"The ones who were wronged were the 3million plus slaves."
And the additional slaves in the North that weren't immediately freed. And the continuation of segregation on both parts for a few generations following.
Again: The South did as it saw was right, and the North did as it saw was right.
Make no confussion, that is at my heart.
However: the South was not morally inferior to the North. And I have been arguing THAT for 500+ threads now.
You mean we DIDN'T beat our slaves all day, and eat collard greens all night!? Just darn. :) (SARCASM)
However: the South was not morally inferior to the North. And I have been arguing THAT for 500+ threads now.
You've determined that conclusion in advance and decided that's what the discussion should be about. So anything that you think throws the North into a bad light you throw up on the screen -- that Irish immigrants might have had a hard time in New York, or that there might have been slaves in 1820 in New York, or that slaves in Delaware weren't freed by the Emancipation Proclamation. And you leave out the corresponding facts about the South that put your posts in context, because those facts would make the South look quite bad indeed. The result is a distortion of history -- everything bad you can think of to say about the North and nothing more.
Understanding that something like half the population of SC or MS was composed of slaves, and Whites there opposed, feared, and suppressed any talk of an end to slavery, helps us to understand why Lincoln's election led to secession. Focusing on the 3 slaves who may have lived in NH in 1830 doesn't bring us any closer to understanding what happened thirty years later and why. Seeing how slavery, so entrenched in 1859, was abolished by 1866 helps us to understand the significance of the war. Griping that slaves in DE weren't freed by the Emancipation Proclamation is a fringe activity that obscures the larger picture.
You're promoting an idea of moral equivalency to the point where it gets in the way of understanding the real differences between the North and South and why they led to secession and war. The result is a skewed, and distorted version of history that tells us nothing about what happened in 1860-1 and why. And though you claim to be even-handed, it looks to others like all you're doing is trying to make the South look better than it was at the time. In the end, Northerners are made to look like hypocrites while the real failings of the South are obscured, which may be the idea. To get around slavery and make the South look better in our eyes than it was, you have to seize on every opportunity to make the North look worse than it was.
The South did as it saw was right, and the North did as it saw was right.
I suppose so, though plenty of people in each region disagreed with the regional consensus. The problem is that plenty of people want to translate that into "The South Was Right," and they leave out a lot of inconvenient facts and circumstances in their rush to reach that conclusion. If you're not one of them, you're certainly doing your best to help them.
We can still respect Confederates for their dedication even if we think they were on the wrong side of an important issue. We don't have to hate or villify them, but can respect them for their sacrifices, even in a bad cause. But I can't help noticing that those who want to vindicate the secessionists feel they have to malign the North and insult Northerners. If your concern is just to win some respect for those who died in a cause they thought was right, it might be better simply to focus on those positive qualities in Southern soldiers, rather than to refight the war. If you're out to prove the Confederacy was right it would be better not to hide behind claims of even-handedness.