Posted on 09/26/2002 6:42:56 PM PDT by tall_tex
And what, please tell me, did the institution of slavery affect the most? The economy.
Absolutely. Keeping slaves was an economic decision. The only reason to own a slave is to have the use of slave labor.
The loss of slaves caused economic devastation to the South. A good slave was worth $1000, an incredible sum back then.
That's right. But slavery was no longer profitable in the North, so they wanted to end it. And they wanted to end it with no solution regarding the replacement of that number.
Had cooler heads prevailed, the institution of slavery would've ended. With the preaching of the Wesleys (late 1700s) and their followers, it would have ended much as it had in Britain. But slowly. And there wouldn't have been an entire race/class of uneducated and ill-prepared people simply turned out to fend for themselves.
"We assert that fourteen of the States have deliberately refused, for years past, to fulfill their constitutional obligations, and we refer to their own Statutes for the proof. ... The States of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa, have enacted laws which either nullify the Acts of Congress or render useless any attempt to execute them."
Nothing hard to understand about that is there? They then reassert the principle of the Declaration of Independence, that whenever any "form of government becomes destructive of the ends for which it was established, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government." A principle that the 13 states a fought a war to secure. And finally, they stated the obvious, "[w]e maintain that in every compact between two or more parties, the obligation is mutual; that the failure of one of the contracting parties to perform a material part of the agreement, entirely releases the obligation of the other."
Exercising the right of eminent domain (which the states had exercised in 1776), the South took control of the Federal forts and arsenals within their borders. After the secession of South Carolina President Lincoln voiced his sentiments regarding an invasion:
"What is ``invasion''? Would the marching of an army into South California, for instance, without the consent of her people, and in hostility against them, be coercion or invasion? I very frankly say, I think it would be invasion, and it would be coercion too, if the people of that country were forced to submit."
Abraham Lincoln, "Speech from the Balcony of the Bates House at Indianapolis, Indiana", 11 Feb 1861, Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, Roy P. Basler, ed., vol IV. p.195.
The South sent three men to meet with Lincoln, to pay the federal government for any property seized, yet Lincoln refused to meet with them. Despite his promises to the contrary, Lincoln invaded South Carolina, forcing the South to defend themselves. Many claim that the South was the aggressor, would they assert that the woman shooting the rapist enetering her bedroom to be the aggressor? The South stood upon the well-established principle of public law that "the aggressor in a war is not the first who uses force, but the first who renders force necessary" [Henry E. Hallam, The Constitutional History of England from Henry VII to George II, (1827)]. Lincoln invaded a sovereign nation, instigated a war that needlessly killed over 623,000 men, women and children, black and white, soldier and civilian. Lincoln waged war against the very principles of the Declaration and Constitution.
"I am directed by the President of the United States to notify you to expect an attempt will be made to supply Fort-Sumpter with provisions only; and that, if such attempt be not resisted, no effort to throw in men, arms, or amunition, will be made, without further notice, or in case of an attack upon the Fort"
- Lincoln, message to Gov. Francis Pickens of South Carolina, CSA, April 6, 1861 by delivery of Robert S. Chew
Compare that "provisions only" message to what Lincoln himself had been planning for months in his correspondence to his leadership:
"Last night I received your letter giving an account of your interview with Gen. Scott, and for which I thank you. Please present my respects to the General, and tell him, confidentially, I shall be obliged to him to be as well prepared as he can to either hold, or retake, the forts [Sumter and Moultrie], as the case may require, at, and after the inaugeration."
- Lincoln, confidential letter to E. B. Washburne, Dec. 21, 1860
"Can you, with all the means now in your control, supply or re-inforce Fort Sumpter within that time?...If not, what amount of means and of what description, in addition to that already at your control, would enable you to supply and reinforce that fortress within the time?"
- Lincoln to Gen. Winfield Scott, March 9, 1861
OK, I'll bite.
From the Northern point of view it was not a war to free the slaves, it never was. It was a war to preserve the Union, period. An end to slavery was a fortunate outcome of the rebellion but not the reason why the North persisted. From the southern point of view, on the other hand, it was a war to defend against what they saw as a threat to their insititution of slavery.
The Emancipation Proclamation did not free the slaves up North because Lincoln lacked the authority to do so. And, contrary to popular southron belief, it didn't end slavery, it took the 13th Amendment to accomplish that. The Emancipation Proclamation merely declared those currently held as slaves to be free, and Lincoln issued it not by authority granted him as president, but by the authority granted him as Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces as a necessary measure for subduing the rebellion. Read the document, it's all in there.
Sumter was not South Carolina property, it was never South Carolina property, it was the property of the government of the United States. It was build on a man-made island (made from New England granite, btw) on territoriy deeded to the federal government by the South Carolina legislature.
From the Northern point, slavery was not the issue. From the southern point, slavery was.
Where?
How can peaceful secession be treason? We did just that from England?
If memory serves, our declaration of our independence from England resulted in a war.
Why did so many states refuse to send their troops to Lincoln when he demanded them?
Which ones? Other than the rebellious ones, of course.
Suspended habeas corpus, appropriated money from the treasury,shut down newspapers, imprisioned the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court,called up troops for 3 years without Congress approval.
Davis suspended habeas corpus and shut down newspapers, too. On a per capita basis the south had more political prisoners than the North. Please show when Lincoln appropriated money. Also, while you're at it, show when Chief Justice Taney was ever imprisioned or threatened, or where the Constitution says that congressional approval was needed for the call up of the troops.
instituted military tribunals.refused to exchange prisioners-but also refused to export medical supplies to the south..causing deaths of his own at places like Andersonville
Davis instituted military tribunals and martial law, too. No criticism for him? The refusal to exchange prisoners was a miltiary decision meant to keep thousands of southern troops out of the war, had Grant known that your intention was to starve the Union POWs to death then maybe he might have decided otherwise. And why should the North have sent medical supplies to the south, so that they could use them for their own army?
The emancipaption proclamations sole purpose was to cause a slave rebellion in the south similar to the one in Haiti.
The sole purpose of the Emancipation Proclamation was to remove slave labor from aiding the southern economy and war effort. Claims of slave rebellion formation have no basis in truth.
Lincoln want to colonize the slaves outside of the US and send as many free blacks with them as he could.
Robert E. Lee believed in colonization and spent his own money to buy passage for some of his former slaves to Liberia. In the only pre-war quote concerning emancipation from Jefferson Davis, he voiced the hope that the emancipated blacks would be 'encouraged' to settle in Central and South America. Again, no criticism of their views from the peanut gallery?
Lincoln, Sherman,Sheridan and Grant..all war criminals by any standard. Check the Geneva codes of 1863.
I did. The 1864 Geneva Convention provided for the neutrality of ambulance and military hospitals, the non-belligerent status of persons who aid the wounded, and sick soldiers of any nationality, the return of prisoners to their country if they are incapable of serving, and the adoption of a white flag with a red cross for use on hospitals, ambulances, and evacuation centres whose neutrality would be recognized by this symbol. Where did Lincoln, Grant, and Sherman violate this?
The Northern policies following the war were the cause and effect of the inception of the KKK.
Considering the Northern policies freed the slaves and tried to ensure voting rights for all southern blacks, this is the only statement you made that I can come close to agreeing with.
You got some fresh meat here, Stainless. It could very well go over a thousand.
Horse feathers. Just read the Declarations of Secession, which are readily available on-line, and they'll tell you all about what "states rights" really meant to the south.
You will note that THE REASON provided for secession was slavery. Slavery! While the North may have fought for a variety of reasons, the Southern states were clear on the point. They seceded, and fought, for the "states' rights" to keep slaves.
You will also note that secession was merely the culmination of a long series of sectional crises, which were also ALL ABOUT SLAVERY. The battle lines were drawn almost immediately after the nation began. By 1820 the two sections had to hammer out the Missouri Compromise. The Compromise of 1850 occurred because the South realized that the MO compromise only permitted slavery in the desert states -- and that controversy almost ended up in a Civil War. And the Kansas-Nebraska act of 1854, which did end up in a war over slavery, was again a result of the South wanting to expand slavery.
Finally, upon Lincoln's election, the South saw that the institution of slavery was finished. And so they seceded before Lincoln could take office. (A cowardly act.)
So don't give us that state's rights stuff. The only state's right the south admitted to caring about was slavery, and they were willing to fight a war over it.
Aw c'mon. You know those folks never read the documents; and if they're shown the documents, they willfully misread them. They hate that the "southern cause" was all about slavery. They'd rather cling to their myths.
At least not the pre-1980's SNL. 'Chevy Chase' isn't just a golf course near D.C.
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