Do you agree with Ron Paul on the War between the States

[Salty]

Ron Paul is told by interviewer he cant be a Republican, since he actually makes since.

Paul says that the War was not mainly fought over slavery, and there was no need to have lost 600,000 Americans (which includes USA & CSA)

He stated that all other countries ended slavery without a war.

 

[Jim1999]

Slavery wasn't the issue, state rights was...So say ALL history books.

Cheers,

Jim

 

[StefanM]

A simplistic explanation is not really possible.

A variety of factors were in place. The South was indeed afraid that the North would try to end slavery. Because the Southern economy was primarily an agricultural, slave-based economy, abolition of slavery likely would have had dire economic consequences for the wealthy and powerful in the South.

Read the South Carolina secession declaration:

http://www.civil-war.net/pages/southcarolina_declaration.asp

You will see that state rights were indeed in play, but this can not be separated from the concept of state rights to preserve the institution of slavery.

The North had no intention of using the war to end slavery. The war was to prevent secession. The Emancipation Proclamation had as much to do with making European intervention unlikely as it did with liberating slaves.

 

[TomVols]

Stefan and Jim are both right.

 

[Jim1999]

Both Canada and England opposed slavery, but financially supported the South in their endeavors. Representatives of the Southern President came to Montreal, Quebec to pick up the monies.

And yet, Canada had people who literally fought on both sides. Canada provided a safe haven for escaped slaves. There are still two towns in Ontario populated by Blacks, or relatives of Blacks, who escaped on the "freedom train". So, they supported the Southern agenda, and slavery was not an issue.

Cheers,

Jim

 

[JohnDeereFan]

Ron Paul is told by interviewer he cant be a Republican, since he actually makes since.

Paul says that the War was not mainly fought over slavery, and there was no need to have lost 600,000 Americans (which includes USA & CSA)

He stated that all other countries ended slavery without a war.

Simply put, if you were to go back in time to the 19th century and ask a Northerner, they would tell you that the war was about slavery. And if you were to ask a Southerner, they would tell you that it was about a federal government overstepping its bounds in order to bully states and take away their sovereignty.

Slavery was only the pretext for the war.

What most people forget is that slavery was both politically and economically untenable and most likely would have faded away by 1880, anyway.

 

[JohnDeereFan]

Slavery wasn't the issue, state rights was...So say ALL history books.

If only that were true.

One of the books we're using with our children now, Larry Schweiker's "A Patriot's History of the United States", addresses this issue in depth.

 

[Jim1999]

Slavery existed in the North as well as in the South. In baptist seminaries, up into the 1950's and even the 60's in some areas, slavery was taught as being biblical. It stemmed out of the three sons of Noah; Ham, Shem and Japeth. The Hamites were the coloured races and also the source of slavery.

This was the battle we had with South Africa until the Dutch church finally adjusted its theology.

Lincoln did not oppose slavery. He opposed the right of Southern States to withdraw from the Union.

England abolished slavery and made them servants. Canada abolished slavery along with England, and even took in slaves from the USA and made them citizens.

Slavery went to segregation, and we wonder at times which was worse.

Cheers,

Jim

 

[glfredrick]

I'm of the mind that slavery would not have phased out. It still hasn't... I was shocked when I traveled to Ridgeland SC and saw the condition of the (their language) "darkies" living in that community. The only real difference I saw between what I've read of 1840 and the time I was there was that the whipping post was gone and there was a meager paycheck issued at the end of the week.

Some people with good hearts "take care of some 'boy' in order to have a good yard hand at the ready. They don't even process how or what they say in regards to the colored population. It is just natural for the white property owners to see anyone of color as a lower-class animal (they are begrudgingly admitted as citizens, but it would be hard to tell -- they have their own stores, churches, neighborhoods, etc.). The white man lives in the "big house" and the "darkies" live in the slave quarters -- run down shacks in a pasture away from the main house.

I saw this over and over again as we traveled from one plantation to the next, and I attended two different churches while I was there -- no sign of anyone of color in either. I gathered that they simply would not dare to enter the white man's church.

I've seen discrimination against people groups before -- I'm not naive -- but never on the level that it was just "natural" the way it was expressed in South Carolina. In other places, it was this or that person who had a hatred or dislike for some person of color, but never just an assumption amongst the entire community that all the people of color "knew their place" and stayed there.

 

[Salty]

Slavery went to segregation, and we wonder at times which was worse. Jim

Of course the carpet baggers did not help the re-unification cause at all.

 

[billwald]

A slave is an asset but an employee is a commodity. The northern states tried slavery in the spinning mills and discovered it was more economical to hire (rent the time of) poor free people and lay them off when there was no contracts for cloth or in winter when the rivers froze. If they owned slaves they would have had to feed and house them even when there was no cash coming in. Employees, they could be laid off and freeze or starve on their own time at no cost to the factory owner. There was always more hungry free people to hire when the ice broke up.

All Lincoln's War did was to change an economy of slaves and share croppers to black share croppers and white share croppers. The War did NOT increase the standard of living for white share croppers and only marginally improved the standard of living for ex-slaves now share croppers.

So about 150 years later the standard of living below the M-D line is still below the standard of living in the north. When the northern mill workers moved south but all that did was lower the standard of living for workers in the north. It did not improve the standard of living in the south. Even scab wages became to high for the mill capitalists and now 90% of our clothing comes from China. Did this help the South's standard of living?

While all this was and is going on, was the standard of living of the "old money" people in the north or the south reduced? Even during the great Depression when several new money ex-millionaires jumped out of windows did any of the old money millionaires jump out of a window? I think not. Has anything since the French Revolution EVER hurt the old money people in the west? I think not.

Nothing ever changes except the words we use to describe ourselves. Slaves and white share croppers became black share croppers and white share croppers became miscegenated poor people and the middle class.

 

[Palatka51]

Simply put, if you were to go back in time to the 19th century and ask a Northerner, they would tell you that the war was about slavery. And if you were to ask a Southerner, they would tell you that it was about a federal government overstepping its bounds in order to bully states and take away their sovereignty.

Slavery was only the pretext for the war.

What most people forget is that slavery was both politically and economically untenable and most likely would have faded away by 1880, anyway.

Up and until the war broke out the North was just as culpable in the slavery issue. Although they did not own slaves, many did support bounties on escaped slaves, which is why slaves did not feel safe until they got to Canada.

What most people forget is that slavery was both politically and economically untenable and most likely would have faded away by 1880, anyway.

Agreed