Vanderbilt professor maligns UDC,Confederate Heritage in Editorial

The Tennessean ^ | 20 November 02 | Jonathan D. Farley

[bjs1779]

But if you have other evidence of steps that the confederacy took to discipline their own men then by all means bring it out. Evidence currently seems to indicate that the opposite was true.

Again, you base your judgment on one man. If for instance he would of said something to the contrary, you probably would not agree with him. You hear what you want to hear.

Even if what you surmise is true, I can understand that the luxuries of prudent justice long afforded in the North just could not be implemented in difficult war time conditions that the South faced in its infancy. To this day, the South is more in tune with the Constitition than the rest of the country, and I don't think that is by accident or by Honest Abe's club in hand. If you want to counter with the KKK element, there is also the pro-abortion activists in the North responsible for 30 million unborn deaths. Pick your poison.

[Non-Sequitur]

I can understand that the luxuries of prudent justice long afforded in the North just could not be implemented in difficult war time conditions that the South faced in its infancy.

THe only explanation is a contempt for the rule of law then. To ignore ones own constituion to the extent of refusing to staff an entire branch of government is inexcusable, especially when they had time to staff a cabinet and fill offices with political rather than constitutional requirements. Given that I can't understand how you can say the south was more in tune with the constitution. It would be more accurate to say that the south believes in the constitution when it suits its purposes.

[GOPcapitalist]

But there were arrests and there was punishment, at least in the cases you mentioned.

Last I checked, rape is typically considered a crime in even the most corrupt regimes. Those records prove that rape was widespread by the yankee soldiers, and the fact that so many cases went unpunished indicates the problem's gravity.

[Non-Sequitur]

IT appears that almost all southern cases must have gone unpunished. What does that say about corruption in the Davis regime when they didn't consider rape and murder by their own troops to be their responsibility. And it was rape and murder by their own troops of their own people.

[ZULU]

"First, Spain still had slavery in its remaining colonies. The same may have been true of South Africa and Portugese colonies."

BY the time of the Civil War, South and Central America and Mexico were esentially ndependent and all those countries had outlawed slavery. Spain's "Empire" was reduced to a few colonies in Africa and Asia. The Slave Trade had been abolished (except in Islamic Countries where it apparently continues.) Portugal, true, still held Angola and Brazil, and a few other small colonies not worthy of mention. South Africa was still divided between warring Bantus and Zulus. The fact is, slavery was dead or dying throughout the civilized world.

"Second, "a few generations" can be a very long and miserable time."

As miserable as all the casualties on both sides of the Civil War, including civlians affected directly or indirectly? I wonder.

"And it's likely that a system of "gradual, compensated emancipation" would have left people in bondage for decades. "

My guess is the Federal Government could have bought and freed every southern slave for less than it spent on the war.

"The example of Eli Whitney strengthened the case of those who thought that slavery would come out on top again, as new lands were annexed and new uses found for slave labor."

Where else could slavery proved such an effective economic system other than on massive, labor intensive, cotton plantations which required lots of unskilled labor? Railriad building? Wheat farming? Gold mining?? Not likely.

"Had the Confederacy succeeded, either because they won the war or because there was no war, it's likely that Spain and Brazil would not have felt so isolated and compelled to end slavery when they did."

The pre-Bellum American South, Spain and Portugal were industrial and economic backwaters, anachronisms in the dawning industrial age.

"This is quite a generalization. There were notable exceptions, but generally, millowners were generally not "the loudest in condemning the South."

I don't think so. Mill owners were not the sole representatives of the new industrial age, and even they were subject to public opinion, as exemplified in England with the Emancipation Proclamation.

"..since the slave trade had been abolished in 1808, it's extremely unlikely that any millowner earned his "first dollars in the slave trade."

Perhaps not, but his father who passed on his wealth to him, probably did.

"The strongest opponents of slavery were in the professions, like the clergy, and in the independent middle classes, not among millowners."

Such outstanding southerners like RObert E. Lee and Jackson opposed slavery or at least recognized it for the evil it was.

"The striking feature in antebellum history is the drying up of Southern antislavery sentiment."

A lot of this was related to the perception of northern aggression and the aggressive abolitionist movement there and its potential impact on the slave population.

[x]

Spain's "Empire" was reduced to a few colonies in Africa and Asia.

If that were true, why did we fight Spain in 1898? Hint: Cuba, also Puerto Rico. Slavery had lost ground in the early 19th century, but it was still a reality. It would have lasted longer had the Confederates won.

My guess is the Federal Government could have bought and freed every southern slave for less than it spent on the war.

Nice guess, but would such a system have passed Congress and been accepted by slaveowners? It's at least as likely that such a system would have freed slave children and those adults that slaveholders wanted to be freed, and let slaveowners keep those they did not want to free. That was how it worked in New Jersey when slavery was abolished. Thus, you could have had some slaves, long after an official compensated emancipation.

Where else could slavery proved such an effective economic system other than on massive, labor intensive, cotton plantations which required lots of unskilled labor? Railriad building? Wheat farming? Gold mining?? Not likely.

Slaves were heavily used in Southern railroad construction. The myth is that they were too valuable for such work, but the reality is that there were always slaveowners who would rent out incorrigible or troublesome slaves for such work. Southern newspapers on the eve of war dreamed of employing slaves in the mines of the Southwest. Slaves had worked mines in the ancient world, and in the Spanish empire. There was no reason why they couldn't have done so in the American Southwest. The South African experience of mass Black mine labor with White overseers provides another example. Slave labor was also used in factories in the Old South.

The pre-Bellum American South, Spain and Portugal were industrial and economic backwaters, anachronisms in the dawning industrial age.

So it appears today, but it didn't look so to Southerners in 1860. And even if the American South was a "backwater" at the time, it could well have clung to slavery as it later clung to segregation. Where else but in "backwaters" do such ideas endure?

Such outstanding southerners like RObert E. Lee and Jackson opposed slavery or at least recognized it for the evil it was.

Lee and Jackson certainly didn't oppose slavery. If Lee saw it as an evil, he clearly and definitely thought it a necessary evil -- necessary to uplift and Christianize the Blacks, more of an evil to their masters than to the slaves, and too necessary to get rid of any time soon.

A lot of this [the end of Southern abolitionist sentiments] was related to the perception of northern aggression and the aggressive abolitionist movement there and its potential impact on the slave population.

Drag your feet on ending an abuse long enough and people will press you to do so. But why the foot dragging? Why not take the initiative yourselves? It's convenient to have someone to blame things on, but it leaves a lot of unasked questions.

Some wealthy New Englanders may have had inherited wealth from the slave trade in their background. But whether they were millowners or whether they were pro- or anti-slavery I can't say. They were only a small percentage of the Northern population.

You have avoided discussing my statement that the same reproach of having benefited from slavery as long as one could and only acting against it when one could get no more money out of it could have been and was thrown at well-to-do Southern abolitionists by their poorer compatriots. It's a distraction from the real tasks of the day. As with some of the other objections you've made, this kind of reproach simply excuses inaction and puts off the reckoning to another day.

[GOPcapitalist]

IT appears that almost all southern cases must have gone unpunished.

What is your source for that and what evidence do you have of southern rapists? I ask because what I have seen indicates that the numbers were far fewer than among the yankees.

[bjs1779]

Given that I can't understand how you can say the south was more in tune with the constitution. It would be more accurate to say that the south believes in the constitution when it suits its purposes

Again, the subject was your allegations of Southern rape when you were confronted with Union documents showing that Union soldiers were guilty of mass rape of women and little girls of the South. Do you have evidence or not the South was guilty of the same thing?

[Non-Sequitur]

I posted evidence in the form of Judah Benjamin's letter. I can post some reports from the OR about confederate soldiers raping Union women but that's a bit different. It's hard to present evidence that the confederate army took actions against their own soldiers for crimes because almost none exists. An indication that actions weren't taken. Of course, if you have evidence that actions were taken then by all means bring it out.

[Adder]

Very true! The entire Civil War hinged on communications....mostly the lack thereof. Lee at Gettysburg blinded by his calvary's disappearance. Hooker at Chancellorsville, McClellan, most anytime. It always amazes me how moves were always forestalled because of overestimates of potential troop strenghts. I realize I come to this on the basis of temporal distance and hindsight. Still, sometimes one wonders how they ever found each other to fight.

[bjs1779]

It's hard to present evidence that the confederate army took actions against their own soldiers for crimes because almost none exists. An indication that actions weren't taken.

Maybe it is an indication that it did not exist to the levels that you wished it did. Hard to accept I know in light of the Union orgy of opportunity...

[l8pilot]

There used to be a division of powers between the states and the Federal government. We all know that you seek the centralisation of power with the "government", telling the rest of us, how to be "good, little citisens,,,. "

The same issues that brought us to war in 1861 are addressed in the politics of the 21st Century. Are we to be the financial slaves of Washington, or will we have limited government? I pay over half my wages to Washington.

The Republicans give my money to big buisness, the Democrats give my money to those who refuse to work.

If my Country, (the South) was free, I don't think we would have an "income tax".. Neither would we be fighting a secular Moslem country like Iraq.

George Washington warned against "entangling foreign alliances". Perhaps we should have listend.

For Southern Independence

Larry