Was the Civil War about Slavery?

Acton Institute, Prager University ^ | 8/11/2015 | Joe Carter

[iowamark]

What caused the Civil War? That seems like the sort of simple, straightforward question that any elementary school child should be able to answer. Yet many Americans—including, mostly, my fellow Southerners—claim that that the cause was economic or state’s rights or just about anything other than slavery.

But slavery was indisputably the primary cause, explains Colonel Ty Seidule, Professor of History at the United States Military Academy at West Point.

The abolition of slavery was the single greatest act of liberty-promotion in the history of America. Because of that fact, it’s natural for people who love freedom, love tradition, and love the South to want to believe that the continued enslavement of our neighbors could not have possibly been the motivation for succession. But we should love truth even more than liberty and heritage, which is why we should not only acknowledge the truth about the cause of the war but be thankful that the Confederacy lost and that freedom won.

[DiogenesLamp]

But crushing the South and wanting its money are two different things. If the "Yankees" could foresee that they'd win the war, how come they didn't foresee just how destructive the war would be?

Lincoln underestimated the determination of a people to eject invaders from their homeland. He badly underestimated the force which would be necessary to impose his will on those five million people.

Hitler had the same sort of problem with the Poles.

[DiogenesLamp]

I just wanted to let you know I saw your message, and I consider it so far “out there” in terms of understanding that I just don’t see it as worth the trouble to reply.

[PeaRidge]

Thanks for that research. However it appears it is modern historians that are being quoted, and not people of the time.

But all of that information became irrelevant as of Feb. 2, 1861. The Northern states no longer had a problem with slavery.

[rockrr]

You didn't look very closely or you choose to see only what you wish to see.

Northern states no longer had a problem with slavery.

Even novice lost causers do not believe that to be true.

[Mollypitcher1]

There was a good chance it would end that way but the south had no choice because they were an AGRICULTURAL ECONOMY and the north was an INDUSTRIAL ECONOMY in expansion.
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The Agricultural economy of the south depended on the slave labor. Slaves were the wealth of the south, the property, more so than the lands or buildings of the southern citizens.Consider that there were almost as many slaves in many states as there were whites. Consider that in the north, slave holding blacks as well as whites were immune from the threat of loss.

[Mollypitcher1]

But crushing the South and wanting its money are two different things. If the “Yankees” could foresee that they’d win the war, how come they didn’t foresee just how destructive the war would be? Or was all that destruction part of the plan?
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The destruction took place in the south ....deliberately! Sherman cut a swathe of destruction that could still be seen in my youth. “Reconstruction” finished the job and the carpetbaggers and their cronies were simply a forerunner of what we are experiencing today with BIG government. The “Civil War” was anything but civil. Today’s State’s Rights are practically nonexistent. All thanks to the low life lawyer Lincoln.

[Mollypitcher1]

The Emancipation Proclamation influenced Britain and France to stay out of the war and inspired many Northerners, but how did it split the South? Capital letters aside, the Emancipation Proclamation could only be issued as a military measure. The government had no authority to free slaves from loyal citizens. That is why it only applied to areas in rebellion. But it was a sign that slavery was on the way out and most likely wouldn’t be tolerated after the war.
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As previously mentioned, there were almost as many blacks as whites in the south. The emancipation proclamation DIVIDED the south by color as was Lincoln’s intention. It is rarely mentioned that high numbers of blacks fought for the south. High numbers of blacks protected their former owners during and after the war. These are facts the Yankees never accept. If all slave owners...the contention of Yankees.....were so horrible, why was such love and loyalty exhibited by so many blacks for their former “owners.” It is also never mentioned that many slave owners lost fortunes, and some went bankrupt because they protected, fed, clothed and housed their slaves long after the slave’s usefulness was finished. Look at the James River plantations as an example.

Your capital letters snarky remark is ignorant. It is well established that capital or bold letters in a word or phrase, as well as italics, are the accepted means of emphasis in writing.

Destroying the economy of an enemy is the key to its destruction. That is a fact that has been known since the beginning of “civilization.” Lincoln’s destruction of the south was deliberate and intended and was in direct violation of the rights of the states to secede. The slaves were the foundation of the south’s economy. By splitting the south he succeeded where his generals failed.

I repeat, the South had the right to secede and had no choice but to do so. We pay the price today for the north’s victory.

[Ditto]

You still don't grasp what Dred Scott was about. The fugitive slave clause had no bearing on the case. If you are a conservative and believe in a strict construction of the Constitution, you have to agree the Taney's decision was awful.

[BroJoeK]

x: "Another question is whether Southern Democrats really had secession on their minds when they split the party, thus ensuring Lincoln's victory.
It's an appealing theory in some ways, but I suspect they were as short-sighted as anybody else, and were looking backward, punishing Douglas for what they regarded as his past disloyalty or unreliability, rather than looking forwards with some complicated strategy..."

And yours could also be an appealing theory, except that the very Fire Eaters who had campaigned in the South for secession for many years, those were the same delegates to the 1860 Democrat Convention in Charleston who walked out and split their previously majority party.
That splitting their majority Democrat party would cause defeat to "Black Republicans" and so justify (in their minds) secession may not, just as you argue, have been a formal written-down plan, but I argue it certainly was the Fire Eaters' fondest hope in 1860.

That's why I say Slave Power Fire Eaters engineered their own defeat by Republicans in 1860, then immediately began organizing for secession after the November 6 election.

[BroJoeK]

PeaRidge: "The Ordinances of Secession, originally numbering 7 (eventually becoming 11) do not list any causes, a direct refutation of your characterization, and your often repeated argument."

Why would you say such a thing?
In Ordinances of Secession documents, Causes can be said to begin with the word "Whereas".
Of the first seven states to declare secession, Alabama used the word "whereas" once in its Ordnance of Secession, Texas three times.
No other state used "whereas" in its Ordnance.
Of those four "wereeas's", only one, a highly generic hand-waving reason, did not refer to slavery (more on this later).

You understand, I'm certain, that the word "slavery" was sometimes substituted-for with words like "property interests" and "domestic institutions".

PeaRidge: "Out of the 20 total declarations, ordinances, and other secession documents only 6 mentioned slavery in any context beyond geographical nomenclature (only 5 mention it at any length - the sixth is in a single brief clause)."

Such a comment is most disingenuous and misleading!
In fact, every secession document, generated by the first seven states to secede "at pleasure", if they gave any reasons, list concerns over slavery as their Number One Reason.

PeaRidge: "Fourteen of those documents specify other causes, either in addition to slavery or without mentioning it at all."

No, of the first seven states to secede, their "reasons" are overwhelmingly concerns over slavery, with one or two other problems thrown in, very briefly.
For example, Texas complains that Col. Robert E. Lee, who was in charge of protecting the Texas frontier against Indians, was doing a lousy job of it.
That is such a serious charge, isn't it, I'm just certain Lee will play no significant role in any future Confederate Army, right?

PeaRidge: "So, what is the conclusion?
Essentially about the only thing that is obvious is that your my-PeaRidge postings have been wrong."

There, fixed your rare but important typographical error, for you.
Yes, you're welcome, FRiend.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "Thank you Comrade Stalin.
We dissidents are obviously insane."

Nothing "Stalin" about it, FRiend, just hoping to be helpful with a fellow FReeper.
Political delusions are the Democrats stock-in-trade, while we conservatives try to remain steel-eyed and realistic.
So, your obvious affinity for political delusions suggests that either you should seek out professional help, or that you are in fact a Democrat poser, only here to agitate trouble.

Which is it?

[BroJoeK]

PeaRidge on the Morrill Tariff: "That is wrong.
Lincoln was elected Nov. 6, 1860.
The Morrill bill was passed out of committee in the US House and brought up for a floor vote near the end of first session of the Congress on May 10, 1860; the bill passed by a vote of 105 to 64."

Passed in the House, sent to the Senate where Southern senators tabled it, just as I said, FRiend:

"The Morrill bill was sent on to the Senate. However, the Senate was controlled by Democrats, and so the bill was bottled up in the Finance Committee, chaired by Robert M. T. Hunter of Virginia.

This insured that the Senate vote would be put off till the second session in December.
It also meant that the tariff would be a prominent issue in the 1860 election.[5]"

[DiogenesLamp]

You still don't grasp what Dred Scott was about. The fugitive slave clause had no bearing on the case.

Again, you merely confirm to me your inability to grasp the point. What does the constitution say?

No Person held to Service or Labour in one State, under the Laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in Consequence of any Law or Regulation therein, be discharged from such Service or Labour, but shall be delivered up on Claim of the Party to whom such Service or Labour may be due.

You don't think this applies to Dred Scott? If you think that, I don't see the point of discussing it with you.

If you are a conservative and believe in a strict construction of the Constitution, you have to agree the Taney's decision was awful.

Tanney's decision may have been morally offensive, but it is correct law for that time period. The Literal words of the US Constitution require that a "person held to labor in one state" cannot use the laws of another state to free himself.

It doesn't get much clearer. It's morally ugly, but it is crystal clear.

[DiogenesLamp]

Your continuous usage of the term "fire eaters" is a deliberate attempt to derogate and dismiss their concerns as unworthy of consideration.

It is simply evidence that you have no understanding of objectivity, and cannot argue from any perspective other than a subjective one.

I suppose it makes you feel good to mock and malign people with whom you disagree. This technique has a long usage in History. After the Nazis encountered stiff resistance from insurgent Poles, they started spreading Polish jokes to mock and make fun of the people they would eventually defeat.

It may be a coping mechanism for you, but it is unworthy of a rational man.

[BroJoeK]

NKP_Vet on Founders' secession views: "years later, after the New England Federalists attempted to secede, Jefferson said, “If any state in the Union will declare that it prefers separation … to a continuance in the union …. I have no hesitation in saying, ‘Let us separate.’” "

And yet, when President Jefferson suspected his own former Vice President Burr of planning to take over Louisiana and declare its secession, Jefferson had Burr tracked down, arrested and tried for treason.
So, declarations of secession were far from trivial matters in Jefferson's eyes.

Indeed, your quote from Jefferson above merely conforms to one of the two conditions all Founders said were necessary to justify declarations of secession:

• Mutual Consent or
• Major Breach of Compact -- usurpations, oppression or injury.

The absence of such justifications our Founders considered to be secession "at pleasure" which was not justified by any, and could fall into the constitutional categories of rebellion, insurrection, "domestic violence", invasion or treason.

[DiogenesLamp]

I do not care about their reasons for leaving. I only care that they had a right to leave, and could do so for reasons good or bad as suits their preference.

All the British citizens would have regarded the US reasons for leaving the British Union as invalid, so I see little point in concerning myself with what people's enemies think of their reasons.

Obviously their enemies are always going to regard their reasons as "bad", or "not good enough." My response to this is that"good" or "bad" are in the eye of the beholder, but their rights do not hinge on the viability of their reasons for exercising them.

If one can only exercise freedom of speech if the speech meets with the approval of one's opponents, than one has neither freedom in general, nor rights to speech in particular.

[DiogenesLamp]

Which is it?

I have no interest in your proffered fallacy of false choice. I consider it to be a childish debate tactic. There is a third choice, and that is that my position is reasonable and accurate, and yours is the deluded one.

Again, I will point out that my position is supported by the Declaration of Independence, the legal authority from which all other laws in this Nation flow.

Your position is in contradiction to it.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "Lincoln said some things so degrading to Blacks that it ought to make most Union Apologists blush, and perhaps even be a little ashamed."

Lincoln's views on slavery in, say, 1850 were similar to those of most Northerners -- they understood that slavery in the South was a precondition for Union, but did not want it expanded to Northern states or Western territories.
Like Jefferson and many others before him, Lincoln thought freed slaves should be returned to Africa.

By 1865, Lincoln's views on both slavery specifically, and African-Americans in general, had changed hugely, especially following meetings with black leaders who told Lincoln they did not want to return to Africa, but rather wished to live in the United States as free men.

So I would not blame Lincoln in 1865 for views he and many others had held years earlier.

[DiogenesLamp]

And yet, when President Jefferson suspected his own former Vice President Burr of planning to take over Louisiana and declare its secession, Jefferson had Burr tracked down, arrested and tried for treason. So, declarations of secession were far from trivial matters in Jefferson's eyes.

I would point out that one man plotting to subvert the Interests of the Government of which he is a part is a very different thing that many millions of people voicing their desire to separate from a government which no longer serves their interests.

Major Breach of Compact -- usurpations, oppression or injury.

I think we have already established that depriving people of "rights" which were explicitly enumerated in the larger body of the US Constitution, constitutes a breach of compact. The Refusal of states to return escaped slaves is a breach of this clause in the constitution. The efforts of the Government to ban slavery in future states would also be regarded in this light.

So even by your standards, what the Union was doing did constitute a "Major Breach of Compact -- usurpations, oppression or injury." You may not agree with this constituting an injury, but that is because you are looking at the "injury" with 2015 eyes, instead of 1860 eyes. According to the laws of that time, this was an "injury" and breach of compact.

[DiogenesLamp]

Lincoln's views on slavery in, say, 1850 were similar to those of most Northerners -- they understood that slavery in the South was a precondition for Union, but did not want it expanded to Northern states or Western territories.

Unfortunately for them, their position is unsupportable by the US Constitution. Slavery was recognized as a property right under that paradigm. You can't ban people from owning their "property", even if you disagree. The Constitution explicitly forbids the laws of another state from freeing people "held to Service or Labour in one State, under the Laws thereof."

If the constitution says that no laws of any state can deprive a man of his "person(s) held to Service or Labour in one State, under the Laws thereof," how can you possibly restrict slavery in another state?

So long as a man leaves a state where slavery is recognized, and goes to a new state, how is he not protected by the US Constitution from bringing his slaves with him?

What is your legal argument here?