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To: mac_truck
However, where is the evidence that the economic policies adopted by the north were designed to hurt the south?

None that I know of. The policies surely would, and in fact did, benefit the north and the entire nation through industrialization and the remaking of the agricultural sector through improved transportation between farm and city. The 40 years after the war saw the greatest economic expansion in the history, including any 20th century expansion. I have seen no evidence that any policy was intended to or in any measurable way, would have 'harmed' the south other than the expansion of slavery.

The issue of Free soil, was vital to the north and a poison pill to a south that rejected industrialization and instead invested its wealth in slave property. The wealthy elite of the south could not see or accept the necessity for economic change. They liked thing just the way they were.

387 posted on 01/19/2004 10:28:08 AM PST by Ditto ( No trees were killed in sending this message, but billions of electrons were inconvenienced.)
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To: Ditto
The wealthy elite of the south could not see or accept the necessity for economic change. They liked thing just the way they were.

This is true. It is similar in some respects to the economic situations in Mexico and South America up until about WW II, however, the south did have some factories and I believe it would have changed eventually on its own- the commodity of cotton would have tanked just as coffee, silver, etc. repeatedly tanked in Brazil and Mexico. These countries were commodity driven. The culture of Spain and Portugal emphasized landowning and status, not entrepeneurship or progress or reinvestment of wealth (as was the case in Britain). So, there were no voices for industrialization until mid-20th century. To a spaniard, to work with the hands was considered to be dirty and beneath them.

393 posted on 01/19/2004 11:15:07 AM PST by exmarine ( sic semper tyrannis)
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