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.
Neil,
I'm not mad at anyone. But I do not care to be catagorized as cultivating pity. As if we had carefully stored up an inventory of the abuses the South has suffered over the last dozen or so decades and we take perverted pleasure in sitting in dark, smelly corners regurgitating them all, chewing them over and over like mouthfuls of stake vomit. I just was pointing out the use of the very word prosperity in regards to the nation wasn't true. Only those of the nation that won. But perhaps none of what I have said happened. Made it all up. I forgot the cardinal rule. The North is right and the South should be grateful for the fact. Please sir, may I have another?
Georgiana, thank you for that. And yes, I have a 14 month old beautiful little tow-headed girl with the most gorgeous blue eyes you ever saw. She definitely has me wrapped around her little teeny finger. It was quite an adjustment getting used to the idea of a new one after 4 kids already and a 14 year gap! It's interesting having a baby of our own, plus a grandson the same age in the house! All thoughts of retirement at a reasonable age have been dismissed.
I can imagine the changes that have taken place in your family over the last couple of years! Our son-in-law deployed with the 121st ARW to Al Udeid on June 3rd and we have now the girls (Emma-5, Lilly-3) two days a week. I have never been so exhausted in my entire life.
Georgiana: I could be misinterpreting your posts, but it seems as if you’re advancing the notion that support for “Manifest Destiny” was in some way confined to the North? Have I misinterpreted?
It appears you have misinterpreted. I've always been of the mind that Manifest Destiny was a concept pretty much accompanying the birth of the republic, and taken to new heights by the southerner Jefferson. And it was certainly alive and well in 1860, and well-beyond. It appears you agree that it was part and parcel of our self-image. Do you not think that it must have come into play with the North's (Lincoln's) refusal to let the South go? After all, since God wanted the US to include most of North America, Mexico and natives be dam*ed, then it would be a perfectly rational step to not just take land from others, but to hold on to what you have, even at great costs. After all, God wanted us this big.
Yes, I would agree that it came into play (in a big way) during the ACW, I just don’t tend to see it as an issue that split purely along sectional lines. I also question how much of this sentiment can be reliably traced to faith, versus explosive population growth and plain-old American materialism.
Neil, I believe I understand your point completely. But I also think that democracy would have been shown to be a resounding success, if only it would have been allowed to operate among the people of the states, instead of thwarted by a centralizing northern military power.
I cannot comprehend how forcing one's will on another is somehow furthering democracy -- unless your definition of democracy is indeed two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.
Could I successfully coax you into explaining what exactly the Southern States were seeking to impose on the North by simply leaving and going their own way?
As for ordinary people deciding their destiny and future? It appears to me you are advocating ordinary peoples' destiny and future being decided by others, far away and against their will.
It appears to me you are saying that self-government is a people's right only if their reasons for wanting self-government are "noble" and "important enough," as defined by those not wanting to allow them their independence?
You speak of the North having to suffer consequences. The only thing I can think of that might cause them suffering was the loss of Southern revenue or perhaps a domestic market for their wares.
Is that what you are getting at?
Just why would the "majority", i.e., the North, care that the South wanted to go their own way? How does that hurt the North?
I very much want to answer you, but I want to do your questions justice as they are very good ones.
Your first sentence is appreciated in that I am glad that you seem to know where I am coming from. I often feel that I am not very clear because I cannot express myself as clearly as some on this board. You further state that you think that democracy would have been shown to be a resounding success if only it would have been allowed to operate among the people of the states, instead of thwarted by a centralizing northern military power.
I ask two questions in return, Hal, in the hopes of explaining myself further. One, what centralizing northern military power? Where was this power before and at the very start of the war? I am very curious to find it as with the research I have done, I keep getting the idea that because the central government at Washington was so weak that the South decided to chance secession.
I keep looking for this centralized northern military government that was so powerful and had such resources. The only instrument of government that I can find that was in every city, town, and state that actually came into contact with most every-day citizens, was the Post Office. Not the 16,000 Federal troops as they were scattered far and wide, mainly out west fighting indians and such. Not Federal Marshals, as there were only a handful and even their activities were directed by a part-time Attorney General. So the centralizing northern military power/government was a danger how?
Now to the first part of your sentence, that democracy would have been shown to be a resounding success, if only it would have been allowed to operate among the people of the states. I agree completely with you on this point.
Your second sentence is one I agree with in total, that it is incomprehensible that by forcing one's will on another is somehow furthering democracy. And at this point you ask me to explain what the Southern States were seeking to impose on the North by simply leaving and going their own way. Here is where I ask you to back up a bit in history, before acts of secession began in the South.
Did the South in any way before the war, force other states in the Union to comply with rules, laws, customs, regulations, that the people in other states (North or South) found objectionable? To the point to where they declared that their elected representatives lodge their objections in Congress and the Senate? And did it matter if a majority of those people in those other states did raise objections?
Did leaders in the South propose changes in the law, or laws, that would be in opposition to the will of the majority of the people in their states? Did the leaders of the South wish an expansion of Federal power, far in excess of what were considered the limits of the government of the times?
What I suggest to you is that the South was trying to impose upon an entire nation and all those people in all the states was done at the behest of a minority who in reality cared little of those peoples desire of democracy or their will. I ask you to consider that every time the institution of slavery, that glaring contradiction of democracy that was pointed out time and time again by a skeptical world, came under any criticism or attack, those leaders of the South swung into action with little regard of the peoples will.
The Congressional gag order that prevented ANY petition to the representatives of those people in the states, a right guaranteed under the Constitution, was passed at mainly Southern insistence, depriving ALL the citizens in the nation of their rights.
When the Democratic Party's best candidate puts forth the idea that the PEOPLE of a state or territory should decide if they want slavery or not, these self-same Southern leaders demand a Federal Law that permits slavery to be protected in EVERY state, not just the new territories or new states that might be created from them, and demands that the Federal government enforce this law throughout the entire country, in every state, regardless how the citizens of a state vote or exercise democracy therein.
And then, if these self-same men can not have their way, that if they are challenged in any manner, they demand that certain candidates not run for office, that if these certain candidates selected by their parties and then elected by a majority of the people in a free election, candidates they will not even allow to be placed on ballots in their states, they will lead their states in rebellion and the hell with the people.
Hal, I think it is reversed in my opinion, that those who find fault with the North, West and with hundreds of thousands in the South who wanted to abide by the law and the legal results of a national election, were betrayed by a hostile minority who short-circuted the very democracy you approve of.
I do not consider the theory of democratic government as secure as you seem to think it would be at that time in history. I believe that those in power in the South were attempting to change it from what it was supposed to be in order to maintain the existing order, even to the point of extending that order's power and influence with it's own citizens at their expense. Because of their ongoing, continuous actions, representative democracy was in danger from them and from other nations who wished it to go away and not upset their social order.
Revenue was not the consequence the North would suffer with the loss of 1/3 of the nation nor the loss of a domestic market for trinkets. The loss would have affected the entire nation and the world, proving to those who did not love democracy that it was a failure, that it could not stand up to any challenge to it and that the people's lives were better off in the hands of the divine right of kings and the powerful few that knew best.
That's the best I can do Hal, with these clumsy phrases and thoughts of mine. I hope I answered some of your questions.
Sincerely,
Unionblue
(Message edited by Unionblue on August 21, 2004)
__________________ "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
Re the Falklands War, I’m afraid I’m too stupid to understand the analogy which you have drawn. Britain fought to ensure that the islanders retained the freedom to choose their own nationality; in 1861 the U.S. government fought to ensure that Southerners could not choose their own nationality. To my mind the two situations could not be more different.
Hal beat me to it in asking you to explain why Southerners were imposing on their Northern neighbours by leaving the Union. Your reply simply deepens my confusion. I must be misunderstanding you, because you appear to be saying that secession was an imposition on the North because Southerners had behaved so unreasonably and imposed on their neighbours while they were in the Union. To me this simply does not compute. Surely Northerners should have been delighted to be free of such obnoxious fellow-citizens?
And I remain baffled by your contention that the global future of the democratic form of government depended on the imprisonment of millions of free-born Americans within the United States. The whole point of freedom and democracy, surely, is that every citizen of a country wants to be a citizen. How can a person or community be free, in any sense of the word, if they cannot even have a say in which country they are a part of?
You urge me to read Union memoirs, diaries & letters. At the moment I only read A.N.V. material from which I can glean biographical material on junior officers. I am working hard to try to publish my project on CD-ROM in about three years time, and I cannot afford to be side-tracked. But I have read many such volumes in the past, and my attitude towards the ordinary Federal soldier is much like yours towards the ordinary Reb (when your buttons aren’t being pushed ): respect for his courage and devotion to principle, but a belief that those principles were mistaken.
Neil, is there any way you can demonstrate how the act of seceding from the Union harmed the remaining States? I really am not mentally quick enough to understand the connection, I fear. Perhaps what you are saying is, they were betrayed, not harmed? If this is what you are saying, then I don't have much of a problem with that. But to say they were harmed by the secessions, that does not compute, given my limited RAM.
As for your questions pertaining to pre-secession laws etc, -- it appears you are speaking of laws that were formed by the central government that included the eventual seceders. There is no question that many laws, acts, etc were favorable to the South. That is the nature of a republic of states and contending interests of such a very large and diverse republic. But I must agree with what Bill says -- ridding themselves from such self-serving baggage should have been a positive thing for the remaining States, it seems to me.
The question regarding exactly how the North was harmed by the act of Southern secession remains a tough puzzle to solve. Other than lost revenue and markets, I am not aware of any harm. And equally problematic is the question of how democracy was saved by using one's military might to destroy self-determination among one's own people.
Neil, I must say that it seems to me, your gripe is that the South took their ball and went home once it became apparent that they were going to lose the game. I will not argue with that, but I will quote the London Times:
London Times: "If Northerners… had peaceably allowed the seceders to depart, the result might fairly have been quoted as illustrating the advantages of Democracy; but when Republicans put empire above liberty, and resorted to political oppression and war rather than suffer any abatement of national power, it was clear that nature at Washington was precisely the same nature as at St. Petersburg. … Democracy broke down, not when the Union ceased to be agreeable to all its constituent states, but when it was upheld, like any other Empire, by force of arms."
Personally, I don’t find the balkanization of the United States an appealing prospect. What keeps nagging at me, however, is the question of whether or not we had, in fact, become two separate “people” or nations. I believe that, despite the founder’s infinite wisdom, their fondest hope was that we would always reconcile our vested interests within the political process. That being said, what if, instead of a stand-off in Charleston Harbor, a convention had been called with an eye toward developing terms for separation – and then vetting those terms with the individual states? Was such an idea really so far-fetched?
Questions to ponder….
What kind of terms would need to be in place in order to avoid a war for continental power?
How would joint debts and obligations be resolved?
What about the territories – how would they be dived-up?
What about the Fugitive Slave Act?
Border States: Without the onset of hostilities, would these states remain within the U.S.?
Would both nations be strong enough to ward-off any attempt from other nations to exert undue influence?
How do both nations evolve over the next 50 years, economically, socially, and politically? How are we positioned for 1917 and 1940?
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): respect for his courage and devotion to principle, but a belief that those principles were mistaken. 
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