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It seems to me you are trying to judge the South by standards in use today.

Slavery was abolished within five years of the south seceding. Clearly slavery was already adjudged to be evil outside the south. With the southern votes to maintain slavery gone, slavery was outlawed. The abolition of slavery was by Constitutional amendment. It required super majorities in the senate, the house, and ratification by the states. The whole process took little over a year. Amazing speed, really. Lincoln was instrumental in getting the House to agree with the required 2/3rds majority. He didn't live to see the states ratify it, however, as the south, The Confederacy of Peace (tm) decided they liked assasination as a means of electioneering.

In spite of revisionist history, Davis was an honorable man

How cheap honor, when it is bestowed upon the defenders of slavery.

We in the South blame Mr Lincoln to a great extent. Yes, he freed the slaves--in the South only.

Bull. He needed the 13th amendment in the free states and he push for it. His freeing the slaves in the slave states was certainly justified on the basis of their renunciation of all Constitutional protections upon seceding from the union.

The actual effect of the emancipation proclamation was that there were no slaves anywhere in the US by 1865 -- even before the 13th amendment was ratified. So the actual end of US slavery flowed directly from Lincoln's emancipation proclamation. The 13th amendment only made it official.

"How cheap honor when it is bestowed upon the defenders of slavery"

How cheap a shot when it ignores the premise, which was that Jefferson Davis was a passionate States Rights advocate, a respected moderate Senator, a former Secretary of War, and an experienced soldier. He was honorable. This is what I mean by judging people of that era by today's standards.

"Clearly slavery was already adjudged evil outside the South."

Clearly! And by some in the South. Do you work at being snide, or does it just come naturally? Clearly, you think the thousands killed, the 138 years of villification and degradation of the South, the bitterness on both sides,the expansion of govt., was justified to get rid of slavery in five years.I don't. What came in its place has lasted 138 years, and is ongoing. Should the descendants of those who fought for the Confederacy line up to be shot, since their ancestors are dead;should they acquiesce in their detractors' reading of Southern history? What would it take for South haters to be satisfied?

As I said, and you ignored, the worldwide acceptance of slavery in civilized countries was coming to an end. You also ignored every historical context of slavery-the law, the economics, the beginning of the end for the myths justifying slavery. You ignored comments about slavery today and its being JUST as evil. South haters just want to look back.

But you really show your contempt for the South when you intimate the entire region assassinated Lincoln.

Vaudine

no slaves anywhere in the US by 1865 -- even before the 13th amendment was ratified

Oh really? Are you saying that the 13th Amendment did not free any slaves then? How interesting. So it is like the so-called Emancipation Proclamation in that it freed no one anywhere? I love the statement from London after January 1863, "Why has Mr. Lincoln freed slaves where he had no juristiction, and kept them enslaved where he does?"