Another idea, During the Civil War, the North had the manufacturing base due to their market economy supported by paid labor. The South was largely agrarian without a developed market economy due to a lack of paid laborers in the middle class. It makes perfect sense in our litigious society for the States of the former Confederacy to sue the decendents of the slaves who crippled their economy.
I find the whole idea of reparations racist. People who looked like me wronged people who looked like present day African-Americans and I'm supposed to pay up. During the time of slavery, my ancetsors didn't own shoes much less slaves. My ancestors were grubbing about for potatoes while their British landlords systematically dispossessed them and tried to starve them into emigrating.