Posted on 12/10/2019 5:05:52 AM PST by Homer_J_Simpson
Worth repeating here:
Governor Gist, of South Carolina, sent his message to the Legislature on November 30 {1859}.
In reference to the relations of the South to the North, he takes bold and decided ground against the agitators of the North and in favor of a separation in the event of the election of a Black Republican President.
The following resolutions were offered in the South Carolina House on the same day:
'Resolved, That the State of South Carolina is ready to enter, together with the other slaveholding States or such as desire present action, into the formation of a Southern Confederacy.
Resolved, That the Governor be requested to forward this resolution to the various Southern Executives.'
Another resolution was offered, asking official information as to the condition of the State arsenals, arms, amunition, number of men enrolled in the State militia, the style of their arms, etc."
THIBODEAUX, LA., December 16, 1859.
MY DEAR SHERMAN: I received your letter from the city. Had your visit only been a week later I could have met you, as my confinement is over for the present. My crop was finished on the 12th, and is by far the most profitable one I have made-giving me a net profit of $30,000 on an investment of $145,000.
On the first Monday, January second, I intend in Baton Rouge to enter on the duties of an office to which I am just elected, “Commissioner of the Board of Public Works,” a new office in this state, but the duties are old, have been discharged heretofore by swamp land commissioner, engineers, etc. The new board is to form a bureau for the general supervision and control of all state work, to appoint all officers and agents, etc. The duties are heavy, expenditures large (over $1,000,000 a year) and the patronage extensive.
Peculations, frauds, swindling and ignorance all combined to render the previous system obnoxious, and I am told the new law was intended to clear off the whole debris, that a new state of affairs might be inaugurated. I did not and do not wish the office, as it gives no prominence and little compensation, but friends, principally Richard Taylor, son of the old general, pressed me to accept a nomination, as they could find no other man whose name could defeat the rogues. Under this pressure I gave up my privacy, and shall strive to inaugurate an honest administration of affairs.
If I do no more I shall at least deserve the thanks and probably receive the maledictions of many who do not or will not understand the merits of my conduct. How long the duties will retain me in Baton Rouge on my first visit I can not foresee; but long enough I hope, to see many members of the legislature. I believe I have some influence with R. Taylor,1 the senator from this district, and I will try to intrest him in the Seminary. He is a very plain, straightforward man, of great independence, candid, honest and clearheaded. Whatever he promises we may rely on, as he has great influence. I have but few others to look to as acquaintances now, except the senator from Terrebonne, F. S. Goode, who is like Taylor, and with whom I shall intercede. The representatives from this parish are very poor sticks and unreliable.
We must try and secure an additional allowance or an appropriation to pay for the sixteen state cadets. I clearly see that you will need funds very soon, unless this can be done, for the people of the country are not yet sufficiently aware of the institution and its plan, etc., to patronize it beyond your suggestion. In time I have no doubt, if we can sustain it in its infancy, it will become popular and self-supporting. In the meantime, we must try to harmonize conflicting interests and opinions.
We all aim at the same great end — to furnish the most suitable and most useful education to the rising young men of our state. High literary institutions are growing up around us in every direction, but in the scientific and military we are sadly deficient. No class of people on the face of the earth are more dependent on science and discipline for success than the southern planters. Scan the whole area of our state and see what proportion of its capital and labor is devoted to science. See our levees, canals, for navigation and drainage; our steamers, our foundries, and last, our plantation machinery. Then apply this science to our soils, and see our woful deficiency and waste in our want of system in cultivation. The very plantation is a small military establishment, or it ought to be. By military I don't mean the old fogy notion of white belts, stiff leather stocks and “palms of the hands to the front,” but discipline, by which we secure system, regularity, method, economy of time, labor and material.
This all tends to secure better health, more labor and less exertion, and with infinitely less punishment, more comfort and happiness to the laborer, and more profit and pleasure to the master. The other consideration weighs no little with me. We have a large class of our population in subordination, just and necessary. Where do we find the fewest mutinies, revolts and rebellions? In the best disciplined commands. Human nature is the same throughout the world. Give us all disciplined masters, managers, and assistants, and we shall never hear of insurrection — unless as an exception — to be suppressed instanter without appeal to foreign aid.
As I shall not have time now to write General Graham, you can show him the foregoing. No consideration can overcome my preference for a military school, but I am open to policy in the course necessary to obtain it. For the present your course is plain, it seems to me. You are an agent selected to carry out the views of others. Your opinion might be expressed as a candid man, but your action should be confined to carrying out the system laid down for your government. When called upon for your views, give them freely. At all other times execute faithfully what is laid down for you. But this is advice I need not give you as from your letters it is the sensible view you have taken of the subject.
The other question, personal to yourself, I can readily see is calculated to make you sensitive and uncomfortable. I hope no one will be so unjust and indelicate as to refer to such a matter, but should it be done, keep silent and refer the matter to your friends. I will answer any such insinuations and vouch for your soundness in any and all ways. I have known you too long and too well to permit a doubt to cross my mind as to the soundness of your views. What sentiments your brother may entertain will be a subject for our representatives at Washington. It is all right and proper that you should wish him success. I do not, of course, know his opinions, but I believe that if he had your experience with us we should have no cause to fear him. His recommendation of that fellow's incendiary work was unfortunate, but I have no doubt was done without reflection or a knowledge of what he was doing, and that he heartily repents of an inconsiderate act. I have not the same charity for a good many of our northern representatives. They go too far, as do some of our own, but they being the aggressors there is some palliation on our side.
Mrs. B. joins me in regards and wishing you every success.
1 Richard Taylor, son of President Taylor, later a confederate general. — Ed.
SOURCES: Walter L. Fleming, General W.T. Sherman as College President, p. 80-3
SEMINARY, ALEXANDRIA, LA., Dec. 16,1859.
. . . I wrote you and Minnie from New Orleans as I told you I would. I did start back in the “Telegram” Monday evening, and Red River being up, we came along without delay, reaching here Wednesday morning. I had despatched by a former boat a good deal of freight, brought some in the same boat, and all the balance will be here in a day or so. I walked out from Pineville, which is the name of a small group of houses on this side of Red River, and sent the cart in for my trunk and for the drummer I had picked up in New Orleans. I wanted also a tailor and shoemaker, but failed to get them. On getting out I was much disappointed at receiving no letters, but was assured that all the mails had failed for a week; and last night being mail night I sent in my new drummer who brought out a good budget, among them your letters. . . So, as you seem to know, this is an out of the way place without telegraphs, railroads, and almost without mails.
It so happened that General Graham came out the very day of my return, not knowing that I was here, and he brought with him Mr. Smith, the professor of chemistry, who is one of the real Virginia F. F. V.'s, a very handsome young man of twenty-two, who will doubtless be good company. He is staying with General Graham, but will move here in a few days. General Graham seemed delighted with the progress I had made, and for the first time seemed well satisfied that we would in fact be ready by January 1.
I have not yet been to Alexandria, as I landed on this side the river and came out at once, but I shall go in on Monday and see all the supervisors, who are again to meet. I know the sentiments of some about abolitionism, and am prepared if they say a word about John. I am not an abolitionist, still I do not intend to let any of them reflect on John in my presence, as the newspapers are full of angry and bitter expressions against him. All I have met have been so courteous that I have no reason to fear such a thing, unless some one of those who came, applicants to the post I fill, with hundreds of letters, should endeavor to undermine me by assertions on the infernal question of slavery, which seems to blind men to all ideas of common sense
. Your letters convey to me the first intimation I have received that the project of ——— had not long since been abandoned. . . You remember I waited as long as I decently could before answering Governor Wickliffe's letter of appointment, in hopes of receiving a word from ——— who promised Hugh to write from London. Not hearing from him and having little faith in the scheme, I finally accepted this place as the best thing offering. Even yet I think this is my best chance unless the question of slavery and my northern birth and associations should prejudice me, and should ——— make his appearance here I should have to be very strongly assured on the subject of pay and permanency before I would even hint at leaving. Of course if I could do better, there is no impropriety in my quitting as there are many strong applicants for the post, many of whom possess qualifications equal if not superior to me. I still do not believe that ——— is to be relied on and I don't expect he has the most remote intention of coming here. . .
These southern politicians have so long cried out wolf that many believe the wolf has come and therefore they might in some moment of anger commit an act resulting in Civil War. As long as the Union is kept I will stand by it, but if we are going to split up into sections I would prefer our children should be raised in Ohio or some northern state to the alternative of a slave state, where we never can have slave property.
I have already described this place to you — the building being of course not at all designed for families and I shall not, as long as I control, permit a woman or child to live in it. The nearest house is an open, cold house a quarter of a mile distant occupied at present by Professor Vallas, wife and five children. During my absence at New Orleans they had here bitter cold weather, the same that killed all the orange trees at New Orleans, and Mr. Vallas tells me he and his family nearly froze, for the house was designed for summer, of the “wentilating” kind.
There are other houses between this and Alexandria of the same general kind, but they are from one and one-half to two and one-half miles distant, too far off for any person connected with the Seminary to live. The plan is and has been to build, but the Seminary is utterly unable to build, nor can it hope to get the money save by a gift from the legislature. General Graham thinks they will appropriate $30,000. Governor Moore, though in favor of doing so, has his doubts and was candid enough to say so. Without that it will be impossible for me to bring you south even next winter. The legislature meets in the latter part of next January and we cannot even get our pay until they appropriate, but they must appropriate $8,1001 because it belongs lawfully to the Seminary. . .
1 Interest on the Seminary land fund. - Ed.
SOURCES: Walter L. Fleming, General W.T. Sherman as College President, p. 84-6
December 16. There was a row at the sympathetic Brunonian meeting last night, but the police kept it under control. Sundry arrests were made. Jerry Larocque spent the night in a station house.
The Diary of George Templeton Strong, Edited by Allan Nevins and Milton Halsey Thomas
Well worth it, indeed. Thanks for repeating and noting.
The Democratic candidate will probably sweep the southern states, and there are several border and northern states not sold on the Republican position on slavery. So as long as the Democrats can remain united there is a good chance the "Black Republican" will be defeated.
Kinda gives lie to DegenerateLamp’s foolishness...
From a fair reading of the historical record there is no question the leadership of the South lead their states into war over the slavery question. It’s ironic given that most of the soldiers who filled out the ranks never had enough money to own a slave.
Those who believe the secession was about slavery haven't done their homework.
For starters, Lincoln admired those in the "protectionist class," such as Henry Clay, a central-bank-loving Hamiltonian who was one of the chief proponents of the 1828 Tariff of Abomination. A Jeffersonian and anti-protectionist named John Taylor labeled those like Clay as the "monied aristocracy":
"Taylor opposed those who advocated the expansion of national power and demanded banks and tariffs. Earlier, these included Hamilton and the Federalists and later, the politicians of the Era of Good Feelings and 1820s who eventually became Whigs. As Taylor saw it, they sought to bring the British system to America, along with its national debt, political corruption, and Court party—which Taylor called the new 'monied aristocracy.'" [F. Thornton Miller, in John Taylor, "Tyranny Unmasked." Liberty Fund, Inc., 2005]
Lincoln was a strong supporter of a national bank, and in this speech on the constitutionality he uses a 'lawyerese-sleight-of-hand' to insinuate that Jefferson would defer to any President on matters of construction:
"When the bill chartering the first Bank of the United States passed Congress, its constitutionality was questioned; Mr. Madison, then in the House of Representatives, as well as others, had opposed it on that ground. General Washington, as President, was called on to approve or reject it. He sought and obtained, on the constitutional question, the separate written opinion of Jefferson, Hamilton, and Edmund Randolph, they then being respectively Secretary of State, Secretary of the Treasury, and Attorney-General. Hamilton's opinion was for the power; while Randolph's and Jefferson's were both against it. Mr. Jefferson, after giving his opinion decidedly against the constitutionality of that bill, closes his letter with the paragraph which I now read:"
"It must be admitted, however, that unless the President's mind, on a view of everything which is urged for and against this bill, is tolerably clear that it is unauthorized by the Constitution; if the pro and the con hang so even as to balance his judgment, a just respect for the wisdom of the legislature would naturally decide the balance in favor of their opinion; it is chiefly for cases where they are clearly misled by error, ambition, or interest, that the Constitution has placed a check in the negative of the President."
Thomas Jefferson February 15, 1791."
"It is here seen that, in Mr. Jefferson's opinion, if, on the constitutionality of any given bill, the President doubts, he is not to veto it, as the gentleman from Kentucky would have him do, but is to defer to Congress and approve it. And if we compare the opinions of Jefferson and Taylor, as expressed in these paragraphs, we shall find them more exactly alike than we can often find any two expressions having any literal difference. None but interested fault-finders, I think, can discover any substantial variation."
[Roy P. Basler, "Abraham Lincoln: his speeches and writings." 1946, pp.233-234]
Now, that was slick! The South considered Abe Lincoln a very dangerous man, and rightly so.
Mr. Kalamata
Those who believe otherwise live in a realm of self-delusion and political fantasy.
Kalamata: "For starters, Lincoln admired those in the "protectionist class," such as Henry Clay, a central-bank-loving Hamiltonian who was one of the chief proponents of the 1828 Tariff of Abomination."
And Henry Clay was from which New England state?
Right, Kentucky, same as who else?
Right, Jefferson Davis and Abraham Lincoln.
And this makes tariffs a North vs. South issue how, exactly?
By the way, who else were original strong supporters of that 1828 "Tariff of Abominations"?
Right, Andrew Jackson from which New England state?
That would be Tennessee.
And who else? Right, VP John C. Calhoun from which New England state?
That would be South Carolina, so isn't it amazing how big New England was?!
Oh, and who all opposed it?
That's right, it was those Southerners from Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont & Main who voted "no".
So clearly, that "Tariff of Abominations" was a strictly North-South issue, oppression by elitist Northerners against hard-working Southerners, more than adequate excuse for lunatics to declare secession over, right?
Let me correct this false notion. The Union already recognized the right to own people as property. Remaining Unified, the Union would have continued to recognize the right to own people as property.
Therefore, the right to own people as property was not why the Union was split.
If you doubt this, look up the Corwin Amendment, which passed both the House and Senate with mostly Northern state majorities. This amendment would have made slavery nearly permanent and Lincoln urged it's passage in his first inaugural address.
The dispute was not over slavery, it was over whether the Southern states commerce and taxation would be controlled by Washington DC, or whether they would govern themselves.
South Carolina was agitating for secession as far back as John Calhoun.
Beyond that, reasons to stir the public for secession are not necessarily the reasons the power blocks might desire it. John Brown's raid frightened the general public, and so it was a useful tool with which to motivate them.
You can try to hide it as you like, but the fact remains that hundreds of millions of dollars per year would move out of the control of New York and Washington DC, and into the control of Montgomery Alabama.
Powerful people in the South wanted this to happen, and powerful people in the North did not.
You should look up the term "confirmation bias".
It's also ironic because legal slavery would have continued indefinitely in the Union anyways.
In fact it is so ironic, that the very notion that they had to leave the Union to preserve slavery is in fact ridiculous, especially after all the Northern Reps and Senators were willing to pass a constitutional amendment that protected slavery indefinitely.
What isn't ironic is the fact that about 200 million dollars per year would have moved out of the control of New York and Washington DC, and under the control of Montgomery Alabama.
Of course 200 million per year is chump change, and nobody in New York or Washington DC would have started a war over such a small amount of money.
Did I mention it was 200 million in 1860 dollars?
Worse yet, the advent of European trade in the South would have resulted in European goods being distributed throughout the Mid West by way of the Mississippi river, thereby costing the Northern industries that produced similar goods those very same markets.
Not only was New York and Washington DC going to lose control of that 200 million dollars per year, so too was their industrial base going to lose probably twice that much money in lost sales, and sales competing against European goods without the protectionist laws that allowed them to sell at much higher prices.
Southern secession was a massive financial disaster for all the powerful wealthy men in the North.
That's easy. The South was ultimately paying them, and the North was ultimately benefiting from having them in place.
What states people come from is not really relevant. Liberal Democrats can emerge from any state.
The Real distinction is whether or not they are Hamiltonian or Jeffersonian in outlook regarding government.
I’m familiar with it. And so are you. I recognize the temptation and try not to deign to reach for the low-hanging fruit. Like most other things you do, you carry confirmation bias to the point of obsession. For you to accuse others of CB is projection on your part.
You continually spout off on issues you seem to know nothing about, Joey; and since you seldom provide scholarly references, I have no way of determining if you are to be believed, or not.
Are you familiar with this historian?
"The thesis that the solid South seceded to protect slavery just does not make sense. The institution of slavery had never been more secure for the slave owners, with the Supreme Court in their back pocket; with the Constitution itself expressly protecting slavery and mandating the return of fugitive slaves everywhere-a mandate Lincoln said he would enforce; with Lincoln also declaring he had no right to interfere with slavery and no personal inclination to do so; with Lincoln personally supporting a new constitutional amendment protecting slavery forever-an amendment expressly made irrevocable. Added to all these guarantees for protecting slavery was the most crucial one of all-money. Wars require money; Peter the Great called money "the heart of war." The money power of the nation, the commercial interests, the Wall Street Boys, the bankers, traders, manufacturers, businessmen in all forms, did not want to interfere with slavery or agitate the South over slavery. There is nothing the South could have asked for the protection of slavery that wouldn't have been gladly provided, just as long as the South remained in the Union. And there would be no money for a war to abolish slavery, period! Why secede, especially considering that throughout history secession wars had almost always meant disaster for the seceders.
"Why did Southern leaders proclaim that slavery was in danger when it was not? I try to answer that. The facts belie their claim and must have irritated the Northerners who were trying to save the Union and appease the South, when their fears were illusory. It didn't take many astute Northerners pondering over the irrational behavior of the South to look behind this facade and find real answers.
"The North American Review (Boston, October 1862) saw through the South's highly emotional charge that slavery was the reason for secession: "Slavery is not the cause of the rebellion.... Slavery is the pretext on which the leaders of the rebellion rely, 'to fire the Southern heart,' and through which the greatest degree of unanimity can be produced.... Mr. Calhoun, after finding that the South could not be brought into sufficient unanimity by a clamor about the tariff, selected slavery as the better subject for agitation."
"In other words, it was a political ploy, commonly resorted to by politicians then and now. So Southerners' proclamation--from the housetops so to speak--that they seceded for slavery was political cant. It was also the South's biggest blunder of the war, since it prevented European intervention. Britain and France, leaders in the worldwide abolition movement, turned away from active support because they couldn't see themselves aiding the biggest slave society of the day.
"Even the territorial issue was a nonissue. It was a part of the Republican platform in 1860, although Lincoln did not mention it in his inaugural address. The only territory that could have benefited the South was New Mexico. At that time it included today's Arizona, 200,000 square miles, four times as big as England. Yet, after ten years as a slave territory there were only twenty-one slaves in the territory, and of the twenty-one, only twelve were resident-hardly a bastion for slavers. And what would the planters in Virginia and in the slave heartland care about having slavery in lands a thousand miles away? As for the adjoining Utah territory, it was almost exclusively controlled by Mormons who had no use for slavery. California, the other huge parcel swiped from Mexico, had already become a state and had rejected slavery. There remains Oklahoma, then called "Indian Territory," the focal point of America's ethnic cleansing at the time. Over one-third (more than sixty tribes) of all Native Americans had been rounded up and herded into this not-too-desirable territory. No room for slaves here.
"Slavery simply was not in jeopardy, despite what the Southern leaders proclaimed, and it is hard to swallow the claim that the South seceded because of slavery. On the other side of the hill, the North cannot pretend that it was fighting for the cause of humanity to remove the blot of slavery from the Union-the North cannot even suggest that its zeal for the interests of the slaves was the cause of the alienation of the South - since there was no such zeal, except for a tiny number of abolitionists, and most of them were on the lunatic fringe, as we shall see. The more one looks behind the slavery facade, on both sides, the more one sees hypocrisy and subterfuge, designed to cover up the fiscal reality of the conflict.
"This being so, the question naturally arises, what was the cause of offense? How did the views of the South come to be so opposed to those of the North that the South determined at all hazards and at any cost to renounce its partnership with the North and declare its independence? If slavery was not in danger, what else did the South have to fear?
"The North and South had evolved in different ways since 1787 and no longer constituted a single nation and people. Their commercial interests had come into conflict, in contrast to the time of the founding. The North had built up a large and extensive manufacturing economy, and to foster that enterprise it demanded a protective tariff, a prohibition tariff, the burden of which fell on the South in two ways. First, because Southerners were large consumers of manufactured goods from their robust economy and, second, as agriculture producers and exporters, it was essential for their commerce to be able to exchange their products (e.g., cotton and tobacco) for manufactured goods in Europe. Otherwise the merchant ships would have to return home empty, and the Southern exporters would have to be paid in hard cash for their commodities, which meant much lower profits for the Southerners. When these same exporters chose to import European goods, notwithstanding the high tariff, this meant a high tax, increasing the cost to the Southern consumer and enriching the coffers of the federal government at the expense of the South, to benefit mostly Northern interests.
"The battle over this tariff struggle began in 1828, with the "tariff of abomination," meaning the highest evil. The prospect that this tariff would split the nation and foster secession was expressed decades before 1860 by a Southern congressman in the debates in the House of Representatives in 1828: "If the union of these states shall ever be severed, and their liberties subverted, historians who record these disasters will have to ascribe them to measures of this description. I do sincerely believe that neither this government, nor any free government, can exist for a quarter of a century under such a system of legislation." This prophetic statement came to pass thirty-two years later in 1860.
"Even more enigmatic was the pro-Union, antisecession views of the slave owners in border states such as Maryland. They wanted to stay in the Union, since Union protection returned runaway slaves. With secession, once a slave went North, he was lost forever; with union, the slave had to go all the way to Canada to be truly free and safe. In short, there had to be something else that caused Southerners to fire the first shot- to leave the Union by force of arms. Yet slavery keeps rearing its ugly head, acting as a great catalyst in the monumental events of the war, and it becomes even more significant in the aftermath of the war. We shall, as the events require, focus on slavery throughout this book. What began as a nonissue became an overriding force as the war came to a close and the "tragic era" began."
[Charles W. Adams, "When in the Course of Human Events: Arguing the Case for Southern Secession." Rowman & Littlefield, 2000, pp.3-6]
Makes sense to me.
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>>Kalamata said: "For starters, Lincoln admired those in the "protectionist class," such as Henry Clay, a central-bank-loving Hamiltonian who was one of the chief proponents of the 1828 Tariff of Abomination."
>>Joey said: "And Henry Clay was from which New England state? Right, Kentucky, same as who else? Right, Jefferson Davis and Abraham Lincoln. And this makes tariffs a North vs. South issue how, exactly?"
LOL! What does that have to do with anything, Joey? Clay was a Hamiltonian, big-government protectionist, that is, a crony-capitalist. Besides, the tariff was NOT a North vs. South issue; it merely seemed that way because the issue was centered around agriculture vs manufacturing -- agriculturalists in other states also opposed the tariff.
In a nutshell, the manufacturers wanted tariff protection for their goods (e.g., crony-capitalism,) while the agriculturists (generally) wanted free trade. Those agriculturalists whose goods were protected by the tariff, such as the hemp farmers in Kentucky, Illinois and Missouri, obviously supported the tariff.
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>>Joey said: "By the way, who else were original strong supporters of that 1828 "Tariff of Abominations"? Right, Andrew Jackson from which New England state? That would be Tennessee. And who else? Right, VP John C. Calhoun from which New England state? That would be South Carolina, so isn't it amazing how big New England was?!"
Again, you seem confused about the issues. Calhoun was a devout free-trader (in the mold of Jefferson) who strongly OPPOSED a protectionist tariff. He supported some tariffs for government expenses, such as providing for the common defense, but little else. He vehemently opposed crony-tariffs that would protect one branch of industry at the expense of others.
Andrew Jackson despised the entrenched political establishment, such as the bankers and protectionists. Although he supported the tariff that he inherited from Adams, he used it primarily to pay down the national debt rather than for crony infrastructure projects, such as the road proposed by Clay and appropriated by Congress that would extend from northern Kentucky, through Clay's hometown in Lexington, down to Nashville, which was Jackson's home town. Jackson insisted a constitutional amendment was required before the road would qualify for federal funds. LOL!
I have read that Jackson was the last president to serve under zero national debt.
****************
>>Joey said: "Oh, and who all opposed it? That's right, it was those Southerners from Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont & Main who voted "no". So clearly, that "Tariff of Abominations" was a strictly North-South issue, oppression by elitist Northerners against hard-working Southerners, more than adequate excuse for lunatics to declare secession over, right?"
You come up with the strangest "arguments!" I have read that the southern states voted 64 to 4 AGAINST the 1828 tariff! Where did you get your information?
Have you read the work of this historian?
"Until Congress enacted the Tariff of 1828, British textile manufacturers had used cheap cotton picked by slaves in the American South to undersell textiles made in New England. The Tariff of 1828 raised costs of British textiles high enough to protect New England textile producers, but it also raised costs of other British imports so high that the agricultural South could no longer afford to buy many British manufactured goods on which they depended." [Unger, Harlow Giles, "Henry Clay: America's Greatest Statesman." De Capo Press, 2015, pp.168-169]
"As the 1828 election approached, New England textile manufacturers set up a drumbeat of demand for higher tariffs to protect them against imports. Other American industries quickly demanded similar tariff protection until the list of proposed tariff s before Congress grew so large and diverse that opponents labeled them collectively the 'Tariff of Abomination.' After the President signed it into law, Southern states, which depended heavily on imports for staples, reacted with outrage at the increased costs of imports, and they renewed their calls for secession. South Carolina's legislature called the tariff unconstitutional and blamed the President for not having vetoed it. Georgia, Mississippi, and Virginia followed suit, edging closer to disunion and costing President [John Qunicy] Adams the South in the 1828 election." [Ibid. p.142]
The way I read that, the adoption of the 1828 tariff by the Adam's administration helped defeat Adams in the next election against Andrew Jackson.
Mr. Kalamata
Quite the contrary, all the proposals made protected slavery only where it existed and did not guarantee it could be expanded into the territories. The Southern states, on the other hand, adopted a constitution that specifically protected to an extent that would never have been possible in the U.S., including protecting slave imports.
Why secede, especially considering that throughout history secession wars had almost always meant disaster for the seceders.
They were just dumb I guess.
"The North American Review (Boston, October 1862) saw through the South's highly emotional charge that slavery was the reason for secession: "Slavery is not the cause of the rebellion.... Slavery is the pretext on which the leaders of the rebellion rely, 'to fire the Southern heart,' and through which the greatest degree of unanimity can be produced.... Mr. Calhoun, after finding that the South could not be brought into sufficient unanimity by a clamor about the tariff, selected slavery as the better subject for agitation."
So then are you saying that the entire Southern cause was based on a lie? They couldn't whup up the support over tariffs so they had to turn to slavery? Could it be that tariffs had little or no impact on Southerners since they paid so small a percentage of them?
The only territory that could have benefited the South was New Mexico.
Obviously Mr. Adams's scholarship is so deficient that he has never heard of Kansas.
Slavery simply was not in jeopardy, despite what the Southern leaders proclaimed, and it is hard to swallow the claim that the South seceded because of slavery.
So you're also saying that the Southern leaders really had no idea why they were rebelling to begin with? A pity Mr. Adams wasn't around 160 years earlier so he could have explained the error of their ways.
When these same exporters chose to import European goods, notwithstanding the high tariff, this meant a high tax, increasing the cost to the Southern consumer and enriching the coffers of the federal government at the expense of the South, to benefit mostly Northern interests.
There is no evidence that Southern consumers imported foreign goods in any large quantities.
We shall, as the events require, focus on slavery throughout this book. What began as a nonissue became an overriding force as the war came to a close and the "tragic era" began."
His whole book is pretty much a non-issue.
We must be reading different Confederate constitutions:
"Article I, Sec. 9. (I) The importation of negroes of the African race from any foreign country other than the slaveholding States or Territories of the United States of America, is hereby forbidden; and Congress is required to pass such laws as shall effectually prevent the same." ["Constitution of the Confederate States." Avalon Project, March 11, 1861]
That certainly appears to be saying that slaves could be imported ONLY from slaveholding States or Territories of the United States; NOT from other foreign lands.
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>>Kalamata quoting Adams: "Why secede, especially considering that throughout history secession wars had almost always meant disaster for the seceders.
>>DoodleDawg wrote: "They were just dumb I guess."
Perhaps they assumed Lincoln was going to be a disaster, no matter which direction they went; and they would rather die free, than under the thumb of a tyrant. Just a thought . . .
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>>Kalamata quoting Adams: "The North American Review (Boston, October 1862) saw through the South's highly emotional charge that slavery was the reason for secession: "Slavery is not the cause of the rebellion.... Slavery is the pretext on which the leaders of the rebellion rely, 'to fire the Southern heart,' and through which the greatest degree of unanimity can be produced.... Mr. Calhoun, after finding that the South could not be brought into sufficient unanimity by a clamor about the tariff, selected slavery as the better subject for agitation."
>>DoodleDawg wrote: "So then are you saying that the entire Southern cause was based on a lie? They couldn't whup up the support over tariffs so they had to turn to slavery?"
It does appear the southerners lacked the "hindsight" of today's arm-chair quarterbacks.
Of course, it is easy to fool the masses. A large portion of Americans believe the Secession was about slavery, even though Jefferson Davis never mentioned it in his Inaugural Address, and Lincoln mentioned it only in an accommodating manner:
"First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861
"Fellow-citizens of the United States:
"In compliance with a custom as old as the government itself, I appear before you to address you briefly, and to take, in your presence, the oath prescribed by the Constitution of the United States, to be taken by the President "before he enters on the execution of his office."
"I do not consider it necessary at present for me to discuss those matters of administration about which there is no special anxiety or excitement.
"Apprehension seems to exist among the people of the Southern States, that by the accession of a Republican Administration, their property, and their peace, and personal security, are to be endangered. There has never been any reasonable cause for such apprehension. Indeed, the most ample evidence to the contrary has all the while existed, and been open to their inspection. It is found in nearly all the published speeches of him who now addresses you. I do but quote from one of those speeches when I declare that "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so." Those who nominated and elected me did so with full knowledge that I had made this, and many similar declarations, and had never recanted them. And more than this, they placed in the platform, for my acceptance, and as a law to themselves, and to me, the clear and emphatic resolution which I now read:
"Resolved, That the maintenance inviolate of the rights of the States, and especially the right of each State to order and control its own domestic institutions according to its own judgment exclusively, is essential to that balance of power on which the perfection and endurance of our political fabric depend; and we denounce the lawless invasion by armed force of the soil of any State or Territory, no matter under what pretext, as among the gravest of crimes."
"I now reiterate these sentiments: and in doing so, I only press upon the public attention the most conclusive evidence of which the case is susceptible, that the property, peace and security of no section are to be in any wise endangered by the now incoming Administration. I add too, that all the protection which, consistently with the Constitution and the laws, can be given, will be cheerfully given to all the States when lawfully demanded, for whatever cause—as cheerfully to one section as to another.
"There is much controversy about the delivering up of fugitives from service or labor. The clause I now read is as plainly written in the Constitution as any other of its provisions:
"No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due."
"It is scarcely questioned that this provision was intended by those who made it, for the reclaiming of what we call fugitive slaves; and the intention of the law-giver is the law. All members of Congress swear their support to the whole Constitution—to this provision as much as to any other. To the proposition, then, that slaves whose cases come within the terms of this clause, "shall be delivered up," their oaths are unanimous. Now, if they would make the effort in good temper, could they not, with nearly equal unanimity, frame and pass a law, by means of which to keep good that unanimous oath?"
"There is some difference of opinion whether this clause should be enforced by national or by state authority; but surely that difference is not a very material one. If the slave is to be surrendered, it can be of but little consequence to him, or to others, by which authority it is done. And should any one, in any case, be content that his oath shall go unkept, on a merely unsubstantial controversy as to how it shall be kept?
"Again, in any law upon this subject, ought not all the safeguards of liberty known in civilized and humane jurisprudence to be introduced, so that a free man be not, in any case, surrendered as a slave? And might it not be well, at the same time to provide by law for the enforcement of that clause in the Constitution which guarantees that "the citizens of each State shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States"?"
[Roy P. Basler, "Abraham Lincoln: his speeches and writings." 1946, pp.579-581]
The real threat from Lincoln was the loss of blood among those who refused to collect HIS tariffs.
I therefore consider that in view of the Constitution and the laws, the Union is unbroken; and to the extent of my ability I shall take care, as the Constitution itself expressly enjoins upon me, that the laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all the States. Doing this I deem to be only a simple duty on my part; and I shall perform it, so far as practicable, unless my rightful masters, the American people, shall withhold the requisite means, or in some authoritative manner, direct the contrary. I trust this will not be regarded as a menace, but only as the declared purpose of the Union that will constitutionally defend and maintain itself.
In doing this there needs to be no bloodshed or violence; and there shall be none, unless it be forced upon the national authority. The power confided to me will be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the government, and to collect the duties and imposts; but beyond what may be necessary for these objects, there will be no invasion -- no using of force against or among the people anywhere.
[Ibid. 583]
That is also how Davis saw it:
"Actuated solely by a desire to protect and preserve our own rights and promote our own welfare, the secession of the Confederate States has been marked by no aggression upon others, and followed by no domestic convulsion. Our industrial pursuits have received no check; the cultivation of our fields has progressed as heretofore; and even should we be involved in war, there would be no considerable diminution in the production of the great staple which constitutes our exports, and in which the commercial world has an interest scarcely less than our own. This common interest of producer and consumer can only be interrupted by external force, which would obstruct shipments to foreign markets -- a course of conduct which would be detrimental to manufacturing and commercial interests abroad. Should reason guide the action of the government from which we have separated, a policy so injurious to the civilized world, the Northern States included, could not be dictated even by the strongest desire to inflict injury upon us; but if otherwise, a terrible responsibility will rest upon it, and the suffering of millions will bear testimony to the folly and wickedness of our aggressors. In the meantime there will remain to us, besides the ordinary remedies before suggested, the well known resources for retaliation upon the commerce of our enemy… There can be no cause to doubt that the courage and patriotism of the people of the Confederate States will be found equal to any measure of defence which may be required for their security. Devoted to agricultural pursuits, their chief interest is the export of a commodity required in every manufacturing country. Our policy is peace, and the freest trade our necessities will permit. It is alike our interest, and that of all those to whom we would sell and from whom we would buy, that there should be the fewest practicable restrictions upon interchange of commodities. There can be but little rivalry between us and any manufacturing or navigating community, such as the Northwestern States of the American Union.
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>>DoodleDawg wrote: "Could it be that tariffs had little or no impact on Southerners since they paid so small a percentage of them?"
Have you ever read anything by Steven Weisman?
"The new president, Jefferson Davis, had been a hero of the Mexican War, a former Secretary of War to President Franklin Pierce, and a respected champion of the South as senator from Mississippi. He was a vigorous exponent of the view that the war was, at its core, not a light to preserve slavery but a struggle to overthrow an exploitive economic system headquartered in the North.
"There was a great deal of evidence to support Davis's view of the South as the nation's stepchild. Although the rebel states had seized a military advantage at the beginning of the war, they suffered from a tremendous and lasting financial disadvantage compared to the North. Indeed, economically the North and the South were two different countries, one a growing industrial power and the other an agricultural backwater. In the North, the workforce on farms and plantations had dropped from 70 to 40 percent since 1800, whereas in the South, it remained constant at 80 percent. With 42 percent of the country's population, the South had only 18 percent of the nation's industrial capacity. A quarter of northerners lived in cities, but only a tenth of southerners. New opportunities beckoned immigrants to the North, not the South. The slave states fell behind in manufacturing, railroads, canals and roads. The South's banking structure was even weaker than that of the North. Of course, cotton prices were high, yielding rich incomes for plantation owners. But cotton made even more money for the credit, insurance, warehousing, manufacturing and shipping companies that were based in the North or overseas. Seventy percent of the cotton was exported, and the remainder went to mills in the North and then came back to the South in the form of clothing and other textiles. Indeed, the South had to import two-thirds of its clothing and manufactured goods from outside the region, and southerners paid artificially high prices because of the high tariffs erected at the behest of American industry. The South even had to import food. The North made nearly all the country's firearms, cloth, pig iron, boots and shoes, an ominous fact, considering the necessity of these things in a war. 'Financially, we are more enslaved than Negroes,' one prominent citizen said.
"From the perspective of the South, the North's economy rested on a kind of state capitalism of trade barriers, government-sponsored railroads, coddling of trusts, suppression of labor and public investment in canals, roads and other infrastructures. Southern slave owners sought to protect and extend slavery, to be sure, but also to secure free trade, overseas markets and cheaper imports. Southern resentment of the tariff system propelled the Democratic Party to define itself as the main challenger to the primacy of the industrial and capitalist overlords of the system."
[Steven R. Weisman, "The Great Tax Wars." Simon & Schuster, 2002, pp.52-53]
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>>Kalamata quoting Adams: "The only territory that could have benefited the South was New Mexico."
>>DoodleDawg wrote: "Obviously Mr. Adams's scholarship is so deficient that he has never heard of Kansas."
In Adam's book there is only one brief mention of the Kansas Territory, regarding John Brown; so obviously it was not important to his narrative. How does Kansas fit into your narrative?
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>>Kalamata quoting Adams: "Slavery simply was not in jeopardy, despite what the Southern leaders proclaimed, and it is hard to swallow the claim that the South seceded because of slavery.
>>DoodleDawg wrote: "So you're also saying that the Southern leaders really had no idea why they were rebelling to begin with? A pity Mr. Adams wasn't around 160 years earlier so he could have explained the error of their ways."
The North American Review that Adams quoted was "hanging around" 160 years ago.
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>>Kalamata quoting Adams: "When these same exporters chose to import European goods, notwithstanding the high tariff, this meant a high tax, increasing the cost to the Southern consumer and enriching the coffers of the federal government at the expense of the South, to benefit mostly Northern interests.
>>DoodleDawg wrote: "There is no evidence that Southern consumers imported foreign goods in any large quantities."
Have you ever read anything by Harlow Giles Unger?
"Until Congress enacted the Tariff of 1828, British textile manufacturers had used cheap cotton picked by slaves in the American South to undersell textiles made in New England. The Tariff of 1828 raised costs of British textiles high enough to protect New England textile producers, but it also raised costs of other British imports so high that the agricultural South could no longer afford to buy many British manufactured goods on which they depended." [Unger, Harlow Giles, "Henry Clay: America's Greatest Statesman." De Capo Press, 2015, pp.168-169]
Also revisit Weisman's quote, above.
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>>Kalamata wrote: " We shall, as the events require, focus on slavery throughout this book. What began as a nonissue became an overriding force as the war came to a close and the "tragic era" began."
>>DoodleDawg wrote: "His whole book is pretty much a non-issue."
What you write is pretty much a non-issue until you provide adequate sources supporting your statements.
Mr. Kalamata
We are reading the same, just comprehending differently. When you read "The importation of negroes of the African race from any foreign country other than the slaveholding States or Territories of the United States of America, is hereby forbidden..." you seem to be locking onto the "forbidden" and ignoring the "except for". Slave imports were specifically protected by the Confederate constitution, albeit from a narrow list of sources.
Perhaps they assumed Lincoln was going to be a disaster, no matter which direction they went; and they would rather die free, than under the thumb of a tyrant. Just a thought . . .
Die free? Well two-thirds of them perhaps. Thumb of a tyrant? What made him a tyrant specifically?
It does appear the southerners lacked the "hindsight" of today's arm-chair quarterbacks.
Or their imagination.
A large portion of Americans believe the Secession was about slavery, even though Jefferson Davis never mentioned it in his Inaugural Address, and Lincoln mentioned it only in an accommodating manner...
Perhaps people believe the Southern secession was about slavery because so many of the Southern leaders of the time said it was about slavery? And while Davis may not have mentioned slavery in his inaugural address, it was certainly topic A in his first address to Congress.
The power confided to me will be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the government, and to collect the duties and imposts; but beyond what may be necessary for these objects, there will be no invasion -- no using of force against or among the people anywhere.
Please continue. Lincoln went on "...Where hostility to the United States, in any interior locality, shall be so great and universal as to prevent competent resident citizens from holding the Federal offices, there will be no attempt to force obnoxious strangers among the people for that object. While the strict legal right may exist in the government to enforce the exercise of these offices, the attempt to do so would be so irritating, and so nearly impracticable withal, that I deem it better to forego for the time the uses of such offices. The mails, unless repelled, will continue to be furnished in all parts of the Union. So far as possible, the people everywhere shall have that sense of perfect security which is most favorable to calm thought and reflection."
What Lincoln was stating was his intention to continue on the functions of government - mails, courts, revenue collection - and would not appoint office holders that might exacerbate the situation. For you to latch on to collecting tariffs and claiming that was Lincolns sole purpose for opposing Southern secession makes about as much sense as saying Lincoln fought the war to make sure the mail got delivered.
Have you ever read anything by Steven Weisman?
No.
Indeed, the South had to import two-thirds of its clothing and manufactured goods from outside the region, and southerners paid artificially high prices because of the high tariffs erected at the behest of American industry.
People in the North paid those artificially high prices as well. And that one-third of clothing and manufactured goods produced domestically in the South had the same tariff protections as Northern manufacturers had.
The South even had to import food. The North made nearly all the country's firearms, cloth, pig iron, boots and shoes, an ominous fact, considering the necessity of these things in a war. 'Financially, we are more enslaved than Negroes,' one prominent citizen said.
Perhaps it's because, as another prominent citizen said, ""We are a primitive people sir! We are an agricultural people; we a primitive but civilized people. We have no cities-we don't want them. We have no literature-we don't need any yet. We have no press-we are glad of it. We have no commercial marine-no navy-we don't want them. Your ships carry our produce and you can protect your own vessels. We want no manufactures; we desire no trading, no mechanical or ,manufacturing classes. As long as we have our cotton, our rice, our sugar, our tobacco, we can command wealth to purchase all we want from these nations with which we are in amity."
In Adam's book there is only one brief mention of the Kansas Territory, regarding John Brown; so obviously it was not important to his narrative. How does Kansas fit into your narrative?
Because for almost ten years prior to the rebellion, slavery forces fought to bring Kansas in as a slave state before anti-slave forces finally got the adoption of an anti-slavery constitution completed. The same kind of fight might well have happened in Nebraska or other states. Arizona and New Mexico were not viewed as the only possible areas for expansion by slave supporters. They wanted the whole country.
The North American Review that Adams quoted was "hanging around" 160 years ago.
Quotes by Southern leaders of the period make it clear that slavery was by far the single, most important reason for their secession. Did Mr. Adams not read their words and writings?
...the agricultural South could no longer afford to buy many British manufactured goods on which they depended
And what goods were those? What did the South import from Europe in such great quantities?
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