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If slavery was so repulsive to them then why not just end it by an act of their state legislature and be done with it, thus freeing themselves of its yoke and telling those vile Yankees to go pound sand?

1. Those who were for it or with the ancestral fortunes invested in it would vote their lives away.

2. Similarly, those who were indifferent knew voting it away would cripple their economy and families since it was engrained at that point (to little to no fault of their own).

3. Those who opposed it often reluctantly maintained it (Jefferson, Lee, etc.) because they had no answer for the question "And then what?" with regards to the newly freed slaves (which the North DEFINITELY didn't answer).

Slaves didn't live the movie Roots from infancy to old age (although surely there were heinous exceptions, I don't recall hearing of mass graves of thousands like you hear even in more modern times like WW2, Cambodia, or last week's Ivory Coast findings). Many were essentially "family" with their masters, helping raise and school children, attending church, etc. and all were provided for cradle-to-grave. No one agrees with any of it now, but there's a reason it was termed the "peculiar institution".

Also, most Southerners understood first-hand that throwing them out to the wolves would be cruel, and they'd be turned into unskilled paupers and political pawns, but that was the North's answer. They flipped the notion of citizenship on it's head and gained a huge "permanent" voting base, and installed "Northern" governments in the South during Reconstruction...all Constitutionally of course. Then and now, people learn and test their way into citizenship, suffrage, etc. and many have been denied for lack of assimilation, yet in one fell swoop 4 million passed the test requirements without answering a single question about the society and responsibilities they were about to assume.

Do you need me to give you page numbers and references for you to ignore again or is that enough for now?

1. Those who were for it or with the ancestral fortunes invested in it would vote their lives away.

So when you say that the South had slavery forced upon them and that they were reluctant slave-holders throughout the existence of the U.S. then you were just joshing with us, is that it?

3. Those who opposed it often reluctantly maintained it (Jefferson, Lee, etc.) because they had no answer for the question "And then what?" with regards to the newly freed slaves (which the North DEFINITELY didn't answer).

Jefferson had an answer. He wanted them forcibly removed to Haiti. What do you think of that? Change your opinions of the man any?

Many were essentially "family" with their masters, helping raise and school children, attending church, etc. and all were provided for cradle-to-grave.

You make it sound so altruistic. You forget that slaves were property and not people. They had no rights and could be sold at a whim. And that the cradle ended young and the grave tended to arrive early. Is that the kind of existence that you would like?

Also, most Southerners understood first-hand that throwing them out to the wolves would be cruel, and they'd be turned into unskilled paupers and political pawns, but that was the North's answer.

So instead they planned on keeping them as property for generations to come. Pure altruism at its finest. </sarcasm>

Do you need me to give you page numbers and references for you to ignore again or is that enough for now?

No, I can dig up Durand's fairy tales on my own. Thanks for offering though.