Posted on 08/05/2010 6:01:30 AM PDT by Michael Zak
[by Assemblyman Chuck DeVore (R-Irvine, CA), re-published with his permission]
For years I have admired Congressman Ron Paul’s principled stance on spending and the Constitution. That said, he really damaged himself when he blamed President Lincoln for the Civil War, saying, “Six hundred thousand Americans died in a senseless civil war… [President Abraham Lincoln] did this just to enhance and get rid of the original intent of the republic.”
This is historical revisionism of the worst order, and it must be addressed.
For Congressman Paul’s benefit – and for his supporters who may not know – seven states illegally declared their “independence” from the United States before Lincoln was sworn in as President. After South Carolina fired the first shot at Fort Sumter, four additional states declared independence...
(Excerpt) Read more at grandoldpartisan.typepad.com ...
“But they did stop it in the Senate in 1860. And could have stopped it again in 1861.”
Surely you know that each state has two senators, regardless of the population, while the House membership is based upon population. Thus, it is one thing to stop a measure in the Senate, where the balance is more equitable, than it is in the House, where the more populous states (i.e., the Northern states) dominate the chamber. How can you say they could have stopped it in 1861? They had nowhere near the votes in the House to overcome the Northern states’ numerical advantage in 1860, before secession, and they sure as hell didn’t have the votes after secession began.
You said: “So you’re saying it was cheaper to bring the goods to New York, unload them, pay the tariffs, load them again, and ship them to their customers in the south? All so they could rapidly load goods for export and high-tail it back to Europe? What export goods might those be?”
It was more profitable for the shipping companies. Hell, they didn’t care where the cargo ended up, or how it eventually ended up there. They were concerned with delivering the cargo ASAP, loading up on goods for the return voyage, and setting sail. For example, a prime commodity that England desired was lumber, and America was its biggest supplier of lumber.
An even larger export was cotton, and by your logic all that cotton should have been exported from New York or Boston because that's where all your ships were turning around and heading back to Europe. But in fact only a fraction of the cotton was exported from New York and Boston, the overwhelming majority was exported from Southern ports. So if all those goods were destined for Southern consumers anyway, as you claim, then why didn't they take them direct to the buyers? Why did they stop and drop them off in New York before heading down to load with cotton?
The fact is that the goods landed in Northern ports because that's where the consumers were. They did not land in Southern ports because the demand for the goods wasn't there.
You said: “The fact is that the goods landed in Northern ports because that’s where the consumers were. They did not land in Southern ports because the demand for the goods wasn’t there.”
One of the major major British exports to America — if not the biggest — was machinery, and the Southern states were the biggest customer. The Northern interests would not import something that they made themselves. One of the reasons the tariff was created was in an effort to force the South to buy its needed machinery from the North, when they (the South) had a far better deal obtaining those goods from Britain, and the South had commodities Britain desired to make the trade balance profitable for both. However, that “cut out” Northern industrial interests, which was something the North could not abide, so it introduced prohibitive (for the the South) protective laws.
What machinery might that be that the South consumed in such massive quantities? And why didn't it go straight to them?
“What machinery might that be that the South consumed in such massive quantities? And why didn’t it go straight to them?”
Agricultural equipment, machine tools, (hell, just about any metal tool) were very desirable because, let’s face it, British metalworks were the best in the world in those days, and were far superior to similar goods manufactured in Northern states (eventually American industrialization became pre-eminent, but that was not until the 20th century).
The Mississippi militia fired warning shots at steamers that didn't pull over to be inspected. The steamers got the message and stopped for inspection. By your logic, the US has a blockade whenever it inspects my luggage when I come back from overseas.
You mean when Davis used Sumter as an excuse to start his war, don't you?
No.
Sumter was no more a threat to the confederacy than Guantanamo Bay is to Cuba.
One difference is that we aren't trying to provoke a war over Guantanamo like Lincoln did over Sumter after his similar ploy at Fort Pickens failed. Here was what Anderson thought when informed that Lincoln was sending the fleet:
I had the honor to receive by yesterday's mail the letter of the honorable Secretary of War, dated April 4, and confess that what he there states surprises me very greatly, following as it does and contradicting so positively the assurance Mr. Crawford telegraphed he was authorized to make. I trust that this matter will be at once put in a correct light, as a movement made now, when the South has been erroneously informed that none such will be attempted, would produce most disastrous results throughout our country.
It is, of course, now too late for me to give any advice in reference to the proposed scheme of Captain Fox. I fear that its result cannot fail to be disastrous to all concerned. ...
... I ought to have been informed that this expedition was to come. Colonel Lamon's remark convinced me that the idea, merely hinted at to me by Captain Fox, would not be carried out. We shall strive to do our duty, though I frankly say that my heart is not in the war which I see is to be thus commenced. That God will still avert it, and cause us to resort to pacific measures to maintain our rights, is my ardent prayer.
Here is what Montgomery Meigs wrote on board the ship heading to Pensacola with orders to reinforce Fort Pickens in violation of the negotiated truce at that fort:
This is the beginning of the war which every statesman and soldier has foreseen since the passage of the South Carolina ordinance of secession.
And here is Lincoln telling Fox that the expedition to Sumter had accomplished what he wanted even though it failed:
You and I both anticipated that the cause of the country would be advanced by making the attempt to provision Fort-Sumpter, [sic] even if it should fail; and it is no small consolation now to feel that our anticipation is justified by the result.
The result, of course, was war.
The Senate could only stop the Morrill Tariff during the first couple of months in 1861 if all senators from the seceded states remained in the Senate. However, once the new Senate was sworn in in March, they could no longer stop the new tariff. As Texas Senator Louis Wigfall said on December 12, 1860 [thanks to former poster GOPcapitalist for the following quote]:
Tell me not that we have got the legislative department of this Government, for I say we have not. As to this body, where do we stand? Why, sir, there are now eighteen non-slaveholding States. In a few weeks we shall have the nineteenth, for Kansas will be brought in. Then arithmetic which settles our position is simple and easy. Thirty-eight northern Senators you will have upon this floor. We shall have thirty to your thirty-eight. After the 4th of March, the Senator from California, the Senator from Indiana, the Senator from New Jersey, and the Senator from Minnesota will be here. That reduces the northern phalanx to thirty-four...There are four of the northern Senators upon whom we can rely, whom we know to be friends, whom we have trusted in our days of trial heretofore, and in whom, as Constitution-loving men, we will trust. Then we stand thirty-four to thirty-four, and your Black Republican Vice President to give the casting vote. Mr. Lincoln can make his own nominations with perfect security that they will be confirmed by this body, even if every slaveholding State should remain in the Union, which, thank God, they will not do.
Agricultural equipment like what? What equipment did farms and plantations use? Machine tools like what and for what? What manufacturing base was there in the Southern states? You're making this stuff up as you go along. According to a 1979 study of Southern imports in the year prior to the rebellion, the South consumed $37 million in foreign imports, and $25 million of that was in coffee and cotton fabric. They didn't import machinery from overseas, didn't buy much from the North for that matter. They didn't consume much from overseas because there was no demand for it.
You might say that. I wouldn't.
No.
Denial.
One difference is that we aren't trying to provoke a war over Guantanamo like Lincoln did over Sumter after his similar ploy at Fort Pickens failed
Falling back on blaming Lincoln for the confederate mistakes again I see.
The result, of course, was war.
Which, of course, was fine with Davis and his crew.
You talked of Jefferson being against the tarriffs. That has nothing to do with whether he thought the New England States should be able to secede over this.
Who ever said anything about New England? Jefferson was talking about Virginia, and he definitely said that when conditions got bad enough to justify secession - "when we must make a choice, there can be no hesitation." I don't believe I've referred to that quote in the context of any other state but Virginia.
As with your last post, it would seem that you have developed a bad habit of placing your own words into the mouth of others to subsequently attack them. Such tactics suggest either carelessness or willful dishonesty.
The myth is there was no manufacturing base in antebellum south, there was a lot actually.
That’s what you have been lead to believe.
Not much of one outside of Virginia. But if you can identify the machinery that was imported by Southerners in such massive quantities then by all means please do so.
Alabama played a key role in Confederate naval operations because of the state's strategic and economic importance and its role in the defense of the Gulf Coast.
The production of iron for ships was very quickly understood to be one of the keys to naval victory in the Civil War, and Alabama was among the most important producers of iron in the South. Indeed, Alabama contributed more iron ore than any other Confederate state and by the end of the war was also producing more coal (which is essential in producing iron from ore) than any other state. Iron was used in naval ships in a variety of ways, including in the creation of fasteners such as nails, bolts, and nuts; in weapons such as heavy iron cannons, cannonballs, and shells; for rams used to sink enemy ships; and for engines, chains, and anchors.
The state was home to four of the 39 iron furnaces in the Confederacy in 1860, and an additional 13 furnaces were built before the end of the war in 1865. Among the best-known manufacturers were the Bibb Iron Company, which was owned by the Confederate government, and the privately owned Shelby Ironworks, Cane Creek Iron works, and Brierfield Furnace. All but one of Alabama's strategically significant iron furnaces were destroyed during the war; Hale & Murdock Ironworks in Lamar County escaped detection.
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