- But the truth is that it was a war-time tactic designed to motivate the north, depress the south, encourage slave uprisings - basically to twist the knife.
Exactly. A PR move.
Posted on 06/13/2005 6:08:24 AM PDT by sheltonmac
Unfortunately, the image in many Northerners minds is that the major component of Southern heritage is racism. People are not going to applaud that or secession. You have a big PR problem.
BTW, about three years ago I visited the Museum of the Confederacy and Confederate White House in Richmond. Even I, a Northerner, thought that it was disgraceful that the museum had sold off virtually all the surrounding land so that the buildings of a university hospital now loom over the site. It appears that some Southerners are extinguishing their own heritage.
YOU act as if every person from the South had slaves. They didn't and you really need to check and see how many of those slave owners were black. Changing history won't make you right.
See post 145 and the Corwin Amendment supported by Lincoln, referenced in his inaugural speech. Specifically, a Constitutional amendment to abolish slavery requires 2/3rds of the states to agree - such did not have enough votes. If slavery was all the Condfederacy wanted, all that was necessary for legalized slavery to continue was to remain in the union.
Davis simply states that the Union should provide (economically) for the slaves, not of any Lincolnesque dreams of mass deportation.
You got that right. Of course firehoses, dogs and church burnings didn't help either.
Agriculture production. With SC having slaves, Georgia planters - small and large - were no longer competitive. Just as northern manufacturers wanted tariffs to improve their position with foreign products, the planters of Georgia wanted to level the economic playing field.
You're welcome.
ping
What - you didn't read it a few weeks ago?
Where did they get that power?
Same place as Lincoln did obviously.
Davis clearly states that if the Union wishes emancipation then they can take the slaves off the southern hands. And prior to the rebellion, Davis did opine that if slavery was to end then he would hope that the freed slaves could be exported to Central and South America. ("Jefferson Davis, American" by William J. Cooper, Jr. pg. 239) He was the only person I'm aware of advocating mass deportation, not once but at least twice.
Weren't the competing with South Carolina planters before 1745 when this ban is supposed to have been put in place?
You have not read the Linocoln-Douglas debates, or you would not impart to Lincoln sentiments he did not have or voice.
The tenth amendment does not give the power of seccession to the states because it does not change or diminish the sovereignty of the United States as a whole, as a unified nation; which is sovereign over the limited sovereignty of the states; limited by the very existence and ratification of the constitution.
The Union cannot be unmade by any state, it can only be unmade by acts of the Union. Any other acts at unmaking it are acts of rebellion, no matter what cause someone uses for that rebellion. The tenth amendment concepts are applicable to the normal course of government of the nation and the states, and do not apply to any question of whether or not a state is or is not part of the nation.
While we were discussing the Civil War era it is irrelevant to drag in events earlier than that. If you want to discuss the earlier slave trade you will not find me defending anyone involved in it. The point is that the Northern states recognized its evil and took steps to stop it. Southern states and slaveholders at the time of the Revolution also recognized its evil and had every intention of letting the instition fade away. Almost every slaveholder felt that way especially men such as Washington, Jefferson and Madison.
But that attitude changed and slavers began to defend it and make plans to expand it. Eventually the principal leaders began to defend it as a POSITIVE good. Such an attitude led to their determination to destroy the Union if necessary to preserve Slavery.
I care and always will.
This was the beginning of the end for the rights of states. Textbooks have had the northern view of Reconstruction in them for years. It is time for the truth to be told and taught as such.
There is so much bullshit in this article, I couldn't get through it. But here are two whoppers:
"Contrary to popular belief, Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation was merely a public relations ploy."
Baloney. What it was was this: a strategic, war tactic. It's no secret that it wasn't a humanitarian cause. We're adults here; we can handle the truth. But the truth is that it was a war-time tactic designed to motivate the north, depress the south, encourage slave uprisings - basically to twist the knife.
It worked.
Exactly. A PR move.
I act in no such way and never believed such a ridiculous thing. There was a TINY minority which owned the VAST majority of slaves. They were the power which controlled the South and were able to brainwash the poor slobs who had nothing to go fight to keep the rich masters' slaves. They were the ones plotting and scheming to destroy the Union.
You cannot point to ONE statement backing up your claim about how I "act."
BTW any black slaveholder was never free from the suspicion of being a slave himself and was subject to the same indignities which could be visited on a slave. Outside of the area within which he was known trouble was always close at hand.
"For one thing, the vast majority of slave owners were not cruel, a stark contrast to how slaves were treated in pagan cultures."
This may well be true about southerners, but it is total rubbish about pagan cultures.
In fact, southern slavery is one of the worst forms ever. Greco-Roman slavery was not based on race, but other factors (including voluntary ones) and one could leave slavery from time to time. Obviously not so with southern slavery.
"If we are to conclude that antebellum Southerners were nothing but evil, racist slave owners who needed to be crushed, then we must operate under the assumption that the Northerners fighting against them were all noble, loving peacemakers who just wanted everyone to live together in harmony."
This is such piss poor moral reasoning that I am shocked to see it posted at FR. We need conclude nothing of the sort.
It is perfectly acceptable to conclude that all slaveowners are evil while understanding that those who fought them were only slightly better. Does the author think that since we conclude that the Nazis are evil, that we must also conclude that our allies in WWII the Soviets were good?
This is so childish it is embarrassing.
Personally I don't feel the need to conclude that all slaveowners were completely depraved. You can't subjectively judge anyone...that is not our place. But what we can do is objectively judge their actions and the culture. Owning another human being is simply intrinsically evil, end of story.
What's so f***ing difficult about that?
That doesn't mean that dismantling those institutions will be easy. It might involve bloodshed; let's hope not. But let's not confuse the difficulty of freeing slaves with the moral condemnation that slavery deserves and which we are obligated to continue even to this day.
This type of essay reminds me of people who are pro-life "but" with various "exceptions". Folks, there are no exceptions. Does that mean that we can't at some level understand and empathize with people who make tragic choices? Of course not. But there are no exceptions. Some moral absolutes exist.
Now that I think about it, I'm glad this essay was posted because this type of moral reasoning needs to be slapped down often.
***
On a final note....let's not also not confuse condemnation of slavery with embracing with a top down, litigious, federal government run "civil rights" program. That is a whole nuther ball of wax.
"Not as an amalgamtion of people - the motion to submit the Constitution for ratification to the people en masse did not even receive a second."
The ratification process is not the contract. The contract is the Constitution and the Constitution is between "we the people" (as a whole) not "we the people of the states" or "we the states". The constitution is a national contract between all the people of the nation, not between the states. As of the ratification of the Constitution, the states became sub-political units of "one nation"; no totally distinct and continuing with 100% of their prior "independent" sovereignty.
A state, acting alone, is not empowered to deny the soverignty of the nation to any of its citizens. To do so is a claim that the Constitution itself is no longer in affect, which is a claim that the nation under that constitution is not SOVEREIGN. Lincoln was right and he rightly defended the soverignty that the constituion stood for.
The south could have attempted to enter into any number of "legal" routes to changing the union and seeking an "independent course". It chose rebellion because it did not have a political majority of the nation on its side. It chose rebellion because the democratic political will of the nation was against it. It reminds me of what the Marxists do now when they don't have the votes; they resort to force - the force of judicial dictators. Same idea, different means.
"A question solved by violence must remain unsolved forever.
- Jefferson Davis-"
Yeah, that's really deep. Things like totalitarian Japan, American independence, Argentina taking over the Falklands, repulsing the Soviets' invasion of Afghanistan, the very existence of Carthage....are of these are still live hot issues that will NEVER be solved by violence!
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