Would restriction have finished slavery?

[ole]

Lincoln believed confining slavery to where it was would eventually lead to its extinction. On what did he base that conviction? Do you believe he was right?

Ole

[milhistbuff1]

I agree it ultimately it would have. There is only so much slave labor can do. Eventually mechanized machinery and assembly lines would have made slave labor unprofitable without industrialization. How long this might take is another story entirely.
Respectfully,
Matt

[matthew mckeon]

Since slavery was recognized and part of the Constitution, Lincoln didn't think the president had the power to abolish slavery if he had won the presidency, but the South hadn't seceded. In case of no war, he would have done what he could have: changing the Fugitive Slave Law, various schemes of compensated or gradual emancipation etc.

If slavery became economically unfeasible there would be fewer slaves, but the impulse to eliminate slavery had to be a moral one. People had to believe that slavery was wrong to eliminate it. Afterall, slavery like conditions exist in many parts of the world today. Presumably a CSA surviving into modern times would have found some use for slaves, UNLESS, the bulk of its citizens determined that slavery was wrong, a modern CSA would hold at least some people as slaves indefinitely.

Even if the legal definition of slavery disappeared, what would be the lot of the freedmen in the South?

Would this sense of slavery as being evil ever develop? Who can say how the CSA would have eventually developed? But its tough to see how.

[samgrant]

I suspect that most Southerners, as well as Northerners, must have had some (if only vague) sense of the immorality of the thing.

I suppose it just goes back that old deadly sin of greed. If one is making a handsome profit, by some vaguely immoral means, well, folks have their priorities!

[milhistbuff1]

that depends on your definition of immorality. If you run around impregnating slaves in order to boost your work force numbers, since importing them is no longer an option, you might not view slavery as immoral. Let me be clear, i am not insinuating every southerner or northerner who owned slaves did this. but this does not excuse them either. Since the magnolia myth managed to hid the sexual of slavery until the civil war years, its hard to see how anyone could have "fully" attacked the immorality of it without this aspect being general knowledge. Sure, plenty of former slaves escaped and told tales of the physical abuse, but lets just say genetics along with the war put the final nail in slavery's coffin.
Respectfully
Matt

[matthew mckeon]

The sexual exploitation angle of slavery was played up quite a bit by abolitionists in the 1850s, because, after all, sex sells. So I think it was "general knowledge," if one wanted to know.
"I don't understand your comment that genetics along with the war put the final nail in slavery's coffin."

[milhistbuff1]

Matthew McKeon,
My comment refers to the illegitmate families formed by the master/slave relationships, hence living proof of the sexual abuse. It was the accounts by fmr slaves such as Linda Brent's Incidents in the life of a slave girl that gave the abolitionists enough ammo and fervor to be willing to commit to war, post ft sumter.
Respectfully,
Matt

[matthew mckeon]

Thanks Matt,
To sum up then, Lincoln felt it was in the power of the president to restrict slavery, (although the Dred Scot decision calls that into question), and hoped that it would have the effect of weakening and eventually ending slavery. He may have had other ideas, as well, which I assume would have been within the law.

I think Lincoln was being optimistic. Since people on this forum in the 21st century have argued that slavery wasn't as bad as free labor, I'm assuming that slaveowners
would have continued to be able to justify slaveowning indefinitely. Of course conditions change all the time, one can only speculate, not predict.

[MobileBoy]

About the offspring of slaves and white men how common was this?Does anyone have a percentage?Was it mainly the scummy white overseer of the slaves or was it the plantation owner?Just some questions I have.I imagine it was more about sex than expanding the number of slaves though.I know about Thomas Jefferson and supposedly Washington but were any Confederate politicians accused of this?The majority weren't so I think this activity was exagerrated.I remeber a caning over the issue in Congress though.I'd be real interested to hear about any other known examples or statistics.

[johan_steele]

Mobileboy, I will make a point of looking for the reference to the "Slave Plantations" in Georgia IIRC. It was discussed to some extent in an earlier thread but I don't even know where to look anymore. IIRC there were four such w/ the owners inviting themselves and their "investors" into the arms of their slaves w/ the express intention of selling off the offspring. Quadroons were not at all uncommon and slaves that were every bit as white as some of their masters were not all that uncommon either. This was part of what fueled the anger towards slavery of many Union troops and helped turn even the most apathetic into staunch Abolishionists.

I suggest reading the diary of Cyrus Boyd for just one example. In particular his Regt finding a lovely quadroon woman w/ a child that was her former masters... the consensus of many was that she was lighter than their own children and a slave.

I have seen a reference to the percentage of quadroons vs "pure" negroes as in the neighborhood of 40% though I doubt the authenticity of it. I have no idea of more accurate numbers.

I think Matt is spot on. If slavery can be defended today w/ a 140 year seperation... I don't think they would have had much of a problem.