Why are All you Southerners in Denial? Of Course It Was About Slavery!!

[GulliverSwift]

You people are in denial. Without the issue of slavery, there would have been no Civil War. I know you try to justify their fight against the federal government, and I think it's good to fight against today's left-wing trash bureaucracy that runs the federal government. But back then slavery was the catalyst that started the whole thing.

In each of the states that seceded, their official document that announced secession referred to slavery as the number one issue.

Now, the average Southern soldier probably didn't think about owning slaves since he sure couldn't afford one. But the average Joe Southerner didn't finance the war. The war was financed by the wealthy class in the South, and they're the ones who had a stake in preserving slavery. The wealthy controlled all the newspapers, the town councils, and the economy, and they're the ones who controlled what people heard and thought.

Lincoln wanted to keep slavery out of future states that would expand in the West, which would create more Congressman from free states that would tip the scales on the Hill. So Southern governments threatened that if Lincoln won the election, they would secede. And sure enough, the seceded.

There's nothing wrong with hating the federal government, the nosy SOBs and DOBs in the bureaucracy feel it's their job to run everything. But that doesn't mean that we also have to agree with what the South did, even if it was against the federal government. I don't want two different United States--two weak countries--especially not one with slaves.

Yes, it was about slavery. Southern states stated that as their official reason, and the wealthy class in the South, the ones with money to pay for the guns and cannons, wanted slavery as well.

You and liberals have something in common. Both believe that it was about "states' rights." Liberal blacks think it was about that because they hate to think that so many white people would want to stop slavery. You Southerners think it was about "states' rights" because you hate to think that so many people fighting against the federal government could ever be a bad thing.

Usually, it's not.

[Lee Heggy]

AN ACT declaring the political ties heretofore existing between the State of Missouri and the United States of America dissolved. WHEREAS, the Government of the United States, in the possession and under the control of a sectional party, has wantonly violated the compact originally made between said government and the State of Missouri, by invading with hostile armies the soil of the State, attacking and making prisoners the militia whilst legally assembled under the State laws, forcibly occupying the State capital, and attempting, through the instrumentality of domestic traitors, to usurp the State government, seizing and destroying private property, and murdering with fiendish malignity peaceable citizens, men, women, and children, together with other acts of atrocity, indicating a deep settled hostility toward the people of Missouri and their institutions; and, WHEREAS, the present administration of the government of the United States has utterly ignored the Constitution, subverted the government as constructed and intended by its makers, and established a despotic and arbitrary power instead thereof; Now, therefore, Be it enacted by the general assembly of the State of Missouri, as follows: That all political ties of every character now existing between the government of the United States of America and the people and government of the State of Missouri, are hereby dissolved, and the State of Missouri, resuming the sovereignty granted by compact to the said United States upon admission of said State into the Federal Union, does again take its place as a free and independent republic amongst the nations of the earth. This act to take effect and be in force from and after its passage. Passed by the Senate, October 28, 1861. Passed by the House, October 30, 1861. Signed into effect, by Governor Claiborne Fox Jackson, October 31, 1861. Don't see the word 'slave' anywhere in there.

[wasp69]

Let us not forget this little gem from the Constitution of the State of Indiana:

Article XIII
Negroes and Mulattoes
Section 1. No negro or mulatto shall come into or settle in the State, after the adoption of this Constitution.
Section 2. All contracts made with any Negro or Mulatto coming into the state, contrary to the provisions of the foregoing section, shall be void, and any person who shall employ such Negro or Mulatto, or otherwise encourage him to remain in the State, shall be fined in any sum not less than ten dollars, nor more than five hundred dollars.
Section3. All fines which may be collected for a violation of the provisions of this article, or of any law that may be passed for the purpose of carrying the same into execution, shall be set apart and appropriated for the colonization of such Negroes or Mulattoes, and their descendants, as may be in the State at the adoption of this Constitution, and may be willing to emigrate.
Section 4. The General assembly shall pass laws to carry out the provisions of this article.

[billbears]

In other words, we should believe politicians. They tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

Remember, abe was a politician, as were all the northerners clamoring for the war, and those who wrote the history that you so readily spout. Your argument isn't very convincing

[Non-Sequitur]

Nor this one from Virginia:

"If any slave hereafter emancipated shall remain within this commonwealth more than twelve months after his or her right to freedom shall have accrued, he or she shall forfeit all such right, and may be apprehended and sold by the overseers of the poor of any county or corporation in which he or she shall be found, for the benefit of the poor of such county or corporation." -- Virginia Manumission Law of 1806 [Shepherd, Statutes at Large, III, 252; passed January 25, 1806; in effect May 1, 1806.]

[wasp69]

Come on, folks, fighting the federal government is a good thing, but slavery would have been preserved if the Confederacy had won.

I'm sorry, but who are you trying to kid? Slavery was practiced and protected in the Union until 9 months after Lee Surrendered.

Besides, this is your post, why don't you answer some of the responses instead of relying on shooter2.5?

[Constitution Day]

It's the sign of a meaningless existence.
They have nothing better to do than live in the past and try to pretend that somehow they had something to do with events 140 years ago.

Tell that to my half-dozen plus ancestors who fought for North Carolina and the Confederacy.
Several of them died... gunshot wounds, typhus, malaria, etc.

I suppose you think they died for nothing.

[Constitution Day]

AWESOME PIC!! BTW, wore that button to work today. Woo-boy, I just stepped all in it!! LOL!!

The picture is from DixieNet.

Glad you enjoyed the button!
I had to bring you something from the Museum of the Confederacy, since you had asked me to bring a flag back.

The ones I was really interested in were the ones they wouldn't let me take home.
They were quite emphatic about it, actually!

I just bet you did "step in it"... hehehehe

I sometimes wear my SCV membership pin out when I am dressed nicely.
It's amusing to see certain people cut their eyes at me when they notice it.

CD

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[bloodmeridian]

Sorry, but Slavery was the moral issue needed to sell every war to the general public. It was about state's rights, pure and simple.

[Poohbah]

If it wasn't about slavery, then why did all of the state secession instruments mention slavery at the top of the list?

[WhiskeyPapa]

They are actually proud of their racism.

Exactly.

South Carolina's document is even bold enough to say that northerners had a false religious belief that all men were equal.

The more scorn heaped on the CSA apologists, the better.

Walt

[bloodmeridian]

Because it was their right as states to write their own constitutions. Plus, they knew it would piss off the elites in the northeast.

[Shooter 2.5]

As I stated before, the ordinances and the declarations seem to be separate documents. I don't know if the other states issued Declarations other than the ones we wrote about. Also, according to my atlas, Missouri was one of the states that stayed in the Union along with Kentucky.

The states that I know for an absolute fact that issued Declarations are: Georgia, Texas, Mississippi and South Carolina. The states that listed Ordinances include Kentucky and Missouri as you pointed out although like I said, those two have been listed as Neutral or staying in the Union. I would like to see if I can find more declarations but I doubt they exist since the web sites haven't listed them already.

[Non-Sequitur]

Because it was their right as states to write their own constitutions. Plus, they knew it would piss off the elites in the northeast.

So in other words...they lied?

[WhiskeyPapa]

Remember, abe was a politician, as were all the northerners clamoring for the war, and those who wrote the history that you so readily spout. Your argument isn't very convincing

President Lincoln transcended politics on occasion, although he was truly a politician in the sense of politics being defined as the art of the possible.

"He said, according to Donald, "But now, if he followed their advice, he would have to do without the help of nearly 200,000 black men in the service of the Union. In that case 'we would be compelled to abandon the war in 3 weeks.' Practical considerations aside, there was the moral issue. How could anybody propose 'to return to slavery the black warriors of Port Hudson and Olustee to their masters to conciliate the South?' "I should be damned in time and eternity for so doing,' he told his visitors (Gov. Randall, and Judge Mills, both from Wisconsin). "The world will know that I keep my faith to friends and enemies, come what will.'"

-- "Lincoln" by David Donald

Walt

[dpa5923]

You wrote: how many states were in the Confederacy? 13 was it?

Hate to be a pain, but it was only 11 states that seceded. The 13 stars on the Confederate flag were for the 11 states that seceded and for the governments in exile from Missouri and Kentucky (neither of which seceded).

[WhiskeyPapa]

The picture is from DixieNet.

I don't know if Dixienet still has it; but they used to have a "humor" link to a site that glorified John Wilkes Booth.

Walt

[Poohbah]

Yup. And the Confederates who wrote about the issue being slavery instead of tariffs lied to their diaries, too, just like that Clinton crony did. :o)

[WhiskeyPapa]

Because it was their right as states to write their own constitutions.

The sovereigns of the United States are the people of the whole United States, not the actual states. That is why the Constutution was ratified in special state conventions and not by the state legislatures.

Walt

[billbears]

And I count those two states as having seceded