Posted on 08/01/2022 9:00:05 AM PDT by DiogenesLamp
For some time I have wondered how to explain the cause of the Civil War in simple terms that are easy to understand. I now see that Ayn Rand did it years ago. Laws passed by a Northern controlled Congress routed all the money produced by the South into Northern "elite" pockets.
Ships bringing imports to the US went to the ports that provided the best access to consumers. That was New York (also Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore). New York was valuable because the city's railroad network made a vast area with much of the country's population easily accessible. New Orleans and other Southern cities didn't provide access to as large a pool of consumers, so imports weren't delivered there.
An article here recounts the problems that led to Charleston's decline as a seaport:
A healthy port, after all, must rely on a thriving hinterland and an effective transportation network to feed it. Hemp grown in eastern Kentucky, for example, was used to bundle southern cotton. But to reach South Carolina, the hemp had to be sent north by rail to the Great Lakes, by barge to New York, and then by coastwise vessels to Charleston. In this era, “New York has a hinterland that stretches west to Indiana” and into the South itself, says Scott Reynolds Nelson, a historian at the College of William & Mary. “South Carolina has a hinterland that doesn’t get to Tennessee.”
You keep repeating that foreign shippers could have carried goods more cheaply and that US shippers raised prices because of the Navigation Act, but you don't provide any real evidence. Competition between domestic shippers would have kept the cost of coastal shipping from going too high.
Your idea that there was some Northern monopoly of coastal shipping runs aground when we look at the domestic slave trade. So far as I've been able to find out slave traders in Virginia had no trouble renting space on or chartering or even buying and operating ships to send slaves to New Orleans for sale. Article about the brig Uncas. More about the four ships owned by Franklin & Armfield.
There was no Northern monopoly of coastal shipping or of transatlantic shipping. The problem was that there was no Southern market for any foreign goods as big as the Greater New York market was, or as big as the market for slaves in the boom days of cotton growing on the Mississippi was. Also, Southerners didn't put as much effort into shipping as Northerners did. It wasn't a priority for them.
Clearly neither Pirates or Slavers would be going up the channel at Charleston Harbor.
More like, the ship regarded itself as Confederate, but didn't want to provoke a bad reaction from a clearly Union vessel, and so chose not to run up a flag or show lights in the hopes they would be ignored. When it was fired upon, it ran up the Stars and Stripes, again, probably to avoid further entanglement with this apparently hostile ship.
Beauregard already had orders from Davis to reduce the fort by force prior to Lane’s incident with Nashville.
From the Secretary of War Walker, and those orders gave Beauregard whatever leeway he needed to make the decision, and they even went so far as to allow a peaceful conclusion.
I believe those orders of which you speak were days old at the time.
He opened fire after Anderson refused his last offer to surrender.
Not quite the whole story. He opened fire after Anderson refused his offer of a truce if Beauregard's forces had to defend themselves from the coming Union warships.
I've seen the messages. Beauregard said he would not fire on Anderson if Anderson agreed to not fire on him, should the ships engage Beauregard's forces. Anderson replied that if Beauregard's forces fired on any of those ships, Anderson would fire on him with the guns of Sumter.
Anderson, together with Lincoln sending those ships, left Beauregard with no acceptable alternative choice.
I believe you know more about this aspect of the 1860 military than do I, and so I shall take your word for it.
My Great Grandfather was enlisted in the 29th Alabama Infantry Regiment and I have his photo right here over my desk.
His brother died in the war and is buried not ten feet from my Great Grandfather. My Dad is buried about twenty yards from them.
Southerners fought to repel Yankee invaders. The personal reasons of individuals have little to do with the overarching claims of the politicians or academics. You come down here to kill and destroy lives, they'll fight you. It was as simple as that. That's all I ever tried to get across.
We should all note that the British Empire abolished slavery in planned stages without a war. Our Un-Civil War did not have to happen.
Well firstly, that wasn't going to happen, and secondly, the Union authorities hadn't been too honest in their dealings up to that point.
1. Anderson violently seized Sumter in the dark of the night after the War Secretary John Floyd had been telling them for weeks (months?) that the forts would be turned over to them.
2.Gustavus Fox lied about checking on the well being of Anderson and his men, and was really plotting the Charleston mission.
3. Buchanan tried to sneak in 200 artillerymen under cover of "supply" and got caught doing it.
4. The National Republican Newspaper had printed in March that during a cabinet meeting it was decided that Sumter would be turned over to them.
5. Union government officials continued stringing along the confederate delegation sent to negotiate on the disposition of the forts and any other debts that needed to be addressed. They were told one lie after another until they finally realized they were being strung along and left.
With all that dishonesty (from the Confederate's perspective), why would they trust anything Lincoln said?
If Lincoln was only sending "supplies", then why did he need warships and troops on the Baltic?
This is like approaching people claiming you "come in peace" while holding a large sword above your head as if ready to strike.
People always trot out this old argument. There were only 4 states out of 11 that said it was about slavery. (among other things they also included) All the rest did not say any such thing.
In your experience, is it normal to let 4 people speak for 11?
Columnist Paul Craig Roberts argues that those states asserted it was about slavery because the Northern states had clearly breached the Constitutional contract on that point, and it allowed them to make the legal argument for leaving.
A Civil War lesson for the uneducated
Virginia, the most important state in the Confederacy, said they seceded because raising troops to make war upon former states was tyranny.
& go compare the Confederate Constitution with the US Constitution.
The US Constitution recognized and protected slavery too. The only difference between it and the Confederate constitution is that the Confederate constitution made it a lot clearer. They had past experience with how people kept twisting the US Constitution, and so they likely wanted to make it much clearer.
It was the institution of Slavery, period. Anyone who says otherwise is one of those Revisionism Liars.
People that repeat the stuff you say are the revisionism liars. The North was going to make slavery permanent. They passed an amendment through congress to make slavery permanent (Corwin Amendment.) and Lincoln supported this amendment.
Therefore, it was *NOT* about slavery.
For example, see this explanation by South Carolina’s Convention...
Yes, see this explanation by South Carolina's convention. Just a different one than you want to use, and one that is far more accurate.
Typical verbally abusive northern snob. You have derided everyone to whom you have replied on this thread, revealing your insecurity about what you claim is gospel.
Amen. As many have noted upthread, it was really about the money. The attacks on morality were some of the psy-ops of that particular war.
You overcomplicate. The South produced 72% of the total value of trade with Europe. The vast bulk of that money ended up in the hands of New York and Washington DC.
You try to obfuscate by making it complex. It's not. It's very simple.
Doesn't provide evidence.
I provide evidence all the d@mn time. You just ignore or reject it because it's not to your liking.
Makes things up.
Like what? I don't make up anything. Show an example of where I have made something up.
Doesn't consider anything that doesn't support what he already believes.
Doesn't buy your flimsy arguments which try to cover up the economic data that is clearly visible.
Consider the success of Uncle Tom's Cabin, the runaway best selling novel, turned into an extremely popular play. Clearly many Northerners did have sympathy with the slaves.
It is unquestionable that propaganda works. Over time with the correct stimulus you can steer the public. We saw the effect of "I don't want to die!" movie helping to abolish capitol punishment. We saw the book, "One flew over the coo coo's nest" help to get rid of asylums. We've witnessed how Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle" helped institute government control of the meat packing industry, and how "To Kill A Mockingbird" created sympathy for black people who were then viewed as getting unfair treatment by the legal system in place in the South.
Yes, Harriet Beecher Stowe (Liberal progressive activist from Hartford Connecticut) created the 1860s version of "woke" activism, and which even President Lincoln acknowledged was a strong contributing factor to triggering the Civil War. He jokingly said something to the effect "So you are the little woman who started this war."
But in the absence of such influence, the dominant sentiment in the North was a hatred of blacks and a desire to keep them away from whites.
Many more probably didn't think about them much at all.
Eventually they were all made to think what the government wanted them to think. Arresting people who disagree tends to have that effect. We see something similar with all the government mandated vaccine activism.
The fact that the Union warships did not fire on the Confederate batteries firing on Fort Sumter is solid evidence that they were not ordered there to attack the Confederates. Their orders only allowed the use of force to aid the resupply effort, which never took place.
“All the allegations that Lincoln did publicly decry lost revenues came from pro-Confederate propagandists after Lincoln was in office. They are not confirmed by any non-hostile original sources.”
Not confirmed by non-hostile original sources??? And I am sure you are familiar with the tons and tons of original sources, hostile and non-hostile. Yep, sure you are.
By the way, how many “Lost Causes” are you familiar with that you can draw such grandiose summations?
You are so full of crap.
Your ancestors were pawns used by evil men who fought and caused the deaths of some 600,000 Americans so they could keep an entire race of beings in bondage and NOTHING is ever going to change that.
You Southerners opened fire on Ft. Sumter.
Your side invaded Maryland and Pennsylvania and got your asses kicked.
Yeah you’re big mouth so cut the crap. Your Ivy League degree hasn’t enlightened you to the truth of The Civil War and that is a coterie of wealthy Southern slave owners who fought like hell to keep Blacks in bondage.
I’m not ‘’superior’’ to anyone here, I’m as as flawed a man as the
Lord God made me, as HE made all of us. The difference I know that about me. You’re the one trying to play the aggrieved here and the only point I’m making here is that the moral relativism and excuse you Democrats use to justify the evil of the Confederacy. A political entity that split the nation in two and caused the deaths of some 600,000 Americans. And you’re too stupid or dishonest to admit that.
I do no such thing. YOUR side trashed the Constitution in 1860 with secession.
And throwing off the chains of a degenerate monarchy and ocean away is no where near undertaking a violent secession to rend a nation in two and keep a race of people in bondage for the purpose of using them a s slave labor.
Ask yourself this: what class of people at the time had the money or the leisure time to buy novels or go to the theater? How does that class compare to those advancing racist theories today to oppress their political rivals?
Many more probably didn't think about them much at all.
If true, those would have been the farming people raising families of many children (pre-birth control) and the small tradespeople who supported the local region. The U.S. population was majority agrarian until 1939.
However, I disagree with your premise. There were no radios, tv or internet, and even railroads were largely limited to distributing product locally; but there were newspapers; people all over the country may have had little opinion about slavery per se, but many opinions about who would move in to their community, and whether they would be compatible neighbors.
There was no such thing as "cool", "casual" or "indifferent" attitudes towards strangers in those days when the vast majority of all the American people, including children, worked up to 12 hours a day, six days a week, and there was no welfare. Even 3/4ths of a century after the CW, my own illiterate Irish-American grandfather went to work at age 7 on a waterfront and worked for the same company to age 65. Every individual and all they brought with them either enhanced the community or dragged it down; so the prospect of a dispersal of former slaves was indeed a large concern.
The "do-gooders" (like today's progressives) dreaming of an immediate and successful integration of the two different cultures (African-slave vs European-American) were concentrated in small areas of big cities and near the Ivy colleges (Yale, Harvard) or elite old churches in New England. Their uopian fantasies worked about as well as George W. Bush's assurance that the Middle Easterners would embrace democracy if we just went over there and got rid of a few overlords.
YOU”RE SIDE STARTED It! Don’t try that bs with me sonny.
They opened fire on Ft. Sumter.
Well said. You know your history.
It’s mystifying how deeply personal this history is to you today, so that you take the occasion not to debate, but to call names, accuse others of being Democrats, and generally stink up the thread with pouting and denunciations.
You seem equally mystified by people who read about and discuss the CW in order to seek a more objective narrative about the many, many aspects of the conflict that require a re-examination of the propaganda from both sides—before, during, and after the war. That they do so dispassionately seems to really irk you, when what you seem to want is a bloody reenactment on this forum.
The proper outlets for your rage are the parallels between what was done then that split this constitutional republic, and what is being done now that is threatening to split this republic—not without bloodshed—and what we can learn from it to prevent even worse times than we are enduring at present.
Cool heads look at those dynamics with open minds to learn, and without rattling sabers at other freepers or spitting in their eyes, but debating with civility, sharing information or citations, and respecting the family ties and home states of others. Your continued denunciations of the south and everyone in it helps nothing and no-one.
He authored The Army Surgeons Manual(still in use) and he had to deal with the carnage your ancestors caused. And because I was born and raised in the northeastern NJ town of Kearny, named after it's most famous local son Union General Phil Kearny, that's why.
And my truck IS NOT with Southerners,I have a North Carolinian sister-in-law.
My problem is with Confederates.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.