The Sunken Fact: Lincoln Instigated the War

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War would not have happened if our southern friends didn’t choose to rebel after a free, legal election sent the country down a path of limiting slavery.
War wouldn't have happened had our colonial friends paid their taxes and the British had allowed them to steal Indian land in the Ohio Valley.
 
There is always Democrat Congressman Alexander Long's assertion on the floor of the House in April 1864 that when Lincoln heard the Confederates had opened fire on Sumter, his words were "I knew they would do it!"

Congressional Globe, 38th Congresss, 1st session, 1499
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And yet Jefferson did not free his slaves talk is cheap without positive action and for a man who owned over 500 slaves I find his ramblings to be both hypocritical and bizarre.
Not the subject of this thread, but there were very good reasons why Jefferson was not able to free his slaves. You might want to look into the laws of Virginia at the time, laws which were specifically written to stop manumission.
 
But, they did insist on secession. Was war inevitable or not?
Thanks for your response.
Since you included my earlier response to that same question and even highlighted a portion, I take it you already have my answer.
 
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War wouldn't have happened had our colonial friends paid their taxes and the British had allowed them to steal Indian land in the Ohio Valley.

Colonies were not subject to taxation ... colonies were subject to trade restrictions which is how England made its money. When that changed through laws passed without representation - a right of all Englishmen... it became a problem.

Then they sent troops to further occupy their cities and confiscate

Surely you see the difference between securing someone’s rights and working to ensure slavery continues... right??
 
Which, if true, would mean that Lincoln knew the resupply mission was hopeless. But he sent the ships anyway.

I have heard this argument before. As I understand it, neither Davis nor Lincoln wanted to appear the aggressor. For his "hesitation" Davis was strongly criticized. Buchanan attempted to send arms, supplies and more soldiers but the ship fired upon. Lincoln announced in his inauguration, "You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors." He announced the unarmed ship carrying only "food for hungry men" (Lincoln again) would be coming.

Somehow the event is perceived as "provocative." Southern authorities know what the ship is carrying, and its arrival is announced ahead of time. Not surrendering another illegally seized property to people who have no right to what they have already stolen is "provocative?" I agree it is — as long as the "provoked" is seeking something, anything however minor to start a fight over. Yes, Lincoln could have ceded the fort and, in doing so, recognized the existence of the Confederacy as a government. He was not about to and clearly indicated he never would.

He might well have predicted the result. I think I would have. That in no way changes the fact that southerners had complete choice in how to respond. They responded by firing on American troops who were being sent food. It is possible, even when provoked, to refrain from violence. Davis decided to use violence.
 
Not the subject of this thread, but there were very good reasons why Jefferson was not able to free his slaves. You might want to look into the laws of Virginia at the time, laws which were specifically written to stop manumission.
To be fair those ended before his death. I really like Jefferson and I think he made a lot of really good faith efforts at .. if not ending... slowing it down. One man can only do so much.... but by his time of death he could have freed his slaves in Virginia ... he was too debt ridden to do so... probably because of his taste for the finer things in life. He could have chosen otherwise. No one is perfect using the lens of today. I can only imagine what future generations would think of me if my life was a completely open book as his was. But I appreciate the efforts he did make in our nations slow movement towards true equality.
 
War would not have happened if our southern friends didn’t choose to rebel after a free, legal election sent the country down a path of limiting slavery.
The "free, legal election" that elected Lincoln President can hardly be reasonably said to have "sent the country down a path of limiting slavery." Presumably the writer's predicate for his use of the phrase "limiting slavery" is the idea that the Republican Party, once in control of the Congress, would repeal the Kansas-Nebraska Act. What, in fact, doing this actually means, is keeping the Africans locked up in the South; i.e., "limiting" the movement of Africans out of the South and into the Territories of the antebellum Union. The phrasing is typical of historians who claim a moral superiority for the white people of the North over the white people of the South, when both groups equally did not want to live with Africans as citizens in community.
 
...would repeal the Kansas-Nebraska Act. What, in fact, doing this actually means, is keeping the Africans locked up in the South; i.e., "limiting" the movement of Africans out of the South and into the Territories of the antebellum Union

What an odd way to put it. To begin with we have to assume you actually mean American black slaves, not "Africans" (the African slave trade had been banished in 1808, so none but black market imports were African any more). But anyway it was their slaveowners that were the ones limiting their movements -- at all times and in every instance. Lincoln didn't intend to change that. He was allowing that people could be held as property in those states where such a system existed. He couldn't have been any more even-handed than that.

If that opened the door to a pending repeal of the KN act it would have only affected a slaveowner's ability to control their slave's movements in places where the slave system did not exist - the Territories. That would have been no injustice. It didn't restrict slave ownership, it merely was a way to keep the slavery system from expanding. Even that was even-handed, yes?

Bottom line; American black slaves being allowed to move freely in the territories is the opposite of "locking them up." Just to clarify that.
 
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I find both articles and many of the following posts unconvincing.

Starting with the premise that we live in a deterministic world where all events are caused by preceding events (they don't just "happen"), and that all definitions are arbitrary, selected only for their usefulness and acceptance, whether war starting is defined as shots fired (which ones?), or decisions made that caused those fired shots (which ones?), and that neither the authors nor the posters have agreed to the definitions, much paper and time is wasted.
 
the War wouldn't have happened had our colonial friends paid their taxes and the British had allowed them to steal Indian land in the Ohio Valley.

... the equating tactic again. It's getting old. It goes like this: If it can be shown that "the secessionists were just as justified in their rebellion as the patriots were in their rebellion," it is hoped that will elevate the cause of the secessionists, and thereby the Confederacy in initiating the CW. (the "we just wanted to be left alone" thing only goes so far).

But, sigh, the cause of that second rebellion was quite different. The secessionist and Confederate cause was the right to own human beings like property. So the attempt to equate that with the American Revolution just doesn't work -- although it's transparent that distracting from the topic of Lincoln's instigating the CW or not is also a goal.
 
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... the equating tactic again. It's getting old. It goes like this: If it can be shown that "the secessionists were just as justified in their rebellion as the patriots were in their rebellion," it is hoped that will elevate the cause of the secessionists, and thereby the Confederacy in initiating the CW. (the "we just wanted to be left alone" thing only goes so far).

But, sigh, the cause of that second rebellion was quite different. The secessionist and Confederate cause was the right to own human beings like property. So the attempt to equate that with the American Revolution just doesn't work -- although it's transparent that distracting from the topic of Lincoln's instigating the CW or not is also a goal.

And who is the privileged lot that gets to do the justifying?


 
Some folks apparently don't know Lincoln had no objection to allowing slavery in the South in perpetuity as long as the Southern States stayed in his union.

Which CivilWarTalk site would that be? :whistling: Maybe I'll have a peek at it, got a link?

Dänged little of that particular bit of ignorance about Lincoln's intentions at the beginning of the conflict to be found 'round these parts. When it is proposed it is usually quickly beaten back, I usually see it being put forth as a strawman of some sort.
 
And who is the privileged lot that gets to do the justifying?

why, it is all of us, North and South! Privileged in this age to have access to period documents in well-stocked local libraries and online, the additional benefit of decades of academic scrutiny and authorship, Lost Cause no longer convincing in the full light of disclosure.

Glory Hallelujah, the South can rise again! All the South for once.
 
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