Actually the saying of Smedley Butler could be applied to The Civil War. Was it about slavery? Yes and NO. It was more about an oligarchy who had built it's factories and cities with slave labor and when slaves became a liability to them the ownership thereof decreased but almost to the day the war began was still legal in some northern states.
The south was beginning the industrial revolution and coming up fast. This soon lead to a turf war so to speak. The north held a monopoly production wise and the south was a threat to it. Slavery in the south at the rate the south was growing would have ended due to economics of liability by 1900 at the latest. Automation in machinery would have made slavery a liability in much the same way tractors replaced plow mules. Mules had to be fed and kept up.
Our history books in the past 50 years have been re-written for political correctness. Most of the Generals put aside their differences after the war. There were long standing friendships before and were re-established after the war. Many Generals were academy classmates. Of course you never hear about Segregationist Abe either who wanted to send slaves home to Africa after the war.
You want truth as to the norths own prejudices? Tombstones tell stories. Visit a National Cemetery in your area. Go to the section where the stones have USCT on them. They existed even in WW2 because the units existed. USCT stands for United States Colored Troops. You'll notice they have their own section in the cemetery. This racial separation policy didn't change until after WW2 although the name USCT went away after the Civil War. They just formed segregated units. That policy ended in the late 1940's.
The military up through WW2 was segregated meaning no the United States government even 80 years post Civil War did not see them as equals.
The Civil War was a Bankers and Industrialist war. It came at the expense of over a million men from both sides who fought it and paid in blood. Was either side noble in the way revisionist want them to be portrayed? No. It was a rich mans war and many if not most slave owners in the south as such were not rich.
Post Civil War began a new form of slavery & northern industrialist were the main players in. Men both black and white were hired to do labor intense high risk jobs like deep mining in remote areas. The companies literally owned towns and every piece of lumber in it down to the 2X4's in the miners homes that were rented to them by the company.
The Company Store was a new form of slavery for both black and white and it did well for many decades to follow. Well for the company I mean. If you owed a debt you could be jailed even up till about 1960. The pay earned never was enough to cover expenses the worker had in living in these towns and owed in credit to the company store. Could they leave? NO. Debts in the day meant jail if they were not paid. Now to further drive home the point I made about the liability of slavery it wasn't laws which brought an end to The Company Store operations. It was simple economics and automation. Entire towns were shut down and mines closed for a faster and more efficient method of mining called surface mining.
Odd as it may seem Coal Wars were fought in what was Union Loyal Territories. Coal companies tried to bring in prison labor and that meant the miners even what little they made was being taken away. The owners paid the state and the state assumed the liability of food and board. Look up The War Of Coal Creek as an example.
Nah, to say the Civil War was all about slavery does both sides of it an injustice. It was an armed trade war, a war over interpretation of our Constitution concerning powers of the states, and slavery was rally cry used to bring it about.If both sides had said Mr Big Bank in the north and Mr Big Bank in the south were going to have men die for their business concerns the war could not have ever won support of the people from either side of it.
Good answer.
Talk to the other guy, I wasn’t picking a fight about a war 150 years ago.