Understanding History: Slavery and the American South

EverVigilant.net ^ | 06/09/2005 | Lee R. Shelton IV

[sheltonmac]

Everywhere you turn it seems there is a concerted effort to erase part of America's past by stamping out Confederate symbols. Why? Because no one wants to take the time to truly understand history. The general consensus is that Abraham Lincoln saved the Union and ushered in a new era of freedom by defeating the evil, slave-owning South. Therefore, Confederate symbols have no place in an enlightened society.

Most of this anti-Southern bigotry stems from an ignorance regarding the institution of slavery. Some people cannot grasp the fact that slavery was once a social reality in this country, and at the time of the War Between the States it was practiced in the North as well as the South. In fact, the slaveholding states of Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky and Missouri remained in the Union during the war. It should also be pointed out that, in our history as an independent nation, slavery existed for 89 years under the U.S. flag (1776-1865) and for only four years under the Confederate flag (1861-1865). I have often wondered: If slavery is to be the standard by which all American historic symbols are judged, then why don't we hear more complaints about the unfurling of Old Glory?

To begin to fully understand this volatile issue, it is important to keep a few things in mind. For example, Lincoln (a.k.a. the "Great Emancipator") was not an abolitionist. Anyone even remotely familiar with Lincoln's speeches and writings knows that freeing the slaves was never one of his primary objectives. In 1862, he said, "My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy slavery…" It wasn't until his war against the South seemed to be going badly for the North that slavery even became an issue for him.

Contrary to popular belief, Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation was merely a public relations ploy. It was an attempt to turn an illegal, unconstitutional war into a humanitarian cause that would win over those who had originally been sympathetic to the South's right to secede. It was also meant to incite insurrection among the slaves as well as drive a wedge between the Confederacy and its European allies who did not want to be viewed as supporters of slavery. A note of interest is that the Proclamation specifically excluded all slaves in the North. Of course, to say that Lincoln had the power to end slavery with the stroke of a pen is to assign dictatorial powers to the presidency, allowing him to override Congress and the Supreme Court and usurp the Constitution--which he did anyway.

Another thing to remember is that the Confederate states that had seceded were no longer bound by the laws of the United States. They were beyond Lincoln's jurisdiction because they were a sovereign nation. Even if they weren't--and most people today deny the South ever left the Union--their respective rights would still have been guaranteed under the Constitution (see the 10th Amendment), denying Lincoln any authority at all to single-handedly free the slaves. This is only reinforced by the fact that he did absolutely nothing to free those slaves that were already under U.S. control.

Slavery had been around in the North for over two centuries, with the international slave trade, until it ended in the early 1800's, being controlled by New England. When abolition finally came to those states--mostly due to the growth of an industrial economy in a region where cooler climatic conditions limited the use of slaves in large-scale farming operations--Northern slaves were sold to plantation owners in the agrarian South. In essence, the North continued to benefit from the existence of slavery even after abolition--if not from free labor, then from the profits gained by selling that labor in areas where it was still legal.

It should be noted that the abolitionist movement had little to do with taking a stand against racism. In fact, many abolitionists themselves looked upon those they were trying to free as inferior, uncivilized human beings. Yes, racism was rampant in the northern U.S. as many states had laws restricting the ability of blacks to vote, travel, marry or even own land. Joanne Pope Melish of Brown University, in her book Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and Race in New England, 1780-1860, points out that some militant groups even made a practice of "conducting terroristic, armed raids on urban black communities and the institutions that served them." This animosity exhibited toward blacks in the North may explain why the Underground Railroad, long before passage of the Fugitive Slave Act, ran all the way to Canada.

Despite the wishes of a select few, slavery had already begun to disappear by the mid- to late-1800s. Even Southern leaders realized slavery wouldn't last. In language far more explicit than its U.S. counterpart, the Confederate Constitution included an outright ban on the international slave trade: "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." Clearly, there is no reason to believe that slavery wouldn't have died of natural causes in the South as it had in every other civilized part of the world.

I'm sure we can all agree that there is no place for slavery in a nation founded on liberty and equality, but that doesn't mean that the South should be written off as an evil "slaveocracy." For one thing, the vast majority of slave owners were not cruel, a stark contrast to how slaves were treated in pagan cultures. In many cases, slaves were considered part of the family--so much so that they were entrusted with helping to raise their masters' children. This is neither an endorsement nor an excuse; it's just a statement of historical fact. Yes, one could argue that the act of one person owning the labor of another is cruel in and of itself, but the same could be said of indentured servitude and other similar arrangements so prominent in our nation's history--not to mention the ability of our modern government to claim ownership of over half of what its citizens earn.

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. Neither characterization is true.

Slavery, 140 years after its demise, continues to be a hot-button topic. Yes, it was a contributing factor in Lincoln's war, but only because the federal government sought to intervene on an issue that clearly fell under the jurisdiction of the various states. Trying to turn what Lincoln did into a moral crusade that justified the deaths of over 600,000 Americans is no better than defending the institution of slavery itself.

[Soliton]

Absolute nonsense. Lincoln was anti-slavery. The republican party was formed as an anti-slavery party. The South seceded because Lincoln was elected ( because the Republican party was anti-slavery).

This article is equivalent to the holocaust denier's crap.

[marty60]

the vast majority of slave owners were not cruel,

ANYONE THAT PRACTICES OR BELIEVES THAT INSLAVING ANOTHER HUMAN BEING FOR ECONOMIC EXPEDIENCY, IS NOT A NICE PERSON. Denying freedom to human beings is not an admirable trait to be herald as benevolence.

But then I guess the Dums want to soften the image of their forefathers.

[blaquebyrd]

"...or those like you who ignore that in favor of an external foe, one easier to battle."

If it's so easy to battle the illegal invaders from the south then why aren't we as a nation joining the battle? I suggest to you that it's easier to sit back and relive/fight the Civil War than it is to stand up as the Minutemen have done and join the fight to protect the nation's sovereignty. Where some may chose to wear the label of Southerner or Northerner I choose American.

[frgoff]

Lincoln was never an abolitionist. Yeah, right. That's why he joined ran for office in the political party formed around one issue and one issue only: ending slavery.

That's why he railed against slavery in the Lincoln-Douglas debates when running for senator. That's why he wrote the emancipation proclamation at practically the beginning of the civil war and simply debated the correct timing to issue it.

That's why the Southern states were furious when he was elected president and determined at that point to secede.

Yeah, all because Lincoln really didn't want to abolish slavery.

This guy is an idiot.

The rest of his arguments are just as stupid. The idea that a state can secede from the Union just because the other states and peoples representatives across the nation do something it doesn't like? This guy doesn't want a Constitutional Republic, he wants 50 sovereign nations under the old Articles of Confederation.

At least he didn't hammer the 'states rights' issue to death sparing me the need to remind him of the all the contradictios the South engaged in with respect to states rights. (Basically they were for it when it promoted slavery, and were against it when it thwarted slavery).

Here's the bottom-line fact. Southern aristocracy traded in human beings as a commodity and fought a war to preserve that practice. End of story.

[4CJ]

The law in question prevented the Confederate government from interfering with the states - they could end slavery within their own state. The Confederacy did enact a law that required that Union slaves captured on Union ships to be returned to the state of origin and freed by that state's Governor.

[F.J. Mitchell]

"How many blacks owned white people?"

Probably not too many in those days, but starting with FDR and coming to fruition during the LBJ regime, they have come to own us all.

[cyborg]

I see where you're going and it's a bit of a flawed comparison.

[Ditto]

Some people cannot grasp the fact that slavery was once a social reality in this country, and at the time of the War Between the States it was practiced in the North as well as the South. In fact, the slaveholding states of Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky and Missouri remained in the Union during the war.

Not this s**t again. First off, in 1860, no one considered Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky or Missouri to be "Northern States". People would have thought you were an idiot if you called any of those states "Northern" All were considered Border States and all were on the South side of the Mason/Dixon line. Three of them were even represented by stars on the Confederate flag and both Missouri and Kentucky had "representitives" recognized and seated by the Confederate Congress and secessionist "governments in exile".

The only difference between those Border states and the 11 Confederate states was they all had relatively small percentages slave populations and their economies did not depend upon slave labor. The same is true for the western counties of Virginia who refused to go along with the secession of that state. There were very few slaves in Western Virginia. In fact, throughout the Confederacy, they was a very direct correlation on a county by county basis on the percentage of slave population and support for secession.

[Ditto]

For example, about one-third of the 10,600 free blacks in New Orleans in 1860 were slave owners.

You can only get that high of a percentage by applying the "one drop rule" and counting French Creoles as black.

[happyathome]

I don't know - violence solved Saddam Hussein fairly permanently. And Hitler.

[happyathome]

Astute observation. I hadn't thought of that.

[happyathome]

No, the real reason was that Britain was militarily engaged in stopping the international trade in the 1860's, and the Rebs were hoping for British recognition.

[sheltonmac]

Lincoln was never an abolitionist. Yeah, right. ... Here's the bottom-line fact. Southern aristocracy traded in human beings as a commodity and fought a war to preserve that practice. End of story.

Are you really that ignorant? Although Lincoln voiced his opposition to slavery, he was not an abolitionist. He would have gladly tolerated slavery if it meant keeping the Union intact. Besides, how do you explain his lack of effort to free the slaves in the North? His Emancipation Proclamation was aimed specifically at slaves in the South.

Do you really believe that poor Southerners would give up their lives in a war just so a small minority of Southerners could keep their slaves? What about the Northern slave owners who, rather than free their own slaves when their states abolished slavery, sold them south of the Mason-Dixon line for a profit? Were they somehow more noble than their Southern counterparts?

[justshutupandtakeit]

Yes I am a UoC alum but know more about the Civil War than you ever will if you believe the pablum the DSs are passing.

[TexConfederate1861]

What a load of CR*P.
You need to take a history course and learn about the South from a neutral source. Slavery wouldn't have lasted, even if the South had won. It just wasn't economically feasible.

As for Lincoln, well, he got what he had coming.

[4CJ]

Lincoln supported a Constitutional Amendment that would have guaranteed slavery to exist forever. He was no abolitionist.

[RegulatorCountry]

"Here's the bottom-line fact. Southern aristocracy traded in human beings as a commodity"

Here's the actual fact: northern money-grubbers traded in human beings, bringing them to the United States, and, before then, to the British New England colonies, as early as 1638. The first state to legalize enslaving Africans was Massachusetts. Persisting in making all of this strictly a "southern" phenomenon is perpetuating a self serving lie.

[justshutupandtakeit]

It was your thesis that slavery would have ended that I referred to. Since the war was DELIBERATELY provoked by the slavers who were determined to expand it that thesis has some heavy sledding to accomplish before becoming true.

Secessionist plotters cared about one thing, Slavery. That was their end all and be all. And they tried to wreck the Union to preserve it.

[TexConfederate1861]

Regardless what the pro-slavery people wanted, slavery wouldn't have lasted.

[sheltonmac]

I think it's more than reasonable to conclude that Lincoln's "anti-slavery" rhetoric was just that--rhetoric.