SC pretty clearly did. There was a significant majority of blacks in the state, and their voice was utterly ignored.
I argue that they were not unaware that slavery would die a slow death. Their intent was in fact to let it slowly fade away but NOT IMMEDIATELY so as not to cause a huge disruption in the economy and livelihood of the South.
You can argue that if you like, but it is utterly contradicted by the history of the time. The root of the conflict between sections was the insistence of the South that slavery be allowed to spread, precisely because they believed it would slowly suffocate if kept in its present bounds. In fact, a very common idea in the South was that they would conquer Mexico, the Caribbean and perhaps South America and build a great, permanent slave empire, complete with renewed importation of slaves from Africa. This was called the Purple Dream. William Walker was one of those who tried to put it into effect.
Your take on souther attitudes towards slavery is accurate but anachronistic. This was the attitude of most at the time of the Founding, certainly of Washington, Jefferson, etc. At the time slavery was becoming less and less profitable.
As the 19th century came in and the Cotton Empire began to expand, slavery reversed its economic decline and became wildly profitable. In fact, the price of slaves, the best single indicator of the health of the institution and its perceived future, reached a peak in 1860.
By this time most southerners viewed slavery as a positive good and something that should be perpetuated and expanded in both time and space. The famous Cornerstone Speech is one of the best examples of this.
Lincoln would have been quite happy to work towards future gradual emancipation. The slaveowners rejected the very notion. In fact, slave owners even in the Union states were so idiotic they rejected Lincoln's offers of compensated emancipation in the last year of the war!
Anybody but a moron or an obsessive could see clearly that slavery was going down by this time, and in the very near future. Yet the slaveowners rejected the very idea of emancipation so fervently they gave up all chance of compensation just to maintain the illusion for a few more months.
Had the South truly wanted independence, all it had to do was announce a program of emancipation, even compensated and very gradual. Britain would have promptly recognized the CSA and broken the Union blockade.
But for the CSA slavery was more important than independence, as maintaining and expanding the institution was the main reason they wanted their independence.
I'm afraid you're suffering from a severe case of rose-colored historical review. Well-meaning, and I appreciate the politeness, but still mistaken.
RE: SC pretty clearly did. There was a significant majority of blacks in the state, and their voice was utterly ignored.
Let’s see this argument as it applies today and use this analogy — there are a significant number of babies being slaughtered, some even at the point of birth (over 40 million for the last 30 years). Therefore, what follows -— we kill abortionists because we believe they are murderers and the constitution protects the right to life ?
In every situation, we have to weigh the consequences. Not every problem we face (slavery included) requires a violent solution IMMEDIATELY.
Did saving the Union and the desire to free slaves justify the slaughter of such a large number of young men? The Confederates posed no military threat to the North.
THAT is the question that we all have to ponder.
Even today, the United States lives in a semi-hypocritical state with a Federal government encroaching on our rights in total violation of the constitution.
What would have been the better choice, to let the South go, and see slavery slowly die, or to force them to submit and lose hundreds of thousands of lives?
Now in regards to economics, I beg to disagree with you.
Slavery was on it’s last leg long before the South’s struggle for independence.
It had already disappeared on the European front (for the most part). However, even after the war, the slave trading ships of the North still dealt in the supply of slaves to the Carribean areas.
Even in European waters where slave trading had been outlawed, non-American slave trading vessels would often hoist the American flag if threatened, because authorities would ignore the American slave trading ships.
The northern states had dropped slavery only when enough cheap labor became available from immigrants. They didn’t, however, drop racism.
Northern states passed laws forbidding Negroes from entering their states, working, owning property, etc. Most people loyal to the northern cause, were thus not because they wanted to stamp out slavery, but because losing the revenues from the southern states would cripple their economy. Many of those in the north who did not agree with forcing the southern states to remain in the union were jailed when Lincoln ignored the constitution’s habeas corpus. Many of these ugly facts of the war are not taught to the school children in their history lessons.
Virginia, a southern state, was the 1st to outlaw slave trading. Northern states still traded in slaves long after the war ended. Brazil was the last country to outlaw slavery.
If the Southern states had achieved their goal of independence, their economy, which had been ravaged by the northern states in unbalanced tariffs, would have blossomed. After cotton died out, the last remnants of slavery would have vanished.
The south would have become more industrialized out of necessity. Their constitution, had it survived, would closer resemble the constitution of the American forefathers than does present day America.
I will grant that slavery would have lasted much longer, perhaps close to the 20th century, but again the question is this -— is it better for it to have lasted till the 20th century, and let it slowly die as it DID (YES IT DID ) in all other countries, or is it better to kill 620,000 men to abolish it 40 years earlier?
THAT IS THE QUESTION WE ALL HAVE TO ANSWER. You say the latter, I say the former.
Take a look at Brazil, a country as big as the USA. Brazil made a “soft” transition from slavery to capitalism, no big revolution or inflection, but a long process of several decades and centuries. Why not the Brazilian way? Because we would have been a more hypocritical country that had a constitution recognizing the rights of all men while at the same time denying a large number such rights?
If so, we should condemn men such as Washington and Jefferson.
Race relations would undoubtedly be much better today, as southerners would not have suffered the atrocities of “reconstruction” where they were humiliated and ravaged by the victors. This, I believe, is the catalyst of the ensuing resentment.
The northern states, however, would had suffered great economical losses had the south won. They would have survived, but would probably pretty much resemble some of the present day northern industrial cities, filled with squalid living conditions, crowded tenements, and much poverty.
Chances are, the north and south would have eventually reunited, but would be more of a true “United” states with more state sovereignty as the writers of the constitution had envisioned, rather than a “Conglomerated” states with the federal govt. being the main governing body. The federal govt.’s main purpose would be defense, as was intended from the beginning.
It’s really interesting to study actual history, instead of the spoon fed kind of which textbooks are made. It’s important to remember that the victors get to write the history books.