Posted on 04/24/2002 9:33:49 AM PDT by wasp69
RICHMOND - It's only a two-hour drive from the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House here on Clay Street.
It took four years and more than 600,000 lives to make that same journey during the second American Revolution, now officially known as the US Civil War.
It's odd that this nation's bloodiest war, a war between brothers, stretched from 1861 until 1865 when the capital of the COnfederate States of America in Richmond is only 100 miles south from the capital of the United States of America in Washington.
Thousands of Americans annually visit Civil War battlefields, museums and monuments.
Enthusiasts study in passionate detail the leaders, military strategy and battles of the Civil War.
My fascination with the Civil War has less to do with military engagements than with the motivations of up to 1.5 million Southern men and boys wiling to die to tear the nation in two in defense of slavery, an utterly indefedsible institution.
Had the conflict, also known as the War of the Southern Planters, been fought only by Southern slave owners, it would have been over in weeks rather than years.
As it was, brilliant and charismatic Confederate Generals such as Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson led armies of poor, non-slave-owning Southerners into battle and came dangerously close to winning the war.
My mother's and father's ancestors were Southerners who fought for the Confederacy. I'm pleased that their side lost.
As a young man I fought for passage of civil rights laws that would eliminate the vestiges of slavery and the continued denial of equal rights to black Americans. What, I wondered, could my Confederate ancestors have been thinking?
I did not find the answer during my tour of the White House of the Confederacy or in the next-door Museum of the Confederacy.
A curator at the museum understood my state of perplexity but could only tell me that it's impossible to judge the decisions of my Confederate ancestors based on todays standards.
Although slavery was central to the decision by the Southern states to break away from the Union, many causes over the years led to conflict.
Sectional rivalry developed as the North became industrialized and gained population with European immigration.
The North wanted to build roads, canals and railroads to accommodate growing industries. Without personal or corporate taxation, revenue was raised by tariffs, which protected Northern products and increased prices of imported goods needed by the nonindustrialized South.
Southerners felt they were being gouged by their Northern brethern. They also felt that the states, not the federal government, had the authority to regulate commerce and other affairs. They also felt that the states had the right under the Constitution to separate from the Union, an idea that had strong supporters in both the North and South.
Deciding whether new territories and states would be slave or nonslave became a North-South fight for power in Congress and within the federal government.
Northern abolitionists demonized the Southerners and backed them into their own regional corner. Many Americans in the early years of the nation felt stronger regional and state pride than national pride.
Lee, who did not want to break up the Union, declined an offer to command the Union Army. He chose fight for Virginia and the South.
There must be lessons to be learned from the Civil War that can be applied to current and future conflicts.
slavery was a by-issue, partly used by the north to inflame passions and to convince the federals of the "rightousness" of their cause. that cause was federal tyrrany, and might makes right.
If the Southern Confederacy had tested the secession issue in the courts instead of on the battlefield, they would of had a much better chance of winning.
It was a forlorn hope from the beginning. Considering the naval, industrial, and financial resources of the North I'm surprised they lasted as long as they did. It's a testament to the skill of the (mostly Virginian) generals and the fortitude of her patriots in the ranks that it went until 1865.
I doubt that this type would feel the need/responsibility to protect its' women. I also suspect that it would expect to receive restitution from its' own government for the rest (as in tax my neighbors for my benefit; penalize others for my stupidity).
Although I dont agree with everything stated in the series, it did a tolerable job of explaining things like Nullification and the Tariff issues that are generally obscure to most folks. Unfortunately although a lot of folks tuned in to the series, many just didn't/or want tounderstand the more complicated issues. IMHO
The Belle asks one of the female dinner guests "Where do y'all come from?"
The woman coldly repies "We come from a place where we don't end a sentence with a preposition".
The Belle responds, "Oh, I'm terribly sorry. Where do y'all come from, bitch?"
What, you thought that only the North was racist?
What is 'indefensible' about the Constitution and States' rights?
Today, without slavery, would a state be able to secede, in peace? Any volunteers?
IMHO, slavery became the 'justification' for the North to proceed against the South. Attacking the south for secession wasn't a strong enough motivator of the public sentiment, nor constitutionally based.
It should have been for each state to come to a knowledge of the 'truth' about ownership of persons/slavery; just as it should be the realm of each state to determine its 'religious' persuasion, should they 'choose' to be parochial.
Nowhere is this more evident then in this debate. The South defended the themselves against the North, primarily because of state right's issues (more specifically because of unfair tarrifs). One only has to read early Lincoln words to know that he did NOT lead the nation to war because of the slavery issue. Lincoln himself was obviously a racist and could have cared less about the fate of the slaves. He was a politition who used the slavery issue for self-serving reasons after 1862. There were better ways to end slavery then going to war...another indicator that this war was not faught over slavery.
Almost sounds like the FBI and BATF today. Some things never change.
Let's us as an example Fort Sumpter. The state of North Carolina, instead of firing on it, goes to the Supreme Court as an independent entity and says "We're outta here, we want the Federal Government off our land."
Maybe it wouldn't have worked, maybe the South would still have had to fight. But it would have sawed Lincoln off at the knees if they had gotten anywhere, delayed the Union blocade while the courts were chewing it over, and perhaps made diplomatic recognition easier.
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