On this date in 1864 President Lincoln receives a Christmas gift.

[Bull Snipe]

"I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the City of Savannah, with one hundred and fifty heavy guns and plenty of ammunition and about twenty-five thousand bales of cotton." General William T. Sherman's "March to the Sea" was over. During the campaign General Sherman had made good on his promise d “to make Georgia howl”. Atlanta was a smoldering ruin, Savannah was in Union hands, closing one of the last large ports to Confederate blockade runners. Sherman’s Army wrecked 300 miles of railroad and numerous bridges and miles of telegraph lines. It seized 5,000 horses, 4,000 mules, and 13,000 head of cattle. It confiscated 9.5 million pounds of corn and 10.5 million pounds of fodder, and destroyed uncounted cotton gins and mills. In all, about 100 million dollars of damage was done to Georgia and the Confederate war effort.

[OIFVeteran]

Good informative video about the cause of the civil war by the former head of the history department at West Point.
https://youtu.be/pcy7qV-BGF4

[OIFVeteran]

https://youtu.be/pcy7qV-BGF4

[rockrr]

I’ve seen this before - good synopsis. Be prepared for more lost cause propaganda in a desperate response...

[BroJoeK]

quoting BJK: "During the "Gilded Age" the US economy grew 150%, population doubled and average real wages rose over 50%."

DiogenesLamp: "Population doubled?
Should that not have doubled the economy?
Does not 150% represent a reduction from what should have been a 200% gain in economic activity due to a doubling of the population?
Worse still, economic activity is synergistic, and doubling of the population should have resulted in economic improvement even greater than 200%."

Sorry, I didn't intend to confuse you with, ahem, advanced mathematics, so let me explain it in simple terms:

• If something (i.e., population) grows from 100 to 150, that is a 50% increase.
• If it grows from 100 to 200 that is a 100% increase = doubled.
• If it grows from 100 to 250 that is a 150% increase.
• If it grows from 100 to 300 that is a 200% increase = tripled, etc.

So, in the Gilded Age (1870 to 1900) the US economy grew 150%, meaning more than doubled.
The population doubled (100% increase) and average real wages grew by 50%.

For comparison, from 1945 to 1970 (the post-war boom) the US population grew about 50% while both US GDP and real wages doubled.
Then from 1970 to today, again US population grew about 50% and again GDP doubled, but real wages remained flat, at best.
Now someone might argue that since 1970 average working American lives have vastly improved due to 1) technology, 2) more women working to increase household income and 3) rising asset values especially homes and 401Ks.
We might also add more generous welfare for the poor.
But wages, adjusted for inflation, remained flat (at best) for nearly 50 years.
Today that seems to be changing.

The "Gilded Age" compares well to the best economic periods in American history.

DiogenesLamp: "So where did that missing money go?
How much went into the pockets of the Train Barons?
The Steel Barons?
The Oil Barons?
The Finance Barons?
And Washington DC bureaucrat pockets?"

Missing money?
That's leftist socialist Democrat talk, FRiend.
The fact is there is no quantifiable evidence that "corruption" (however you define it) was greater or less at any one historical period than any other.

Consider today's wealthiest billionaires -- over half made their money from technology (i.e., Bill Gates), about a third first inherited their wealth, though like the Walton's of Walmart they also grew it spectacularly, and many of the rest made their money in investments (i.e., Buffet, Bloomberg).
Now consider that some of these people have even been accused of "crimes" which were totally unimaginable 30 years ago, and which even today are not fully codified.
Does that make them more corrupt than the generations before them, or does it simply mean the economy changed faster than our laws?

Obviously the latter, just as in the Gilded Age 130 years ago.

[OIFVeteran]

Yes, I’m sure the Brigadier General will be accused of being a Marxist.

[BroJoeK]

quoting BJK: "Lincoln's (alleged) offer to Virginians might have prevented war from starting at Fort Sumter, but that's all.
It would not stop war from breaking out somewhere else, Fort Pickens, for example."

DiogenesLamp: "This theory only works if you postulate that Lincoln is a back stabbing liar and had no intention of giving Virginia what they thought they were getting.
(Which was to leave the seceded states alone.) "

That's just total nonsense.
The deal Lincoln (allegedly) offered Virginians was his surrender of Fort Sumter to Confederates in exchange for Virginians permanently dissolving their secession convention.
"A fort for a state" Lincoln supposedly said.
But it covered nothing else and could no-way guarantee that Jefferson Davis would not start war elsewhere, Fort Pickens, for example.

So no historian has ever suggested that Lincoln offered Virginians, or anybody else, a comprehensive peace deal which would allow Confederates, in Gen. Scott's words, to "depart in peace, wayward sisters".
Indeed, claims that Lincoln made any offer whatever seem reasonable, but are only inferred based on later accounts.

DiogenesLamp: "Yes, if Lincoln fully expected to start the war somewhere else, and only told Virginia what they wanted to hear until he could pull another trick to start a war, then you are correct. "

And that's just your own insanity talking, not reality.
In reality Lincoln had no intention of starting war, if he could avoid it, but Jefferson Davis absolutely did as he explained to Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg:

• At Fort Sumter: "There would be to us an advantage in so placing them that an attack by them would be a necessity, but when we are ready to relieve our territory and jurisdiction of the presence of a foreign garrison that advantage is overbalanced by other considerations."

• At Fort Pickens: "The case of Pensacola then is reduced [to] the more palpable elements of a military problem and your measures may without disturbing views be directed to the capture of Fort Pickens and the defence of the harbor.
  You will soon have I hope a force sufficient to occupy all the points necessary for that end.
  As many additional troops as may be required can be promptly furnished."
  Davis to Bragg April 3, 1861

DiogenesLamp: "So yes, Lincoln fully intended to start the war somewhere else and was only conning Virginia to get them to do what he wanted long enough to keep them in line."

Lincoln's mission at Fort Pickens was the same as at Fort Sumter, to prevent Confederates from seizing Union troops & property.
If that could be accomplished without war (as with the 1858 Paraguay expedition) then so much the better.

But Jefferson Davis had different ideas.

[Kalamata]

>>OIFVeteran wrote: “Good informative video about the cause of the civil war by the former head of the history department at West Point. https://youtu.be/pcy7qV-BGF4";

I see you are continuing to sneak your big-government, central-planning socialism into the narrative. Seidule is, to be kind, a revisionist-historian. Why else would he get that kind of position at the Academy under the Obama Administration? Think about it?

I seem to recall the same blood-thirsty generals — primarily, Sherman, Sheridan, and Grant — who plundered, pillaged and then burned the South almost to the ground, leaving hundreds of thousands freezing and starving to death in the dead of winter, were the same ones who continued their bloody careers by the massacre of, and/or promoting the massacre of, the Native-American Indians, whose natural title to the land was standing in the way of the blatantly unconstitutional, government-sponsored-and-paid-for Transcontinental Railroad, that just so-happened to begin in Souix City, Iowa, where the patron-saint Abraham Lincoln had previously, and conveniently, bought a whole bunch of land, and by which many “republican” politicians and supporters lined-their pockets with land-grabs and political favors. Nice guys...

Shame on you.

Mr. Kalamata

[BroJoeK]

Picking up where we left off, Kalamata's post #517:

Kalamata: "That is one of the nicest things a hard-left progressive has ever said about me, Joey."

As usual, Kalamata can't post without lying about something.

Kalamata: "Professor James Randall was also guilty of committing an act of 'history,' as follows:...
...[Randall, James G., "Constitutional Problems Under Lincoln." D. Appleton & Company, 1926, pp.52-53] "

Randall was of the Revisionist School, effectively anti-Lincoln: claiming to be "neutral" he called the war "unnecessary" and said it, "could have been avoided, supposing of course that something more of statesmanship, moderation, and understanding, and something less of professional patrioteering, slogan-making, face-saving, political clamoring, and propaganda, had existed on both sides"

So let's look at your Randall quote:

• Randall: "In referring to his proclamation of May 4, 1861, calling for enlistments in the regular army far beyond the existing legal limits, Lincoln himself frankly admitted that he had overstepped his authority."

  In fact, the 1807 Insurrection Act set no legal limits and the 75,000 Union troops Lincoln called up was consistent with both the 100,000 Confederates called in March and the 13,000 President Washington called up in 1794 against the Whiskey Rebellion, adjusting for the increased population.
  Further, if in fact Lincoln "frankly admitted overstepping his authority", Randall provided us no quote to support the claim.
  So right away, Randall's claims are nonsense.

• Randall: "It was such acts as these that gave rise to the charge of "military dictatorship," and this charge seemed to gain weight from the President's deliberate postponement of the special session of Congress until July 4, though the call for such session was issued on April 15."

  Sure, and those Democrat accusations against Republican President Lincoln were just as baseless & politically motivated as Democrat accusations against Republican President Trump today.
  Democrats have always been insane.

• Randall: "The alleged "unconstitutionality" of this conduct of President Lincoln was urged as a leading argument by those who contended that the whole process by which the "war" began was illegal…
  War, it was argued, must begin with a declaration; Congress alone has the power of declaring war;
  the President's power of suppressing an insurrection is not tantamount to the war power;
  and his right to promulgate a blockade order becomes valid only after war has become a legal fact through a congressional declaration.
  War, therefore, did not lawfully exist, it was said, when these early captures were made;
  hence there could be no valid blockade and no prize jurisdiction in the Federal courts."

  Note Randall's repeated qualifying phrase, "it was said", meaning: it was claimed by insane Democrats who literally cared more about their partisan interests than about preserving, protecting or defending the United States.

In fact, Congress never declared Civil War because they considered it a rebellion, insurrection and domestic violence covered by the 1807 Insurrection Act, not requiring a declaration of war.
The fact that Democrats wanted to make it more difficult to defeat the rebellion was a major reason they themselves were defeated by ever increasing margins in future elections.

Kalamata after first claiming my words were his own: "No objective historian would claim Lincoln's actions were legal, Joey."

No, only partisan Democrats pretend Lincoln's actions were illegal, Danny-boy.

Kalamata: "Davis would be only a tiny blip in history, if not for Lincoln's treachery."

One way we can tell that Kalamata (along with other pro-Confederates) is an intellectually dishonest Democrat, is the total double-standard he (& they) apply to Lincoln & Davis.
Just as today they excuse Democrats Clintons & Bidens for high crimes while trying to convict Republican President Trump for alleged infractions, so they also excuse Democrat Jefferson Davis while hoping to convict Republican President Lincoln.

Kalamata: "I know what a 'Burner and Plunderer' is, Joey; but what is a Lost Causer?"

Pro-Confederate Democrats, like you Danny.

Kalamata: "You just admitted to Lincoln's tyranny (highlighted.)
How careless of you, old man?"

How careless of you, Danny, I admitted no such thing.

Kalamata: "Professor Donald also made this statement which seems to contradict your assertion about Davis:

"It is true that in January, 1862, the Confederate Congress did pass a law forbidding the publication of unauthorized news of troop movements, but even this slight regulation was bitterly protested and flagrantly ignored.
No Southern newspaper was ever suppressed by the Confederate government for its opinions, however critical or demoralizing."

Those words sound more like a Soviet-style propagandist than real historian.
The real truth was a bit more... complicated.

• "The first conscription act in North America authorizing Davis to draft soldiers was said to be the "essence of military despotism".[241][242]

  Vice President Alexander H. Stephens feared losing the very form of republican government.
  Allowing President Davis to threaten "arbitrary arrests" to draft hundreds of governor-appointed "bomb-proof" bureaucrats conferred "more power than the English Parliament had ever bestowed on the king.
  History proved the dangers of such unchecked authority."[243]
  The abolishment of draft exemptions for newspaper editors was interpreted as an attempt by the Confederate government to muzzle presses, such as the Raleigh NC Standard, to control elections and to suppress the peace meetings there."

• "The Confederacy actively used the army to arrest people suspected of loyalty to the United States.
  Historian Mark Neely found 4,108 names of men arrested and estimated a much larger total.[272]
  The Confederacy arrested pro-Union civilians in the South at about the same rate as the Union arrested pro-Confederate civilians in the North.[273]
  Neely argues:
  'The Confederate citizen was not any freer than the Union citizen – and perhaps no less likely to be arrested by military authorities.
  In fact, the Confederate citizen may have been in some ways less free than his Northern counterpart.
  For example, freedom to travel within the Confederate states was severely limited by a domestic passport system.[274] "

The truth is that Confederate citizens were less free to travel and just as likely to be arrested or drafted for expressing political dissent.

Kalamata quoting on Lincoln vs. Davis: "Neely concluded. 'Both showed little sincere interest in constitutional restrictions on government authority in wartime.
Both were obsessed with winning the war.'"
[James M. McPherson, "Embattled Rebel: Jefferson Davis as Commander in Chief." Penguin Press, 2014, Chap.2]"

I suspect a clerical error here, (McPherson quoting Neely?), but taking it at face value: and yet those, typical Democrats, who have condemned Republican Lincoln the loudest have the very least to say about anything Democrat Davis did.

Kalamata cherry-picking quote from Neely:

"Historians could not help but notice the differences in Confederate and Union ideologies and policies—the Union restricting liberty from the earliest moment to the very end of the war, while the Confederacy made a great point of its maintenance of civilian rights in the midst of war almost to the very end.
Dwelling more on what the presidents said than what they did, historians assumed that Confederates valued white civil liberties more than Northerners did and that Confederate leaders had more reverence for the constitution."
[Mark E. Neely Jr., "Southern Rights: political prisoners and the myth of Confederate constitutionalism." University Press of Virgiinia, 1999, pp.166-167]"

Kalamata: "Imagine that? Davis was the good guy?"

No, that's not what Neely said, read it again, Danny.
For a better understanding of Texas born, Penn State Professor Neely's opinions, you can hear them directly from him, here.
An excellent lecture, I listened to it all, thought in the beginning he sounded a bit like a Kalamata-class lunatic, but by the end found him very, very reasonable.

Kalamata on habeas corpus: "Only the Congress is authorized that power, Joey."

So claim our pro-Confederates, but neither Congress nor the Supreme Court ruled it when Habeas Corpus was suspended by Presidents Lincoln, Grant and FDR (during WWII) without serious constitutional challenges.

Kalamata: "The Republican Congress usurped the constitution when it rubber-stamped Lincoln's tyranny, Joey.
Further, no Supreme Court has recognized the power over habeas corpus belonging to anyone, but the Congress, Joey."

Oh, Danny baby-boy, you just must stop lying.
In fact, neither Congress nor the Supreme Court ruled against Presidents Lincoln, Grant or Franklin Roosevelt whenever they suspended habeas corpus.
Sure, today habeas corpus is strictly defined by law and may be suspended for terrorists, but in previous generations Presidents had more discretion during war-time.

Kalamata: "Chief Justice Taney issued an opinion that Lincoln's suspension was unconstitutional, citing John Marshall and Joseph Story, and had it delivered to Lincoln.
Lincoln ignored it."

That crazy lunatic Roger Taney hoped to do to Lincoln what he'd already done to Dred Scott.
Both rulings were completely insane, and I doubt if you know the half of it.

Kalamata: "You don't know what you are talking about."

Child.

;-)

[DiogenesLamp]

I only watched it half way through and it's just a regurgitation of the same old talking points I always hear.

What *NEVER* gets pointed out in these diatribes is that they were going to keep slavery in the Union, that indeed Lincoln and his associates bent over backwards to guarantee that slavery would persist in those states that wanted it.

Of course this blows a very big hole in the assertion "the war was over slavery."

Not really. Slavery wasn't on the negotiating table at all. The North was doing whatever it could to reassure the South on this point, so no, the North really wasn't motivated to attack them because they hated slavery.

Also, this business of hating slavery in that day and age is not quite the way it's presented nowadays. There were a few abolitionists and such that hated it because they saw it as immoral, but the majority of whites in the North hated it because it brought black people into their societies, and because they saw it as a threat to their labor and wages.

They were very prejudiced in those days, and black laws were created in all sorts of Northern states to keep black people out.

[OIFVeteran]

Well at least you didn’t call him a Marxist. Must burn you up knowing that the leaders of the US army are learning the true reason for the war of rebellion(which is the official name given to it by the US Army).

If you truly are a veteran(Which I doubt) I hope it wasn’t the US Army you served in. If it was, and considering your unhinged hatred of America and love of the southern pretend confederacy, you should really burn all your US Army uniforms and medals.

[OIFVeteran]

Of course you couldn’t get more than half-way through because the truth conflicts with your dearly held delusion of the war. It’s too bad because some times you show flashes of reasonable thought.

[DiogenesLamp]

Lincoln's mission at Fort Pickens was the same as at Fort Sumter, to prevent Confederates from seizing Union troops & property.

This has been explained to you before. Lieutenant Porter immediately tried to engage the confederate shore batteries as soon as he arrived. If you think he was doing this contrary to the President's orders, you are greatly mistaken.

One can only conclude that his orders were to start a d@mn fight as soon as he got there. Nothing else is reasonable.

Ergo, Lincoln intended to start the war there if his trick to start it in Charleston failed.

[DiogenesLamp]

It's the same old thing. It's focusing on "secession statements" and he is mistaken when he said "all" of the Southern states listed slavery as the primary reason, so he's just wrong about that.

Again, the North had taken slavery off the table by passing the Corwin amendment through congress. What I mean here is that so far as the Northern states were concerned, slavery could persist indefinitely, therefore they were not fighting against the South because the South had slavery.

The North did not launch a war over slavery. They just didn't.

Ergo, "slavery" was not the cause over which the war was began.

[BroJoeK]

Kalamata: "I am continuously amazed that the Plunderers-and-Burners refuse to believe everything Lincoln said."

I assume by that is meant the people who plundered & burned their way through Union cities from Chambersburg, Pennsylvania to Lawrence, Kansas.

• In West Virginia: "Pro-Confederate guerrillas burned and plundered in some sections, and were not entirely suppressed until after the war was ended."

• In Kentucky: "At the completion of his escape through the Commonwealth, Morgan claimed to have captured and paroled 1,200 enemy soldiers, recruited 300 men and acquired several hundred horses for his cavalry, used or destroyed supplies in seventeen towns, and incurred fewer than 100 casualties.[51]"

• In Missouri: "Perhaps the costliest incidents of guerrilla warfare were the Sacking of Osceola, the burning of Platte City, and the Centralia Massacre.
  Among the most notorious bushwhackers were William C. Quantrill's raiders, Silas M. Gordon, William "Bloody Bill" Anderson, and a young Jesse James."

• In Kansas: "a guerrilla raid by pro-slavery "bushwhackers" led by William C. Quantrill, who descended on Lawrence, a center of anti-slavery Unionist sentiment, and proceeded to sack the town, burning numerous buildings and executing about 180 men and boys"

• In Pennsylvania: "As a result of its vital role as a Federal raw material source and its proximity to the Mason–Dixon line, Pennsylvania was the target of several raids by the Confederate States Army.
  These included cavalry raids in 1862 and 1863 by J.E.B. Stuart, in 1863 by John Imboden, and in 1864 by John McCausland in which his troopers burned the city of Chambersburg.[15]"

• In Indiana: "Morgan continued his raid north and burned most of the town of Salem.[53]"

• In Maryland: "Frederick would later be extorted by Jubal Early, who threatened to burn down the city if its residents did not pay a ransom.[60]
  Hagerstown too would also suffer a similar fate.[61] "

So, when Kalamata talks about "burners & plunderers", he's talking about Confederates.

[OIFVeteran]

The North didn’t launch a war, and you know that. The rebels in the southern states started a war by firing the first shot at an American fort.

Now you should also know that the reason the slavocracy rebelled is because of slavery. They mention slavery more than any other reason in both their declarations and the statements they made at their rebel conventions.

[BroJoeK]

eartick: "AND it is true today, the north would starve if it was not for the Southern and midwest States.
The north are takers, they are not givers in the final tally."

Only if, by "the North" you mean agricultural production in just New England, which today produces only about 1% of US agricultural products.
But if, by "the North" you mean 1861 Union States (except California) then today they produce about 36% of US agricultural products.
California alone produces 13%.

Today former Confederate States combined produce about 25% of US agricultural products.

US agricultural production by state

In the 1860s Union states out-manufactured Confederate states by factors of several to one.
Today the differences are not so pronounced.

[BroJoeK]

eartick: "Do you have a link. I wish I could read the key off of your image but cannot."

Sorry about that.

This is the link for that and several others like it.

Try this image for greater details.

[Repeal The 17th]

I think about this and I wonder: “Why at Fort Sumter?
Many other federal properties had already come under Confederate control.

History does not record any shots fired at:

South Carolina seizures:
United States Arsenal at Charleston
Fort Moultrie
Fort Johnson
Castle Pinckney

Georgia seizures:
United States Arsenal at Augusta
Dahlonega Mint
Fort Jackson
Fort Pulaski
Oglethorpe Barracks

Alabama seizures:
United States Arsenal at Mount Vernon
Fort Morgan
Fort Gaines

Mississippi seizure:
Fort Massachusetts on Ship Island

Florida seizures:
United States Arsenal at Apalachicola
Pensacola Navy Yard (Warrington Ship Yard)
Fort Marion
Fort McRee
Fort Barrancas and Barrancas Barracks

Louisiana seizures:
United States Arsenal at Baton Rouge
New Orleans Mint
United States paymaster’s office at New Orleans
Fort Jackson
Fort Saint Philip
Fort Pike
Fort Macomb
Baton Rouge Barrack

Texas seizures:
United States Arsenal at San Antonio
Fort Clark
Camp Verde
San Antonio Barracks

Arkansas seizures:
United States Arsenal at Little Rock
United States ordnance stores at Napoleon
United States subsistence stores at Pine Bluff
Fort Smith

North Carolina seizures:
United States Arsenal at Fayetteville
Charlotte Mint
Fort Johnston
Fort Caswell
Fort Macon

Missouri seizures:
United States Arsenal at Liberty
United States ordnance stores at Kansas City

[DiogenesLamp]

The rebels in the southern states started a war by firing the first shot at an American fort.

Because the fort informed them that it would be firing upon them when those ships arrived. The fort was offered a truce, but the Fort declined.

Look, virtually all of Lincoln's cabinet told him his plan would start a war. The Commander of the Fort, Major Anderson, wrote that this plan was going to start a war.

Lincoln did in fact start the war by ordering those warships into Charleston. The war started April 5th, not April 11th, and Lincoln started it.

Now you should also know that the reason the slavocracy rebelled is because of slavery.

I have maintained all along that people wanting independence don't have to justify why they wish to exercise the right to independence. It is the people who attack them that has to justify why they are attacking people who just want out from under their control.

Only the Union's reasons for launching that war matter. And their reason was NOT slavery.

[DiogenesLamp]

I think about this and I wonder: “Why at Fort Sumter?

It almost happened at Ft. Pickens in Pensacola. Lieutenant David Porter tried to open fire on the Confederates, but was prevented from doing so by Captain Meigs who interposed his ship between Porter and the Confederates.

Porter said he almost decided to ram him, but then he decided to stop.

Porter was trying to start the war, and he was acting under direct hand carried and secret orders from Abraham Lincoln.

And yes, none of the other events devolved into fighting.