The American Civil War - and how your perception changes when you learn about it

[Cavalry]

One final note at all of these documents: slavery is mentioned 82 times in all of these documents. The word tariff does not appear once, and it only occurs in one document in two small mentioned. Looking at the seceeding decks own justifications, I don't know how you can say the war was over tariffs.

I would guess, to make secession on tariff matter is not very good. What's wrong to pay the national tariff, or better don't pay that tariff and support national industries? Like the USA government never mention OIL when they attack Iraq! Sure slavery is major part, but I think it was more about slavery economy than about emancipation. No one as I know, both North and South, offered terms or negotiate about emancipation yet until 1863.

By the way, I don't mean if the South has the right to secede or not. I just don't care!

 

[keynes2.0]

nevermind

 

[Stuckenschmidt]

The ACW started due to tariffs? One learns new things every day.

:laugh:

 

[StephenT]

The ACW started due to tariffs? One learns new things every day.

For that matter, what possible motive could the South have for wanting minimal tariffs?

Surely it wasn't because their entire economy revolved around a single, highly profitable cash crop which for some odd reason required a high capital expense to set up and get started (making it financially difficult for them to diversify into other forms of economic activity), but afterwards could be produced at a very minimal expense? That crop could then be sold to Britain at high prices, allowing the Southerners to use their pounds sterling to buy lots of manufactured British goods and import them back to the US.

Now, how does slavery figure into this equation?

 

[keynes2.0]

Wow, when you put it that way it's all Britain's fault.

 

[Niptium]

Wow, when you put it that way it's all Britain's fault.

They started it all in 1756.

 

[Culise]

For that matter, what possible motive could the South have for wanting minimal tariffs?

Surely it wasn't because their entire economy revolved around a single, highly profitable cash crop which for some odd reason required a high capital expense to set up and get started (making it financially difficult for them to diversify into other forms of economic activity), but afterwards could be produced at a very minimal expense? That crop could then be sold to Britain at high prices, allowing the Southerners to use their pounds sterling to buy lots of manufactured British goods and import them back to the US.

Now, how does slavery figure into this equation?

To be fair, the West also disliked tariffs for much the same reason as the South, without a slave-based economy. It's the promise of the Homestead Acts (opposed by the South and passed only after their delegates withdrew - much like the Morrill Tariff, actually) that brought the West decisively to the side of the North. Even before that, anti-slavery sentiments were also particularly high in free territories, especially where those sentiments were tied into religion as well, which is why relentless Southern pressure on the two issues of slavery and homesteading kept the two from uniting on the basis of their shared agrarian interests against the industrialist North.

 

[Niptium]

Has anyone read Mary Chestnut's Diary ? A classic source written by a well versed higher class woman who supported the South during the Civil War, yet secretly wished for slavery's abolition.

 

[Cavalry]

To be fair, the West also disliked tariffs for much the same reason as the South, without a slave-based economy. It's the promise of the Homestead Acts (opposed by the South and passed only after their delegates withdrew - much like the Morrill Tariff, actually) that brought the West decisively to the side of the North. .

Most of the ordinary people also don't like Government tax if they are not the one who spend it, but not everybody is going to civil war! And the Federal treasury was in crisis just before Morrill Tariff and even that tariff is not enough for the coming war.
Would someone explain why the South opposed the Homestead Acts, did they tried to compromise on this and ally with the West?

 

[Magic Pancake]

Most of the ordinary people also don't like Government tax if they are not the one who spend it, but not everybody is going to civil war! And the Federal treasury was in crisis just before Morrill Tariff and even that tariff is not enough for the coming war.
Would someone explain why the South opposed the Homestead Acts, did they tried to compromise on this and ally with the West?

The south opposed the Homestead Act because they wanted the land to be used for slave plantations. That, and they were afraid that the new states would end up opposing slavery. That's why Kansas was such a contentious issue.

 

[Culise]

The south opposed the Homestead Act because they wanted the land to be used for slave plantations. That, and they were afraid that the new states would end up opposing slavery. That's why Kansas was such a contentious issue.

And to be fair, they also had good reason to expect the new freeholding states to oppose slavery - they did. States like Minnesota and Wisconsin were among the first to raise volunteers for the Union, Frémont in 1856 drew significant support from those Western states (specifically, Wisconsin, Iowa, and Michigan, as well over 40% of the votes in both Illinois and Indiana), and when it was put to popular sovereignty, Nebraska went quietly anti-slavery without a serious blip. Kansas would have gone the same way if not for the Missouri Border Ruffians, according to the special committee appointed by Congress to investigate the 1855 elections, and in fact, they eventually did in the elections in 1857 and their constitution's ratification in 1859. I said that the Homestead Acts brought the West decisively with the North, which is true, but it's also likely true that even without them, the West would still have sided with the Union in force for the other reasons in my post - that is, slavery.

 

[magritte2]

To be fair, the West also disliked tariffs for much the same reason as the South, without a slave-based economy. It's the promise of the Homestead Acts (opposed by the South and passed only after their delegates withdrew - much like the Morrill Tariff, actually) that brought the West decisively to the side of the North. Even before that, anti-slavery sentiments were also particularly high in free territories, especially where those sentiments were tied into religion as well, which is why relentless Southern pressure on the two issues of slavery and homesteading kept the two from uniting on the basis of their shared agrarian interests against the industrialist North.

I didn't get this information from an academic source, so it might be inaccurate but when I was in Louisiana I was told that southern Louisiana actually liked protectionist tariffs (and had voted Republican) because its main crop was sugar, which was subject to competition from cheaper sugar from the Caribbean. But they still voted for secession, which calls into question the notion that the South seceded over tariffs.

 

[Yakman]

The south opposed the Homestead Act because they wanted the land to be used for slave plantations. That, and they were afraid that the new states would end up opposing slavery. That's why Kansas was such a contentious issue.

Kansas became a state long before the Homestead Act.

 

[Cavalry]

I didn't get this information from an academic source, so it might be inaccurate but when I was in Louisiana I was told that southern Louisiana actually liked protectionist tariffs (and had voted Republican) because its main crop was sugar, which was subject to competition from cheaper sugar from the Caribbean. But they still voted for secession, which calls into question the notion that the South seceded over tariffs.

Louisiana has a lot of Union sympathizers, but the Governer Moore had tried to force the secession. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisiana_in_the_American_Civil_War#Politics_and_strategy_in_Louisiana

So it seceded but quickly fell to Union on 1862.

 

[PMLF]

They didn't get compensation in Brazil either, but there is much less prejudice there than here because of the organic nature of emancipation.

The 'less prejudice' in Brazil has nothing to do with how slavery was abolished. Just for the record, slavery was slowly phased out.

Mixing between the Portuguese and the non-Europeans (Africans and native Indians) happened since the beginning and were common in other Portuguese colonies too (like Angola and Goa). Despite that, there were many rebellions (ex: the Malê Revolt), and there was a fear of Brazil ending in a situation like Haiti.

But even despite that mixing, prejudice did exist, although in a different less institutionalized way than the USA. After slavery was abolished there were still many 'hidden' codes to exclude people of African descent, like jobs only accepting people of 'good' (read white) appearance or soccer clubs not allowing black players, with clubs that signed them getting kicked out of the leagues.

Brazil brought millions of Europeans between 1850-1950 to whiten the population, so nowadays Brazil have the biggest Portuguese (about every Brazilian has Portuguese background)-descent population in the World and the biggest Italian-descent population outside Italy (about 25 million people), besides millions of people of Spanish, German, Syrian-Lebanese descent.

 

[Magic Pancake]

Kansas became a state long before the Homestead Act.

I was referring more to the south's resistance to free states being made in the west, hence the violence in Kansas.

 

[Aardvark Bellay]

Louisiana has a lot of Union sympathizers, but the Governer Moore had tried to force the secession. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisiana_in_the_American_Civil_War#Politics_and_strategy_in_Louisiana

So it seceded but quickly fell to Union on 1862.

Funny that you said 'has'.
Reminded me how my american step-grandad explained to me as a kid that even though you only very rarely saw dixie flags, in comparison to other southern states,
raising the US flag in front of your house was still a statement not everyone agreed with.
That blew my mind as a young german teen in the 80s.

 

[Yakman]

Funny that you said 'has'.
Reminded me how my american step-grandad explained to me as a kid that even though you only very rarely saw dixie flags, in comparison to other southern states,
raising the US flag in front of your house was still a statement not everyone agreed with.
That blew my mind as a young german teen in the 80s.

not sure he was telling you the truth.

 

[Aardvark Bellay]

not sure he was telling you the truth.

How so ?

 

[seattle]

My first contact with the ACW was the tv-series "North and South" with Patrick Swayze. Boy, were those rednecks evil nazis!
Next step: the Amiga-game "North and South" (the arcadey, cartoonish strategy game from Ubisoft). I remember prefering the Union. After all they fought for a just cause and had fancier uniforms, not some old rags.
Then a book about ACW weapons, some movies, some growing up, some gaining perspective.

Then came the Ken Burns documentary series about the ACW and Shelby Foote. That surely changed everything.
IIRC only 2% of the Southerns possessed slaves and the majority was in favour of abolishing slavery. It would have probably taken another 20-30 years for the problem to resolve itself.

Instead Abe Lincoln wanted to make a name for himself. The Southerners are proud people that always were sceptical of the Union because they felt patronized by the North-dominated senate. When Lincoln took office, those feelings were vastly increased and that's why they finally opted for independence.

Why wouldn't you be able to leave the Union if you so choose? Does entering a union bind you to it for eternity? How's that democratic? Instead it was dishonest Abe who broke a variety of laws (Kentucky for instance) and democratic values to save his own ass. He didn't care too much about the slaves (see his speech about saving the union with or without freeing a single slave). Had he not provoked the South into war, he would have been considered the worst president ever. He would have destroyed the Union after all. So he had to get his war and correct his mistake at all cost.
That he freed the slaves in the end and got assassinated was a blessing for his legacy. Similar to JFK who was a horrible president. Being assassinated somehow makes you a hero and mutes all valid criticism.