Posted on 11/18/2008 7:46:57 PM PST by DBCJR
It is now about one year since the first Tariff Act of 1861 was passed; it is almost one year since the Rebellion became a settled fact, and war was rendered inevitable by the bombardment of Fort Sumter. The time is a fitting one for a review of the effects of the passage of the former and the influence of the latter on the commerce and foreign trade of our country.
(Excerpt) Read more at query.nytimes.com ...
“The fact that you think Lincoln did not support abolition, even though he ran on an abolitionist ticket, shows how ignorant you truly are to the facts surrounding the matter.”
First, you are violating the flaming rule. Second, your are projecting your status onto me.
Read my posts on this thread, quotes from the National Archives pages which say Lincoln was NOT an abolutionist AND that he was for the preservation of the Union. He would not have done something that purposely divided the country in that manner.
To say the war was about freeing the slaves seems to imply that the Union invaded the South to set the slaves free. That did NOT happen. The whole thing about Ft Sumter, the start of the war was TARIFFS.
“I recommend the following book by Walter Donald Kennedy: Red Republicans and Lincoln’s Marxists: Marxism in the Civil War.”
Thank you! I have developed these theories of Marxism and centralized Federalism in the context of the Civil War on my own. I’m excited to hear of some books on the subject.
No, this is what you said that was smug:
“GAME. SET. MATCH.
This is for extra credit.”
Had you actually read the articles I posted OR my reply to you you would not make such remarks. You missed the point, not cinched the game, set, and match.
“There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which can not fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance-that principle is contempt prior to investigation.”
—HERBERT SPENCER
Could another reason for this have been that the Emancipation Proclamation's antecedent, the Confiscation Act(s), proved largely to be ineffective? (That and Lincoln was against the Confiscation Acts from the start)?
Also, could the CSA have truly been winning even though the Union was finding much more success in the western fronts (Ft. Henry and Ft. Donelson, as well as the conquering and Federal occupation of New Orleans) than in the east (e.g.: First Manassas and the Seven Days Battles)?
Well, if you read the start of my post it said it was copied from my home page. So the whole thing was, including the GAME SET MATCH.
It wasn’t specific to you, it was from a larger part of the whole that has been sitting there for years.
Had you actually read.....
Oh, why bother.
I really appreciate your tone as compared to others who have taken issue with my posts. You are serious about discussion and debate.
The First Confiscation Act of 1861 authorized the confiscation of any Confederate property by Union forces (”property” included slaves). This meant that all slaves that fought or worked for the Confederate military were freed whenever they were “confiscated” by Union troops. The bill passed in the House 60-48 and in the Senate 24-11[1]. The act was signed into law by President Lincoln on August 6, 1861.
The Second Confiscation Act was passed on July 17, 1862. It stated that the slaves of any Confederate official, military or civilian, who did not surrender within 60 days of the act’s passage would be freed. However, this act was only applicable in Confederate areas which had already been occupied by the Union Army. All slaves taking refuge in Union areas were “captives of war” and would be set free.
U.S. President Abraham Lincoln opposed these acts, believing that they would push the border states towards siding with the Confederacy. The growing movement towards emancipation was aided by these acts, which eventually led to the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863.
Wisconsin’s Supreme Court ruled the Fugitive Slave Act unconstitutional.
“Well, if you read the start of my post it said it was copied from my home page. So the whole thing was, including the GAME SET MATCH.
It wasn’t specific to you, it was from a larger part of the whole that has been sitting there for years.
Had you actually read.....
Oh, why bother.”
You really are something. I’m responsible for you copying and pasting something you did not mean, in response to my post, and I’m not supposed to believe that you are talking about me? Then I get the “Oh, why bother.” Kind of sounds smug.
Thanks. I'm not really in the position to argue, so I ask questions primarily for my own study.
I guess I’m not getting your point.
I seem to have touched a nerve with some people on this issue. I am not defending slavery and actually worked in the 60’s going door-to-door registering black voters at the same time the people were murdered in Mississippi.
My point in posting is that the issue of States Rights (vs Federal Centralized Power) has been central to this country’s quest for freedom since the days of the colonies. The Civil War dealt a blow to State’s Rights that we have seen diminished ever since. With the advent of Marxism this threat is of even greater concern since it wraps itself in a socialist populist appeal. We are looking at possibly a new chapter in this development since this recent election.
I had to be proud of my country for electing a Black (half-black) man, but he scares me.
I really appreciate your tone as compared to others who have taken issue with my posts. You are serious about discussion and debate.
—
Thanks. I’m not really in the position to argue, so I ask questions primarily for my own study.
—
Whether you are in a position to argue or not, to do so in a disrespectful manner as some have on this thread is not conducive to an exchange of ideas. You seem to have that respect that is essential.
You are stating something that is nonsense and false. Lots of somethings in fact. Tariffs are clearly NOT unconstitutional. The war came because the slavers refused to accept Lincoln’s election which came as a result of their own colossal stupidity in running three Democrat slates against him.
Southerners controlled every aspect of the government for most of the time since the Founding: Congress, the Court and almost all of the presidents had been southern. J. Adams, J.Q. Adams, Van Buren, Filimore, and Buchanan were the only Northerners and only J.Q. was anti-slavery.
For the South the war was ONLY about slavery and they made no bones about it.
Your other claims are equally false and full of distortions.
Reference PING
Thanks!
Additional reference PING
Thanks!
Concerning the cause of the war I posted the New York Times archived article, not the Montgomery Alabama Gazette, so this was a Northern perspective. I also cited many other sources including two from the National Archives.
The South did NOT control government as you say. That is preposterous.
PLEASE read the articles that I have posted BEFORE you start ranting.
The expansion of slavery into the territories, tariffs, internal improvements... pick your favorite conentious political issue of the antebellum period... explaining the “why?” behind The Civil War has too oftened focused on the “trees in the forest” rather than the bigger picture of the forest itself. In a nutshell, the “why?” behind The Civil War can best be summed up in three short words (as Joe Biden might say... except in this case it actually IS three words): GOVERNMENT BY CONSENT
Keeping this in mind, here’s my simplest explanation of the “why?” behind The Civil War.
For some four decades in the early/mid 1800s Southerners watched as the Northern states got bigger and bigger, and thus came to dominate more and more of the federal government (at least in terms of numbers, especially in the House of Representatives and despite the 3/5ths Compromise). For a while (1820s - late 1850s) this disparity was concerning to them (Southerners), as the South for the most part had a very diffenet political agenda/set of priorities than the North (see issues at top of post), but remained a managable problem. Why did it remain a managable problem? Because, with a few tariffs laws and some internal improvement projects notwithstanding, institutional impediments in the national political structure prevented the Northern States from using their population advantage to impose much of their political agenda (like barring slavery from the Western territories) upon the South.
The most important of the institutional impediments to the North imposing its political will upon the South was the two-party system... which saw the Whigs and Democrats - political parties of comparable electoral strength and competitive pretty much all across the country - unable to appeal or govern too much in favor of or against the interests of either North or South. Neither party could stake out positions TOO unfavorable to either Northern or Southern opinions... without alienating half their supporters and throwing control of the Congress and the presidency to the other party. In essence, though the North controlled the House of Representatives because (by the 1850s) the free states had nearly twice the population of the slaves states, after the Compromise of 1850 (California statehood) had a two vote edge in Senate, and for many years now comprised enough electoral votes to essentially choose the president regardless of how anyone in the South voted... neither the Northern Whigs nor the Northern Democrats could go too far in trying to steer the country away from its more moderate trajectory in terms of sectional arguments without commiting electoral suicide for their party.
Unfortunatley for the South, the debate over the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act (which opened up - potentially - these previously designated free terrories to slavery via popular sovereignty) and the outbreak of violence in Kansas that followed destroyed the coalition of Northern Whigs and Southern Whigs that comprised one of the nation’s two major political parties. And,it didn’t take long for a new political party, called the Republicans, to fill that void in establishing themselves as the main opposition to the Democrats. Of course, there was one major difference between the Whigs as the main opposition to the Democrats and the new Republican Party that now assumed that role.
The new Republican Party was a Northern party only... not a national party at all like the Whigs had been and the Democrats still were. Every position they took on every issue (slavery in the territories, tariffs, internal improvements still being amongst the more divisive of sectional disputes) embranced the dominant Northern perspective and rejected the dominant Southern perspective. And throughout the 1850s-early 1860s the Republicans neither tried nor even pretended to be a national party. In fact, they didn’t bother to recruit members or field candidates in most slave states, they didn’t campaign in slave states, and when they fielded their first candidate for president in 1856 - John C. Fremont from California - he wasn’t even on the ballot in half the states of the union. To give you a sense of what that would be like today... that would be like Barack Obama not even being on the ballot in every state south of Virginia-Kentucky-Missouri. Literally, if you wanted to vote for Fremont in 1856 (or for that matter Abraham Lincoln in 1860) and you lived in Alabama... you had to scribble in his name as a write-in candidate as if he were Mickey Mouse or Frank Zappa.
The rise of the Northern Republican Party, with its platform diametrically opposed to everything important to the vast majority of Southerners, scared the crap out of the South. All of the sudden, it because a very real possibility that in the very short term a Northern political faction could take over the whole federal government. In their first election (1856), though the Repulicans didn’t win the presidency... Fremont scored a very respectable 114 electoral votes to James Buchanan’s 174, and it was actually much closer than that. Had just one more big Northern State - say Pennsylvania - plus maybe a couple of New Jersey’s electors gone Fremont’s way instead... he would have won. The message heard in the South was very simple: If the Northerns band together and all vote for the Republicans next time... they’ll win the presidency and perhaps a working majority in Congress without even being on the ballot in our states. And then, they’ll be able to do whatever they want to us and we won’t be able to stop a bit of it.
Going into the 1860 election the growing sentiment in the South was this: If the Republicans take over (understood as... if Abraham Lincoln wins the presidency) we’re outta here. We don’t want to be part of a country anymore run by a sectional Northern party that we have ZERO influence over... and where we’ll never again have a legitimate opportunity to pursue our national agenda with any prospects for success. We’d rather strike out on our own... and even if we end up failing... at least it will because we made our own bad decisions and not because we had them imposed upon us by the Yankees. And so when Lincoln did indeed win... the states of the Deep South - beginning with South Carolina - followed through with their threat of secession. And once South Carolina chose to divorce itself from Washington DC... so too did every other state between Georgia/Florida and Texas.
And what did they base their decision to secede upon? The principle of GOVERNMENT BY CONSENT... the very same principle that Thomas Jefferson used to justify secession from the British Empire in 1776 in his famous Declaration of Independence. Just as the folks back then had revoked their consent to any longer being told what to do by King George III and Lord North because they believed they were being oppressed... the folks in the South revoked their consent to any longer being under the sway of the President, Congress, or Supreme Court of the USA because they feld like they were or were about to be oppressed.
Of course the North (or at least Abraham Lincoln once he became president) didn’t see it as a principled independence movement based upon the ideal of GOVERNMENT BY CONSENT. They saw it as the South “not respecting the results of an election they lost fair and square.” The North’s collective response was, “how can you have a functioning democratic constitutional republic when the losers pick up their toys and go home whenever they don’t get to be in charge?” And this too was a legimate point of view. For let’s just say Lincoln lets the South go... then what? The next time a section of the country or political faction doesn’t like the results of an election what are they going to do... secede too? This happens too many times and before long North America turns into a balkanized continent of petty bickering states just like Europe... and who wanted to turn America into the mess that was Europe in the 1800s?
I believe you have expressed the nature of this recent election as it manifested on several levels. It is quite true, if the "Civil War" is so over, why is it such a relevant and active subject? < /retor-ques >
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