I agree there were shades of grey and a lot of complexity but it's a disservice to history to downplay slavery as the reason for the war. How that issue was played out was complicated but slavery was the primary cause of the Civil War.
Has there ever been a vote for independence from the UK that didn't succeed? This seems to be the first
I need to be clear. I am not down playing the issue of slavery, it is involved directly or indirectly in almost every component of the lead up to and the actual Civil War. The issue is very complicated, it isn't as simple as the North wanted to free slaves, yeah! The end. There was a whole lot of political and economic gamesmanship. The South did not like the increasing population and as a result political strength of the North. Further the North was not happy that the cotton made in the South was going to England. Tariffs were enacted as a threat. The South at various times responded with violence. Further, it isn't the case that the North was united against slavery and the South was united for slavery. You had serious divides within the North and South. Many Northerners were resentful of fighting a war to free slaves. There were small rebellions on both sides. There were Southerners that raped and pillaged the land and homes of Confederates at battle. There were thousands of biases, factors and elements at play in the entire ordeal. The simple story taught in many school books, including in the Midwest do a disservice to a fascinating and complex time in American history. I do not begrudge the narrative, as to the victor goes the spoils, and make no mistake had the South won the school books would be quite biased. I had relatives that fought on both sides. My great great great Grandfather fought for the Confederacy and his 2 brothers fought for the Union. His own family was split, his own wife provided financing to the North.
It's actually pretty simple, the south wanted to keep slavery forever, the majority of folks up north didn't see it that way. Anything else is either an obfuscation of or a derivation of that simple truth regarding slavery. Worried about the economic power of hte north? Sure, because it could use its power to end slavery, which it idid. Simply because there were pro-union slaveholders or a few antislavery southerners doesn't really change that at all. Read any of the declarations of secession. You'll note the term slavery, slaveholding, etc appears prominently in all of them and are cited repeatedly, and the term tariff appears approximately never, not once, in any of them.
You're just spouting the propaganda of the victor, slavery was how they sold the war to the masses but it was not the prime reason for the Civil War in that the banning of slavery wasn't done as a moral thing, it was done to cripple the South economically.The North held the votes to do so, and they regularly screwed over the South. It was decades of dickish policies all culminating with the one thing they absolutely couldn't accept, the immediate end of slavery. It was something that was impossible for them to do economically. It's fair to say that slavery had a big part in the Civil War, but it was just the final straw, the most extreme measure that led to succession. You can't ignore all of the factors that led to that poisonous political climate.
wow!! I like to joke about getting over the War of Yankee Aggression, but apparently many of these guys have not. Is this due mainly to the Civil Rights Act of 1964? ; or the gullible falling for the one percent or Koch Bro style propaganda. wrt "States Rights" so you can play the states against each other for lower wages, anti-unionism, weaker pollution standards etc. which allow them to make more money which doesn't trickle down?
Southern whites loved having free labor. It's pretty easy to turn a profit if you get your labor free. Plus you always get to walk around with that smug feeling of being superior, like Bobby. All wars are economic. The Scottish referendum failed; that surprises me a lot. I feel like self-determination is a pretty natural human desire, to localize as much decision making as possible for greater control of your own destiny. I'll be greatly interested in the post election explanations today.
Of course they are. Rich people are special, after all. There's no way intelligent rich people could ever be suckered in by ideals unlike those stupid poor people. And congrats to the Scots for not losing their minds.
I don't think this is a surprise. The Scots weren't clamoring for independence for a long time. When this referendum was first announced, the polls showed No votes with 80% - it was a vocal minority pushing independence. It's pretty amazing that they got up to 45% from that starting point. I think its the same result if you allowed Texas to vote on secession. It sounds good to some people, but once you realize the benefits of being a state and all the questions and uncertainty that would come with breaking away, it seems less appealing. As geeimsobored noted earlier, Quebec went through this as well. It turns out people actually like being part of big, powerful, stable nations no matter how much they gripe. But besides that, by scaring the Brits, the Scots actually ended up doing well - they get a lot of the benefits of independence (more autonomy, new taxing powers, etc) without the drawbacks.
I would edit to say: No wonder the men wear skirts. But I can't edit. So you get stuck with version 1.0 and version 1.1.
Actually Slavery wasn't initially sold to the masses as the reason for the war in the North. Seccession was. Lincoln himself had been willing to keep slavery to keep the Union and many Abolitionists were frustrated with Lincoln because it didn't seem like he really wanted to end slavery. It was only till 1863 that Lincoln fully came around on the issue. As far as the war as being the North's drive to cripple the South economically certain many Northerners felt that way but it is very clear from Lincoln that wasn't his motivation and he even was very concerned about what would happen if the South was crippled. It wasn't the final straw because slavery was why states right's was such an issue and why the economy of the South was the way it was. Behind every other issue brought up regarding the Civil War slavery is inextricably entangled with it.
It wasn't about slavery! It was about the southern "States Rights"...to keep slaves It was about the southern economy....built on slave labor It was about the North pushing their morality...of being against slavery It was about new areas becoming states...that would vote against slavery It was about Southern opposition to the election of Abraham Lincoln...because they feared he would end slavery.
Actually it's the propaganda of the losers, BobbyDaClown. I'll say it again, the South LOVED DEM SOME SLAVERY. This is not controversial, this is not disputed, this was noted repeatedly at the time, by the South itself. Read any of the contemporaneous documents of the era, most notably the declaration of causes of secession.
I am not sure why you are surprised. Even outside of the economical benefits, its not a shame to still be part of England. The country is doing well compared to many parts of Europe. They really do not have anything to gain by being independent outside of pride.
