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Civil War: Fought over Secession or Slavery?

true, but if the North's entire economy was dependent on slavery there wouldn't have been a civil war either. One side wasn't "better" than the other, it was simply not economically important to them.

and the North did not go to war to free the slaves, which someone might assume from your statement. If the war had ended and the South had kept their slaves, the north still would have declared victory. wouldn't you agree?

I'm saying this isn't the morality play the libtards around here are trying to frame it to be. The north acted in their best interest, so did the south, free slaves or no free slaves. If anything it's the RELIGIOUS sect of society which should receive the most praise for ending slavery, because they were the first ones and the most ardent supporters of freeing slaves. Ironic, since the liberals of today can't STAND religious people and refuse to give them credit for a damn thing. but liberal thinking is full of ironies I have found.

There were some in the North who went to war to free the slaves. Some went to war only to save the Union. Lincoln focused on the latter in the early phase because that created the most support for the war. As Northern sentiments were hardened by fighting, Lincoln led the shifting sentiment to a full anti-slavery position.
 
Subtract the Reserved Powers promised as part of the contract to ratify...and/or add strict adherence to the Enumerated Powers and, Viola', no Civil War.

That makes no sense. The Constitutional theories by which the South's advocates seek to legitimize secession cannot stand as motive for secession.
 
Gaugingcatenate is getting whipped from one end of this thread to the other but cant let it go because of an emotive need to exorcise the Confederacy of its basis in slavery. You can see it shine through with his sleight of hand castigation of Lincoln and the subtle inference that it was the rest of the Republic, not the South, that was responsible for the era of racism and segregation that followed the war.
Please, again, your limited powers of observation are coming into plain view to even the deaf dumb and blind of this site.

Show me your evidence of "rest of the Republic, not the South, that was responsible for the era of racism and segregation that followed the war." I do not know whether your difficulties lay with reading comprehension, math or logic... but you certainly have a hard time putting two and two together. I will try to make it one and one from now on...cannot do any better than that, sorry.

What you failed, apparently, to understand, is that the war really solved nothing. This is why the founders were for slow change, why they made the amendment process so onerous, so only that which is truly striven for will be achieved. The people have to be behind it. The South lost the war but they won the peace afterward, for a hundred years. Lot of misery for very very little gain. But here, you go ahead and put it in your own words since you either do not want to understand mine... or you cannot.

Not my problem.
 
That makes no sense. The Constitutional theories by which the South's advocates seek to legitimize secession cannot stand as motive for secession.
Sure seemed to make sense to them. What is it you know about their motives that they themselves didn't? And where did you come about these mystical powers?
 
How about you quit talking down to me? I have 3 decades in the direct field of history, as a profession and it's obvious you are plucking out your Lost Cause jumbo like a teenager after reading "The South Was Right."

Let cut this roast...

There were 393,975 slaveowners.

A bit over half of those 9 million were free whites.

Nearly 4 million slaves.

Now, follow me here: There were only a little over one million families in the South.

That's all. One million families.

Break that down in your calculating bubble.

Hell, there was only a little over 5 million families in the entire US in 1860.

Does that figure stun you?

When you consider more than one on four rebels who took up arms against the North came from slaveholding families (and one in two in a few other states) it presents a different picture.

One could say, yes, well, those were families - just because pop owned the slave, doesn't mean the boys did too.

However, that slave labor on their property, in some form or another, helped provide them food, shelter and money, and also helped formulate their future wealth they could, and most often did, inherit.

Slave labor provided so much of just about everything when it came to the commerce of the South.

And you've yet to show HOW slavery was "dying out" and how these people who owned 4 BILLION dollars worth of wealth wer going to just give it up -- because Lincoln tried compensated emancipation with the border state, a locale where slavery was not nearly as enmeshed as the deep south, and they would have none of it.

They wanted to KEEP their slaves. And were willing to die to the bloody death to maintain and expand it.
The tariffs had been historically low. You should know this. The Morrill tariff would likely not have passed if the southern ****ers had not left the damn congress after Lincoln had been elected.

Here's a graph to gaze your eyes up, next time you think about saying it was the South who was more affected by tariffs.

Just who was paying the bulk of the tariff revenues?
Hey, if you are too lazy to read the thread, want to attack but have no idea what was said prior, well, you make your bed in that manner and you lie in it, don't whine to me about it. I sure as hell am not going to retype everything for you.

Okay, the first third of your post is just pretty much an exact recounting the figures I already laid out there.

Then starts the magic. You ask me if I am stunned by the figure of how many families were in the South and the US total? This after you being the one telling us, and I went back and found your quote so you cannot run and hide from what you were saying

In what world do these millions of property owning families -- with billions of dollars of property -- just say, meh, so what if the free market values you at thousands (yes, that was the going price in the 60's -- not price adjusted for that time --actual price) !
.

And YOU want to ask ME, if it is I that am stunned, give me a break. Millions of families my ass.

Twenty-five percent of rebel soldiers from slave holding families… that leaves a super majority not from slave holding families, right? Sounds about like your batting average against me here, maybe 1 in 4 pertinent and valid facts out of all the other flotsam.

I showed you the timeline of slavery abolition worldwide, how it was dying out. Also indicated, and if you are actually indeed in the history field, you would know the mass immigration to the US, the cheap labor in the northern cities with manufacturing jobs, one of the pull factors attracting people from Europe. Labor you didn't have to birth and bring up, only started paying them in the North, low wages btw, when they were already capably productive, didn't have to take care of them when they got sick or too old to work. Machines, as indicated before, were taking over jobs, more and more mechanized and organized farming. You sure don't seem to know much about history for being involved in it so long.

And how about not being so disingenuous, how about going back to the actual tariffs I was talking about that created rifts between the regions? Tariffs were a major political issue. The Whigs (1832-1852) and the Republicans (after 1854) sought to protect their mostly northern industries and constituents by voting for higher tariffs. Southern Democrats, which had very little industry but imported many goods wanted lower tariffs. So how about showing the load borne after the 1828 Tariff of Abominations, the 1832 Tariff that brought on the Nullification Crisis, the 1833 Tariff... why the choice of tariff chart for 1859, huh?

Disingenuous.
 
Wow. You're really outdoing yourself.

Quite a Stormfront...

At his core he doesn't really think slavery was all that bad. Which is why he's so free with his comparisons and with these appeals to 'incremental change'.
 
Furthermore, let's listen to Alexander Stephens again....an address to the Georgia legislature in November 1860:


"The next evil that my friend complained of, was the Tariff. Well, let us look at that for a moment.

About the time I commenced noticing public matters, this question was agitating the country almost as fearfully as the Slave question now is. In 1832, when I was in college, South Carolina was ready to nullify or secede from the Union on this account. And what have we seen?

The tariff no longer distracts the public councils. Reason has triumphed. The present tariff was voted for by Massachusetts and South Carolina. The lion and the lamb lay down together-- every man in the Senate and House from Massachusetts and South Carolina, I think, voted for it, as did my honorable friend himself.

And if it be true, to use the figure of speech of my honorable friend, that every man in the North, that works in iron and brass and wood, has his muscle strengthened by the protection of the government, that stimulant was given by his vote, and I believe every other Southern man. So we ought not to complain of that...Yes, and Massachusetts, with unanimity, voted with the South to lessen them, and they were made just as low as Southern men asked them to be, and those are the rates they are now at."

Alex Stephen's Speech to the Georgia Legislature
Ah, which brings up the immediate causes, remember those that we were chatting about earlier? As Stevens makes very clear, this was about tariffs, this WAS NOT THE SLAVE QUESTION..."this question was agitating the country almost as fearfully as the Slave question now is. In 1832, when I was in college, South Carolina was ready to nullify or secede from the Union on this account."... and yet it almost caused secession at that juncture.

So, thanks for helping me make my point, highlighting it nicely in fact. Hat tip to you.
 
Ah, which brings up the immediate causes, remember those that we were chatting about earlier? As Stevens makes very clear, this was about tariffs, this WAS NOT THE SLAVE QUESTION..."this question was agitating the country almost as fearfully as the Slave question now is. In 1832, when I was in college, South Carolina was ready to nullify or secede from the Union on this account."... and yet it almost caused secession at that juncture.

So, thanks for helping me make my point, highlighting it nicely in fact. Hat tip to you.

Even in 1832 there would have been no war for tariffs, and as Stephens notes, by 1860 tariffs were no longer a problem.
 
At his core he doesn't really think slavery was all that bad. Which is why he's so free with his comparisons and with these appeals to 'incremental change'.
That is your most imbecilic and offensive post yet. Apparently nothing I say actually goes in ...but a lot crap seems to pop out, none of it accurate. Can't win the argument on merit, have to start attacking my character.

You lose, that is a sure fire concession in anyone's book. Thanks, I accept.
 
Keep repeating the mantra, or try being the little train that could if it pleases you. I cannot make the blind see, I can only offer what is obvious and those that choose sight are welcome aboard.

The rest can just walk right off that plank at any time. Why not look at the inaugural address given by the South's #1 guy... might think ol' Jeff Davis would, you know, mention something as important as the ONLY CAUSE for separation... well, if it indeed was the only cause. Apparently it didn't seem to cross his mind as it is not mentioned even once in his speech. Jefferson Davis' Inaugural Address

Hmmmm, but yanno, He does somehow get around to mentioning the fact that the government derives its power from the consent of the governed, talks about the Constitution and how the Confederates will not really change it, just more, you know, abide by it faithfully, preserving rights accorded by it, "that delegated powers are to be strictly construed ".

But of course, Jeff Davis would not have a clue as to what the secession was all about, you know, being the top dog and all. Yours, my brother, is the Lost Cause, mine has been a search for the actual truth [ I am a Yankee ]and finding all the evidence which YOU ignore. It is quite apparent that if it does not fit your pre-supposed template, then its automatically trivial and worthless. I get the close mindedness, just don't understand where it behooves one to be that closed minded.

LOL, you get your arguments shut down with ease, so naturally you have to keep moving the goal posts. Tell us again how only 8% of Southerners owned slaves - you gave it away with that. Literally everyone with more than a passing knowledge of the issue knows better, and so knows you're either intentionally misleading or mindlessly repeating propaganda you've read written by fellow Lost Cause types.

And my mind is far from closed on the issue. In fact for much of my early life I was happy to believe that there were several "causes" for the Civil War. Then I had a discussion with a descendant of a slave owning family in Virginia and an expert on the Civil War, was confronted with the mounds of evidence, and changed my mind to conform with the evidence. That was maybe 20 years ago and nothing I've seen from Lost Causers in many of these online discussions or cites they can provide that has caused me to rethink this actually very simple issue. What was the threat to the South? Slavery. Why did they secede? Slavery. How do we know? They told us this, repeatedly.

Here's a pretty good list - a few dozen men at various times and in various settings making the central issue crystal clear - it was all about slavery.

Selected Quotations
 
Even in 1832 there would have been no war for tariffs, and as Stephens notes, by 1860 tariffs were no longer a problem.
If one could pick cotton as well as you are cherry picking, there would have been no need to ever mechanize the process.

So we can all believe Stevens on the tariffs not being the particular problem by 1860... but he was wrong about potential nullification or secession. Hell, we were right on the brink with Jackson and his Force Bill and then Clay to the rescue with a compromise tariff... thus fighting was duly averted. But Jackson had prepared, the Nullifiers were serious...so without Clay it most certainly could have happened. It didn't, but to wipe it clean off the table, pure nonsense.

Oh, and speaking of Nullification,

Jefferson on Nullification
"… that in cases of an abuse of the delegated powers, the members of the general government, being chosen by the people, a change by the people would be the constitutional remedy; but, where powers are assumed which have not been delegated, a nullification of the act is the rightful remedy: that every State has a natural right in cases not within the compact, (casus non fœderis) to nullify of their own authority all assumptions of power by others within their limits: that without this right, they would be under the dominion, absolute and unlimited, of whosoever might exercise this right of judgment for them: that nevertheless, this commonwealth, from motives of regard and respect for its co-States, has wished to communicate with them on the subject: that with them alone it is proper to communicate, they alone being parties to the compact, and solely authorized to judge in the last resort of the powers exercised under it…"

Madison, the "Father of the Constitution" on Interposition:
"The resolutions, having taken this view of the Federal compact, proceed to infer that, in cases of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of other powers, not granted by the said compact, the States, who are parties thereto, have the right, and are in duty bound to interpose to arrest the evil, and for maintaining, within their respective limits, the authorities, rights, and liberties appertaining to them. ...The Constitution of the United States was formed by the sanction of the States, given by each in its sovereign capacity. It adds to the stability and dignity, as well as to the authority of the Constitution, that it rests on this solid foundation. The States, then, being parties to the constitutional compact, and in their sovereign capacity, it follows of necessity that there can be no tribunal above their authority to decide, in the last resort, whether the compact made by them be violated; and, consequently, as parties to it, they must themselves decide, in the last resort, such questions as may be of sufficient magnitude to require their interposition."

Seems Jefferson and Madison have a different view of if there is a compact than you and Chase.
 
LOL, you get your arguments shut down with ease, so naturally you have to keep moving the goal posts. Tell us again how only 8% of Southerners owned slaves - you gave it away with that. Literally everyone with more than a passing knowledge of the issue knows better, and so knows you're either intentionally misleading or mindlessly repeating propaganda you've read written by fellow Lost Cause types.

And my mind is far from closed on the issue. In fact for much of my early life I was happy to believe that there were several "causes" for the Civil War. Then I had a discussion with a descendant of a slave owning family in Virginia and an expert on the Civil War, was confronted with the mounds of evidence, and changed my mind to conform with the evidence. That was maybe 20 years ago and nothing I've seen from Lost Causers in many of these online discussions or cites they can provide that has caused me to rethink this actually very simple issue. What was the threat to the South? Slavery. Why did they secede? Slavery. How do we know? They told us this, repeatedly.

Here's a pretty good list - a few dozen men at various times and in various settings making the central issue crystal clear - it was all about slavery.

Selected Quotations
You can run the numbers yourself. Or maybe your math skills are no better than your defense of ONLY ONE CAUSE, ha ha ha. I ll make it easier for you, approximately 400,000 slave owners, approximately a 5 million white population base. So 5 million into 400K, you tell me, what do you get?

I have shown you here exactly what they said, and while slavery was the exigent issue at that crisis moment, it was one of many grievances accumulated over time in which the South grew disenchanted with the Union and felt the promises made with ratification were not being kept. Why you cannot or will not accept that, being given proof in the Declarations of Cause, being given proofs in Davis' inaugural speech, being given in Stevens' speech, the Hartford Convention which also feared Federal overreach... who knows why you avoid, dodge that all together. I can only see it as an agenda conflict problem. Does not fit your partisan profile.

All those quotes do is confirm that the war was also very much about slavery, something I have never denied. I tried to visualize even one point that your side has made that would make it only about slavery... not one in the entire bunch. Closest was Stevens' Cornerstone speech, until one takes time to read the whole thing, then you should realize there is more going on there.
 
You can run the numbers yourself. Or maybe your math skills are no better than your defense of ONLY ONE CAUSE, ha ha ha. I ll make it easier for you, approximately 400,000 slave owners, approximately a 5 million white population base. So 5 million into 400K, you tell me, what do you get?

And I explained that the husband, maybe the grandfather, of a family of maybe 10 would own all the property, so to say that the only person in that family who was a slave owner was the person with a deed is either deceptive or intentionally misleading as it lowballs the extent of families with slaves.

I have shown you here exactly what they said, and while slavery was the exigent issue at that crisis moment, it was one of many grievances accumulated over time in which the South grew disenchanted with the Union and felt the promises made with ratification were not being kept. Why you cannot or will not accept that, being given proof in the Declarations of Cause, being given proofs in Davis' inaugural speech, being given in Stevens' speech, the Hartford Convention which also feared Federal overreach... who knows why you avoid, dodge that all together. I can only see it as an agenda conflict problem. Does not fit your partisan profile.

Sure, slavery wasn't the only issue but if they solved slavery, if the South was confident it would be able to expand slavery unhindered into the territories, the North would enforce laws against fugitive slaves and Congress would never attempt to amend the Constitution to end slavery in the states, none of those other issues are sufficient for a Civil War. Solve ALL those other issues but leave slavery at risk, which means their wealth, economy, and way of life was at risk, and there is still a Civil War.

All those quotes do is confirm that the war was also very much about slavery, something I have never denied. I tried to visualize even one point that your side has made that would make it only about slavery... not one in the entire bunch. Closest was Stevens' Cornerstone speech, until one takes time to read the whole thing, then you should realize there is more going on there.

I think you're intentionally missing the point now, and in any event I have nothing more to add. The men at that time were crystal clear. If we didn't know why, we can just read what they told us.
 
And I explained that the husband, maybe the grandfather, of a family of maybe 10 would own all the property, so to say that the only person in that family who was a slave owner was the person with a deed is either deceptive or intentionally misleading as it lowballs the extent of families with slaves.



Sure, slavery wasn't the only issue but if they solved slavery, if the South was confident it would be able to expand slavery unhindered into the territories, the North would enforce laws against fugitive slaves and Congress would never attempt to amend the Constitution to end slavery in the states, none of those other issues are sufficient for a Civil War. Solve ALL those other issues but leave slavery at risk, which means their wealth, economy, and way of life was at risk, and there is still a Civil War.



I think you're intentionally missing the point now, and in any event I have nothing more to add. The men at that time were crystal clear. If we didn't know why, we can just read what they told us.
Yes, and the other way highballs the amount of people owning slaves, goes both ways. We are debating, you use your facts to your advantage, the other side is not allowed that same option? Still, if one third is the number we agree to use, that is still a super-majority that did not have slaves.

As stated previously, slavery was doomed and was dying out. The last country in the Western world to ban slavery was Brazil. In 1872, the population of Brazil was around 10 million with about 15% being slaves. Slavery was ended in 1888. As per Wikipedia, in fact it was an institution in decline by this time since in the 1880s the country had begun to attract European immigrant labor instead. Brazil was the last nation in the Western world to abolish slavery, and had about 40% of all slaves shipped to the Americas.

The US had mass immigration starting much earlier. From the early 1820s when we started keeping records until 1914 we know that more than 30 million Europeans immigrated to the US. That is a lot of labor supply. With workers in such supply they could fill all the jobs we had plus there was no need to take care of them cradle to grave. Add to that the growing mechanization of jobs during this period.

Slavery was on its way out, the writing was on the wall. The Southerners who had utilized the invention of the cotton gin making it feasible to remove the seeds without the individual hand picking tedium...which made it very profitable and why they wanted to increase slavery...those same folks would have jumped eagerly onto the next bandwagon inventions that would save them more money.


The fact of the matter is I have cut and pasted numerous instances of what they, Southerners, wrote other than slavery and you just willingly ignore it. So be it.
 
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If one could pick cotton as well as you are cherry picking, there would have been no need to ever mechanize the process.

So we can all believe Stevens on the tariffs not being the particular problem by 1860... but he was wrong about potential nullification or secession. Hell, we were right on the brink with Jackson and his Force Bill and then Clay to the rescue with a compromise tariff... thus fighting was duly averted. But Jackson had prepared, the Nullifiers were serious...so without Clay it most certainly could have happened. It didn't, but to wipe it clean off the table, pure nonsense.

Oh, and speaking of Nullification,

Jefferson on Nullification
"… that in cases of an abuse of the delegated powers, the members of the general government, being chosen by the people, a change by the people would be the constitutional remedy; but, where powers are assumed which have not been delegated, a nullification of the act is the rightful remedy: that every State has a natural right in cases not within the compact, (casus non fœderis) to nullify of their own authority all assumptions of power by others within their limits: that without this right, they would be under the dominion, absolute and unlimited, of whosoever might exercise this right of judgment for them: that nevertheless, this commonwealth, from motives of regard and respect for its co-States, has wished to communicate with them on the subject: that with them alone it is proper to communicate, they alone being parties to the compact, and solely authorized to judge in the last resort of the powers exercised under it…"

Madison, the "Father of the Constitution" on Interposition:
"The resolutions, having taken this view of the Federal compact, proceed to infer that, in cases of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of other powers, not granted by the said compact, the States, who are parties thereto, have the right, and are in duty bound to interpose to arrest the evil, and for maintaining, within their respective limits, the authorities, rights, and liberties appertaining to them. ...The Constitution of the United States was formed by the sanction of the States, given by each in its sovereign capacity. It adds to the stability and dignity, as well as to the authority of the Constitution, that it rests on this solid foundation. The States, then, being parties to the constitutional compact, and in their sovereign capacity, it follows of necessity that there can be no tribunal above their authority to decide, in the last resort, whether the compact made by them be violated; and, consequently, as parties to it, they must themselves decide, in the last resort, such questions as may be of sufficient magnitude to require their interposition."

Seems Jefferson and Madison have a different view of if there is a compact than you and Chase.

Chase wins. He was Chief Justice; they were not.
 
Chase wins. He was Chief Justice; they were not.
You are hilarious and, of course, absolutely wrong.

Two of the original founders, one the drafter of the DoI, the other the undisputed "Father of the Constitution", both Presidents of the United States, both former Secretaries of State, Madison also the one who pressed hard for the Bill of Rights, one of three authors of the Federalist Papers regarding that Constitution and the promises made to get it ratified...both far deeper thinkers with far more insight, not to mention experience, into what the Constitution actually says and its history, the meaning behind each word and phrase. Especially Madison.

Chase? Simply outclassed in every aspect. Secy of the Treasury and, based on his knowledge of Constitutional history, a lousy Chief Justice.

Its not criminal to be wrong Jack, but if it were, I would say you would be facing a lot of time looking at four walls. Hey, but on the bright side, you would have more time to read up on the fundamentals of the Constitution... silver linings always...
 
You are hilarious and, of course, absolutely wrong.

Two of the original founders, one the drafter of the DoI, the other the undisputed "Father of the Constitution", both Presidents of the United States, both former Secretaries of State, Madison also the one who pressed hard for the Bill of Rights, one of three authors of the Federalist Papers regarding that Constitution and the promises made to get it ratified...both far deeper thinkers with far more insight, not to mention experience, into what the Constitution actually says and its history, the meaning behind each word and phrase. Especially Madison.

Chase? Simply outclassed in every aspect. Secy of the Treasury and, based on his knowledge of Constitutional history, a lousy Chief Justice.

Its not criminal to be wrong Jack, but if it were, I would say you would be facing a lot of time looking at four walls. Hey, but on the bright side, you would have more time to read up on the fundamentals of the Constitution... silver linings always...

"The Constitution is what the judges say it is." --Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes QED
 
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