MYTH- Southerners supported slavery while Northerners hated it. No Southern alive today disputes that slavery was morally wrong, but the fact remains that all Northern states once had slaves, and virtually all of the slave ships were owned by Yankees. Profits from the slave trade stayed in the North.
MYTH - Southerners tried to break up the Union. It was New England which invented the idea of secession; first in objection to the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 doubling the nation’s land area, and then in 1814 when New England wanted to trade with enemy England during the War of 1812.
MYTH - The War For Southern Independence was about “slavery.” While the South foolishly defended slavery in early 1860s rhetoric, The War was really fought over power and money. If Northerners had a moral objection to slavery in the 19th century, why did they finance the slave trade in the 18th century?
NOT A MYTH - It was only in the NORTH where owning slaves was still legal during the Civil War.
Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation did not free all slaves in the United States. Rather, it declared free only those slaves living in states not under Union control. William Seward, Lincoln's secretary of state, commented, “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 was fully aware of the irony, but he did not want to antagonize the slave states loyal to the Union by setting their slaves free.
It’s not North versus South however. There were copperheads in the North, loyalists in the South. From 1861 to today, Southern leaders and manipulators have been able to justify and explain their power grab as a North versus South conflict and thus force better men like your great uncles into making a hard choice.
People fail to notice those points. They are brainwashed from elementary school forward that the North was anti-salvery and the South was pro-slavery, and that’s what the war was fought about. They fail to know that the North had slavery the entire time of the war or that their States as late as 1842 even added to their Constitutions further strength to their slave holdings.
And where did the profits from the slave labor stay? Who profited from the buying and selling of the slaves. You're like the junkie who blames the drug dealer for all his woes when the fact of the matter is that without demand there would be no supply.
MYTH - Southerners tried to break up the Union. It was New England which invented the idea of secession; first in objection to the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 doubling the nation’s land area, and then in 1814 when New England wanted to trade with enemy England during the War of 1812.
It was the South who actually tried to break it up and resorted to armed rebellion to accomplish their goals. Having started the war your main complaint is that the North didn't let you win it.
MYTH - The War For Southern Independence was about “slavery.” While the South foolishly defended slavery in early 1860s rhetoric, The War was really fought over power and money. If Northerners had a moral objection to slavery in the 19th century, why did they finance the slave trade in the 18th century?
Tell that to the people who lived there:
"What did we go to war for, if not to protect our [slave] property?" - CSA senator from Virgina, Robert Hunter, 1865
"What was the reason that induced Georgia to take the step of secession? This reason may be summed up in one single proposition. It was a conviction, a deep conviction on the part of Georgia, that a separation from the North-was the only thing that could prevent the abolition of her slavery." -- Speech of Henry Benning to the Virginia Convention
"But not to be tedious in enumerating the numerous changes for the better, allow me to allude to one other -- though last, not least. The new constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution -- African slavery as it exists amongst us -- the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution." - Alexander Stephens, 1861
NOT A MYTH - It was only in the NORTH where owning slaves was still legal during the Civil War.
Say what? Are you claiming that Davis ended slavery?
Lincoln was fully aware of the irony, but he did not want to antagonize the slave states loyal to the Union by setting their slaves free.
And then he went and pushed through the 13th Amendment which...freed the slaves. Damned tricky of him.
We went through this before. Not every Northern state had slaves.
Vermont abolished slavery in 1777 -- there probably weren't very many slaves there at the time and the overall population was pretty small -- and didn't become a state until 1791.
The Northwest Ordinance (1787) barred slavery from what would become the Great Lakes states, so apart from a few very early settlers and Southerners bringing their slaves with them on short states, slavery was never legal in those stays.
Nor were all or virtually all of the slave ships that brought slaves here owned by "Yankees." Englishmen and other foreigners had the largest share of the slave trade.
NOT A MYTH - It was only in the NORTH where owning slaves was still legal during the Civil War.
WTF? In the laws of the Confederate states slaveowning was legal throughout the war. If they'd won, those laws would have continued in force.
Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation "gave" freedom to slaves in the rebel areas, but that freedom had to be taken by the slaves or won by Union troops.
The Emancipation Proclamation excluded the Border States loyal the the union (and part of Lousiana), but those weren't really part of the "North," were they?
In any event, an emancipation proclamation could only be justified as a war measure, so of course it couldn't be applied to areas not in rebellion. The 13th Amendment freed the rest of the slaves soon enough.
You can check these things out for yourself, and after you do, please stop posting things that you find out are untrue.
Thank you. I’ve written elsewhere on the multitude of causes for the war, and there was great money behind the reason for northern tyranny. The bulk of this history is not taught to any of our children, and yet if one simply digs a little bit you get the truth in volumes. Great post.