Civil War History - Secession and PoliticsWas it Slavery, or was it States Rights? Perhaps it was the election of Lincoln? What were the real reasons for Southern Secession and what were the political issues in this time of war? Find your answers here in the Secession and Politics Disussion.
The Philosophy of Secession, A Southern View.
by the Hon. L. W. Spratt, 13 February 1861.
"The South is now in the formation of a Slave Republic. This, perhaps, is not admitted generally. There are many contented to believe that the South as a geographical section is in mere assertion of its independence; that, it is instinct with no especial truth-pregnant of no distinct social nature; that for some unaccountable reason the two sections have become opposed to each other that for reasons equally insufficient, there is disagreement between peoples that direct them; and that from no overruling necessity, no impossibility of co-existence, but as mere matter of policy, it has been considered best for the South to strike out herself and establish an independance of her own. This, I fear, is an inadequate conception of the controversy.
The contest is not between the North and South as geographical sections, for between such sections merely there can be contest; nor between the people of the North and the people of the South, for our relations have been pleasant and on neutral grounds there is still nothing to estrange us. We eat together, trade together, and practice, yet, in intercourse, with great respect, the courtesies of common life. But the real contest is between the two forms of society which have become established, the one at the North and the other at the South. Society is essentially different from government--as different as is the nut from the bur, or nervous body of the shell-fish from the bony structure which surrounds it; and within this government two societies had developed as variant in structure and distinct in form as any two beings in animated nature. The one is a society composed of one race, the other of two races. The one is bound together buty by the two great social relations of husband and wife and parent to child; the other by the three relations of husband and wife, and parent and child, and master and slave. The one embodies in it's political structure the principle that equality is the right of man; the other that it is the right of equals only, has taken to itself the rounded form of a social aristocracy... "
__________________ "The American people and the Government at Washington may refuse to recognize it for a time but the inexorable logic of events will force it upon them in the end; that the war now being waged in this land is a war for and against slavery." Frederick Douglass
"Loyalty to our ancestors does not include loyalty to their mistakes." George Santayana
The Philosophy of Secession, A Southern View.
by the Hon. L. W. Spratt, 13 February 1861.
"The South is now in the formation of a Slave Republic. This, perhaps, is not admitted generally. There are many contented to believe that the South as a geographical section is in mere assertion of its independence; that, it is instinct with no especial truth-pregnant of no distinct social nature; that for some unaccountable reason the two sections have become opposed to each other that for reasons equally insufficient, there is disagreement between peoples that direct them; and that from no overruling necessity, no impossibility of co-existence, but as mere matter of policy, it has been considered best for the South to strike out herself and establish an independance of her own. This, I fear, is an inadequate conception of the controversy.
The contest is not between the North and South as geographical sections, for between such sections merely there can be contest; nor between the people of the North and the people of the South, for our relations have been pleasant and on neutral grounds there is still nothing to estrange us. We eat together, trade together, and practice, yet, in intercourse, with great respect, the courtesies of common life. But the real contest is between the two forms of society which have become established, the one at the North and the other at the South. Society is essentially different from government--as different as is the nut from the bur, or nervous body of the shell-fish from the bony structure which surrounds it; and within this government two societies had developed as variant in structure and distinct in form as any two beings in animated nature. The one is a society composed of one race, the other of two races. The one is bound together buty by the two great social relations of husband and wife and parent to child; the other by the three relations of husband and wife, and parent and child, and master and slave. The one embodies in it's political structure the principle that equality is the right of man; the other that it is the right of equals only, has taken to itself the rounded form of a social aristocracy... "
"The one is a society composed of one race [whitesonly], the other of two races."
__________________ POWER & MONEY
"Your New-York bankers and merchants are shrewd people, but I never gave them credit for so much sagacity as when they took the Government Loan. It was not merely patriotism, it was a high stroke of policy. It has saved the Government, and what they will regard as equally important, saved them from a great financial disaster."
Since the post is 7 pages, it can be assumed revisionist like Battalion will not (or cannot) study it.
To me, the most important part of the Letter, is proof, provided by the writer, that the proposed confederacy, will, probably, not survive and gives the reason's it will not i.e., the southern leadership did not, in the end, face up to the challenge of accepting forthrightly and honestly the implications of what was required to successfully base a country and it's society upon slavery.
Tariffs would only become an issue because the South was so dependent on slavery for their wealth and economic growth.
If slavery were not the major reason, why did the Constitution of the Confederate States have so many stipulations concerning the right to own and possess slaves in any Confederate state or territory.
Tariffs would only become an issue because the South was so dependent on slavery for their wealth and economic growth.
*The Tariiff WAS an issue...and longer than that of slavery.
*All those in the South engaged in farming were disaffected by the tariff...whether they owned slaves or not.
__________________ POWER & MONEY
"Your New-York bankers and merchants are shrewd people, but I never gave them credit for so much sagacity as when they took the Government Loan. It was not merely patriotism, it was a high stroke of policy. It has saved the Government, and what they will regard as equally important, saved them from a great financial disaster."
*The Tariiff WAS an issue...and longer than that of slavery.
*All those in the South engaged in farming were disaffected by the tariff...whether they owned slaves or not.
Slavery, we know, was an issue at the Constitutional convention of 1787, and had caused contention among the states before that. The Tariff of 1789 appears to be the first tariff in US history. Please explain what you are referring to here.
Tim
__________________ "Let us, then, consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each state is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy, which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses."
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina, 1740-1824, Revolutionary War soldier, one of the authors of the US Constitution in 1787, speaking at the South Carolina Ratifying Convention in 1788.
*The Tariiff WAS an issue...and longer than that of slavery.
*All those in the South engaged in farming were disaffected by the tariff...whether they owned slaves or not.
Are these statements above your opinion or do you have a source for them?
Unionblue
__________________ "The American people and the Government at Washington may refuse to recognize it for a time but the inexorable logic of events will force it upon them in the end; that the war now being waged in this land is a war for and against slavery." Frederick Douglass
"Loyalty to our ancestors does not include loyalty to their mistakes." George Santayana
Are these statements above your opinion or do you have a source for them?
Unionblue
Like say what the goods the tariff actually had an impact on, which effected everyone everwhere, but in different degrees or like in the secesion ordinces that mention Tariffs as a cause for secesion.
__________________ "Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.
Liberty is a well armed lamb contesting the vote."
Benjamin Franklin, 1759
All those in the South engaged in farming were disaffected by the tariff...whether they owned slaves or not.
No matter how many times the sections are inaccurately divided into industrial and agrarian, the fact is that farming was not a sectional occupation. More free people outside the slave states engaged in farming than within. New York led the nation in number of farms, acres of improved land, and cash value, followed by Ohio, Pennslyvania, Illinois, and Indiana. Your assertion is misleading and your argument is simply empty.
Southern farmers bore no more burden when they bought their sugar or chains or wool suit than did their northern or western countrymen.
Like say what the goods the tariff actually had an impact on, which effected everyone everwhere, but in different degrees....
I'm not positive I understand what it is you're trying to say, here? Are you familiar with the various tariff schedules? Do you have any examples you'd like to give of tariffs that especially burdened the bulk of southerners more than the bulk of northerners?
Cedarstripper
Last edited by cedarstripper; 06-04-2008 at 10:07 AM.
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