Posted on 03/20/2013 9:57:49 AM PDT by mnehring
“For instance,...he separates the West from the North but combines the entire South, as a way of making the South’s contribution to the economy loom larger".
Combining the data for West and North does not change any of the facts on import/export data or productions affected by tariffs. It does allow for a more incisive analysis of relative economic positions by being much more specific than any of his peers or subsequent historians.
Your characterizations of him and his work are not supported by facts, but merely your effort to call him a racist...modern tactic of the left...and to try to reduce his work because it is the antithesis of your world view and biases.
He produces a thorough work which proves that practically all northern industry was dependent on the productions of the South. He also demonstrates that the political system favored the North, and enabled its manufacturing to progress at the expense of other regions. He very clearly estabishes the facts surrounding the massive growth of the Southern economy just as the tariff system of the North was about to become an albatross around its own neck.
The Supreme Court of the United States affixed the date of the start of the war as the date that Lincoln ordered the call for troops and the blockade.
Their argument was simply that War is declared by the public act of a legally empowered government body. According to the Confederate Constitution, the legal body empowered to declare war was its Congress.
You cannot produce any document of the Congress that records a vote for war.
That is, of course, why the South grew constantly stronger as the war progressed, while the Northern economy gradually shriveled up and died as it was cut off from the South.
Your characterizations of him and his work are not supported by facts, but merely your effort to call him a racist...modern tactic of the left...and to try to reduce his work because it is the antithesis of your world view and biases.
It is quite true that calling anyone who disagrees is a tactic of the Left, and often an illegitimate one.
However, calling someone a racist who is a racist is not a tactic, it is telling the truth.
Kettel was a proud racist. That is just a fact. If you insist I can dig up some passages that prove it quite beyond doubt.
He did not view slavery of blacks, or slavery in general for that matter, as a necessary evil to be eventually overcome, but rather as a wonderful positive good to be expanded in both space and time.
Reading him I find it very difficult to avoid thinking the word "evil." While he may have been an admirable and honorable man in many ways, his belief system was irretrievably evil and un- even anti-American, at least as I understand what America means.
The is not to say that HE and others who believed as he did were necessarily evil people, simply that they had been seduced into belief in an evil ideology. As many others before and since have been.
his work ... is the antithesis of your (my) world view and biases.
Got that right. And damn proud of it.
You used the term ‘official reasons for secession.’
Who was the official?
How wrong can you be and still not realize it?
By late March, 1860, and upon the realization that the Morrill tariff would make them uncompetitive, greed and fear of economic loss was propelling the Federal government toward coercion of the seceded states.
The New York Herald said:
“ The combined effects of these two tariffs must be to desolate the entire North, to stop its importations, cripple its commerce and turn its capital into another channel; for, although there is specie now lying idle in New York to the amount of nearly forty millions of dollars, and as much more in the other large cities, waiting for an opportunity of investment, it will be soon scattered all over the country, wherever the most available means of using it are presented, and it will be lost to the trade of this city and the other Northern states.
“There is nothing to be predicted of the combination of results produced by the Northern and Southern tariffs but general ruin to the commerce of the Northern confederacy… The tariff of the South opens its ports upon fair and equitable terms to the manufacturers of foreign countries, which it were folly to suppose will not be eagerly availed of; which the stupid and suicidal tariff just adopted by the Northern Congress imposes excessive and almost prohibitory duties upon the same articles.
“Thus the combination of abolition fanatics and stockjobbers in Washington has reduced the whole North to the verge of ruin, which nothing can avert unless the administration recognizes the necessity of at once calling an extra session of Congress to repeal the Morrill tariff, and enact such measures as may bring back the seceded States, and reconstruct the Union upon terms of conciliation, justice and right.”
The results of the secession and the impact on trade were reported in the Richmond Dispatch of May 23, 1861:
“The total amount of imports at the port of New York for the week ending on the 18th, was $2,328,479; for the same week in 1860, $5,517,58 . This was a decrease of 57%.
“Since 1st January, $66,424,138; for the same period last year, $91,215,143. The decline was 30% at that point.
In March while the furious clamor continued in the newspapers, and Lincoln and the cabinet labored on their secret plans, a Charleston citizen was quoted on the state of affairs in Charleston harbor.
“Taken altogether, this is a most singular state of war….Fort Sumter is surrounded by batteries prepared to batter or shell it….Nearly the like state of things exists as to Fort Pickens.
“The officers of the fort and the besieging Confederate army even exchange friendly visits, and dine at each other’s quarters.
“Two different governments are now existing, and the new one completely organized and established.
“Peaceful relations have continued between the two peoples, despite the violent animosity of the communities, and still more of individuals of the two sections.
“While every participation and aid of secession in the South is denounced in the North as treason….and even so declared judicially, Southern and Northern men freely visit and travel any where in the other section, without being interfered with by any legal restraint or penalty
“The mails are uninterrupted, and the railway trains, express transportation and telegraph lines are operating normally.”
The point of the writer was that despite the clamor in the newspapers and among politicians, that the citizenry was experiencing peace.
The leaders in the South knew that there would only be two choices open to the federal government politicians who had always maintained a permanent monopoly on tax revenues.
Either they would meet the South’s low tax rates and compete in a peaceful free-market which would mean a drastic cut in government revenue, power and special interest benefits.
Or they would suffer financial losses, corporate and national bankruptcy. Not a likely scenario.
Or they would trump up some fake reasons to go to war and attempt to destroy the competitor.
Of course, I disagree with any quotes which suggest Lincoln's lawful actions in supplying Federal Forts somehow started Civil War.
War itself -- as opposed to, say, rebellion, insurrection and "domestic violence" -- began with Confederate military assaults on those US Army units.
I also note your analogy in post #393, equating the Confederacy to a rattlesnake, and bringing to mind the original Founders' slogan: "Don't Tread on Me".
But in this particular case, it's an unfortunate analogy, since no rattlesnake belongs in a US Army fortress, and one which invades and strikes a human there -- however "justified" it might or might not be -- will necessarily be killed as a result.
So, a Confederate "rattlesnake" which had no more good sense than your analogy, deserved and got the appropriate response.
rustbucket: "You and I have very different interpretations of the issues and history of the war.
That's fine.
However, I don't want to get bogged down in an FR version of Groundhog Day..."
I'm here to refute any allegations that Deep South secessionists were somehow "victims" of "evil Republicans' " assault on them and their "peculiar institution".
In fact, secessionists planned, provoked, started and declared ("recognized") war long before the "evil Republicans" assaulted anyone anywhere.
Here are the tariff numbers I go by.
You will note: overall tariffs
Once Civil War began, then Union tariffs were further increased, reaching 36% in 1865 and 45% in 1870 -- but these obviously had nothing to do with causing Deep South secession.
PeaRidge: "By comparison, the confederate tariff adopted in May 1861 had an average rate of just over 13%."
According to this source, the Confederates' ad velorum duty rate was 15%, but included new tariffs imposed on "imports" from the Union, which effectively meant Southerners would pay more tariffs than ever before!
PeaRidge: "It was critically important to Northern manufacturing and consumers that the Morrill tariff was 40% higher and would drive European trade through Southern ports."
You obviously intend to suggest that Northern fears of Confederate tariff rates caused Lincoln to provoke war by resupplying Fort Sumter, right?
One problem with that idea is: Confederates did not pass their new lower tariff rate (March 15) until after Lincoln had already announced (March 4) his policy to "hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the government".
So Lincoln's policy was not based on Confederate tariffs, but rather on his oath of office as President.
Yes, Lincoln was willing to trade a fort (Sumter) for a state (Virginia), but no such offer was ever accepted.
PeaRidge: "Actually they [highest rates of 45%] came five years before then", meaning in 1865.
According to this source, Union tariffs rose from 36% in 1865 to peak at 48% in 1868, then to 45% in 1870.
PeaRidge on the 1860 Morrill vote: "The sectional breakdown was 96–15 in the north, 7–9 in the Border states, and 1–39 in the south.
Had everyone in the South and border states voted against it, it would still carry."
In fact, there were more than enough votes among Southerners and/or Democrats to defeat Morrill in 1860.
First, eight Border and Southern representatives voted for Morrill, along with seven Northern Democrats.
Those 15 votes alone would change the overall vote from 105 versus 64 to 90 for and 79 against, meaning opponents would need only 12 more votes to defeat Morrill.
Second, those 12 final votes to defeat Morrill could easily have come from among 21 Southerners and 12 Northern Democrats who abstained from voting.
By contrast, only 13 Republicans abstained.
That's why I say Morrill could have been defeated in 1860 if Southerners and Democrats had been solidly opposed.
But they were not.
PeaRidge: "Wrong again."
Right again.
PeaRidge: "Wrong again and again....this is boring."
Right again and again... and your repeated DeNiles are worse than boring.
PeaRidge quoting Texas Senator Wigfall: "Then we stand thirty-four to thirty-four, and your Black Republican Vice President to give the casting vote."
First and foremost it's important to remember that Secessionist Fire-Eaters engineered the Democrats' election defeat in 1860, by splitting their party in two, thus guaranteeing victory for minority "Black Republicans", and giving Fire-Eaters the justification they needed for secession.
A leader among Fire-Eaters was none other than Texas Senator Louis Wigfall.
So your quote above simply shows Wigfall decrying conditions that he himself hoped-for and helped engineer to justify secession.
Only for purposes of law-suits involving statutes of limitations.
Also in that same decision, Supremes clearly acknowledged that war was started by Confederates, but did not feel obliged to pick which single Confederate action should be designated as their first act of war.
PeaRidge: "Their argument was simply that War is declared by the public act of a legally empowered government body."
No, as I re-read (and re-read) their ruling, it's absolutely clear they only intended:
PeaRidge: "According to the Confederate Constitution, the legal body empowered to declare war was its Congress.
You cannot produce any document of the Congress that records a vote for war."
You continue your role as Prince of DeNile against the obvious fact that Confederate Congress passed and President Davis approved on May 6, 1861 -- for all intents and purposes -- a Declaration (or "recognition") of War on the United States.
There continue to be no -- zero, zip, nada -- differences, practical, legal or logical between the Confederate "recognition" and other "declarations" of war.
According to those documents themselves, conventions which approved ordnances of secession:
Naturally, when I say "official", I mean the term loosely, since neither Unionists in 1861 nor most people today considered those secession conventions constitutionally legitimate.
It was all an unconstitutional fraud, from the beginning.
Nevertheless, to the degree that any act of secessionist conventions was "official", then so were their "Declarations of Immediate Causes..."
How wrong can you be and still not realize it?
PeaRidge: "By late March, 1860, and upon the realization that the Morrill tariff would make them uncompetitive, greed and fear of economic loss was propelling the Federal government toward coercion of the seceded states."
Rubbish.
Lincoln's inaugural address on March 4, 1861 pledged:
This had nothing to do with the Confederacy's 15% tariff rates passed on March 15, but rather came from Lincoln's oath of office as President.
PeaRidge: "The New York Herald said: “ The combined effects of these two tariffs must be to desolate the entire North..."
The New York Herald was a pro-Confederate Democrat Northern paper opposed to Republicans generally, and the new tariff specifically.
The fact remains, if all Democrats had been as opposed to Morrill as the New York Herald was, that bill could never have passed in the first place.
But they were not.
Many Democrats, along with nearly all Republicans, welcomed higher tariffs precisely because they provided protection for US manufactured products.
PeaRidge: "The results of the secession and the impact on trade were reported in the Richmond Dispatch of May 23, 1861:"
Sure, there is no doubt the Union suffered economically because of secession and war.
It did not, however, suffer as much as the Confederacy, which first planned, provoked, started and formally declared ("recognized") war on the United States, before a single Confederate soldier was killed by any Union force, or any Confederate state "invaded" by any Union Army.
PeaRidge: "Or they would trump up some fake reasons to go to war and attempt to destroy the competitor."
The only "trumping" was done by Confederates themselves in demanding surrender of Federal troops and properties, and then launching military assault against them.
The demands for surrender were in themselves acts of rebellion / insurrection.
Military assault on Fort Sumter was an act of war.
The Confederacy's declaration ("recognition") of war formally completed its status change and guaranteed the Confederacy's ultimate destruction.
In a five-month period in 1840, Wigfall managed to get into a fistfight, two duels, three near-duels, and was charged, but not indicted, for killing a man.
He later (Dec. 1860) co-authored the Southern Manifesto of southern Senators and Reps by which they denounced any farther attempts at compromise and urged immediate secession. Oddly enough, no mention of tariff rates or really any other reason for secession was mentioned, though the references to "the slave-holding states" implies there just may be some connection between the Peculiar Institution and southern grievances.
http://southernmanifesto.blogspot.com/
Also ran across what is far and away the most comprehensive timeline of the Civil War I've ever seen. Very useful.
http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/chron/civilwar.html
Thanks. I've long looked for such a resource.
Already have two similar books here, but online is quicker & easier to reference...
Hinton Rowan Helper's The Impending Crisis of the South: How to Meet It, which you have probably heard of. 1857.
Sort of the anti-Kettel. A southerner who hated slavery because it was detrimental to non-slaveowning whites, not because it was unjust to black people.
Tries to use the same batch of statistics to prove the great impediment that slavery produces, not its advantages.
I'm not enough of a statistician to tell who is right. Suspect both are, to some extent. Slavery was wildly profitable for some, and immensely destructive to the prospects of others.
http://docsouth.unc.edu/nc/helper/helper.html
Guy is amazingly long-winded and tends to over-egg his pudding. 400+ page book would probably have been much better edited down to <200.
Again, thanks.
I added Helper to my saved books, along with Kettell and Colwell and the DeBow's Review of Kettell.
Will have to read enough of each to know where to find their most vital statistics...
Had not heard of Helper before, but have seen some of his comparisons in other books.
Indeed, various historians argue the case one way, others the other -- the South was worse off, no it was better off, worse, better... ;-)
A lot depends on exactly which numbers you look at, and how you look at them, especially the values of slaves.
Anyway, there's much to consider and thanks again for the references.
South Carolina and Georgia opposed limits on the slave trade. Rutledge and Pinckney of SC even declared that South Carolina's support for the Constitution would hinge on this point.
Some Northerners like Roger Sherman and Oliver Ellsworth of Connecticut worked out the 1808 (originally 1800) compromise. Sherman wanted to keep SC and GA in the union. Ellsworth assumed slavery would eventually disappear (and wasn't apparently troubled by what happened in the meantime).
Now if one finds Virginia slaveowner George Mason passionately arguing for the abolition of the slave trade in the very near future and Northerners like Ellsworth and Sherman objecting one might interpret that as Southerners wanting the abolition of the trade and Northerners opposing it, but that would be a distortion and one would be wrong.
For instance, the neo-confeds Exhibit 1 in the "protective tariff as intentional repression of the South" display is the Tariff of Abominations of 1828. This is portrayed as the North (in this context generally meaning the NE and in particular New England) using its power to impose policies that would enrich the North at the cost of despoliation of the South.
While that may indeed, to some extent, have been its effect, that bears little relationship to the intent of the parties involved.
That this particular tariff ever got to a floor vote was because of a disastrously failed southern parliamentary maneuver.
The presumption that a unanimous NE imposed its will is also inaccurate.
Here's how the House vote went:
Region - For - Against
New England - 16 - 23
Middle States (Mid-Atlantic) - 57 - 11
West (Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri)- 17 - 1
South (including Louisiana) - 3 - 50
Southwest (Tennessee, Kentucky) - 12 - 9
Total - 105 - 94
So in no region was the vote unanimous. New England actually voted against it.The greatest number of For votes were from the Middle States, but the greatest percentage For vote was from the West, which at this point was every bit as agricultural as the South, possibly more so. Even the South was not unanimous Against.
The Southwest, slave states, along with Missouri, included in the West, were solidly For. Indeed, the leader of the protection forces, Henry Clay, was a large slaveowner from KY.
So the common southern portrayal of this as a solid industrial North (free states) vote intentionally imposing destruction on the agricultural South (slave states) is just inaccurate.
I was just reading about this the other night in Thomas Krannawitter's book, Vindicating Lincoln. Krannawatter, who's posted here, points out that the "Tariff of Abominations" was rushed to a vote by anti-tariff forces who expected Congress to defeat it. After it was voted up, Calhoun and the others who'd demanded the bill come up for a vote led the campaign against it.
New Englanders were more opposed to the bill than in favor of it, since in those days, shipping interests (and domestic wool production) were still stronger than the textile industry was. It was the West and the Mid-Atlantic states that put the bill through.
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