[dsc]

“Democrat Slavers ways and Democrat Slavers deeds never forgotten and still persist to the day!”

Lemme ax you this, buddy:

If you had no prospects of ever owning a slave—as was true of the vast majority of southerners—would you go and fight for slavery, given the hardships involved?

I can’t think of any sane person who would.

[Ditto]

If you had no prospects of ever owning a slave—as was true of the vast majority of southerners—

Lemme ax you this, buddy:

If you were a 20 year old, why would you think you had no prospects of ever owning a slave? Why wouldn't they think they could become prosperous and own slaves some day?

Were all those Confederate solders just resigned to being poor and underclass the rest of their lives or did they have their own dreams and ambitions?

[BroJoeK]

dsc: "If you had no prospects of ever owning a slave—as was true of the vast majority of southerners—would you go and fight for slavery, given the hardships involved?
I can’t think of any sane person who would."

First, it's important to remember that secession and Civil War proceeded in three distinct steps:

1. Step One: Seven Deep South states (South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Louisiana Georgia and Texas) declared their secession, solely for the purpose of protecting their "peculiar institution" of slavery against the perceived threat of newly-elected anti-slavery President Abraham Lincoln.

   At the same time eight other slave-holding states of the Upper South and Border States refused to secede just to protect slavery -- North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, Arkansas, Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri.

2. Step two: recognizing that his cause was hopeless if he could not get more states to join the Confederacy, Jefferson Davis provoked, started and declared war (May 6, 1861) against the United States.

   In response, newly inaugurated President Lincoln called up Union troops to suppress the rebellion and recover seized Federal properties (i.e., Fort Sumter).

3. Step three: Now that they were forced to chose sides in war, the four Upper South states which had originally refused, now switched to join the Confederacy: Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Arkansas.
   Four Border States still refused: Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri.

Second, it's important to remember that those categories of Deep South, Upper South and Border States correspond to average percentages of families which owned slaves:

1. Deep South: roughly 50% of white families owned slaves, meaning that those who did not were typically young-marrieds or perhaps poorer artisans in towns.
   Virtually everyone was closely related to somebody who owned slaves.

2. Upper South: roughly 25% of white families owned slaves, and many who did not were loyal Unionists whose young men served in Union units and who supported Union armies operating in their states.
   Many of these people received compensation for their expenses from the Federal Government after the war.

3. Border States: typically 10% of white families owned slaves, slave owners were a distinct minority, lacking enough political clout to force secession, and states like Maryland had as many free-blacks as slaves.
   While Border States also provided soldiers to both sides, ratios were typically two Union for every one Confederate.

Point is: the vast majority of Confederate troops came from Deep South states or sections of Upper South & Border States with very high percentages of slave-holding families.

Areas of Confederate states with low slave-holding percentages (i.e., western Virginia, eastern Tennessee, western North Carolina, etc.) remained loyal to the Union and provided military units to Union forces.

[rockrr]

I can’t think of any sane person who would.

And yet that's exactly what thousands of them did.