Why the South Lives On

American Thinker.com ^ | April 12, 2022 | Mike Konrad

[Kaslin]

It was in this month, one hundred and fifty-seven years ago, that the Civil War ended. I have seen afficionados of both sides lament what happened, while they might argue over who was right, and what was lost.

I am not an aficionado of the Lost Cause Theory. While some defenders of Dixie claim the issue was states’ rights, the chief underlying cause of the war was slavery. In his "Cornerstone Speech" of March 21, 1861, Confederate VP Alexander H. Stephens' stated bluntly that slavery was the very foundation of Southern society. Four states: Mississippi, Texas, Georgia, and South Carolina, even listed slavery among their reasons for leaving.

Four states went further. Texas, Mississippi, Georgia and South Carolina all issued additional documents, usually referred to as the “Declarations of Causes"…

Two major themes emerge in these documents: slavery and states' rights. All four states strongly defend slavery while making varying claims related to states' rights. -- Battlefields.org

The usual reply is that the South rejected the proposed Corwin Amendment which would have protected slavery in the south, hence the issue was states’ rights.

The problem with that argument is that the South did not want slavery to be “protected.” Rather, the South wanted slavery to expand to the Pacific. They wanted New Mexico, Arizona, and even Southern California to allow slavery. In their minds, the Corwin Amendment wasn’t enough.

[DiogenesLamp]

You are taking their effort to prevent the war (Corwin amendment) completely out of context.

I am pointing out that they truthfully did not consider the continuation of slavery to be their primary concern.

They were not worried about the continuation of slavery. What they were worried about was the fact that the South produced 72% of all tariff revenue which funded Washington, and if the South left, the Northern people would have to start paying their fair share of taxes, and the government would have to cut back on it's pork barrel projects which were putting so much money into so many northern pockets.

Southern independence would have become a massive financial disaster for the Northern power blocks, and they cared far more about their own money streams than they ever did for slaves working in the South to make them rich.

[moehoward]

Excellant!

[DiogenesLamp]

I have been made aware of this, and the pity is that so many others who would discuss this issue are *not* aware of it.

They finally got Rhode Island to join by threatening to cut off all trade with it. Rhode Island rejected ratification several times before they brought out the threats.

Finally Rhode Island capitulated to the pressure they put on it.

[DiogenesLamp]

Rhe Sorh’s slave systemwas Anri-Free Marketand Socalistic. Read Fritxroy.

Nobody in the Northern power block cared what it was so long as it was funneling money into their pockets.

[DoodleDawg]

Both Jefferson (in his Kentucky Resolutions and his Declaration of 1825) and Madison (in his Virginia Resolutions and Report on those same resolutions)...

In an 1832 letter to Alexander Rives Madison seems to deny that was his intent. He writes: "But the ability and the motives disclosed in the Essays induce me to say in compliance with the wish expressed, that I do not consider the proceedings of Virginia in ’98-’99 as countenancing the doctrine that a state may at will secede from its Constitutional compact with the other States. A rightful secession requires the consent of the others, or an abuse of the compact, absolving the seceding party from the obligations imposed by it."

Again, the right of secession (as it was understood prior to the war) was most definitely not "easily refutable"...

But in Chapter XXXII "On the Permanence of the Union" Rawle also writes: "The secession of a state from the Union depends on the will of the people of such state. The people alone as we have already seen, bold the power to alter their constitution. The Constitution of the United States is to a certain extent, incorporated into the constitutions or the several states by the act of the people. The state legislatures have only to perform certain organical operations in respect to it. To withdraw from the Union comes not within the general scope of their delegated authority. There must be an express pro- vision to that effect inserted in the state constitutions. This is not at present the case with any of them, and it would perhaps be impolitic to confide it to them. A matter so momentous, ought not to be entrusted to those who would have it in their power to exercise it lightly and precipitately upon sudden dissatisfaction, or causeless jealousy, perhaps against the interests and the wishes of a majority of their constituents.

[DoodleDawg]

Sounds like you are starting to grasp the truth.

Why bless your heart.

[FLT-bird]

One specifically protects slave imports,

The one that specifically protected slave imports from outside the country was the US Constitution.

specifically prevents non-slave states,

Neither of them does that.

specifically guarantees slavery in the territories,

They both did that after Dred Scott

specifically prevents laws impairing slave ownership and the other doesn't.

They both prevent laws impairing slave ownership.

That seems to be a pretty significant difference in allowances and protections to me.

That's because you have a false understanding of each.

Then we can say that one protected slave imports for 20 years and the other protected it in perpetuity. Seems like a pretty significant difference to me.

No. We can say one protected slave imports from outside the country for 20 years while the other did not. If there is a significant difference then it is the Confederate Constitution that is more restrictive of the slave trade than the US Constitution.

Except that the parts about slavery in the territory in the Dred Scott decision were made in dicta and was not binding. It would have been challenged by the Lincoln administration.

Except it was binding.

Except that the U.S. Constitution did not have the prohibition on any law denying or impairing the right to own slaves while the Confederate Constitution did. That would appear to mean the Confederate Congress was prohibited from doing anything, anything at all, that might have any negative impact on slave ownership. Including authorizing a constitutional amendment ending or limiting it.

Firstly, the US constitution allowed for slavery and protected the owner's right to reclaim his fugitive slaves - even if those slaves were in states that no longer allowed slavery. After Dred Scott, it could not be denied that an owner could bring his slaves into the territory of the US and still retain ownership of them. Any law can be overturned by a future law. Any provision of the constitution can be overturned by a future amendment.

But could not completely abolish slavery within its borders since any Confederate citizen who owned slaves was free to bring them into the state for as long as they wished to stay.

It said transit - The same was true in the US.

In theory perhaps. But since territories were prohibited from being slave-free then what is the chance that any state created from them would be non-slave?

Not perhaps. A provision that would have prohibited states that had banned slavery from joining was expressly voted down. You ask what are the chances that any territory that had slaves in it would choose to become a state that banned slavery. Ask Kansas.

[FLT-bird]

Wilson always saw himself as a Southerner.

Southerners don't see him as one. He left the South as a boy and spent all of his formative years - his entire adulthood - in New Jersey.

[jmacusa]

It's not about ‘’hating Southerners'', that's a bs argument. It's about a treasonous , illegal Democrat created entity called the Confederacy. And you Lost Causers know it.

[DiogenesLamp]

Bruce Catton said it best, in far fewer words. The war was ABOUT slavery, not OVER slavery.

Well he is wrong because the Corwin amendment proves slavery was not the issue over which the Northern armies felt the need to invade. You don't hand slave states slavery on a silver platter and then later pretend it is your moral objections to the institution that compel you to invade and kill people.

As far as the statement in the Declaration goes - it states the ideal principle. The fact that it was ignored for convenience sake does not negate it’s meaning - it only shows the hypocrisy of it’s writer(s).

It was not "ignored" it was seen as applying to the British Subjects. It was *not* seen as applying to slaves when it was written. That came later after people wanted to start creatively interpreting it.

The defense and active expansion of slavery into new territories was the primary reason that slave states seceded

So their enemies have repeatedly said over and over, but I actually went to the trouble to investigate this claim and found out it was just a lie.

Cotton plantations was the absolute primary usage of slavery in this era, and what I discovered is you could not grow cotton, tobacco or any other significant cash crop in the territories in 1860. It is only with modern irrigation systems that did not exist in 1860 that we can grow cotton and other crops in the territories today.

What the northern power blocks were opposed to is the possibility that territories would enter the Union favoring the slave states, because the northern power blocks had carefully worked themselves into a position of a super majority and to gain new states favorable to the Southern states would risk breaking some of their carefully crafted laws which had the effect of moving Southern money into Northern pockets.

The real objection to "slavery in the territories" was not actual slavery in the territories. It was an objection to new states supporting the South instead of the Northern power block.

It was really about the power of Washington DC to funnel money into powerful Northern pockets, and nothing else.

They were destroying “The United States” by the act of secession.

No they weren't. The United States would have continued to go on as before, but without control over the Southern states, and without all those hundreds of millions of dollars the Southern economy was producing which went into powerful Northern pockets.

That loss of money was the real objection. Everything they did hinged on keeping that money flowing into their pockets.

All that for the right to have humans hold other humans in chattel slavery.

Legal according to the US Constitution, and would have been even more explicitly legal and permanent by the actions of all those Northern congressmen who voted to pass the Corwin amendment.

So spare me the deception that they were so aghast about slavery that they went to war over it, just shortly after they voted to enshrine it in the constitution forever.

As far as the Corwin amendment goes - it was a desperate last-ditch give up everything to try to keep dissolution of the nation from occurring.

So? Why on earth would they want to keep a bunch of slave holding states in the Union anyways? Not only did they want to keep them, they wanted it so bad that they offered permanent slavery to them in an effort to entice them to remain.

What motive can there be for all those Northern state congressmen to vote for permanent slavery, just to keep the slave holding southern states?

I say their motive was money, not morality. They cared about their pocketbooks and those of their rich wealthy patrons who had bought all those congressmen.

So why do *YOU* say they wanted to keep those Southern states? What possible reason would they have for wanting them to remain in the Union?

Even that was rejected by southern interests, as it would have still meant limitation of expansion.

There was never going to be any "expansion." That was just a lie. You only need to look at a modern cotton map to see it was impossible to "expand" any significant slavery into the territories.

Also, the wikipedia entry on "New Mexico territory" points out that when the entire "New Mexico territory" stretched from Texas to California, there were less than a dozen slaves in it for it's entire history.

The primary reason they didn't want slaves in the territories was because they hated black people and they detested the idea of having to associate them in the territories, which they regarded as a place for white people.

A Week ago I read someone quoting Lincoln in which he specifically said the territories need to be kept free of black people so that white people could enjoy them.

The people whom you are defending are not who you think they are. They weren't motivated by hatred of slavery, they were motivated by hatred of black people and a lust for money and power.

[DiogenesLamp]

Seek help.

I don't require any help to prove you wrong. I'm doing a pretty good job all by myself. You are the one who needs some help arguing your side of the discussion.

[FLT-bird]

You are taking their effort to prevent the war (Corwin amendment) completely out of context.

No he's not. The Corwin Amendment shows the North was not threatening slavery and had no intention to threaten slavery. Congress passed a resolution soon after the start of the war explicitly stating that they were not fighting over slavery. With the North not threatening slavery, the South could hardly have been fighting to protect it....and in any case the original 7 seceding states rejected slavery effectively forever by express constitutional amendment.

[DiogenesLamp]

Not “ our own”, mine , not yours. As you hate the US just like the left does.

I hate the evil parts of it, but most of it is not evil. Just the big liberal cities. San Fransicko can just fall into the ocean for all I care. Same with Boston, DC, New York and a host of other arrogant bastards that try to tell the rest of us what morality to have and how we should live.

But I love the ideas on which this nation was founded, and I remain true to those, even when others seek to change what it means to be an American.

[sarge83]

I had ancestors on both sides with my family being from Kentucky/Tennessee/Virginia area. Those in the Confederacy were dirt poor farmers and had no slaves. They were fighting as Shelby Foote put it, “because your(Yankees) are down here.” That being said I had relatives who fought for the Union cause just a vehemently. I had one relative who fought for the South, was captured and agreed to fight in the Union Army. Him and his brother in the Confederate Army never spoke again to each other after the war according to family stories. My great-great grandfather was a boy during the war and the story is told that he was on his way to the mill with his corn and ran into a Union patrol who seized it but let him keep his mule. To quote him, “them damn Yankees took my corn!”

The South is the only part of America to know total defeat in war, which I think hardened the survivors resolve to recover and retain parts of their history. I dated a girl in the 1990’s who was a Democrat and yet her family still in that time frame talked with disdain for General Sherman and what his army did to their ancestors. Yes we lost in Vietnam and Afghanistan but that was far away and not in our neck of the woods. To recover from total defeat, occupation, object poverty and overcome institutional racism-Democrats again, was a remarkable feat over 115 roughly years from April 1865.

[FLT-bird]

The defense and active expansion of slavery into new territories was the primary reason that slave states seceded - this is very clear from all the southern leadership at the time. They were willing to destroy the United States in order to defend this institution - they weren’t ‘leaving’ the United States. They were destroying “The United States” by the act of secession.

if the Southern states were leaving the US over the issue of not being able to expand slavery to the territories, then why did they make no claim to the territories upon seceding? They let them go entirely. They claimed nothing other than their own sovereign territory. So their solution to not being able to expand slavery was to leave and give up any chance to expand slavery? That makes zero sense.

As far as the Corwin amendment goes - it was a desperate last-ditch give up everything to try to keep dissolution of the nation from occurring. Even that was rejected by southern interests, as it would have still meant limitation of expansion. Six southern states had already seceded and it was clear that there was no turning back to preserve the nation.

I've already addressed the part about expansion of slavery - the Southern states were quite happy to leave without any of the territory and thus no ability to expand slavery. Next there were 7 original seceding states, not 6. Next the Corwin Amendment shows that the North was not fighting to abolish slavery. Protection of slavery effectively forever was the very first bargaining chip they offered up. The original 7 seceding states rejected it. Clearly protecting slavery was not the primary concern.

[DiogenesLamp]

It's about a treasonous , illegal Democrat created entity called the Confederacy.

Like the people who engaged in "insurrection" and "rebellion" on January 6th 2020.

Or it could just be *LIES* told by a corrupt power block that controls the government, all the news and publications.

[DiogenesLamp]

I had one relative who fought for the South, was captured and agreed to fight in the Union Army. Him and his brother in the Confederate Army never spoke again to each other after the war according to family stories.

I wouldn't speak to a traitor to the family either. Especially one who helped put the yoke of slavery on me.

[FLT-bird]

It's not about ‘’hating Southerners'', that's a bs argument. It's about a treasonous , illegal Democrat created entity called the Confederacy. And you Lost Causers know it.

PC Revisionism is an attempt by Leftists in Academia to smear the South. Also, secession was perfectly consistent with the Constitution. The only treason against it was when Lincoln "made war against them" ie the states. That is the very definition of treason in the Constitution.

[jmacusa]

BS. The Democrats wanted secession to preserve slavery and undertook a war to do so.

Quit lying.

[jmacusa]

The ‘’insurrection’’ of Jan. 6 was another Democrat created myth.

An ‘’insurrection’’ without a leader, without arms. Yeah. Right.

Even for you that’s lame beyond belief.