Understanding Slavery

>>>>>>The South intended to keep the institution of slavery going, no one is arguing that they weren't. It's just that it shouldn't have been a reason for the North(whose attitudes were/are just as racist as in the South) to trample on States' rights.<<<<<<<<<

But there was no trampling on states rights. The south had an explicit promise from the President elect that the national government would not interfere with slavery. Not only that but the north would cooperate in returning escaped slaves. Alexander Stephens, vice-president of the Confederacy, made clear that it was not the ACTIONS of the national government that caused the rebellion, but the ATTITUDE of the new Republican party and Lincoln. Ken, you have repeated a lie that is at the core of the argument of the revisionists, that somehow the north trampled on the rights of the states. That is an important point. How about proving that point beyond a doubt. What action did the north take that "trampled on the rights of the southern states"? What ACTION of the federal government caused the secession?

 

The following is a part of Lincoln's Cooper Union Speech, which was very well received in 1860 in New York. He explains very clearly how that the North was not doing anything that should lead to rebellion. Can you dispute it? Read carefully and see if he has making any mistake of fact.

Last Portion of the Cooper Union Address:

"But you will break up the Union rather than submit to a denial of your Constitutional rights.

That has a somewhat reckless sound; but it would be palliated, if not fully justified, were we proposing, by the mere force of numbers, to deprive you of some right, plainly written down in the Constitution. But we are proposing no such thing.

When you make these declarations, you have a specific and well-understood allusion to an assumed Constitutional right of yours, to take slaves into the federal territories, and to hold them there as property. But no such right is specifically written in the Constitution. That instrument is literally silent about any such right. We, on the contrary, deny that such a right has any existence in the Constitution, even by implication.

Your purpose, then, plainly stated, is that you will destroy the Government, unless you be allowed to construe and enforce the Constitution as you please, on all points in dispute between you and us. You will rule or ruin in all events.

This, plainly stated, is your language. Perhaps you will say the Supreme Court has decided the disputed Constitutional question in your favor. Not quite so. But waiving the lawyer's distinction between dictum and decision, the Court have decided the question for you in a sort of way. The Court have substantially said, it is your Constitutional right to take slaves into the federal territories, and to hold them there as property. When I say the decision was made in a sort of way, I mean it was made in a divided Court, by a bare majority of the Judges, and they not quite agreeing with one another in the reasons for making it; that it is so made as that its avowed supporters disagree with one another about its meaning, and that it was mainly based upon a mistaken statement of fact - the statement in the opinion that "the right of property in a slave is distinctly and expressly affirmed in the Constitution."

An inspection of the Constitution will show that the right of property in a slave is not "distinctly and expressly affirmed" in it. Bear in mind, the Judges do not pledge their judicial opinion that such right is impliedly affirmed in the Constitution; but they pledge their veracity that it is "distinctly and expressly" affirmed there - "distinctly," that is, not mingled with anything else - "expressly," that is, in words meaning just that, without the aid of any inference, and susceptible of no other meaning.

If they had only pledged their judicial opinion that such right is affirmed in the instrument by implication, it would be open to others to show that neither the word "slave" nor "slavery" is to be found in the Constitution, nor the word "property" even, in any connection with language alluding to the things slave, or slavery; and that wherever in that instrument the slave is alluded to, he is called a "person;" - and wherever his master's legal right in relation to him is alluded to, it is spoken of as "service or labor which may be due," - as a debt payable in service or labor. Also, it would be open to show, by contemporaneous history, that this mode of alluding to slaves and slavery, instead of speaking of them, was employed on purpose to exclude from the Constitution the idea that there could be property in man.

To show all this, is easy and certain.

When this obvious mistake of the Judges shall be brought to their notice, is it not reasonable to expect that they will withdraw the mistaken statement, and reconsider the conclusion based upon it?

And then it is to be remembered that "our fathers, who framed the Government under which we live" - the men who made the Constitution - decided this same Constitutional question in our favor, long ago - decided it without division among themselves, when making the decision; without division among themselves about the meaning of it after it was made, and, so far as any evidence is left, without basing it upon any mistaken statement of facts.

Under all these circumstances, do you really feel yourselves justified to break up this Government unless such a court decision as yours is, shall be at once submitted to as a conclusive and final rule of political action? But you will not abide the election of a Republican president! In that supposed event, you say, you will destroy the Union; and then, you say, the great crime of having destroyed it will be upon us! That is cool. A highwayman holds a pistol to my ear, and mutters through his teeth, "Stand and deliver, or I shall kill you, and then you will be a murderer!"

To be sure, what the robber demanded of me - my money - was my own; and I had a clear right to keep it; but it was no more my own than my vote is my own; and the threat of death to me, to extort my money, and the threat of destruction to the Union, to extort my vote, can scarcely be distinguished in principle.

A few words now to Republicans. It is exceedingly desirable that all parts of this great Confederacy shall be at peace, and in harmony, one with another. Let us Republicans do our part to have it so. Even though much provoked, let us do nothing through passion and ill temper. Even though the southern people will not so much as listen to us, let us calmly consider their demands, and yield to them if, in our deliberate view of our duty, we possibly can. Judging by all they say and do, and by the subject and nature of their controversy with us, let us determine, if we can, what will satisfy them.

Will they be satisfied if the Territories be unconditionally surrendered to them? We know they will not. In all their present complaints against us, the Territories are scarcely mentioned. Invasions and insurrections are the rage now. Will it satisfy them, if, in the future, we have nothing to do with invasions and insurrections? We know it will not. We so know, because we know we never had anything to do with invasions and insurrections; and yet this total abstaining does not exempt us from the charge and the denunciation.

The question recurs, what will satisfy them? Simply this: We must not only let them alone, but we must somehow, convince them that we do let them alone. This, we know by experience, is no easy task. We have been so trying to convince them from the very beginning of our organization, but with no success. In all our platforms and speeches we have constantly protested our purpose to let them alone; but this has had no tendency to convince them. Alike unavailing to convince them, is the fact that they have never detected a man of us in any attempt to disturb them.

These natural, and apparently adequate means all failing, what will convince them? This, and this only: cease to call slavery wrong, and join them in calling it right. And this must be done thoroughly - done in acts as well as in words. Silence will not be tolerated - we must place ourselves avowedly with them. Senator Douglas' new sedition law must be enacted and enforced, suppressing all declarations that slavery is wrong, whether made in politics, in presses, in pulpits, or in private. We must arrest and return their fugitive slaves with greedy pleasure. We must pull down our Free State constitutions. The whole atmosphere must be disinfected from all taint of opposition to slavery, before they will cease to believe that all their troubles proceed from us.

I am quite aware they do not state their case precisely in this way. Most of them would probably say to us, "Let us alone, do nothing to us, and say what you please about slavery." But we do let them alone - have never disturbed them - so that, after all, it is what we say, which dissatisfies them. They will continue to accuse us of doing, until we cease saying.

I am also aware they have not, as yet, in terms, demanded the overthrow of our Free-State Constitutions. Yet those Constitutions declare the wrong of slavery, with more solemn emphasis, than do all other sayings against it; and when all these other sayings shall have been silenced, the overthrow of these Constitutions will be demanded, and nothing be left to resist the demand. It is nothing to the contrary, that they do not demand the whole of this just now. Demanding what they do, and for the reason they do, they can voluntarily stop nowhere short of this consummation. Holding, as they do, that slavery is morally right, and socially elevating, they cannot cease to demand a full national recognition of it, as a legal right, and a social blessing.

Nor can we justifiably withhold this, on any ground save our conviction that slavery is wrong. If slavery is right, all words, acts, laws, and constitutions against it, are themselves wrong, and should be silenced, and swept away. If it is right, we cannot justly object to its nationality - its universality; if it is wrong, they cannot justly insist upon its extension - its enlargement. All they ask, we could readily grant, if we thought slavery right; all we ask, they could as readily grant, if they thought it wrong. Their thinking it right, and our thinking it wrong, is the precise fact upon which depends the whole controversy. Thinking it right, as they do, they are not to blame for desiring its full recognition, as being right; but, thinking it wrong, as we do, can we yield to them? Can we cast our votes with their view, and against our own? In view of our moral, social, and political responsibilities, can we do this?

Wrong as we think slavery is, we can yet afford to let it alone where it is, because that much is due to the necessity arising from its actual presence in the nation; but can we, while our votes will prevent it, allow it to spread into the National Territories, and to overrun us here in these Free States? If our sense of duty forbids this, then let us stand by our duty, fearlessly and effectively. Let us be diverted by none of those sophistical contrivances wherewith we are so industriously plied and belabored - contrivances such as groping for some middle ground between the right and the wrong, vain as the search for a man who should be neither a living man nor a dead man - such as a policy of "don't care" on a question about which all true men do care - such as Union appeals beseeching true Union men to yield to Disunionists, reversing the divine rule, and calling, not the sinners, but the righteous to repentance - such as invocations to Washington, imploring men to unsay what Washington said, and undo what Washington did.

Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government nor of dungeons to ourselves. LET US HAVE FAITH THAT RIGHT MAKES MIGHT, AND IN THAT FAITH, LET US, TO THE END, DARE TO DUR DUTY AS WE UNDERSTAND IT."


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Regardless of the roots of the SBC, had they not openly apologized for their attitude on slavery, I probably wouldn't be one now.

 

>>>The war was almost over by then. That's historical revisionism by Mr. Lincoln.<<<<<

No, he said the same thing even before the war started, that somehow slavery was the cause of it. Also, as someone else has pointed out, the southern states themselves gave explicit reasons for their rebellion in various official statements prior to the start of hostilities. You must totally ignore these official statements in order to maintain the fiction that you have repeatedly proposed here. Ken, I know that the fiction you put forward is comforting to you, but it is simply fiction.

 

No and no.

 

You misunderstand my point. The CSA Constitution banned the importation of slaves, when the USA Constitution did not. The USA did so by a law which could have easily been changed back to the way it was. Therefore, the CSA prohibition was the more solid one.

 

No and no. </font>[/QUOTE]After reading this entire thread and, now seeing this unbelievable admission by you, Ken H, it is easy to see where your understanding of history comes from. How misguided!

 

I think you and your ilk are the ones misguided. I do not attempt to place 21st Century attitudes on 19th Century people.

It sounds like you want to place 21st Century attitudes on 1st Century people. I guess you would have refused to fellowship with Christian slave owners in the 1st Century or even with the apostle Paul since he never told them to free their slaves.

 

I'm going to come to KenH's defense on this one. How can any of you say that KenH and his family had it any better than any black person? Do you know him or his family history?

My grandmother grew up on a share-crop farm where they were dirt poor. They treated the black people around their farm just the same as they did everyone else. Blacks were not the only ones who lived below what we call sub-standard today. For some reason, people seem to think that all blacks were mistreated up until the 1970's or so.

Even in the 1940's, my grandfather worked at a car dealership in downtown Houston. He called them nigger and they called him honky, but none was meant as disrespectful. Those were as good of friends as he ever had and he did not look down on them.

so, before people start making judgments about people they don't even know, perhaps you should ask them just how they grew up. I, myself, grew up with many black friends. To say that the southern culture has always mistreated blacks is simply not true.

If anything, the southern people were as kind or kinder to black people than were there northern counterparts. Just look at all of the race riots in Chicago, Cincinnati, and Los Angeles, and elsewhere.

 

Well, I need to defend my position I will just say that I have suffered reprimands(in private) for not being a racist.

1) In first grade I was severely reprimanded by my mother for playing with a Mexican-American first grader.

2) A few years later while watching on TV the race riots in places like Detroit and Newark(are they in the South )during a visit to my grandma, my mother made a disparaging remark about blacks which led me to say to her, "They have the same kind of blood you do." Later she said, "Don't you respect your grandma?" I have no idea how that fit in.

For several years while I had money before I got married , I supported a missionary in Ghana.

Of the 10 people I supervise at work, 4 are African-Americans.

Therefore, I reject any charge that I am a racist because I support the CSA and States' rights and limited, constitutional government.

 

Scott, have you read the entire thread? There is quite a bit of documentation on page 1 (next to last post on the page), including links to documents from the time period. Yes, slavery existed in the Union up to the end of the "civil" war. No one had slaves (if so, at least not legally) after the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution in December 1865. In the District of Columbia, the Union capital, slavery was not abolished until a year after Fort Sumter. Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri were slave states. I have heard that some scattered occurences of "servants" existed in some other northern states, but have no documentation of that as a fact.

 

I read a article some time back about a number of slaves, who were treated so well by their "masters" they refused to leave the plantations and remained loyal to the end. I can't document it, It was just an article I recall.

Cheers,

Jim

 

BTW, there were some free blacks in the southern states, though obviously not that common. In the Life and Writings of Elder John Leland (I think that's the correct title), Elder Leland tells of a free black woman in Virginia who was also a slaveholder. She actually owned her husband (and several other slaves).

 

Isn't that always the case.

 

Regardless of the roots of the SBC, had they not openly apologized for their attitude on slavery, I probably wouldn't be one now. </font>[/QUOTE]Did they apologize for their attitude on slavery or on Segregation? I honestly can't remember. [/QB]</font>[/QUOTE]They've apologized for both.

 

Please define the word you keep using that has 'yankee' in it, so we know who you are really talking about instead of whom you appear to be talking about. Thanks. Oh, and please indicate in the definition to what extent you are being ironic.

 

&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;generations of school children have been misinformed about the realities of slavery.&lt;&lt;&lt;&lt;&lt;

How so? Do you think it has been made to appear to be worse than it was? It was pretty bad, it seems to me.

 

MORE TIDBITS ON THE SUBJECT OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA
</font>

• 1619 - First Africans brought to Virginia</font>
• 1726 - Virginia seeks end of foreign slave trade, but Britain will not allow them to end it.</font>
• 1808 - Importation of slaves outlawed.</font>
• 1816 - [re]Colonization movement founded.</font>
• 1820 - the "Missouri Compromise"</font>
• 1831 - Petition attempt to abolish slavery in District of Columbia fails.</font>
• 1850 - Fugitive Slave Act</font>
• 1865 - Thirteenth Amendment ends 246 years of slavery in America</font>

Dates slavery was abolished by states that would remain in the Union in 1860's. </font>

• 1774 - Rhode Island - Freed by state legislative action</font>
• 1777 - Vermont - Freed by state Constitution</font>
• 1780 - Pennsylvania - Provided for gradual emancipation</font>
• 1781 - Massachusetts - Ended by court decisions</font>
• 1781 - New Hampshire - Ended by court decisions</font>
• 1784 - Connecticut - Provided for gradual emancipation</font>
• 1799 - New York - Provided for gradual emancipation</font>
• 1804 - New Jersey - Provided for gradual emancipation</font>
• 1820 - Maine - Enters Union as a free state</font>
• 1862 - District of Columbia - Freed by D.C. Emancipation Act</font>
• 1862 - U. S. Territories - Slavery prohibited by an act of Congress</font>
• 1864 - Maryland - Freed by new state Constitution</font>
• 1865 - Missouri - Freed by new state Constitution</font>
• 1865 - ?Kentucky & Delaware? - ?by 13th Amendment?????</font>
• 1865 - United States - Slavery abolished by 13th Amendment</font>

 

The initial stock costs money, but after that, you can breed, trade and sell them.

However, rogue horses almost never foment rebellion amongst their peers. Neither do they pass along information on routes and safe stables. And, while it may be possible, I've never heard of horses deducing what would happen to them by witnessing what happened to a fellow horse.

I don't understand this part - whose wages? Generally, men who earned wages didn't own slaves and men who owned slaves didn't pay wages. At that time, wages were more of a Northern, industrial thing. Sharecroppers and tenant farmers had barter systems in conjunction with cash money. So, whose wages?

"yankeescum"....well, I have no answer to that except to say I find the Southern obsession with "yankees" puzzling.