Academic historians rarely maintain that any event has only one cause or can be explained in a word. We laypeople know what caused the American revolution and who started WWII, yet any professional historian worth his or her salt can write hundreds of pages on these topics and count it as a failure if it doesn't include something new or challenging or unorthodox. Your Great Satan McPherson has written 230 pages on "why men fought in the Civil War," that apparently disproves that any one word answer can be given for the genesis of the war.
But the last two generations of historians have themselves been in reaction against earlier ideas that the war was the unwanted and accidental result of a political breakdown, or of the split between agricultural and industrial America. They are looking for one important answer that won't explain everything or displace other factors, but that will account for the most.
Slavery, and the conflict over its expansion and survival, does seem to go much more than tariffs, or industrial-agricultural conflict, or subsidies to industry. I suspect it has something to do with the context of our own times. If slavery had survived and industrialism died, we would doubtless view things in a different light.
The political breakdown theory does have lot to recommend it. So does a study of the political ideas prevalent in the North and in the South. But one senses that in this case there is something more fundamental behind the developments of political and shaping them. The conflict over slavery does seem to have been the essential catalyst that produced that kind of war at that time and place, though other factors clearly fanned the flames and inclined individuals to support one side or the other.
But it's also clearly the case that the kind of culture that we have shapes our responses towards institutions like slavery, and turns passive acceptance to rejection or defiant affirmation. I don't think one can say, "This caused this or that war." And one does have to take into account the explanations people themselves gave for playing the roles that they came to play. But you can rate various explanations in terms of how much they explain and how much they leave unexplained.
The line about the success of the Fire-eaters being due to the fact that they didn't all represent one set of views comes from Eric Walther's book, "The Fire Eaters" and the reviews of it. It's not a dig at the southern extremists, just a matter-of-fact description accounting for their appeal.
I suppose you're right that Wigfall played an important role in that last session. Apparently he played an important role in killing compromise measures. But at that point Congress seems to have become relatively useless, a place for jousting and sparring, rather than the source of practical wisdom or effective solutions.
Reading Walther's account, I don't see Wigfall as motivated primarily by race-hatred. That wasn't so much of a factor as we might think. Slavery was the topic of the day, not race. But Wigfall definitely does seem to be driven by demons, though. Mary Chestnut recounted the assessment of a friend of Wigfall's about the Senator's conduct in the day's leading up to the war: "Wigfall chafes at the restraints of civilized life. He likes to be where he can be as rude as he pleases and he is indulging himself now to the fullest extent, apparently."
So much of the debate here is about rational positions and it's conducted with a desire to prove one set of positions right and the other wrong. But emotional "irrational" factors, questions of honor, insult, fear, "saving face," and group identity and affirmation played a far larger role than we give them credit for. Whether they truly were "irrational" is another question, but they do a lot to explain the situation our country found itself in during the Civil War era. Bertram Wyatt-Brown, a Southerner, has examined these questions in his books.
I agree entirely. As one who does not maintain that the war is reducable to any one cause, I think it is fair to say that fault for this circle lies elsewhere in those who do.
Academic historians rarely maintain that any event has only one cause or can be explained in a word.
In most cases, yes. But with the war, there are many "credible" academics who push the slavery-only line as their own beliefs. The Jaffa cult subscribes very strongly to this position. James McPherson has also advocated it and written articles asserting that other issues, such as the tariff, were inconsequential and essentially irrelevant. It's also undeniably a the common perception among many non-historian northerners and is accepted as undeniable fact by "mainstream" media types regardless of where they're from.
Your Great Satan McPherson has written 230 pages on "why men fought in the Civil War," that apparently disproves that any one word answer can be given for the genesis of the war.
That particular book is problematic for McPherson and indicates very clearly that he is a man incapable of accepting his own research's findings. While McPherson's book definately does evidence the wide array of issues involve, he personally maintains that slavery was virtually the sole cause and the dismisses others - "The Civil War was not fought over the issue of tariff or of industrialization or of land grants...What lay at the root of this separation? Slavery."
http://www.historychannel.com/perl/print_book.pl?ID=34903
McPherson's analysis is almost like the scientist who gets a set of numbers from an experiment but refuses to accept them because they contradict his previous hypothesis on something.
If slavery had survived and industrialism died, we would doubtless view things in a different light.
Surely, but again - my issue is with those such as McPherson who dismiss all issues but slavery out of hand and insist that slavery alone defined the conflict - even when their own evidence shows otherwise. If someone thinks slavery was the biggest or one of the biggest issues, fine. That's certainly a possible interpretation. But I ask for the sake of honesty and historical accuracy that the other issues be included and given their due recognition. The alternative is little more than selective propaganda designed to demonize the south and deify the north around the single issue of slavery.
The conflict over slavery does seem to have been the essential catalyst that produced that kind of war at that time and place, though other factors clearly fanned the flames and inclined individuals to support one side or the other.
You have stated this before in similarly general terms. Please elaborate your reasoning with specifics.
The line about the success of the Fire-eaters being due to the fact that they didn't all represent one set of views comes from Eric Walther's book, "The Fire Eaters" and the reviews of it. It's not a dig at the southern extremists, just a matter-of-fact description accounting for their appeal.
I've actually been meaning to obtain a copy of that book if I can find one. The vast majority of my reading of the fire-eaters has come in the form of their own speeches and writings. Unfortunately there are relatively few texts out there giving an account of them for historical purposes.
I suppose you're right that Wigfall played an important role in that last session. Apparently he played an important role in killing compromise measures.
If you mean by inciting the southerners to leave and forwarding the conclusion that the situation was beyond repair, then yes. As for the particular compromise measures that came before the House and Senate, not really. By the time they made it to the floor he was virtually alone as the single deep south secessionist remaining in congress and could have done very little to alter them even if he wanted to. The compromise proposals at that point died because of the uncompromising opposition to them from the Sumner faction of northern radicals. This is not an opinion about Sumner, but a matter of fact of that session - his group killed the hopes of compromise on the floor, a fact that was openly admitted and recognized by more level-headed northerners and even some otherwise fiercely partisan northerners who recognized the urgency of the situation. They ranged from Clement Vallandigham to Stephen Douglas to William Seward and Charles Francis Adams, all northerners from a wide array of beliefs who placed the blame on the northern radicals.
And naturally, Wigfall weighed in himself. At the close of the session when moderates were pleading last ditch compromise attempts, Wigfall rose to explain why he saw the split as an inevitability and held out little hope for compromise. His clearly stated reason was that neither he, nor even the moderates could get a fair word in before Congress in debate with the openly hostile Sumner faction.
Reading Walther's account, I don't see Wigfall as motivated primarily by race-hatred.
I would have to concur. Wigfall came from a prominent South Carolina planter family and inherited some slaves from them. Accounts of their relationships with the Wigfall family indicate mutual respect between the two, even under the detestable institution of slavery with all its wrongs. As the war was coming to a close, Wigfall's freed house servants stood watch for him and even helped him escape the yankee troops that were looking for confederate officials to arrest. His view on slavery's existence reflects certain strains of a planter view of the time, but he was hardly some sort of a barbaric hate-filled racist figure often stereotyped into the plantation role by later writers.
But Wigfall definitely does seem to be driven by demons, though. Mary Chestnut recounted the assessment of a friend of Wigfall's about the Senator's conduct in the day's leading up to the war: "Wigfall chafes at the restraints of civilized life. He likes to be where he can be as rude as he pleases and he is indulging himself now to the fullest extent, apparently."
And Chestnut's is a perfectly reasonable account of a very vibrant and somewhat eccentric figure. He was a famed duelist, among other things if that is to give an indication of his personality. In Congress he was a staunch ideological southerner who made the case for his beliefs to the fullest. As I noted earlier, his great skill was the floor fight - he was feared and respected as a skilled debator, and that session provided the perfect opportunity for him to employ his strengths.