Posted on 01/19/2011 11:35:34 AM PST by kosciusko51
One hundred and fifty years after the Civil War began, we're still fighting it -- or at least fighting over its history. I've polled thousands of high school history teachers and spoken about the war to audiences across the country, and there is little agreement even on why the South seceded. Was it over slavery? States' rights? Tariffs and taxes?
As the nation begins to commemorate the anniversaries of the war's various battles -- from Fort Sumter to Appomattox -- let's first dispense with some of the more prevalent myths about why it all began.
1. The South seceded over states' rights.
Confederate states did claim the right to secede, but no state claimed to be seceding for that right. In fact, Confederates opposed states' rights -- that is, the right of Northern states not to support slavery.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Just wondering then, did the Emancipation Proclamation free any slaves?
Did President Lincoln’s first Inagrual Address take place before of after Confederate troops attacked Ft. Sumter?
And why is it that you would desire that an American president not use military action against a foreign state that launched an attack on an American military installation?
Do you also believe the the US should not have gone to war with Japan after their attack on Pearl Harbor?
Well that’s a stretch. Japan, BTW, was not a fascist country. Germany was. Germany did not attack Hawaii. Japan did. Japan was an imperialistic expansionist country then.
On that, you are wrong. Slaves in the South were hired out by their owners to mines, foundries, mills, shipyards and virtually every industrial activity. Not all slaves were on the plantation.
. Of the four million slaves working in the South in 1860, about one million worked in homes or in industry, construction, mining, lumbering or transportation. The remaining three million worked in agriculture, two million of whom worked in cotton.4. I seriously doubt the south had 75% of all American exports. The south was already in decline and the north was already largely industrialized by 1860.
Source: http://www.historycentral.com/CivilWar/AMERICA/Economics.html
That was the cotton crop. The US didn't export nearly as much as we imported back then (just like today) and cotton was the 800 pound gorilla of exports. The North had built up their industry, but it was primarily focused on supplying the domestic market. Other than that, the North did export some grain to Europe, but it was very small compared to cotton. Here's a link that shows it graphically
Fort Sumter was South Carolina territory and after secession they had every right to evict a foreign army. More than that, Sumter was the key to enforcing the import tariff since it controls the harbor. The "attack" against Sumter was really just a demonstration. No one was hurt and the fort surrendered after an honorable interval. The matter should have ended there but Lincoln wanted war and had sent supplies to Sumter after promising not to in order to provoke an incident.
The Perl Harbor analogy is silly. Hawaii was US territory. South Carolina wasn't. Perhaps if the Japanese had driven Commodore Perry out of Edo that would have made a good analogy.
Read the whole thesis here: here
“Fort Sumter was South Carolina territory and after secession they had every right to evict a foreign army.”
So, it is your view that US military installations in foreign nations can be attacked with impunity?
Oh boy, here we go again. Arguing with Lost Causers is like arguing with the “Legalize Pot” crew.
The ACW had to do with two conflicting visions of what the US was supposed to be. Either an integrated industrial capitalism or a loose, decentralized, feudal agrarian society.
fair enough, so substitute imperialistic expansionist for fascism.
Interesting. I’ve not had it presented in this manner before. It makes some sense, but do you have a link to someone who has fleshed out this argument in more detail?
Well they didn't just attack it (like Perl Harbor). They negotiated and tried for months to get all of the federal forts vacated. They were successful until Lincoln decided he wanted war and refused to give up this one.
If the current German government or British government were to tell us to vacate the US bases on their territory wouldn't we be obliged to go?
There’s even more to complicate the picture. Indians also owned slaves. There were white slaves, and I’ve read but don’t know if I believe it - Indian slaves.
Even though the Civil War had alot to do with slavery, part of that was slavery the economic institution, not slavery because all blacks should be slaves. Similar to why some want illegal immigration - cheap labor. They don’t care where it comes from either. In some ways the Southern states couldn’t back down on slavery, they knew they’d be hurt badly if it ended. There might have even been loyalists still in the Northeast that would have liked to see America turned back into a British colony - who knows.
Blacks also fought for the Confederacy. Units of border states would at times fight for the ‘wrong’ side. They did that here - some Iowa units fought for the South, and some Missouri for the North. There were many ulterior motives, and each man fought for different reasons. That’s why it was brother against brother.
You can go on and on. It was a far more complex time than this stupid author tries to make it.
“If the current German government or British government were to tell us to vacate the US bases on their territory wouldn’t we be obliged to go?”
Not if such an action ran counter to our national security interests.
And there we have it. A purely "might makes right" justification for Lincoln's actions at Fort Sumter. This is, in my experience, what most Lincoln apologias reduce to if you explore them far enough.
“Just wondering then, did the Emancipation Proclamation free any slaves?”
Not sure why you’re asking, but yes, it did. About 4 million of them. Not in the border states, nor in the parts of Virginia that were turning into a border state. But in the rest of the Confederacy, yes.
How could Lincoln free the slaves in the Confederate states before the end of the war? He had no control over them.
“Japan, BTW, was not a fascist country. Germany was. Germany did not attack Hawaii. Japan did. Japan was an imperialistic expansionist country then.”
I think you might have noticed that the U.S. also went to war with Germany, so what’s up with that? Mightn’t it have something to do with their being “fascist”? I mean, in the sense that all militaristic imperialist expansionism is popularly associated with fascism? It’s a loaded term, and perhaps the original poster could’ve picked a less controversial one. Fine, whatever word you pick that covers both Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany is fine with me.
“And there we have it. A purely ‘might makes right’ justification for Lincoln’s actions at Fort Sumter. This is, in my experience, what most Lincoln apologias reduce to if you explore them far enough.”
I’m at a loss as to how South Carolina’s claims amount to anything more than Might Makes Right.
Dr. McWhinney is greatly respected in the Civil War history community. Have you read his book?
I was speaking of the 1800s when the Civil War occurred not the 1700s.
The North had more railroads with the same gauge whereas the South only had multiple gauge railroads from plantation to port cities. Industry is what helped the North win the war whereas the lack of industry defeated the South. Lack of port cities in their hands were also a factor.
What industry was in the South before the CW?
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