Posted on 11/11/2002 1:23:27 PM PST by l8pilot
Evidence Builds for DiLorenzo’s Lincoln by Paul Craig Roberts
In an excellent piece of historical research and economic exposition, two economics professors, Robert A. McGuire of the University of Akron and T. Norman Van Cott of Ball State University, have provided independent evidence for Thomas J. Dilorenzo’s thesis that tariffs played a bigger role in causing the Civil War than slavery.
In The Real Lincoln, DiLorenzo argues that President Lincoln invaded the secessionist South in order to hold on to the tariff revenues with which to subsidize Northern industry and build an American Empire. In "The Confederate Constitution, Tariffs, and the Laffer Relationship" (Economic Inquiry, Vol. 40, No. 3, July 2002), McGuire and Van Cott show that the Confederate Constitution explicitly prohibits tariff revenues from being used "to promote or foster any branch of industry." By prohibiting subsidies to industries and tariffs high enough to be protective, the Confederates located their tax on the lower end of the "Laffer curve."
The Confederate Constitution reflected the argument of John C. Calhoun against the 1828 Tariff of Abominations. Calhoun argued that the U.S. Constitution granted the tariff "as a tax power for the sole purpose of revenue – a power in its nature essentially different from that of imposing protective or prohibitory duties."
McGuire and Van Cott conclude that the tariff issue was a major factor in North-South tensions. Higher tariffs were "a key plank in the August 1860 Republican party platform. . . . northern politicians overall wanted dramatically higher tariff rates; Southern politicians did not."
"The handwriting was on the wall for the South," which clearly understood that remaining in the union meant certain tax exploitation for the benefit of the north.
October 16, 2002
Dr. Roberts [send him mail] is John M. Olin Fellow at the Institute for Political Economy and Senior Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He is a former associate editor of the Wall Street Journal and a former assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury. He is the co-author of The Tyranny of Good Intentions Evidence Builds for DiLorenzo’s Lincoln by Paul Craig Roberts
In an excellent piece of historical research and economic exposition, two economics professors, Robert A. McGuire of the University of Akron and T. Norman Van Cott of Ball State University, have provided independent evidence for Thomas J. Dilorenzo’s thesis that tariffs played a bigger role in causing the Civil War than slavery.
In The Real Lincoln, DiLorenzo argues that President Lincoln invaded the secessionist South in order to hold on to the tariff revenues with which to subsidize Northern industry and build an American Empire. In "The Confederate Constitution, Tariffs, and the Laffer Relationship" (Economic Inquiry, Vol. 40, No. 3, July 2002), McGuire and Van Cott show that the Confederate Constitution explicitly prohibits tariff revenues from being used "to promote or foster any branch of industry." By prohibiting subsidies to industries and tariffs high enough to be protective, the Confederates located their tax on the lower end of the "Laffer curve."
The Confederate Constitution reflected the argument of John C. Calhoun against the 1828 Tariff of Abominations. Calhoun argued that the U.S. Constitution granted the tariff "as a tax power for the sole purpose of revenue – a power in its nature essentially different from that of imposing protective or prohibitory duties."
McGuire and Van Cott conclude that the tariff issue was a major factor in North-South tensions. Higher tariffs were "a key plank in the August 1860 Republican party platform. . . . northern politicians overall wanted dramatically higher tariff rates; Southern politicians did not."
"The handwriting was on the wall for the South," which clearly understood that remaining in the union meant certain tax exploitation for the benefit of the north.
October 16, 2002
Dr. Roberts [send him mail] is John M. Olin Fellow at the Institute for Political Economy and Senior Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He is a former associate editor of the Wall Street Journal and a former assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury. He is the co-author of The Tyranny of Good Intentions
Backing away. Wouldn't that require some definitive action, like me to make a post modifying or retracting something? Simply not posting doesn't mean anything.
That's all nonsense, isn't it? You know it's nonsense (assuming you are rational) but you still post it.
Walt
You are probably under the illusion that that was a clever response.
I know it doesn't have the profanity FR asks posters to not use.
Walt
Crawl back into your hole......
For a WLAT FREE DIXIE!
You said that most of the founders wrote about the right of secession.
In #585, I said to "Start quoting."
What you wrote above is your response.
You don't have any facts; you were just lying, I guess.
Walt
Dr. McPherson's BattleCry of Freedom is very balanced. He bends over backwards to be fair. The facts don't suit you, so you attack him.
I heard again yesterday the Tennessee pep band playing a flourish based on that popular song of the ACW from which Dr. McPherson's book takes its name.
Walt
It's not so much as glazed eyes as it is muffled laughter, at least in this case. You blame Lincoln but how much worse would it have been for you had the south won? After all Davis was seizing private property 'for the war effort' from the get go. Nationalizing industry, confiscatory income taxes, seizing private property, trampling on the constitution, those are all Davis legacies rather than Lincoln legacies.
I didn't find anything about Chamberlain protesting Wirz's treatment.
This is where you declare on a "Wlat Free Dixie" again.
Walt
". . . an incident occurred, which I have never seen recorded, but which seems to me worthy of not. A vessel suddenly appeared through the mist from behind the Bar, a passenger steamer, which was made out to be the Nashville. She had no colors set, and as she approached the fleet she refused to show them. Captain Faunce ordered one of the guns manned, and as she came still nearer turned to the gunner. 'Stop her!' he said, and a shot went skipping across her bows. Immediately the United States ensign went to her gaff end, and she was allowed to proceed..."
I figured you'd go for this hook, line and sinker, and you sure did.
Walt
If one is taking the ultimate step of armed rebellion it stands to reason that by then the gloves would be off and the causes for the rebellion would be clearly stated. And nowhere in the documents of the time is any reason for secession stated more clearly and more forcefully than defense of the institution of slavery. But there were some discussion on tariffs. Alexander Stephens, for example, spoke on tariffs in December 1860.
"Yes, and Massachusetts, with unanimity, voted with the South to lessen them (tariff rates), and they were made just as low as Southern men asked them to be, and those are the rates they are now at."
It ought to be obvious that slavery is a NON-market structure because it enslaves consumers, and cannot fucntion except for the iron hand of government---in this case, southern state governments that REQUIRE free men to join slave posses; that prohibited freedom of speech when it came to talks on abolition; that prohibited free flow of information in the mail (i.e., abolitionist literature) and which denied "right to life" of the slaves.
McPherson's book should be commended for its efforts at a one volume account of the Civil War. I still recommend it to people starting to read about the Civil War for the first time. McPherson nevertheless emphasizes the moral rather than political role slavery played in the cause of the war. You can regularly find him on C-Span comparing the 1860's and 1960's, with Lincoln as a Civil rights leader etc.
Of course just about everyone in the CW history field will lean pro North or pro South a bit. For example VaTech's Robertson seems pro South while UVa's Ghallagher leans pro north, yet neither are offensive to most people. For a professional historian (yes I know he's not the only one) he bends over backwards in his anti-South bias. He brags about it. Perhaps he's reacting to criticism from Neo-Confeds. Even so, he's gotten more liberal since Battle Cry came out a few years back. McPherson was originally trained as a Presidential historian. When he dabbled in the CW and it somehow boomed and he found he could make money in it (unlike professors whose expertise is 4th century French agriculture I suppose)he's become some sort of "expert". Now he's somehow the official Civil War Historian Laureate of the United States. He is a sub-par CW scholar amongst his peers. I mean, yes Battle Cry of Freedom is better than Di Lorenzo or those dumbass Kennedey books the Neo-confeds tout, but not that much better.
The southern man on the street may not have owned a slave but he had a vested interest in keeping the institution of slavery. Slavery cemented his position in society. He may not have had much but he was a free man. Take away slavery and he has 4 million free blacks to contend with.
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