HISTORICAL IGNORANCE II: Forgotten facts about Lincoln, slavery and the Civil War

We call the war of 1861 the Civil War. But is that right? A civil war is a struggle between two or more entities trying to take over the central government. Confederate President Jefferson Davis no more sought to take over Washington, D.C., than George Washington sought to take over London in 1776. Both wars, those of 1776 and 1861, were wars of independence. Such a recognition does not require one to sanction the horrors of slavery. We might ask, How much of the war was about slavery?

Was President Abraham Lincoln really for outlawing slavery? Let's look at his words. In an 1858 letter, Lincoln said, "I have declared a thousand times, and now repeat that, in my opinion neither the General Government, nor any other power outside of the slave states, can constitutionally or rightfully interfere with slaves or slavery where it already exists." In a Springfield, Illinois, speech, he explained: "My declarations upon this subject of Negro slavery may be misrepresented but cannot be misunderstood. I have said that I do not understand the Declaration (of Independence) to mean that all men were created equal in all respects." Debating Sen. Stephen Douglas, Lincoln said, "I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or jurors of Negroes nor of qualifying them to hold office nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races, which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality."

What about Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation? Here are his words: "I view the matter (of slaves' emancipation) as a practical war measure, to be decided upon according to the advantages or disadvantages it may offer to the suppression of the rebellion." He also wrote: "I will also concede that emancipation would help us in Europe, and convince them that we are incited by something more than ambition." When Lincoln first drafted the proclamation, war was going badly for the Union.

London and Paris were considering recognizing the Confederacy and assisting it in its war against the Union.

The Emancipation Proclamation was not a universal declaration. It specifically detailed where slaves were to be freed: only in those states "in rebellion against the United States." Slaves remained slaves in states not in rebellion — such as Kentucky, Maryland, Delaware and Missouri. The hypocrisy of the Emancipation Proclamation came in for heavy criticism. Lincoln's own secretary of state, William Seward, sarcastically said, "We show our sympathy with slavery by emancipating slaves where we cannot reach them and holding them in bondage where we can set them free."

Lincoln did articulate a view of secession that would have been heartily endorsed by the Confederacy: "Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government and form a new one that suits them better. ... Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people that can may revolutionize and make their own of so much of the territory as they inhabit." Lincoln expressed that view in an 1848 speech in the U.S. House of Representatives, supporting the war with Mexico and the secession of Texas.

Why didn't Lincoln share the same feelings about Southern secession? Following the money might help with an answer. Throughout most of our nation's history, the only sources of federal revenue were excise taxes and tariffs. During the 1850s, tariffs amounted to 90 percent of federal revenue. Southern ports paid 75 percent of tariffs in 1859. What "responsible" politician would let that much revenue go?

Sherman Logan: "What Walter was probably thinking about in his 75% number was the value of exports.
For which the South did provide something along that percentage, mostly cotton."

This link from iowamark's post #25 above, shows that total 1860 US exports were $400 million.
Of that, this link shows total cotton exports were less than $200 million, meaning cotton in 1860 accounted for less than 50% of all US exports.

But the numbers also tell us that Southern US cotton accounted for 75% of all cotton produced worldwide, which was the key fact behind the Confederacy's "King Cotton" strategy.
And this link tells us about 40% of cotton shipped from New Orleans -- with 85% of that going to such European countries as Britain & France, just 15% to Northern US manufacturers.

Bottom line: in 1860 Deep South and Upper South whites totaled about 5.5 million or 20% of all US whites.
Yes, on average they were somewhat more prosperous than their northern cousins, and tens of thousands of plantation owners were very prosperous indeed.
So they could well account for a disproportionate share of imports -- perhaps 25% in total -- but there is no way they could be the purchasers of a majority, much less 75%, of US import duties.

DiogenesLamp: "The consent of people who do not live there is irrelevant.
It is none of outsider's business what other people do with their own land."

But there was no civil war when Deep South secessionists first declared independence and a new Confederacy.

And there was no civil war even when the Confederacy many times provoked war by forcefully seizing Federal forts, ships, arsenal & mints.

And there was no civil war even when the Confederacy first threatened US officials and fired on Union ships (December 1860 through April 1861).

Civil War only began, and the first Confederate troops only died, after the Confederacy launched a military assault on Union forces in Union Fort Sumter (April 12, 1861), then formally declared war on the United States (May 6, 1861), then sent military aid to pro-Confederates in Missouri.

So Lincoln only did what the US Constitution requires him to do: defeated the military power attempting to destroy the United States.

From the article: "Why didn’t Lincoln share the same feelings about Southern secession?”

Boogieman: "Because he was a hypocrite."

No, because in early 1861, the Confederacy provoked, started, formally declared war and sent military aid to pro-Confederates in the Union state of Missouri.
Lincoln merely did what the US Constitution required him to do: defeated the military force attempting to destroy the United States.

Boogieman: "The second category doesn’t fit either.
The South seceded peacefully and was governing itself, and then the war started after that, as a war between two sovereign nations."

But "the South" did not secede peacefully!
It was unlawful and violent from Day One, December 1860 -- seizing dozens of major Federal properties, threatening Union officials, firing on US ships.
There was nothing "peaceful" about it.

Then in April, 1861, the Confederacy started Civil War by launching a long-planned military assault on Union troops in Union Fort Sumter, and on May 6, 1861 formally declared war on the United States, at the same time sending military aid to pro-Confederate forces in the Union state of Missouri.

Here is a definition of "civil war" which certainly includes the US from 1861 - 1865:

A civil war is a war between organized groups within the same state or country,[1] or, less commonly, between two countries created from a formerly united state.[2]
The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region or to change government policies

Neither the United States nor any major power on Earth ever recognized the Confederacy as a legitimate independent country.

"Fort Sumter was a United States Army facility, staffed by the US Army under Major Anderson.

Use of the events at Ft. Sumter in an attempt to establish Southern military aggression against US property is a false argument, done either from ignorance or bias.

Major Anderson moved his garrison to a pile of granite with walls. It had not been commissioned. It was nothing more than a reinforced position.

If your next argument is "the first to fire is at fault" notion, Freeper rustbucket has documentation that hostile Federal fire predated both Sumter and "Star of the West".

If this is still not satisfactory, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the war officially began in Lincoln's office several days after Sumter.

Boogieman: "Nonsense, it was the refusal of the Union to remove its troops from Confederate territory, and the attempt by the Union to resupply those troops in defiance of the Confederacy that precipitated the attack."

As has been noted here frequently, Communist Cuba also claims that US forces in Guantanamo Bay are illegitimate and must be removed.
But our guys remain there, and any Cuban military assault on the base will be, correctly, seen as an act war against the United States.

The United States tolerated British forts on US territory for 30+ years, before that issue was resolved peacefully in 1814.

Bottom line: regardless of how legitimate, or illegitimate, Confederate claims to Fort Sumter were, their military assault on Union troops there was as clearly an act of war as, for example, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor -- a day of infamy.

DiogenesLamp: "Beyond that, the Declaration of Independence says explicitly that people have a right to leave."

No actual Founder -- not one -- ever declared that states were free to secede "at pleasure".
All insisted or implied that one or both of two conditions must exist:

Mutual consent -- meaning the approval of Congress, or,
Oppression or usurpations -- meaning a material breach of compact, in Madison's words, "having the same effect".

Neither condition existed in December 1860, and so by our Founders' original intent, Deep South declarations of secession were illegitimate.

Still, that did not start the Civil War.
War only began after the Confederacy provoked, started & declared war, while sending military aid to pro-Confederates in Missouri.

Boogieman: "If you have to justify the separation with a moral cause, then you don’t have a right to self governance.
If I have a right to something, then I don’t need to justify exercising the right."

When the men who wrote and signed the Declaration of Independence also wrote their first constitution -- Articles of Confederation -- they called it a "perpetual union", they did not intend it to end in secession.

When they later wrote a new US Constitution, they changed "perpetual union" to "more perfect union", and they provided protections against rebellion, insurrection, "domestic violence", invasion and treason.
All expressed or implied that "dis-union" could only legitimately come from 1) mutual consent or 2) oppression & usurpations "having that same effect."

But neither of the Founders' legitimate reasons existed in December 1860 when Deep South Fire Eaters began the process to declare their secession, Confederacy and war on the United States.

DiogenesLamp: "Slavery is secondary to him.
He would put up with it if he could stop the humiliation of being the man who broke the country."

After the Confederacy first provoked, then started, then formally declared war on the United States, then sent military aid to pro-Confederates in the Union state of Missouri, then Lincoln had no choice except to defeat the military power which clearly threatened to destroy the United States.

Freeing slaves was a tactic in that war, but it was also something that Lincoln had long considered a long-term goal.

DiogenesLamp: "That New York collects the tariff says nothing about who pays it in the end."

In 1860, Deep South and Upper South whites totaled about 20% of all US whites -- 5.5 million out of 28 million.
On average, those Southern whites were slightly better off than their northern cousins.
Of those 5.5 million, at most 3% (165,000) were wealthy plantation owners, and those folks were very wealthy indeed, certainly by standards of their time.

But there is just no possibility -- none, zero, nada -- that 165,000 very wealthy plantation owners accounted for any number remotely resembling 75% or even 50% of total US imports.
At best, those future Confederate states may have accounted for a disproportionate 25% of all US imports, meaning about half of those imports went through Southern ports, and half through northern ports like New York.

DouglasKC debating the definition of "civil war": "Except the south declared they were a different nation..."

Note in my post #425 above that other definitions clearly include the American war from 1861 - 1865.

Here is that entire article, definition of civil war.

"A civil war is a war between organized groups within the same state or country,[1] or, less commonly, between two countries created from a formerly united state.
The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region or to change government policies."

Boogieman: "Before that, everyone properly understood that, if the individual states were not themselves sovereign, then they never would have had any power to form the “United States” in the first place."

I think most people "get" that you guys wish to endlessly debate your "theory of secession", and some even understand that your "theory" is false, because our Founders originally intended that secession must not come "at pleasure" but only from mutual consent or, in effect, a serious breach of compact.
And neither condition existed in December 1860.

But what only a few seem to grasp is that this "debate" is utterly irrelevant -- because Deep South declarations of secession did not cause Civil War.
Neither did forming a new Confederacy cause Civil War.
And neither did dozens of Confederate provocations in seizing Federal forts, ships, arsenals and mints.

What started Civil War was the Confederate military assault on Federal troops in Federal Fort Sumter, followed by their formal declaration of war against the United States, and sending military aid to pro-Confederates in Union Missouri.

In his First Inaugural Address (March 4, 1861) Lincoln announced to the Confederacy that they could not have a war unless they themselves started it.
So Jefferson Davis immediately ordered preparations for the assault on Fort Sumter.

Your arguments over secession theory are irrelevant to actual history.

DiogenesLamp: "In other words, Imports have a corresponding relationship to exports, n'est pas? "

So let us again review some basic historical facts:

In 1860, US cotton accounted for 75% of the world's production, hence the term "King Cotton", and that may be how Williams derived his number.
In the late 1850s, 40% of US cotton shipped from New Orleans, and of that, 85% went to Europeans, 15% to Northern US manufacturers.
Total US cotton in 1860 was about 5 million bales valued at nearly $200 million, a huge sum for that time.
Total US exports in 1860, including cotton, were around $400 million, so cotton was just under half.
The 1860 surplus of US exports over imports was $61 million.
So the US enjoyed a positive cash flow.
In 1860 total white population of 11 future Confederate states was 5.5 million, or 20% of total US whites.
On average, these people were marginally better off than their Northern cousins, but only a small percent (3% = 165,000) were the wealthy plantation owners we see in Gone With the Wind.
There is no possible way -- and no evidence to support -- claims that these 165,000 wealthy plantation owners accounted for 75% or 50% or anything above say 25% of total US imports.

Therefore, claims that Lincoln was primarily driven by his need to protect Federal revenues from Southern states imports has no basis in fact.

DiogenesLamp: "If you bring up the topic of slavery, you are effectively arguing that it is justification for the Union's invasion of the South.

If you don't want to argue this, don't bring up the topic.
It has no relevance to the Union's reasons for invading.
It is just an ex post facto rationalization for what they did."

Well...
First of all, protecting the future of slavery was the only serious reason that Deep South Fire Eaters declared their secessions beginning in December 1860.
To protect slavery they formed a Confederacy which soon provoked, started and formally declared war on the United States.

In response, President Lincoln executed long-made plans to defeat the Confederate military, which eventually came to include freeing slaves under US Army control -- Emancipation Proclamation.

It was a tactic intended to weaken the Confederacy which fit perfectly with abolitionist aspirations, and eventually denied the Slave Power the use of hundreds of thousands of former slaves.

The Emancipation Proclamation was all that Lincoln could constitutionally do, at the time, but he also submitted and got passed the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, demonstrating that for Republicans, slavery was not just a tactical military matter, but also a moral issue.

Democrats are the party of slavery, of Jim Crow and of every abomination they now which to saddle on Republicans.

HamiltonJay: "However, facts don’t matter, as we have a nation of idiots today that are truly becoming dumber and less informed with every passing day."

Obviously speaking of yourself, since your understanding of the Emancipation Proclamation is... well, less than fully informed.

The Emancipation Proclamation was a military tactic, first suggested by former President John Quincy Adams when he was again a Congressman, likely directly to young Abraham Lincoln when they both served, in 1847.
It's military use is obvious, in denying the Confederacy services of, eventually, hundreds of thousands and millions of slaves in territory controlled by the US Army.

As a military tactic, the Emancipation Proclamation was used before the Civil War, Florida comes to mind.
And of course, the Brits used a similar tactic against our Founders.

Until the 13th Amendment was ratified, the Emancipation Proclamation was the only lawful method Lincoln had to free slaves, and to his credit, he used it.

DiogenesLamp: "But the law of God as they wrote in the Declaration does not place conditions on the right to leave.
This is good, because if it placed the same conditions on them that people try to place on the South, then the 13 slave holding colonies wouldn't have been permitted to secede either."

FRiend, I'd like to know the name of your history professor who told you that our "13 slave holding colonies" were somehow permitted to secede.
Such a professor would deserve to be defrocked, tarred and feathered for malpractice and malfeasance.

All our Founders clearly understood, as Benjamin Franklin famously quipped, on July 4, 1776:

"Now, gentlemen, we must all hang together, or we will most assuredly all hang separately."

Our Founders knew that the penalty for failed rebellion was inglorious death.
Pro-Confederates, by contrast, love to whine and complain that they were not treated like heroes.

wideawake: "No state can unilaterally alienate territory."

DiogenesLamp: "Except when 13 slave holding states asserted a right from God to do so, and did exactly that.
You are going to have to pick a side.
Either both sides had a right to leave, or both sides did not."

Rubbish, see my post #439 above.

The proper way to look at this is: God clearly favored our Founders' rebellion (imperfect as they were) in the name of "All men are created equal, and endowed by their Creator...".

God did not look so kindly on the Slave Power rebelling and starting a war to protect their "property" and "peculiar institution" of slavery.

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