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.
First thank you Captain Obvious do you really think I was unaware that Congress affixes tarrifs.President Jackson did sign it into law though or are you not aware he could've vetoed it.
As for your question about whether a person in Iowa paid the same for an imported product as someone from South Carolina well yes duh.If you cannot grasp the concept that an import cost more because of legislation passed by the Northern states then I pity you.At that time as you probably are aware Northeastern manufactures simply could not compete with Britsh goods.British goods were much cheaper than American goods.You're a smart fellow I know you realize this.Enough said.
What part of New England are you claiming was horribly victimized by this?As a matter of record New England voted for this tarrif.As a matter of record South Carolina voted against it.That fact should squash any nonsense comparing New England's suffering with South Carolinas.New England was unhappy about parts of the tarrif they thought benefited the Western states but they obviously didn't see enough negative in the bill to vote against it.Please name one South Carolinian who voted for the tarrif of abominations.Oh wait a minute there's not one.Unless you subscribe to the belief that New Englanders are intellectually inferior to Southerners(I'd probably like to believe this but unfortunately I know better) why would they vote for a tarrif devastating their state?Could it possibly be because they thought the good outweighed the bad?Yes South Carolina cried the loudest and with good darn reason.Following is what I believe to be an objective summary of the tarrif of abominations.This source is not neo-Confederate in nature.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
(Redirected from Tariff of Abominations)
The Tariff of 1828, also known as the Tariff of Abominations, was a protective tariff passed by the U.S. Congress in 1828.
The goal of the tariff was to protect industry in the northern United States from competing European goods by causing the prices of those goods to rise. The system of tariffs was triggered after end of the War of 1812 and the Napoleonic Wars, when a recession in Europe led British manufacturers to offer to sell goods in America at prices American manufacturers often could not match.
The first protective tariff was passed by Congress in 1816, and was increased in 1824, and again in 1828 by the Tariff of Abominations, a name given by the bill's Southern opponents. President John Quincy Adams signed the tariff, although he realized it would be used to discredit him politically. In the 1828 election, Andrew Jackson defeated Adams.
John C. Calhoun was Jackson's vice president at the time. He was a South Carolinian, and thus strongly against the tariff. Faced with a reduced market for goods, the British reduced their imports of cotton, which hurt the South. Thus, not only did the tariff force the South to buy manufactured goods at a higher price, but they also faced a reduced income from sales of raw materials. This inspired Calhoun to attempt nullification of the tariff within South Carolina. He authored the South Carolina Exposition and Protest in response and would later participate in the Nullification Crisis in 1832.
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tariff_of_1828"
It is a common known fact that South Carolina feared becoming poor due to the tarrif.
Nope. It's a commonly held belief, due to misinformation spread by charlatans like Thomas DiLorenzo and Charles Adams or well-meaning but misled folks like the SCV [An organization I consider does the Lord's work when they are honoring soldiers, but unfortunately is way off when they try to teach history].
Check out Cedarstripper's Post #579 in this thread. He saved me the trouble of finding that excerpt from Taussig's history of the tariff of the United States. It shows emphatically that Calhoun himself and his cronies were the ones who actually designed the 1828 tariff and tried to make it as odious as possible to the New England states. They never dreamed it would pass, but it did pass. South Carolina didn't fear becoming poor due to the tariff. The opposition to the tariff was driven, as I showed, by the desire to protect slavery, because they believed the same power that enabled Congress to lay the tariff and to provide for the common welfare by spending on internal improvements could be used to abolish slavery.
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Originally Posted by MobileBoy
Calhoun wasn't always a supporter of state's rights he changed his views as I'm well aware and most literate Southerners are.
He changed his views because he saw a threat to slavery and looked to state rights as the way to preserve slavery by interposing the power of the state against the Federal government.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MobileBoy
Why did Andrew Jackson lower the tarrif if he didn't want to give some relief to the Southern states.
Andrew Jackson didn't have the power to lower the tariff. Cedarstripper is exactly right that Congress, not the President, sets the tariff rates.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MobileBoy
Let me guess the fact that the tarrif was reduced is irrelevant to you because in your mind it wasn't an issue.
You might want to give up your dream of becoming a mindreader.
The fact that the tariff was reduced is not irrelevant. As I showed when I quoted Lawrence Keitt, the extreme state rights advocates saw that they could get the Federal government to back down, and this was an important step along the way to the Civil War. The issue of the tariff was the pretext for the test of the extreme state rights position, but the Federal government acted to remedy what was being complained about. The real issue, the protection of slavery, though, remained. This was a manufactured crisis from beginning to end.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MobileBoy
How can you call John Calhoun the devil.I guess to you a politician representing the interest of the state he was elected from is satanic.
There you go trying to read minds again when it would be more instructive to read the actual history.
Calhoun manufactured a crisis in 1828 in order to develop his extreme state rights theory for the purpose of protecting and perpetuating the institution of slavery, keeping human beings in bondage. That's enough to make him a devil. But he spread his heresy and it eventually led to a bloody war that cost over 600,000 American lives. That places him at Lucifer's right hand.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MobileBoy
How many South Carolinians voted for the tarrif of abominations.Please put that up.There's no way the majority of them casted a positive vote for it.That my friend is fact that they did not.
None. That was their plan. See the excerpt from Taussig provided by Cedarstripper. The plan was to craft the bill but vote against it. As William Freehling told us, "The tariff of 1828 was the law of the land, and South Carolinians were the authors of its worst abominations." [William W. Freehling, Prelude to Civil War: The Nullification Controversy in South Carolina, 1816-1836, p. 137]
But then, none from Maine voted for it either. 11 of 13 House of Representatives members from Massachusetts voted against it. New England as a whole voted against it 23-16 in the House. Nobody from New England, especially Maine and Massachusetts, said anything about nullifying the tariff.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MobileBoy
So to pretend that the tarrif had no impact on South Carolina's decision to secede is really not worth discussing further.
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Not pretending at all. It's a historical fact proven by the record. The South Carolinians were the ones who crafted the 1828 Tariff. His Satanic Majesty, John C. Calhoun, manufactured the nullification crisis from the start. If you're not willing to be educated in the real history of events, that's not my problem. But I highly recommend you read William W. Freehling's book, Prelude to Civil War: The Nullification Controversy in South Carolina, 1816-1836. It is the real history behind the crisis, not the falsities from the charlatans and the deluded.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MobileBoy
I love how you quote saying South Carolinians were the authors of some of its worst abominations.What were they the authors of ?You leave that out.
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See the excerpt from Taussig provided by Cedarstripper. I can't help it if you haven't read the basic history of the 1828 tariff.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MobileBoy
That quote is totally irrelevant because South Carolina didn't support the tarrif.That is fact noone can contradict.
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That was their plan. They wrote it, then voted against it.
As for your question about whether a person in Iowa paid the same for an imported product as someone from South Carolina well yes duh.If you cannot grasp the concept that an import cost more because of legislation passed by the Northern states then I pity you.
This remark is uncalled for. And an import that is not dutiable does not cost more because of the tariff. And it wasn't passed by the Northern states.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MobileBoy
At that time as you probably are aware Northeastern manufactures simply could not compete with Britsh goods.British goods were much cheaper than American goods.
Actually, that's not true. British goods were not on the whole cheaper than American goods. We have several instances of southerners saying how Northern goods were very cheap to buy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MobileBoy
What part of New England are you claiming was horribly victimized by this?As a matter of record New England voted for this tarrif.
Now you are showing that you are completely unfamiliar with the history surrounding this tariff. If you're not going to bother to do the basic research you're going to make yourself look bad every time. As a matter of record, New England voted AGAINST this tariff in the House of Representatives. In the Senate it was a bare majority of 6-5 for the tariff, with one not voting. So the actual record is the OPPOSITE of what you assumed it was. See the House Journal for 22 Apr 1828 and the Senate Journal for 13 May 1828.
If you haven't read Taussig on this, if you haven't looked at the voting or the debate on this, and if you haven't read Freehling on this, then you just don't have the background.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MobileBoy
This source is not neo-Confederate in nature.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
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It might as well be, because it's not a credible source. Or have you not bothered to read this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikiped...ral_disclaimer
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First thank you Captain Obvious do you really think I was unaware that Congress affixes tarrifs.President Jackson did sign it into law though or are you not aware he could've vetoed it.
If you want to descend into rudeness, I've got better things to do. The fact is, you wrote this: "Why did Andrew Jackson lower the tarrif if he didn't want to give some relief to the Southern states." You make no mention of the intent of Congress - only 'why did Jackson do this if he didn't want to give that," as if he were flying solo. It's sloppy - kinda like when someone claims that tariffs were put in place by northern industrialists.
Quote:
If you cannot grasp the concept that an import cost more because of legislation passed by the Northern states then I pity you.
It all depends. Are you familiar with "elasticity"? But lets go with the case of a revenue tariff with no domestic substitution - how about coffee. How does the duty added to coffee inspire the deep southern states to secede, and not any other states?
I'm curious...what do you think most tariff revenues were raised on?
Hey cedarstripper ,
To me that was being Captain Obvious in a big way to tell me that Congress affixes tarrifs.No I didn't mention Congress because I assumed that every member on this forum knew their role considering we're all high school graduates.Andrew Jackson is generally credited by historians as having a major part in getting the tarrif lowered.I do aplogize for being rude.I could have left the Captain Obvious reference out.
Maybe you and I are not on the same page with what we're discussing on the tarrif issue.So I'm going to try to clear that up.I don't think the Confederate states seceded over tarrifs.I do think Southerners were aware of the tarrif and how it benefited the North.I don't think the Northern politicians were evil but I think they were well aware the tarrifs benefited the North more than the South.They represented the interest of the areas where they were elected from so I don't condemn them as demons for what they did.I do recognize the fact as do most historians that this tarrif was voted through by the North to the detriment of Southerners.I feel like you try to pretend that the tarrif wasn't beneficial to the North and detrimental to the South.Like pretending New England was just as bad as South Carolina and that South Carolina only cried the loudest.Yet you didn't object when I told you that New England voted for the tarrif of abominations and not one South Carolinian did.Maybe I'm wrong and you weren't trying to persuade me to believe that somehow you have more knowledge of the tarrif issue than my college professors,99% historians who have reported on the issue, and 99% of all American college students who have ever taken American history.You are obviously an intelligent fellow but sometimes when poeple say the sky is blue it is.
"Maybe I'm wrong and you weren't trying to persuade me to believe that somehow you have more knowledge of the tarrif issue than my college professors,99% historians who have reported on the issue, and 99% of all American college students who have ever taken American history."
You will need to back up those numbers. When one can't see the forest because the trees are in the way, others might question their perception. How many college professors did you have that discussed the tariff/WBTS argument? Which historians do you include in your 99 percent. And how many of all American History college students do you know?
It may be that tariff revenue benefitted the North more than the South, but you've submitted no evidence backing that contention. As the South held congressional power during most of the period in question, why didn't it dip its fingers into the pot?
If slavery was not THE CAUSE of the WBTS, then it was the leading candidate. It would have been followed (in my opinion) by Southern fears over the loss of political power in Washington as well as the Tariff question (asserted by Jeff Davis in his book The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government).
Slavery was dying in the early 1800s until the invetion of the cotton gin, making that labor intensive crop more profitable.
I have a theory that slavery would have started to finally die out in the 1870s without the intervention of the WBTS. I think most Southerners forsaw the end of slavery but wanted to be in control of it, not having it forced on them by the point of Northern bayonets.
__________________ F. S. Powers
Union Ancersor: Pvt Arnuah Norton, 60th Ohio. (G-G-G Grandfather) Died at Salisbury NC, November 3, 1864
Confederate Ancestors: Captain Thomas A. Morrow, 29th Texas Cavalry (G-G-G- Uncle) and 2LT George W. Morrow, 31st Texas Cavalry (G-G-G Grandfather). Both survived the war
If slavery was not THE CAUSE of the WBTS, then it was the leading candidate. It would have been followed (in my opinion) by Southern fears over the loss of political power in Washington as well as the Tariff question (asserted by Jeff Davis in his book The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government).
Slavery was dying in the early 1800s until the invetion of the cotton gin, making that labor intensive crop more profitable.
I have a theory that slavery would have started to finally die out in the 1870s without the intervention of the WBTS. I think most Southerners forsaw the end of slavery but wanted to be in control of it, not havivg it forced on them by the point of Northern bayonets.
My way of thinking too. Slavery was on the way out. Northern "liberals", then, as now, sought to impose their beliefs and lifestyle on the South, and the South resented it. Odd how the political map still closely resembles the map of the divided states during the War. Just my opinion. No offense to anyone.
John W.
__________________ Ancestors in CSA Army: 51st VA, 54th VA, 45th VA, 50th VA, 24th VA
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