In addition to the slaves they had cotton and arrogance.
Marked to watch this thread implode, LOL!
I am going to book mark this one. Davy, you are about to find out how passionate some Folks are about their Southern Heritage.
Secession was like a really bad divorce.
In any divorce, there are the reasons given by the spouses, and the true underlying causes. There is seldom much correspondence between the two. In fact, the spouses are quite often not fully aware of the true underlying causes.
The main (not only) underlying cause of secession and therefore of war was slavery. Without it all the others could have been settled amicably. With slavery in the picture all other factors were immensely aggravated.
And the war came.
For those of us who chose to read the article, the slavery issue was intelligently handled and explained. Thos of us who live in the South know that the Civil War (and, incxreasingly, I’m warming to the Southern name “War of Northern Aggression”) was not about slavery, it was about the economic survival of the South.
Submission is slavery, and the bitterest taunt in the vocabulary of those who advocated secession was “submissionist.” Interesting article - the source documents give us a glimpse of what was really going on.
"Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world."
The secessionists' own words condemn themselves - it was all about slavery in the minds of the Confederate elite.
The way I see it: If the Southern states wanted to leave the Union because they wanted to keep slavery and the rest of the Union abhorred slavery (this is not me defending slavery)...then the Union should have been HAPPY to let the Southerners go their way and watch the country implode. As it was though, the Union came barreling down with their troops and their self-righteousness to prevent the Southern states from exercising their Constitutional rights. So, then...who needed slavery? The Unionists wanted it both ways, if we’re going to argue that the War of Northern Aggression was all about stopping slavery.
bookmark for later reading
George William Brown tried to have the bridges and telegraph lines leading into Baltimore from the North destroyed.
It's pretty much accepted that Sumter and war increased support for secession the Upper South after they had rejected it earlier.
But to jump to the idea that slavery wasn't at the root of the North-South conflict is unwarranted.
gotta mark this , gonna be good
mark
bump