large plantation owners, which most definitely was a small minority, lived nearly like kings, constructing large estates and manors for them to live in. If the South contributed most of America's exports at the time, then these men are the ones who contributed most of the south's exports .

[Dannyg28]

It may have been a factor, however, I do not even think it was a major factor. The South didn't want a war. The South just wanted to be able to be their own nation without the overreaching federal government that the US was quickly becoming at the time. Plus, the South and the North had two completely different cultures. They didn't get along before the war, and the two sides really don't get along today. Rather than trying to force the South's views onto the North, the South just wanted to be left alone.

There is no way that any federal government would allow for a good half of their member states to just get up and leave without a fight, it just is not a realistic idea of what could have happened. The south knew it would end up as a war, they obviously didnt want to be the ones who fired the first shot however.To compare how the south and north not getting along then to how they dont get along now is not equatable, while each area obviously have different interests than the other, you dont see a threat of a massive succession coming anything soon, back then, every other month the South seemed to be threatening to succeed.

Most of the plantation owners in the south were getting tired of being exploited by the federal government in an attempt to aid the industries in the north. Basically, it was the first instance of wealth redistribution in the US. The government was taking money from the wealthy in the south and giving it to their special interest groups in the north. That's basically what is happening today. The government is taking money from the tax payers, which they claim is on the wealthy, and giving it to their special interest groups. This money does not benefit the poor. What it does is ensure that the poor stay poor. It also diminishes the middle class, but that's another topic for another forum.

wont deny this was a large factor, that was the feeling in the south.

Had the South won, slavery would have still fazed out with the advent of mechanical farming equipment. Jefferson Davis, a true hero unlike Abraham Lincoln, even spoke of this before and during the time he was the President of the Confederate States of America.

Jeffereson Davis said that slavery would be dissolved with the advent of future farming equipment he didnt know about? and how long would it have taken for slavery to have been dissolved? 10 more years?20?30?40?

Had the South won, I feel this would have been a vibrant country with a largely agricultural economy base, but the economy would have received a big boost from the natural resources that are in the south, such as coal, oil, and iron. I feel race relations would have been much better because we wouldn't have gone through the bogus civil rights act in the 1960s that was nothing more than the government getting more involved in the lives of the people of this nation. I do not feel we would have had unsustainable entitlement programs either.

The U.S. hasnt have a successful economy with the North winning? If the South won the United States probably wouldnt exist, or atleast not how we know it today, the South's mission was never to invade the North and make them concede to the South's demands, and then the South would come back to the union. it was to gain independence and become its own country.

what makes you think civil rights would have been better had the south won?slavery would have been abolished years, or decades later and even after a century after the abolishment of slavery blacks were still being mistreated in the middle 20th century

Bogus 1960s civil rights act? blacks were being treated as 2nd class citizens and attempting to stop this is considered "interfering with the lives with eh people of this nation"?with whose lives does it interfere with? people who deny blacks the right to vote?