House drops Confederate Flag ban for veterans cemeteries

politico.com ^ | 6/23/16 | Matthew Nussbaum

[ColdOne]

A measure to bar confederate flags from cemeteries run by the Department of Veterans Affairs was removed from legislation passed by the House early Thursday.

The flag ban was added to the VA funding bill in May by a vote of 265-159, with most Republicans voting against the ban. But Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) both supported the measure. Ryan was commended for allowing a vote on the controversial measure, but has since limited what amendments can be offered on the floor.

[BroJoeK]

HangUpNow: "Wait -- was that supposed to hurt??"

Naw, supposed to have been slightly humorous, that's all.

But this is Sunday, and I'm again away from home (Indiana today) and not in church where I would be, so will take a moment to confess having gotten a bit rough in yesterday's posts, to ask your indulgences and to promise not to do it again, to the best of my ability.

I actually consider this whole thread to be pretty well behaved, overall, far less in the way personal animosity than we've seen on some others.
I enjoy it, and thank you for putting up with me.

God bless you all.

[HangUpNow]

Nothing taken personally, BroJoe. I'm not emotionally vested in these threads, but do find it fascinating how one person can be a total 180 degrees from the other despite seeing and processing the same information -- albeit in, from a different, personal bias and perspective.

The reason the subject of the CW is resonating so strongly by many these days is simply because we see, hear, and feel the same creeping, dangerous fedguv overreach, over-regulation, and violation of sovereignty that appears to parallel a divided Union in 1861.

There are clearly the same "Two-Americas," identity politics are loudly in play today as the media and Dem Party collude to manipulate public opinion. Bi-partisan establishment-politicians (fronting for elites or own self-serving goals as well as social justice warriors) have sown and fomented division -- as in 1861 in *my* opinion.

Moreover, the same Economic Elephant in the room exists as a driving factor of division -- not so obvious back in 1861, but a factor amongst the two warring factions just the same today.

America IS at war with itself at the moment. Believing otherwise is wishful thinking and delusion. And as was the case in 1861, it is across-the-board sovereignty at stake.

If a tyrannical Hillary somehow becomes President, hell is likely to completely breaking loose; It will make the CW seem like a playground spat. If Trump becomes President, our Republic has the opportunity to restore order and stability.

[rustbucket]

Wow! I love it, thanks for the corrections, and news article, and thanks too for getting it wrong so I can correct you too, sir.

Wrong? The endorsers were from the 35th Congress, not the 36th as you claim. At least a quick check of a few states shows endorsers from the 35th Congress who weren't in the 36th. The 36th House did not convene until December 5, 1859, and members apparently did not get sworn in until 1860 because of the long delayed election of the Speaker of the House. The Congressional Globe of January 5, 1860 provides info about the late swearing in:

Mr. Thaddeus Stevens made the point of order that it was inadmissible, on the ground that, by the act of June 1, 1789, it is not competent for the House to enter upon any other business before the oath to support the Constitution of the United States is administered to the Speaker, and by him to the other members present and to the Clerk.

The 68 who endorsed on March 9, 1859 were all in the House of Representatives, likely members of the 35th House session that ended on March 3. They were a majority of the House; 68 out of 92 for the 35th House (73.9%). The Congressional Globe listed 109 Republican House members on December 5, 1859 as the Republican part of the 237 members of the House.

I'll be more circumspect next time and say a majority of Republicans in the House of Representatives endorsed Helper's Book, at least the sanitized, cleaned up version of it they wanted to distribute. Thanks for helping me clear that up.

The controversy over Helper's Book stirred interest in the book such that 142,000 copies of the book had been distributed by the Fall of 1860. From Michael Kent Curtis's article I linked to in my last post:

A final irony was that the attack on Helper's book transformed it from a moderate success to a raging best seller. One hundred and forty-two thousand copies of the book had been distributed by the fall of 1860. In December 1860, the New York Tribune, which was promoting the book, cheerfully reported that Southern "Fire-eaters" and Northern "Doughfaces" had by their persistent discussion of The Impending Crisis generated a circulation rapidly approaching that of Uncle Tom's Cabin.

Republicans were apparently sending out copies of the sanitized Helper's Book to constituents using public money via the franking privilege. The New York Herald of November 28, 1859 said the following:

To frank this document was a great saving, as the postage on each copy amounts o eight or nine cents, or fully one half of its cost.

But naturally Dems focused not on the sanitized abridged version, but Hinton's original unabridged & highly inflammatory version, which many of those 68 Republicans were far too cowardly to own up to.

I suspect that for political reasons the Republicans wanted to distribute a sanitized version that would cause the readers of the sanitized version to wonder what the fuss the Democrats were making was all about. The circular that justified the sanitized version had a heading, "The Stupid Masses in the South." Like that would go over big in the South, but it might in parts of the North.

That "Stupid Masses in the South" reminds me of something spot on that Texas Senator Wigfall said in the Senate. Originally posted by former FReeper GOPcapitalist. My paragraph breaks below:

That the people of the North shall consider themselves as more blessed than we, more civilized, and happier, is not a matter at which we would complain at all, if they would only content themselves with believing that to be the fact; but when they come and attempt to propagandize, and insist that we shall be as perfect as they imagine themselves to be, then it is that their good opinion of themselves becomes offensive to us.

Let my neighbor believe that his wife is an angel and his children cherubs, I care not, though I may know he is mistaken; but when he comes impertinently poking his nose into my door every morning, and telling me that my wife is a shrew and my children brats, then the neighborhood becomes uncomfortable, and if I cannot remove him, I will remove myself; and if he says to me, "you shall not move, but you shall stay here, and you shall, day after day, hear the demerits of your wife and children discussed," then I begin to feel a little restive, and possibly might assert that great original right of pursuing whatever may conduce to my happiness, though it might be kicking him out of my door.

If New England would only be content with the blessings which she imagines she has, we would not disturb her in her happiness.

So in this quote Wigfall is making his case, as a senator from Texas, against the Union based on his idea that, for virtually the first time ever, the South was now a minority in Congress.
But the truth is, the South had many more potential friends than Wigfall here admits.

The South had already been a minority in Congress for some time. They weren't able to stop the Morrill Tariff in the House in 1859, even though all but one Southerner voted against it.

You know better than Wigfall how Senators would vote? Wigfall, who knew the Senators well? Is there any end to your omnipotence? (/sarc)

The rest of your post is basically regurgitating your vesion of history again.

[BroJoeK]

rockrr: "IMO taney's blatant indulgence in judicial activism did more to precipitate hostilities between the north and south than any other government act."

Taney was the original "DiogenesLamp" arguing, in effect, the Constitution prohibits abolition.
This was the source of Lincoln's "house divided" remarks, that the nation must now become all slave or all free, because one more Supreme Court ruling like Dred-Scott would make the US 100% a slave-nation.

I would add to that the 1850 Compromise, which removed the job of returning fugitive slaves from Northern state authorities to the Federal Government.
Together with Dred-Scott, these made Northern state laws abolishing slavery irrelevant.

So after 1857 the US was on the road to becoming an all-slave nation.
And Northerners didn't like that, not one bit, which is why they voted Republican in ever greater numbers in 1858 and 1860.

[BroJoeK]

rockrr: "Look at its sources - mises.org and lewrockwell.
They make Art Bell appear (almost) normal by comparison ;’}"

Do you mean Art Bell, the eminent scientist?
Close associate of Albert Einstein and brother of Alexander Graham?
That Art Bell?

Well, then I can see now that I've totally misunderestimated our FRiend DiogenesLamp!

;-)

[BroJoeK]

HangUpNow: "If a tyrannical Hillary somehow becomes President, hell is likely to completely breaking loose; It will make the CW seem like a playground spat.
If Trump becomes President, our Republic has the opportunity to restore order and stability."

Like any good FReeper, I totally agree with you about today's political world.
My mood is not quite as dark as, for example Glen Beck's, who can't even bring himself to support someone like Donald Trump, I'm not that pessimistic.
I think Trump will be a welcome breath of fresh air, will protect the Supreme Court against total "progressive" domination, and will do at least some of what more serious conservatives (i.e., Cruz) will appreciate.

A President Hillary, especially if supported by Democrat majorities in Congress, would lock in and expand Obama's agenda making a later conservative recovery all the more difficult, if not impossible.

However, I don't blame my political ancestors, "Ape" Lincoln and his "Black Republicans", for any of this.
I think they did what they were forced to do and in the process accomplished something amazing: 100% abolition of slavery while putting former slaves on a path to full citizenship.
I only regret the actual historical record has been so, so distorted to the point where most African-Americans would say that Lincoln was a Democrat and Jefferson Davis an evil Republican!

[BroJoeK]

rustbucket: "The 36th House did not convene until December 5, 1859, and members apparently did not get sworn in until 1860 because of the long delayed election of the Speaker of the House."

Check out this source.
Note it says there was a special session of the 36th Congress from March 4 to March 10, 1859.
So, the article you posted says this particular event took place on March 9, which would be during that special session of the 36th Congress.
That would make those 68 endorsers 49% of all 138 Republican Congressmen & Senators.
Certainly a minor & arcane point, but interesting.

rustbucket: "The 68 who endorsed on March 9, 1859 were all in the House of Representatives, likely members of the 35th House session that ended on March 3."

See my link above, the 36th Congress was in special session on March 9, 1859, so 68 would be 49% of the total 138 Republicans.

rustbucket: "The South had already been a minority in Congress for some time.
They weren't able to stop the Morrill Tariff in the House in 1859, even though all but one Southerner voted against it."

But Southern Democrats had always allied with Northern Democrats to make large majorities in both House & Senate.
Of course, the strength of that alliance depended on political passions of a particular issue.
On matters of great importance to Southern Democrats, they could call on not just their Northern Democrat allies, but also Southern Whigs or American Party, and possibly even Northern Border state Republicans.

That's why my argument here is that Southern Democrats didn't really care as much about the Morrill tariff bill as they later pretended.
When you look at the numbers, you see there were enough abstentions to have defeated the bill, if they had voted against it.

Bottom line: in 1860 tariffs were just "politics as usual", they went up, they went down based on many factors, and had never been considered a justification for extreme measures like secession.
Even in 1861 the Morrill tariff was not mentioned by any of the four seceding state conventions which produced official "Reason for Secession" documents.
Those documents all focused on the real reason for secession: their fears over what might happen to their "peculiar institution" under Republican government in Washington, DC.

It was not secession with mutual consent.
It was not secession for material cause.
It was secession "at pleasure".

rustbucket: "You know better than Wigfall how Senators would vote?
Wigfall, who knew the Senators well?
Is there any end to your omnipotence? (/sarc)"

You forget that Wigfall was only elected to the Senate in December 1859, so by December 1860 had exactly one year of seniority.
That did not make him the most experienced & knowledgeable Senator in Washington.
So Wigfall's judgment on these matters should be taken with a healthy dose of salt.

Again, the historical fact is that Southern Democrats had always worked with Northern & Western allies, sometimes called "Doughfaced", and could continue doing so in 1861 and beyond, if they wanted.
But the voting on November 6, 1860 convinced many that it was too much effort and time had come to declare secession.
But it was secession "at pleasure" because in fact, at that time, nothing had changed.

[x]

Hinton Rowan Helper was a white Southern critic of slavery who addressed his book to “To the non-slaveholding whites of the South generally, whether at home or abroad.” That his book was taken as a threat to the South and circulating it — or even possessing a copy — was a crime was a symptom of the madness of the day. In a saner world, the idea that society and the economy would benefit from abolishing slavery wouldn’t have been controversial. If even wondering whether the South would be better off without slavery could get a questioner imprisoned or killed, how close could emancipation really be?

[rustbucket]

Note it says there was a special session of the 36th Congress from March 4 to March 10, 1859.
So, the article you posted says this particular event took place on March 9, which would be during that special session of the 36th Congress.
That would make those 68 endorsers 49% of all 138 Republican Congressmen & Senators.
Certainly a minor & arcane point, but interesting.

I thought you would have learned by now not to rely solely on Wikipedia. Check out this more authoritative source for the dates of the 35th and 36th congresses: [Link]. As you'll see, only the 36th Senate was in session on March 4 to March 10, but not the House.

As I said before, using that correct source and a comment in a January 1860 Congressional Globe issue, the 36th House wasn't in session until December 5, 1859, and the members of the 36th House were not sworn in officially until sometime in 1860. The 36th House couldn't act until they were sworn in. The endorsement of Helper's Book was done by 68 members of the 35th House (73.9%).

Even in 1861 the Morrill tariff was not mentioned by any of the four seceding state conventions which produced official "Reason for Secession" documents.

Sectional aggrandizement was mentioned in Texas and Georgia's causes of secession documents. The tariff was but one part of that sectional aggrandizement. Protective tariffs helped Northern manufacturers and gave Northern workers jobs, at the expense of money extracted from the South.

TEXAS: They have impoverished the slave-holding States by unequal and partial legislation, thereby enriching themselves by draining our substance.

GEORGIA: The Georgia causes document mentioned aggrandizement by the North concerning navigation, manufacturing, commercial interests, fishing, shipbuilders, and miners. They mentioned high duties that had been charged in the past as one of the aggrandizements, and that protectionism had been beaten down. At least, it had been at the time Georgia wrote their causes document - but the protectionism issue arose again when the Morrill Tariff passed after Georgia left the Union.

Certainly the Morrill Tariff was an issue. Consider what Georgia Senator Robert Toombs, a member of the 36th Congress, said about the tariff and other sectional aggrandizement on November 13, 1860 [paragraph breaks mine]:

Even the fishermen of Massachusetts and New England demand and receive from the public treasury about half a million of dollars per annum as a pure bounty on their business of catching codfish. The North, at the very first Congress, demanded and received bounties under the name of protection, for every trade, craft, and calling which they pursue, and there is not an artisan in brass, or iron, or wood, or weaver, or spinner in wool or cotton, or a calicomaker, or iron-master, or a coal-owner, in all of the Northern or Middle States, who has not received what he calls the protection of his government on his industry to the extent of from fifteen to two hundred per cent from the year 1791 to this day. They will not strike a blow, or stretch a muscle, without bounties from the government. No wonder they cry aloud for the glorious Union; they have the same reason for praising it, that craftsmen of Ephesus had for shouting, "Great is Diana of the Ephesians," whom all Asia and the world worshipped. By it they got their wealth; by it they levy tribute on honest labor.

It is true that this policy has been largely sustained by the South; it is true that the present tariff was sustained by an almost unanimous vote of the South; but it was a reduction - a reduction necessary from the plethora of the revenue; but the policy of the North soon made it inadequate to meet the public expenditure, by an enormous and profligate increase of the public expenditure; and at the last session of Congress they brought in and passed through the House the most atrocious tariff bill that ever was enacted, raising the present duties from twenty to two hundred and fifty per cent above the existing rates of duty. That bill now lies on the table of the Senate.

It was a master stroke of abolition policy; it united cupidity to fanaticism, and thereby made a combination which has swept the country. There were thousands of protectionists in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New-York, and in New-England, who were not abolitionists. There were thousands of abolitionists who were free traders. The mongers brought them together upon a mutual surrender of their principles. The free-trade abolitionists became protectionists; the non-abolition protectionists became abolitionists. The result of this coalition was the infamous Morrill bill - the robber and the incendiary struck hands, and united in joint raid against the South.

Thus stands the account between the North and the South. Under its ordinary and most favorable action, bounties and protection to every interest and every pursuit in the North, to the extent of at least fifty millions per annum, besides the expenditure of at least sixty millions out of every seventy of the public expenditure among them, thus making the treasury a perpetual fertilizing stream to them and their industry, and a suction-pump to drain away our substance and parch up our lands.

Even in 1861 the Morrill tariff was not mentioned by any of the four seceding state conventions which produced official "Reason for Secession" documents.

Not mentioned in the state secession conventions perhaps because it had not yet become law. But high tariffs were mentioned. Here from the speech of John S. Preston, the South Carolina Commissioner to the Virginia Secession Convention, is what he told the Virginia Secession Convention on February 19, 1861 [paragraph breaks mine; a lot of aggrandizement talk here, it's not just about tariffs]:

I would state. as preliminary, that a large portion of the revenue of the government of the United States has always been drawn from duties on imports. Now, the products that have been necessary to purchase these imports, were at one time almost exclusively, and have always mainly been the result of slave labor, and therefore the burden of the revenue duties upon imports purchased by these exports must fall upon the producer who happens also to be the consumer of the imports.

In addition to this, it may be stated, that at a very early period of the existence of this Government, the Northern people, from a variety of causes, entered upon the industries of manufacture and of commerce, but of agriculture scarcely to the extent of self support. This may have arisen from a variety of causes; among them, perhaps, an uncongenial climate, a barren soil, but an alluring sea coast adapted to commerce, besides an inherent tendency upon the part of the people of these latitudes to the arts of manucraft and traffic; and while, therefore, it was important that all the sources of the revenue should be kept up to meet the increasing expenses of the Government, it also manifestly became of great importance that these articles of manufacture in which they have been engaged should be subject to the purchase of their confederates.

They, therefore, invented a system of duties partial and discriminating, by which the whole burden of the revenue from this extraordinary system fell upon those who produced the articles of exports which purchased the articles of imports, and which articles of import were consumed mainly, or to a great extent, by those who produced the exports.

Now, the State of South Carolina being at the time one of the largest exporters and consumers of imports, was so oppressed by the operations of this system upon her, that she was driven to the necessity of interposing her sovereign reservation to arrest it, so far as she was concerned. This interposition, together with the rapid spread of the principle of free trade all over the world, did arrest the iniquity in the shape in which it was then presented. It could no longer be the avowed policy of the Government to tax one section for the purpose of building up another. But so successful had been the system; to such an extent had it already, in a few years, been pushed; so vast had been its accumulations of capital; so vastly had it been diffused throughout its ramifications as seemingly to inter-weave the very life of industry itself, in the two sections into each other in the form of mechanics, of manufactures, ships, merchants, and bankers.

The people of the Northern States have so crawled and crept into every crevice of our industry which they could approach, and they have themselves so conformed to it, that we ourselves began to believe that they were absolutely necessary to its vitality; and they have so fed and fattened, and grown so great and large as they feed and fatten upon this sweating giant of the South, that with the insolence natural to sudden and bloated wealth and power, they begin to believe that the giant was created only as their tributary.

[me]: They weren't able to stop the Morrill Tariff in the House in 1859, even though all but one Southerner voted against it.

[you]: But Southern Democrats had always allied with Northern Democrats to make large majorities in both House & Senate.

If your argument were correct, the Northern Democrats should have come to the rescue and stopped the Morrill Tariff from passing the House. But they didn't. Perhaps Wigfall recognized that the South could no longer count on that strong support, but you, 155 years later, can't seem to see it.

"at pleasure", "at pleasure"

Yes, we know what you think and don't agree with your version of history.

[BroJoeK]

rustbucket: "Protective tariffs helped Northern manufacturers and gave Northern workers jobs, at the expense of money extracted from the South."

I'll refer you back to my post #742, where I explained to DiogenesLamp the South's domination of Washington DC from 1800 until the election of 1860.
Yes, the focus of post #742 was slavery, but the same could well be said of tariffs.

Regarding tariffs, I can add to the data from post #742:

1. Northern Federalists controlled both houses of congress and the Presidency from 1788 through 1800 -- 12 years.
   During those 12 years of Northern control, tariffs averaged 10%.

2. Southern Jeffersonian and Jacksonian Democrats controlled both houses of congress and the Presidency in 88% of the years from 1801 through 1860 -- 59 years.
   During those 59 years in only two did the opposition control both houses of congress and the presidency -- 1841 & 1842.
   During those 59 years of Southern Democrat control, tariffs went up & down, from a low of 7% in 1815 to a high of 35% in 1830.
   The overall average was 18%.

3. In all that rising and falling of tariffs under Southern Democrat control only the 1830 era 35% "tariff of abominations" caused a hew & cry serious enough to threaten the Union, a threat that soon ended when President Andrew Jackson promised to hang any rebels he caught.

4. The original 1859 Morrill tariff bill came nowhere near "abomination" levels, proposing to raise the previous 15% average to around 22%.
   It was defeated in the 35th Congress.

5. The election of November 6, 1860 was engineered (or "rigged" as we might say today) by Fire Eaters to produce massive losses for Democrats and so justify Fire Eater demands for secession.
   It and they were successful, but the Morrill tariff was not their primary focus or reason for secession.
   Slavery was.

rustbucket quoting Robert Toombs: "...at the last session of Congress they brought in and passed through the House the most atrocious tariff bill that ever was enacted, raising the present duties from twenty to two hundred and fifty per cent above the existing rates of duty.
That bill now lies on the table of the Senate."

Of course, it was far from the "most atrocious tariff bill", not even close.
Under Southern Democrat control, tariffs had been as high or higher from approx. 1819 through 1833 and again from 1845 through 1857.
It's average levels were perfectly ordinary, and it was intended to tax ordinary goods used by average citizens far less than luxury goods affordable only by the wealthiest.

Finally we have already discussed at length the claim that only Southern exports (cotton & tobacco) paid for US imports.
In fact, by 1860 they paid about half -- as your Preston quote acknowledges:

"...products that have been necessary to purchase these imports, were at one time almost exclusively, and have always mainly been the result of slave labor"

That one word, "mainly" I think expresses the exact truth in 1860, meaning roughly half of total US exports came from cotton & tobacco.

rustbucket quoting Toombs: "...bounties and protection to every interest and every pursuit in the North..."

Of course those tariffs protected all US producers, in whatever region they lived, including such Southern producers as sugarcane planters, who are still protected to this very day!

rustbucket quoting Preston: "...they have themselves so conformed to it, that we ourselves began to believe that they were absolutely necessary to its vitality."

And here we see just a quick-peek at the real truth of the matter, which is that for decades Southern Democrats were happy to support reasonable tariff levels, so long as they were in charge in Washington, DC.
Only when their absolute power over Federal Government begins, slightly to slip away, now suddenly Washington is a monster feeding off "this sweating giant of the South".

In reality, nothing had changed except Southern attitudes towards Federal Government.

rustbucket: "If your argument were correct, the Northern Democrats should have come to the rescue and stopped the Morrill Tariff from passing the House.
But they didn't."

No, my argument is: the reason those Northern Democrats and others (i.e., American Party) didn't "come to the rescue" is because, first, they weren't asked, and second, they weren't asked because in reality, the original Morrill proposal was not that big a change, not that big a deal, nowhere near as important as some Southern politicians later pretended.

rustbucket: "Perhaps Wigfall recognized that the South could no longer count on that strong support, but you, 155 years later, can't seem to see it."

In December 1860, Texas Senator Wigfall had exactly one year experience in the US Senate.
He was a freshman with no real clue as to what was really going on.
Further, he was a Fire Eater secessionist looking for reasons to justify his calls for disunion.

So Wigfall's judgment on these matters should count for precisely: zero.

[DiogenesLamp]

BroJoeK, I stopped reading your stuff about 30 messages ago. I've got too much stuff going on in the real world to wade through your spiel. Maybe when I can catch a break, i'll get back to looking at what you say again, but the ad nauseum arguing technique isn't really accomplishing anything.

For the rest of us, I am wanting to dissect the US GDP for the 1860-ish period. As near as I can tell, total GDP for 1860 was around 4.5 billion dollars. What I want to figure out, is how much money was the North making off of the South.

It appears the value of direct Southern exports was around 200 million, and the indirect value (Products supplied to Northern Manufacturers, etc.) was substantial too.

I don't see how California and the Western states really had much to do with Southern exports and European shipping, so I think their contributions to the GDP should be deducted from the number at which I am trying to arrive.

Gold and Silver production, Cattle and Timber, and whatever other produce of value the western states created, ought not figure in to how valuable was the South to the North.

Only those things traceable to value lost from an Independent South should be considered toward's the total value of what was at stake for the North if the South became independent.

I've got a source i'm going to look through for some numbers, but I thought if others of you had some sources, that would help flesh out exactly what was the cost to the North of the South leaving their Economic sphere of influence.

My bet is that it's plenty enough money for a nation to go to war over.

[DiogenesLamp]

Thus stands the account between the North and the South. Under its ordinary and most favorable action, bounties and protection to every interest and every pursuit in the North, to the extent of at least fifty millions per annum, besides the expenditure of at least sixty millions out of every seventy of the public expenditure among them, thus making the treasury a perpetual fertilizing stream to them and their industry, and a suction-pump to drain away our substance and parch up our lands.

We all know that the US Federal government ran on Tariff revenues in those days. Tariff's were collected on Imports, which directly correlate with Exports.

From my calculations of the export value of Southern products, (from the previously posted excerpt above) they make up 72% of the total. The citizen population of the North was 21 million, and the citizen population of the South was 5.5 million, yet those 5.5 million were furnishing 72% of the revenue to run the US Government, and from what you have listed above, apparently the US Government was putting a lot of coins directly into a lot of Northern pockets as well.

Of course it was the slaves who were actually producing most of the products for export, and the US government was content to allow 72% of it's income to be produced by slave labor, and the Northern Protectionists were content to receive the benefits of this slave labor as well.

They only reacted with fury when they realized that income stream was going to be cut off from them.

[DiogenesLamp]

They, therefore, invented a system of duties partial and discriminating, by which the whole burden of the revenue from this extraordinary system fell upon those who produced the articles of exports which purchased the articles of imports, and which articles of import were consumed mainly, or to a great extent, by those who produced the exports.

And this is a further point. Not only was 72% of the total Tariff revenue produced by Southern exports, they jiggered the specific duties to place more taxes on items intended to be consumed by the South.

It makes the effective tax burden even larger than 72%.

They shifted the Tax burden to the South.

Hey! While i'm thinking about this, Isn't this the same section of the Country still desirous of growing the government, and still desirous of enacting protectionist laws for their now Unionized labor which is compensated far beyond what they would receive in a normal free market?

If you think about it, the same economic and social dynamics which were at work back then, are still operating today.

[DiogenesLamp]

That the people of the North shall consider themselves as more blessed than we, more civilized, and happier, is not a matter at which we would complain at all, if they would only content themselves with believing that to be the fact; but when they come and attempt to propagandize, and insist that we shall be as perfect as they imagine themselves to be, then it is that their good opinion of themselves becomes offensive to us.

"Gay Marriage!" You intolerant bigots need to be made to understand that you are morally inferior to we people of Boston, New York, and San Francisco who recognize different kinds of love.

"Global Warming!" You racists backwards fools who live in "flyover country" are too ignorant to understand the great crises facing us. You should just do what we, your educated betters tell you to do.

"Black Lives Matter!" You are a racist if you think all lives matter as much as Black lives.

"Abortion!" You immoral people need to be taught that you have no say over a woman's right to chose abortion.

"Animal Rights!" Meat is murder.

And so on... .

They are still preaching at us. Whatever is their latest moral outrage, you can bet they are going to chastise us for not embracing their new-found morality quickly enough!

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "It appears the value of direct Southern exports was around 200 million, and the indirect value (Products supplied to Northern Manufacturers, etc.) was substantial too."

Your figures for 1859 show total exports, including specie, of $336 million.
My numbers from this link, page 605, show those same numbers as $349 million, about 4% more.

My figure for 1860 rises to $392 million, or 17% more than your total number for 1859.
Of that $392 million, I see cotton at $192 million and tobacco at $16 million, together 53% of total exports.

So here are some problems with your numbers:

1. Cotton certainly is a "product of the South", and mostly the Deep South at that, certainly the Confederate States.
   But your article values raw cotton at 60% of manufactured cotton exports, which is probably high.
   Half that would be more realistic.

2. Tobacco is now, and was then, grown in several states outside the Confederate South.
   Even today, Northern tobacco farms account for around 20% of total tobacco farms.
   Further, Union Kentucky is a top tobacco producing state, so should not be included in "products of the South".
   So not all tobacco in 1860 can be credited to "the South".

3. Naval stores are the 4th listed item, but by 1860 some of those still came from northern forests.
   They were not 100% Southern products.

4. Molasses comes from sugar cane protected by tariffs in the South, but also from sugar beets grown in the North.
   So molasses would not necessarily be 100% Southern produced.

5. The huge category called "other from the South" was the second largest in 1857, third in 1859.
   Those numbers are way, way too big to be considered some sort of "miscellaneous" exports.
   So I suspect something fishy going on, which should discount those numbers.

6. Finally, "products of the South" would include regions of the Upper South and Border States which remained loyal to the Union.
   

Bottom line is just what your report says: "...more than one-half the whole is exclusively Southern origin..."
For 1860 especially, that figure of "one-half" is about exactly right.
Of 1860's $392 million total exports, 55% or so came from future Confederate states.

DiogenesLamp: "My bet is that it's plenty enough money for a nation to go to war over."

Possibly for hot-headed Southerners, but certainly not for cooler Northerners, absent some act of war and declaration of war against the Union, which those hot-heads soon provided.

But it's pure Marxism to reduce everything to economics, and human nature is far more complex than that.
We know this for certain because four of the original Deep South seceding states wrote official "Reasons for Secession" and their overwhelming concern was to protect slavery.
Of course, that is an "economic reason", but Southerners also looked on secession as a defense of their culture and way of life.
To them, slavery was much more than just "economics".

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "From my calculations of the export value of Southern products, (from the previously posted excerpt above) they make up 72% of the total."

50% is more realistic for 1860.
Your higher number might well be realistic for prior years, but by 1860 other US products, especially manufactured, also were growing rapidly.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "Not only was 72% of the total Tariff revenue produced by Southern exports, they jiggered the specific duties to place more taxes on items intended to be consumed by the South.
It makes the effective tax burden even larger than 72%."

"Jiggered"?
Throughout the 59 years of Southern Democrat dominance in Washington, DC -- 1801 through 1860 -- tariff rates on specific commodities were often adjusted for any number of reasons.
But no tariff from that era ever passed without some support from the South.

Of course, South Carolina was particularly troubled by the 1830s "tariff of abominations", but it only happened with support from Tennessean President Jackson and South Carolinian Vice President Calhoun.
Point is: not all Southerners were always of one mind on these issues.

Even in 1859, that Morrill tariff over which such a fuss was raised, only passed the House (but not the Senate) because 55 Democrats & others friendly to the South abstained.
So why would they abstain, if so passionately opposed?

Finally, Morrill's rates were highest on imported luxury items, lowest on commodities necessary to poorer people.
And this is a problem in what way?

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "They are still preaching at us."

Us? Us??
Who you mean "us" Kemosabe?

I thought your pose here was as a "northerner", who never really knew the South, never lived there, just la-te-da going through life learning "Northern propaganda" against those evil slavers, until suddenly, accidentally you somehow stumbled across the "real truth", which is that "Ape" Lincoln and his "Black Republicans" were actually (in John Boehner's words) "Lucifer in the flesh".

Wow! What a surprising revelation to some northern kid as innocent of real truth as young DiogenesLamp!
Now suddenly he realizes that everything he was taught is good was evil, and those Southern evil-ones are now all-good.

That's what we thought, but now DiogenesLamp suddenly reveals his-self as one of "us" Southrons?

???!!

[rockrr]

Why are you still bothering with his crap? Does not the axiom of “wrestling with a pig” come to mind when you see a post from the degenerate?

[BroJoeK]

rockrr: "Why are you still bothering with his crap?"

;-)