Posted on 09/15/2014 5:47:13 PM PDT by walford
bkmk
“Someday, someone will write a thoughtful dystopian novel.”
Like “1984?” Or “Brave New World?”
“The idea that the Civil War was fought over “states’ rights” and not slavery resulted from a sort of PR campaign that began only fifteen years after the end of the war”
Bullshit, you ignorant POS.
“Bullshit, you ignorant POS.”
Brilliant refutation, filled with wit, bibliographic references, scholastic achievement, and gentlemanly conduct. You have done a great job at representing your cause.
Maybe you should believe the southern leaders quoted below that were living at the time.
In an abstract sense the state’s rights argument is correct. It was all about the Southern States “right” to violate God’s law. (Exodus 22:21 Thou shalt neither vex a stranger, nor oppress him: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.) Unfortunately that falls apart because rights are given by God, and God does not give the “right” to sin without consequence. I suggest you read Judges chapter 19 and 20 to see how God commanded the country to respond when one state or tribe refused to enforce justice. The State of Benjamin was burned and almost everyone killed. Only 600 remained alive, when tens of thousands were killed.
Henry L. Benning, Georgia politician and future Confederate general, writing in the summer of 1849 to his fellow Georgian, Howell Cobb: “First then, it is apparent, horribly apparent, that the slavery question rides insolently over every other everywhere — in fact that is the only question which in the least affects the results of the elections.” [Allan Nevins, The Fruits of Manifest Destiny pages 240-241.] Later in the same letter Benning says, “I think then, 1st, that the only safety of the South from abolition universal is to be found in an early dissolution of the Union.”
G. T. Yelverton, of Coffee County, Alabama, speaking to the Alabama Secession Convention on January 25, 1861: “The question of Slavery is the rock upon which the Old Government split: it is the cause of secession.”
Albert Gallatin Brown, U.S. Senator from Mississippi, again, December 27, 1860: “Mr. President, it seems to me that northern Senators most pertinaciously overlook the main point at issue between the two sections of our Confederacy. We claim that there is property in slaves, and they deny it. Until we shall settle, upon some basis, that point of controversy, it is idle to talk of going any further.” [Quote taken from The Congressional Globe, 36th Cong., 2nd Sess., p. 201.]
“We are not one people. We are two peoples. We are a people for Freedom and a people for Slavery. Between the two, conflict is inevitable.” - New York Tribune publisher Horace Greeley on the Kansas-Nebraska Act, 1854 from: Horace Greeley, quoted in Robert C. Williams, Horace Greeley: Champion of American Freedom (New York: New York University Press, 2006), 173.
Representative Benjamin Stanton, Republican of Ohio, January 15, 1861: “Mr. Chairman, I desire to state, in a few words, what I regard as the real question in controversy between the political parties of the country. The Republican party holds that African slavery is a local institution, created and sustained by State laws and usages that cannot exist beyond the limits of the State, by virtue of whose laws it is established and sustained. The Democratic party holds that African slavery is a national institution, recognized and sustained by the Constitution of the United States throughout the entire territorial limits, where not prohibited by State constitutions and State laws...All other questions about which we differ grow out of this, and are dependent upon it...” [Congressional Globe, 36th Cong., 2nd Sess., (Appendix), p 58]
Senator Louis Trezevant Wigfall; December 11, 1860, on the floor of the Senate; “I said that one of the causes, and the one that has created more excitement and dissatisfaction than any other, is, that the Government will not hereafter, and when it is necessary, interpose to protect slaves as property in the Territories; and I asked the Senator if he would abandon his squatter-sovereignty notions and agree to protect slaves as all other property?” [Quote taken from The Congressional Globe, 36th Cong., 2nd Sess., p. 58.]
“Brilliant refutation”
The reappearance of that ancient lie deserves no better than I gave it, and its repetition has no claim on “gentlemanly conduct.”
“Maybe you should believe the southern leaders quoted below that were living at the time.”
In this day of the Internet, any idiot can find quotations, or alleged quotations, that purport to support any conceivable position on any subject.
Maybe you should believe the overwhelming preponderance of the evidence instead of cherry-picking a few things you like and calling it a day.
I see, facts don’t matter because YOU say there is an overwhelming preponderance of evidence. I have read the many state’s rights arguments authors. I was only overwhelmed at how poor the arguments were.
I apologize. In my previous reply I gave your post far too much credit. I presumed that you would at least have cherry-picked quotes that actually seem to support your position.
I now see that you failed to do even that.
Benning doesn’t say that the war was fought over slavery. He says, correctly or not, that slavery is the deciding question for one particular election cycle. Not the same thing at all. He also says that he thinks the north will impose its will on the south if the south does not secede.
Now, here’s where you probably won’t be able to follow the argument.
There are two issues there: that the north is imposing its will in the matter of slavery, and that the north is imposing its will at all.
Revisionists insist that the only one of those issues that played a role at all was the matter of slavery. To discover the drooling stupidity of that position, look up the number of people in the South who did *not* own slaves, had no reasonable expectation of owning slaves, and were unlikely in the extreme ever to profit from the institution of slavery.
That is analogous to expecting me to march off and die for Bill Gates’s conviction that women should have the unfettered power to kill their unborn children.
Aside from the fact that it was self-evident until the revisionists started propagandizing against it, the only thing that makes any sense is that the vast majority of the South were willing to fight the north out of patriotism. Die for somebody else’s slaves? Ridiculous.
Further, in saying “I think then, 1st, that the only safety of the South from abolition universal is to be found in an early dissolution of the Union,” he is not necessarily advocating the dissolution of the Union. In the absence of context, he might well have been responding to the question, “Do you think the north will impose abolition?” Score: zero.
“G. T. Yelverton, of Coffee County, Alabama, speaking to the Alabama Secession Convention on January 25, 1861: “The question of Slavery is the rock upon which the Old Government split: it is the cause of secession.”
G. T. Yelverton, eh? Very credible.
“Albert Gallatin Brown, U.S. Senator from Mississippi”
A senator, no less. Just the sort of person who might be sufficiently well-off to own slaves. And, as a senator, subject to the blandishments of wealthy slave-owners. What in the world would make you think that anything this politician would say must reflect the opinion of the general population? Is this really the best you could do?
Further, he speaks of the issue as being between “the two sections of our Confederacy.” Is he calling the Union “our Confederacy?” Or is he referring to a portion of the seceding states that opposed slavery?
“We are not one people. We are two peoples. We are a people for Freedom and a people for Slavery. Between the two, conflict is inevitable.” - New York Tribune publisher Horace Greeley”
I’m curious: exactly how is a quotation from a yankee and a strong abolitionist supposed to reveal the South’s motives for secession? Score: less than zero.
“Representative Benjamin Stanton, Republican of Ohio”
Again, I really thought you would try to find quotations that support your position. I wonder why you didn’t.
“Senator Louis Trezevant Wigfall”
…Wigfall was among a group of leading secessionists known as Fire-Eaters, advocating the preservation and expansion of an aristocratic agricultural society based on slave labor…(Wikipedia)
I would direct your attention to the word “aristocratic.”
So, according to you, subsistence farmers and ranchers in Texas were eager to march off and die so that Senator Wigfall could continue to profit from his slaves. Are you really unable to see how ridiculous that notion is?
“I said that one of the causes”
Causes of what? Not the war, because Lincoln hadn’t started it yet.
“…the one that has created more excitement and dissatisfaction than any other, is, that the Government will not hereafter, and when it is necessary, interpose to protect slaves as property in the Territories; and I asked the Senator if he would abandon his squatter-sovereignty notions and agree to protect slaves as all other property?”
In the Territories. So, outside the boundaries of the United States.
Everyone who has studied the era knows that slave-owners wanted runaway slaves returned to them. Anyone with a lick of sense knows that it was the wealthy slave-owners who kicked up the ruckus, and not the vast body of men who left their dead bodies on the field at Gettysburg.
Oh, but according to you, the institution of slavery was so important to men who owned no slaves, had no reasonable expectation of owning slaves, and were unlikely in the extreme ever to profit from the institution of slavery, that they would gladly die for it.
By the way, are you familiar with the convention that a person commenting on an article is addressing or speaking of the author of the article and not the poster?
“I see, facts don’t matter because YOU say there is an overwhelming preponderance of evidence.”
The things you presented don’t matter, because even given the broadest possible interpretation they don’t support your contention.
And it is not honest to pretend that only I make these arguments.
“I have read the many state’s rights arguments authors.”
Reminds me of an old joke: A liberal reads Marx; a conservative understands Marx.
“I was only overwhelmed at how poor the arguments were.”
I doubt that very much.
“That was G.W. Bush’s main problem, IMHO. He just couldn’t believe that most people over there don’t want freedom, at least not in terms of individual liberty for everyone.”
But we gave them the chance. Now if we have to nuke them, at least we know we tried.
“The Confederacy was formed to ensure the continuation of slavery”
Slavery was only one issue. States’ rights and unfair taxation were also. The north winning ensured that federal rights trumped states’ rights and led to the bloated megalomaniac government we have today.
Great quote. What the neo-confederates conveniently leave out of their states rights argument is the fact that Dred Scott forced northern states that outlawed slavery to enforce it within their own borders. A lot of northerners who were willing to live and let live on the issue found they could no longer do so. They had to either abolish it altogether, or take part. States rights for me, but not for thee.
That's a weak argument. Confederate soldiers fought for patriotism, pride, and their brothers in arms, like soldiers have always done. As they say, wars are started by old men and fought by young men. Not usually for the same reasons.
Well dsc, I give you credit for one thing. When sufficiently challenged you rose slightly above your brash name calling to actually attempt an argument. Kudos. Unfortunately the argument falls flat.
I hate to befuddle you but the situation wasn’t all peace, calm and agreement one day and the next day war. Any historian of the era knows the conflict was building since the 1820’s. To dismiss the statement of a general in the civil war, and politician for the south, when he says slavery is THE issue as only representing one election cycle is folly.
It is kind of funny that you say I wont follow the issue of the matter of slavery being imposed on the South when I have already stated that it IS about state’s rights in that sense. At least though now you are admitting that it is about slavery, when you say “There are two issues there: that the north is imposing its will in the matter OF SLAVERY,” [emphasis mine] As I said before the Southern states wanted the “right” to violate God’s law. That is NOT a right. Further it was not just the north, England and the whole world looked on the moronic behavior of “all-men created equal” vs slaveholding. England already abolished it.
The argument you attempt regarding aristocratic slave owners vs. the common man shows either disingenuity or ignorance. The South had 4 million slaves. The entire economy depended upon them every aspect of everyone’s life was affected by it. Churches had made preaching about it a big deal. Entire denominations split from their northern counterparts on the issue of slavery.
Also trying to dismiss quotes about the territories shows an even greater ignorance about the history of the error. Any historian of that error knows the great role that the Acts regarding slavery in the territories had in the build up of the conflict.
Nice try though, read up some more.
BTW, actually I am defending the authors post against someone who made a very rude and inaccurate comment.
Pol pot just killed them off, they didn’t even get the chance to shovel shit for a decade or so.
“Unfortunately the argument falls flat.”
Prove it. You certainly didn’t in your last post.
“To dismiss the statement of a general in the civil war, and politician for the south, when he says slavery is THE issue as only representing one election cycle is folly.”
No, it is calm reason. You are attempting to demonstrate that the War of Northern Aggression was solely—or, to give you the undeserved benefit of the doubt—chiefly about slavery. You offered a comment saying that slavery was the primary issue in one election cycle as evidence. Further, you are assuming what remains to be demonstrated when you say that because he was a general in the civil war and politician for the south that it must be so.
“It is kind of funny that you say I wont follow the issue of the matter of slavery”
Yes, it’s screamingly funny since you did not in fact follow it, as demonstrated by your comment.
“At least though now you are admitting that it is about slavery”
I never said that slavery was nowhere on the list of causes. I contradicted the ignorant POS who wrote the original argument when he said “The idea that the Civil War was fought over ‘states’ rights’ and not slavery resulted from a sort of PR campaign that began only fifteen years after the end of the war.”
States’ rights were very much on the mind of practically the entire population of the South for decades prior to the war.
“As I said before the Southern states wanted the “right” to violate God’s law.”
Not badly enough to die for it.
We can agree, I hope, that any arguments advanced in support of slavery are fatally flawed. That said, the South wanted the right to self-government in all things, with slavery appearing somewhere on that list depending on the person. Robert E. Lee wrote that the South should have ended slavery before seceding. Gee, I wonder why he would say something like that, since the only reason he endorsed the war was to protect slavery.
Your argument, viewed most charitably, boils down to this: It was right to deny the South the self-government for which the Founding Fathers fought the British, because one of the things they would have done is keep the institution of slavery for a few more years—until economic, political, and agricultural forces killed it, as had recently happened in England.
Oh, but wait a minute: the Founding Fathers themselves allowed slavery to exist. (I didn’t get a harruph outta that guy.)
Yes, Lincoln was dead right to get 600,000 men killed to end slavery immediately, rather than allowing economic factors and moral opprobrium to kill it a few years down the road. I’m sure every one of those dead men would agree.
And, wait a minute: if it were all about slavery, why did the South secede before Lincoln showed any indication of trying to end slavery? Lincoln promised not to interfere in the matter. And, in fact, he didn’t issue the Emancipation Proclamation until January 1, 1863, until that date promising the Confederacy that if they would only come home, all would be forgiven, and they could even keep slavery. Even then, he only proclaimed the freedom of slaves in states actually in rebellion, leaving the rest in their fetters.
“England and the whole world looked on the moronic behavior of “all-men created equal” vs slaveholding.”
Right, especially those parts of the world that still mandated slavery. England had ended slavery 20 years before. From our standpoint, it would be as though they had ended slavery in 1994. That would explain why England very nearly entered the war on the side of the South. Oh, wait a minute: no, it wouldn’t.
The entire British Empire ended slavery without a civil war. So did Brazil, and many other countries. Was ten more years of slavery worth the lives of 600,000 men?
“The argument you attempt regarding aristocratic slave owners vs. the common man shows either disingenuity or ignorance. The South had 4 million slaves. The entire economy depended upon them every aspect of everyone’s life was affected by it.”
Buncombe. Now you want us to believe that poor men marched off to die for their right to remain poor while Mars’ William up there on the hill stayed rich. We can’t even get people to *vote* in their own best interests today, but the illiterate poor understood economics so well that they were ready to take a bullet for Mars’ William. What a pantload.
Sure, the estimated slave population of 3,521,110 (38.7%, all figures very approximate) had an effect in a total population of 9,101,090. Let’s guess that about half of the free population was male. That leaves 2,723,610 white males, and a large number of free women not rich enough to be idle.
What were those 3,000,000+ white people doing? All sitting on the front porch sipping a mint julep while the darkies toiled in the fields? Slaves played a large role in the Southern economy, but other people were working too.
“Churches had made preaching about it a big deal.”
Some churches. Oh, well, today’s churches—some of them—preach against fornication. Doesn’t mean that the bulk of the population agrees or conforms their behavior thereto.
“Entire denominations split from their northern counterparts on the issue of slavery.”
On the issue of slavery, or on the issue of being told what to do by people who don’t even live there? I guess you couldn’t conceive of someone saying, “I never owned a slave; I never will own a slave; but I’ll be damned if those yankees are going to come down here and tell me what to do.”
“Also trying to dismiss quotes about the territories”
Once again you demonstrate your inability to understand the arguments.
“BTW, actually I am defending the authors post against someone who made a very rude and inaccurate comment.”
Don’t come the great poncy swan with me. Firstly, you haven’t displayed much refinement here either. Secondly, this is not a place that requires courtesy toward the authors of posted materials, so honk off. Thirdly, the repetition of a lie deserves no courtesy. And lastly, the author’s statement was about as accurate as claims that Cuba has a great medical system.
“That’s a weak argument. Confederate soldiers fought for patriotism, pride, and their brothers in arms, like soldiers have always done. As they say, wars are started by old men and fought by young men. Not usually for the same reasons.”
Are you saying that it is a weak argument to assert that:
—Men who were unlikely in the extreme ever to profit from the institution of slavery would not want to die for the institution of slavery.
There’s no doubt that they *did* die; we’re arguing about *why* they died, and I’m saying “not for slavery.”
You seem to agree.
I agree that the soldiers’ motivation wasn’t slavery. I disagree that it means slavery wasn’t the cause of the war. Those are two separate things.
Oh, well.
Best article of the week, the month, maybe even the year.
That was true of FDR and Wilson, also Carter and now Obama. Roosevelt trusted his own political skills too much. Wilson and Carter underestimated the complexity and chaos of the world. Wilson assuming his abstract ideas could solve all the world's problems and Carter assuming America was the problem. You can see some of those same mistakes in the current administration.
Not just liberals, but even a lot of conservatives just can’t open their minds to that reality. That was G.W. Bush’s main problem, IMHO. He just couldn’t believe that most people over there don’t want freedom, at least not in terms of individual liberty for everyone.
That is also true. It has something to do with ethnic fragmentation (nobody wants other groups to have the same freedom they want for themselves), with religion (which trumps individual freedom in that part of the world), and with distrust (people assume that if they don't have the upper hand they will be at the mercy of others who aren't very merciful).
“That was true of FDR”
It is said that FDR thought of Stalin as “Uncle Joe, Senator from Russia,” and thought he could log-roll him like he did US senators.
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