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.
"Mr. Lincoln has accepted the Presidential nomination tendered him by the Black Republicans. ...[_Daily Courier,_ Louisville, 26 May 1860]
"Upon the accession of Lincoln to power, we would apprehend no direct act of violence against negro property, but by the use of federal office, contracts, power and patronage, the building up in every Southern State of a Black Republican party, the ally and stipendiary of Northern fanaticism, to become in a few short years the open advocates of abolition, the confiscation of negro property by emancipation sudden or gradual, and eventually the ruin of every Southern State by the destruction of negro labor. ...[_Richmond Enquirer,_ 10 Jul 1860]
I am not sure why you think this strengthens your case for anything. All I see here is talk by people who don't like the way things are headed. There isn't the slightest hint of illegal conduct by the rest of the country, only the gradual loss of a political battle by peaceful means. Essentially, the South went to war because they lost out, fair and square, in the democratic process. Even then, there is every evidence that the election of 1860 was lost at least in part by the direct attempt of various Southerners, the Fire-Eaters, to split the Democratic Party and throw the election to a Republican (ANY Republican, not just Lincoln) as a means of whipping up fervor for secession.
Most newspaper editorials follow events rather than initiating them. If one is seeking causes, it is well to listen to those who acted to realize a cause, rather than those who merely pontificate on the results of the action.
What influence Barnwell Rhett's thoughts and actions had on the starting of the Civil War is problematic, But the thoughts and actions of the govenor and the legislature of S.C. are not problematic, nor are the results of their actions.
Mr. Rhett, however, had been a SC state legislator, SC's Attorney General back in the Nullification Crisis, a US Congressman, and a US Senator. He resigned in protest when SC only passed a measure asserting the right to secede instead of actually seceding in 1852.)He spoke out for secession in the 1820s, in his very first public campaign. He worked tirelessly to achieve it, used the power of his paper to spread it, corresponded with others throughout the South about it (such as Pollard of the Richmond Examiner) and hoped to become the first Governor of an independent SC (in which he was bitterly disappointed). He was universally regarded as one of the two most important members of the Fire-Eaters, and was discussing in letters in 1858 the split of the Democratic Party that happened in 1860 at Charleston. He was then one of the more influential members of the SC secession convention, a representative of the delegation to Montgomery to form the Confederacy, and a disgruntled member of the Confederate Congress.
Did y'all notice that the New Orlean's Bee and Picayune, squared off on opposite sides?
Editors then walked a fine line between agreeable commentary and titillating rant. Commentary is not exciting whereas rant is; therefore rant sells more papers unless it becomes disagreeable. We might assume that the screaming meemies felt safe in their rantings; i.e., their readership wasn't going to string them up.
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Most newspaper editorials follow events rather than initiating them. If one is seeking causes, it is well to listen to those who acted to realize a cause, rather than those who merely pontificate on the results of the action.
Yes and no. Take one of Battalion's earlier posts from the NO Bee. Was that following an event? No. It was adolescent braggadocio and prediction. A few of the others were, as well. But then, I'd call the Picayune's editorial (posted by Cash) a remarkably daring depiction of what might be an event. Don't remember all the others, but that's not so important as that there were split opinions among southern editors.
Ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
I consistently find them that don not represent the mainstream view of...Northern "historians"
Since I have made no reference at all to this, I'll have to assume you are simply trying to create a diversion here.
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Originally Posted by Battalion
I find no shortage of them...so how is it not mainstream?...how does it not prove my point?
Now, you know that if you want to provide 20 quotes like these, deliberately thrown out without context and picked out like needles from a haystack, I can find 200 to deny it. You can find a quote for any purpose in the mountain of material that is the Civil War, and you are simply playing a game to try to make a point you want to push look all new and shiny.
It isn't so. As I have already said, it is normal for economics to be involved when humans are. Naturally enough, Northerners were concerned when Southerners started trying to bankrupt them, as I have pointed out elsewhere. Yet we know for sure that Northerners DID NOT then go to war. They waited and hoped for a peaceful resolution -- while Southerners used armed force to seize property, and raised armies, and finally assaulted US troops peacefully going about their duties.
If you want to look at an economic cause of the war, tell us about the one that caused the Southerners to open fire. I am fairly sure Beauregard didn't receive his orders to attack because of concern for the unemployed in Philadelphia and other Northern cities. Are you trying to tell us that was what made Davis issue those orders?
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Originally Posted by Battalion
How did your Northern "historians" manage to totally ignore this matter?
What makes you say that they did? Economics and the Civil War have been discussed ad nauseum ever since the war began by speakers and writers on both sides. I doubt there is ANY Civil War related issue that has not been covered in huge piles of scholarly books and theses. I think the problem that bothers you is that all this silliness has been long since discarded after decades of scholarly work as unsupportable.
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Originally Posted by Battalion
Both sides have self-interest involved.
Of course. The problem for you is that ONLY the South started taking illegal actions, using armed force, seizing property and funds, breaking agreements, and assaulting Federal troops peacefully going about their duty. What "self-interest" caused that violent and illegal behavior, and why is it you do not wish to address it?
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Originally Posted by Battalion
It is you and your cohorts that have shrugged off and repeatedly denied any motive of self-interest on the part of the North.
I have "cohorts"? Wow. I always wanted "cohorts". If you are talking about the Roman military unit, there would be about 600 of them. Who are they?
But the fact is that people here seem to be acknowledging that Northerners had concerns and "self-interests". They just notice that Northerners didn't do anything at all to the seceding states until after they started shooting at US troops. Whatever axe you have to grind, you can't accept that and you refuse to face it. So you throw out quotes without explaining your meaning, and you ask all these rhetorical questions to avoid examining the issue in a fair and forthright manner. This allows you to claim it was all the fault of those mean Northerners, and that those nice Southerners were the aggrieved party. What a humbug that is.
How did your Northern "historians" manage to totally ignore this matter?
Probably because there is nothing there.
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It is you and your cohorts that have shrugged off and repeatedly denied any motive of self-interest on the part of the North.
There was plenty of self-interest on the part of the North -- most of that went away when Beau ordered the open fire.
If you would, please, name a "southern" historian.
Ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
I am not sure why you think this strengthens your case for anything. All I see here is talk by people who don't like the way things are headed. There isn't the slightest hint of illegal conduct by the rest of the country, only the gradual loss of a political battle by peaceful means. Essentially, the South went to war because they lost out, fair and square, in the democratic process. Even then, there is every evidence that the election of 1860 was lost at least in part by the direct attempt of various Southerners, the Fire-Eaters, to split the Democratic Party and throw the election to a Republican (ANY Republican, not just Lincoln) as a means of whipping up fervor for secession.
Tim
It's the reasons they used to justify "resistance"--slavery, slavery, slavery.
"The issue before the country is the extinction of slavery. No man of common sense, who has observed the progress of events, and who is not prepared to surrender the institution, with the safety and independence of the South, can doubt that the time for action has come--now or never. The Southern States are now in the crisis of their fate; and, if we read aright the signs of the times, nothing is needed for our deliverance, but that the ball of revolution be set in motion. There is sufficient readiness among the people to make it entirely successful. Co-operation will follow the action of any State. The example of a forward movement only is requisite to unite Southern States in a common cause. Under these circumstances the Legislature of South Carolina is about to meet. It happens to assemble in advance of the Legislature of any other State. Being in session at this momentous juncture--the Legislature of that State which is most united in the policy of freeing the South from Black Republican domination--the eyes of the whole country, and most especially of the resistance party of the Southern States, is intently turned upon the conduct of this body. We have innumerable assurances that the men of action in each and all of the Southern States, earnestly desire South Carolina to exhibit promptitude and decision in this conjuncture. Other states are torn and divided, to a greater or less extent, by old party issues. South Carolina alone is not. Any practical move would enable the people of other States to rise above their past divisions, and lock shields on the broad ground of Southern security." [_Charleston Mercury,_ 3 Nov 1860]
It's the reasons they used to justify "resistance"--slavery, slavery, slavery.
Yes, it is always useful to talk in code on issues people are squeamish about.
It is like the mention of how "most Southerners didn't own slaves". Absolutely true. Slaves were expensive. Most people did not own slaves because they could not afford them; they were a sign of prosperity and wealth.
In the 1860 census, only about 25% of Southern families owned slaves. But that story changes drastically if you look at a group like the members of the state legislatures, or the governors and appointed officials, and the members of the secession conventions of the seceding states. Then you discover the percentage of slave owners was much higher, essentially 100% in some states. That is normal enough when you begin to associate the term slave with money, and money with politics. You don't find a lot of dirt-poor farmers in state legislatures in those days; you do find lawyers and plantation owners in great abundance. So when you actually look at the men casting the votes that brought secessionabout in the South, virtually all of them did own slaves.
This thread was apparently, started by a southron who feels editorials in major northern cities proves that the Civil War was started by the north due to the overwhelming economic interests of northern capitalist, whereas the words of the political leadership of the south (and not a few leading southern editorialists) explaining exactly why the South seceded, is dilligently ignored.
"A party founded on the single sentiment, the exclusive feeling of hatred to African slavery, is now the controlling power in this Confederacy. Constitutional limits on its powers are only such, in its creed, as its agents or itself shall recognize. It claims power for the Government which it will control, to construe the measure of its own authority, and to use the entire governmental power of this Confederacy to enforce its construction upon the people and States of this Union. No man can fail to see and know this who reads and understands what he reads. The fact is a great and a perilous truth. No clap trap about the Union, no details of private conversations of Northern men can alter it or weaken its force. It is here present, living, mischievous fact. The Government of the Union is in the hands of the avowed enemies of one entire section. It is to be directed in hostility to the property of that section.
"What is to be done, is the question that presses on every man, strive to put it out of view as he may. ... What will the other slaveholding States do now? Will they stand idly by to suffer this momentous issue to be disposed of by others, and then come dragged into a melee forced on them by others? We warn the people that the right and power of a State to bring this issue on the country is no subject for speculation now. Men may call it rebellion, treason, or whatever opprobrious name their own folly and bad taste may dispose them to use." [_Richmond Semi-weekly Examiner,_ 9 Nov 1860]
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