[ggekko]

"But what was the splitting issue in the "union?" It was none other than slavery...."

I belive the tariff issue was of greater importance than the slavery. The slavery issue was important but is was not the driving issue; the tariff issue was.

The Morill tariff bill was passed in 1860 and was signed into law by Lincoln shortly after his election. This bill nearly doubled tariff levels on most products. This bill further exacerbated the inequity in the Federal tax system to the point where most Federal revenue came from the South and most Federal spending occurred in the North. Immediately before the start of Civil War the South was paying 87% of all Federal Taxes!

The tariff issue was explosive. Southern ports were beginning to undercut the Port of New York and Southern exporters were beginning to buy the bulk of their manufacturing imports from Europe. The size of the tariff increase in the Morrill bill was designed to forestall these trends. In several speeches Lincoln threatened to enfore the new tariff regime by force.

The threat of facing a naval blockade and having the economic lifeblood choked out of them was too grave a threat for several sates which then began seccession planning.

[Grand Old Partisan]

The Morrill Tariff was passed on March 2, 1861 -- after, not before, seven states had already seceded. Only the walkout of all those Democrats from the Confederate states made its passage possible. As for tariffs or anything other than slavery being a reason for secession, it is all revisionist nonsense. Each of the eleven Confederate states published declarations of secession. Every word of every one of them is about slavery and the need to keep blacks people down.

[Non-Sequitur]

Immediately before the start of Civil War the South was paying 87% of all Federal Taxes!

No it didn't. About 95% of all tariff revenue was collected in New York, Boston, and Philadelphia.

[jlogajan]

I belive the tariff issue was of greater importance than the slavery. The slavery issue was important but is was not the driving issue; the tariff issue was.

Well, this is what South Carolina had to say, the first state to secede because of the election of Lincoln:

Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union

The people of the State of South Carolina, in Convention assembled, on the 26th day of April, A.D., 1852, declared that the frequent violations of the Constitution of the United States, by the Federal Government, and its encroachments upon the reserved rights of the States, fully justified this State in then withdrawing from the Federal Union; but in deference to the opinions and wishes of the other slaveholding States, she forbore at that time to exercise this right....

The Constitution of the United States, in its fourth Article, provides as follows: "No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due." This stipulation was so material to the compact, that without it that compact would not have been made. The greater number of the contracting parties held slaves, and they had previously evinced their estimate of the value of such a stipulation by making it a condition in the Ordinance for the government of the territory ceded by Virginia, which now composes the States north of the Ohio River

The same article of the Constitution stipulates also for rendition by the several States of fugitives from justice from the other States. The General Government, as the common agent, passed laws to carry into effect these stipulations of the States. For many years these laws were executed. But 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. The States of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa, have enacted laws which either nullify the Acts of Congress or render useless any attempt to execute them. In many of these States the fugitive is discharged from service or labor claimed, and in none of them has the State Government complied with the stipulation made in the Constitution. The State of New Jersey, at an early day, passed a law in conformity with her constitutional obligation; but the current of anti-slavery feeling has led her more recently to enact laws which render inoperative the remedies provided by her own law and by the laws of Congress. In the State of New York even the right of transit for a slave has been denied by her tribunals; and the States of Ohio and Iowa have refused to surrender to justice fugitives charged with murder, and with inciting servile insurrection in the State of Virginia. Thus the constituted compact has been deliberately broken and disregarded by the non-slaveholding States, and the consequence follows that South Carolina is released from her obligation.

Looks like it was all about slavery.

[Non-Sequitur]

I belive the tariff issue was of greater importance than the slavery. The slavery issue was important but is was not the driving issue; the tariff issue was.

If the tariff was such a bone of contention the why was one of the first acts of the confederate congress the passing of a tariff? Wouldn't that be like the founding fathers winning the Revolutionary War and then vote to become a colony of France?

[WhiskeyPapa]

But what was the splitting issue in the "union?" It was none other than slavery...."

I belive the tariff issue was of greater importance than the slavery.

Then why don't efforts to stop the fighting during the war -ever- mention slavery? Throughout 1862 President Lincoln pushed compensated emancipation and relocation schemes. Tariffs are not mentioned.

The prewar dialog was 90% slavery, 10% (or less) tariffs.

Walt

[WhiskeyPapa]

The Morill tariff bill was passed in 1860 and was signed into law by Lincoln shortly after his election.

Buchanan signed the Morrill Tariff, not Lincoln.

Shortly after his election, Lincoln was the president elect.

Walt