Posted on 10/03/2015 1:28:14 PM PDT by Kaslin
Although the American Revolution resulted in independence for the United States and World War II made it an international power, the American Civil War was arguably the most important war in American history. It truly was an American watershed.
In order to appreciate that war’s significance, it must be understood what the Civil War was about. Contrary to all-too-popular opinion, the Civil War was not about states’ rights. Instead it was all about slavery and white supremacy. As shown in my just-released book, The Myth of the Lost Cause: Why the South Fought the Civil War and Why the North Won, there is compelling evidence that secession and the Confederacy were the result of Southerners’ desire to preserve slavery and white supremacy – not to promote states’ rights.
The evidence of the seceders’ motivations is clear-cut and convincing. Only slave states seceded, and the greater the percentage of slaves and the percentage of slave-owning families the more likely a slave state was to secede. Those states complained that the Federal Government was doing not too much but too little – Southerners wanted the central government to more aggressively enforce slavery, especially to return runaway slaves. They also were upset that other states were passing “liberty laws” to make it more difficult to retrieve runaways. The issue was not who had the power to do what but instead whether their powers were being used to promote slavery. Far from respecting individual states’ rights, they wanted to compel the Federal and other state governments to enforce slaveholders’ rights and preserve slavery.
The strongest evidence of seceders’ motivations is the language they used in their own secession documents. What could be more telling? Six of the seven early seceding states provided clear statements of their reasons for seceding. Their reasons included the election of Abraham Lincoln, who opposed extension of slavery into territories; the runaway slave issue; the threat to slavery’s existence with the possible loss of four to six billion dollars in slave property (the largest component of Southern wealth); the perceived end of white supremacy and the resultant political and social equality of blacks and whites, and desperate warnings of the effect all this change would have on Southern Womanhood.
South Carolina’s declaration of the reasons for secession said, “an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery, has led to a disregard of their obligations, and the laws of the General Government have ceased to effect the objects of the Constitution [runaway slave return provision].”
As he called for a secession convention, Mississippi’s governor declared, “The existence or the abolition of African slavery in the Southern States is now up for a final settlement.” Citing only slavery-protection reasons, that state’s legislature convened a secession convention. The latter’s declaration of the causes of secession got right to the point in its opening line: “Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery – the greatest material interest of the world.”
Not only did their own secession resolutions reveal slavery and white supremacy as their causation, but the seven states who seceded even before Lincoln’s inauguration immediately began an outreach campaign to other slave states. Their correspondence and speeches relied only on slavery-related issues to encourage other slave states’ secession. They only lobbied slave states.
Much other evidence demonstrates that slavery and white supremacy preservation were the causes of secession and even trumped possible Confederate victory in the war. All efforts to avoid war by compromise focused only on slavery issues. Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens said slavery was the “cornerstone” of the Confederacy and Thomas Jefferson and the Founding Fathers had erred in stating that all men were created equal.
Even though it had a tremendous manpower shortage, the Confederacy officially rejected the use of slaves as soldiers (as inconsistent with its white supremacy views) and rejected one-on-one prisoner exchanges for captured black Union soldiers. Just as American colonists needed European intervention to win the Revolutionary War, the Confederates were desperate for British and French intervention; however, they declined to end slavery in order to achieve involvement by the slavery-hating Europeans.
Union victory ended slavery and kept America from being an international pariah. It also resulted in passage of the 13th, 14th and 15th constitutional amendments; these provided the legal basis for ending legal segregation and providing blacks with voting and other civil rights.
Despite the compelling evidence of slavery’s and white supremacy’s roles in fomenting secession, the Confederacy, and the Civil War, too many contemporary Americans cling to the myth that somehow states’ rights were at the root of the Civil War. We need to accept the reality of the racial underpinnings of that critical war in order to contemplate, confront, and overcome the continuing racial tensions in America.
Ed Bonekemper is retarded.
No, slavery as in “no you cant steal my slaves” was a secondary cause of secession.
The secessionists were the grandsons of the Founders exercising their GOD given right to separate from a tyrannical Federal government.
And the wrong side Definitely won.
The South (ie Democrats) were fighting because they refused to accept the results of an election. The North was fighting to preserve the Union.
I think they would have eventually rejoined the Union. It would have probably taken another 80 years or so, but I think slavery would have eventually become uneconomical and worse, embarrassing, and I think they would have eventually abolished it.
I also think Charleston would have become a far more important Port than it is now, more along the lines of New York or Boston. I think the national power/finances would have become less concentrated in the New England area.
Canada? How so?
“the wrong side lost in 1865”
Then you need to emigrate to Brazil or Mexico and join the other Confederate traitors.
The North was fighting to preserve the Union. The South was fighting to become Independent of it.
The Declaration of Independence (the founding document of the United States) says the South had a right to leave.
Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,--That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
I agree.
What would it have taken for the U.S. to decide in 1856, the 80th year of our independence, that they wanted to rejoin the British empire?
I also think Charleston would have become a far more important Port than it is now, more along the lines of New York or Boston. I think the national power/finances would have become less concentrated in the New England area.
Charleston wasn't even the busiest port in the South in 1860; Mobile and New Orleans were. What would make Charleston eclipse those?
If you mean under the British umbrella then I agree.
That may or may not be the reason states left the union, but that’s not the reason the war was fought. The US got 70% of its revenue from tariffs in the South and could not afford the loss of funds. Leaving the union was legal (constitution would not have been ratified without it) - leaving the north unfunded could not stand.
And you’ll be right there with them, won’t you? With your Neo-Union talking points.
Me? I read about this most interesting and tragic war and commiserate with both sides.
In case you’ve never read it, here’s H.L. Mencken’s take on an independent South:
http://theamericanmercury.org/2010/04/the-calamity-of-appomattox/
The people who were traitors to the principles upon which *THIS* nation was founded were the ones who denied the right of Independence to others.
The Declaration of Independence says that people have a God given right to leave a government which no longer suits their interests. It is the basis upon which we justified our secession from the United Kingdom.
The same Principle should have been respected by the US Government in 1861.
You are aware that when Lincoln sent that letter to Greeley he had already presented the first draft of the Emancipation Proclamation to his cabinet? And that the last line of that letter he clearly stated that his personal preference was an end to slavery?
Oh yeah. Now I remember. Lincoln freed all the slaves in all the states before the southern states seceded. Sarcasm. Just to be clear.
Your assessment of Charleston sounds reasonable. Charleston was the cultural capital of the American republic prior to the war between the states. (the first opera in the US was in Charleston - FYI)
I think the Confederate states would have reached mutual consent with the other nation-states at some point. JMHO.
The war between the states was a war of taxation & tariffs.
75% of taxes collected at the federal level came from South Carolina, Georgia, Virginia, and North Carolina. 90% of those federal taxes were spent on the states that were not part of the states that seceded.
Neither was any Southern leader, though I would argue that Lincoln was far more supportive of abolition than they were.
3. Lincoln didn’t believe blacks should have the same rights as whites.
Neither were any Southern leaders.
3. Lincoln thought colonization could resolve the issue of slavery.
So did Thomas Jefferson.
4. Emancipation was a military policy.
Yes, but it was still emancipation. What emancipation policy did Southern leaders advocate?
5. The Emancipation Proclamation didn’t actually free all of the slaves.
No, the 13th Amendment did that. And Lincoln pushed hard to get that ratified and sent to the states.
Poor analogy. The Confederate Constitution was heavily based on the US Constitution and incorporated virtually all of it even using the same text verbatim throughout much of it.
The South was politically closer to the North than it was to England by that time. Once Slavery was gone, people would likely see two different governments as redundant.
Charleston wasn't even the busiest port in the South in 1860; Mobile and New Orleans were. What would make Charleston eclipse those?
Well this is where I learned some things from reading Pea Ridge's postings. The Vast bulk of European trade went through New York. Charleston was a lot further to travel to trade with Europe than New York, and New York had access to the great lakes and all that interior trade. People wouldn't go to Charleston without some additional reason to go there.
In addition, laws were in effect to more or less force trade to go through New York. Foreign ships were not permitted to carry goods between American ports. Only American ships were permitted to do that.
There was a packet shipping system set up to run up and down the coast shipping goods between American Ports.
Foreign Ships found it easier to restrict their trade to just New York and Boston.
New Orleans and Mobile were busier because people HAD to go to these ports to get Cotton/Agriculture Shipments from them. Transporting these cargoes overland wasn't practical, so those ports had to be used to access that territory's products.
Going independent would allow foreign trade ships to stop in New York, and then go on to Charleston, and the packet shipping, (which mostly benefited New York) would have taken less of a cut of the trade traffic.
Also the reduced import duties that would have been available from Charleston would have boosted traffic there dramatically.
There's more to it, but this is a quick stab at explaining it. An Independent South would have made Charleston (and surrounding area) a far more wealthy city, and it would have come at the expense of New York and to a lesser extent Boston and Philadelphia.
The Civil War, as i was taught many years before jimmy carter’s abomination of education, WAS about States’ Rights vs. the growing unConstitutional centralization of the federal government.
Does it seem as though we might be heading for another one?
Yes, but i still hope not.
Why?
‘Cause how much is left, that i fought to defend, and keep free.
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