would it have been possible to be a confederate and a devout catholic?

[Lujack]

Oh, I didn’t want to get pulled into this topic any deeper to hijack the OP and turn it into a history discussion and have to spend a lot of time revisiting all the history. I’ll particpate bit more since I am learning some new things…

I don’t think I’ve read an uglier pro-Southern argument.

I was curious so was just researching the numbers this morning and found a reference that says there were an estimated nearly 4 million slaves all together - mostly in the South but also boarder states and a few out west. The largest concentration was in Virgina at 491,000 followed by Alabama 435,080. What is very illuminating is examining the ratio of free citizens to slaves in the Lower South to get an idea of the economic leverage the south had. As well it should suggest how immediate in the minds of Southerns it would have been to imagine the social horror of suddenly finding themselves a minority in their own states by a Federal fiat that suddenly freed them all. The slaves by numbers could have easily taken over the south (esp. in Miss. & S, Carolina) by shear numbers if they had later organized themselves politically or elected to reverse the relationship to takeover the southern states by force. The South was already committed to an economy based on slavery and had invested itself fully in that and also put itself in SEVERE socio-economic jeopardy if the Fed. Gov. suddenly forced its policies on them.

So they needed to keep the slaves because they were making money off of them. And because their entire society was based on it. So you’re admitting, flat out, that antebellum Southern society was based on the institution of slavery. Which is true; it is, after all, what Alexander Stephens said in his famous cornerstone speech.

But the argument that follows is horrendous and immoral: in order to preserve that society, you’re arguing that it was worth maintaining slavery. So, by that token: when should the slaves have been freed? Your argument has answered the question: essentially never.

From the Southern perspective there had to be real fears that they would become dominated by the slaves if forced to release them and might reasonably expect retributions and civil unrest and conflict. In a very real sense the election of Lincoln ignited the realization that the Southerner’s very lives were in jeopardy if nearly 4 million slaves who had limited exposure to the American culture were suddenly turned loose on the streets. Southerners knew that there would be a different kind of civil war and massive bloodshed.

Like the Civil War that happenned after 1865? Waitaminute, there weren’t any massacres of whites by blacks! That’s not what happenned!

And you’re ignoring that Lincoln’s platform was against the expansion of slavery; abolitionists voted Republican, but the Republican Party did not favor immediate emancipation until after Abraham lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. Before that, it was all about the restriction of slavery.

And limited exposure to American culture? The slaves had been in America for quite some time! No slave had been imported to the United States legally since 1808, and while the illegal slave trade continued, it was on a very small scale.

The South clearly preferred to take its chances warring with the Federal Government over what they had to imagine was a surety of the complete chaos, civil unrest and rupture to society that would occur if the bowed to Lincolns wishes.

What were Lincoln’s wishes? He hadn’t taken office yet. And I think you are now the first living person I’ve had contact with who has the temerity to argue that the South was right to oppose abolition because it would have been bad to free the slaves.

Gladness has nothing at all to do with it. They were victims of Islamic expansion and opportunistic nations and interests.

Opportunistic nations and interests like slavetraders, slave auctioneers, and slave owners?

The slaves were not US citizens and were not entitled to constitutional rights at the time - nor apparently where the states.

Ladies and gentlemen, introducing Roger B. Taney!

I am seeing this all now from a new perspective of the general Southerner who had no slave suddenly realizing what it meant to him and his family if near equal numbers of slaves were suddenly released from the “wealthy plantation” owners and were forced to compete with cheap labor, mass poverty, and non educated people who did not share any cultural or common values now wandering the streets and homeless. It would have been social chaos. The common Southerner must have been terrified at the prospects for what would happen and that is no doubt what is behind any brutality that was seen. They were afraid for their lives and losing their way of life. There was nothing to lose in resisting the Federal government since capitulation would bring their worst fears.

Their worst fears, based on racial imagery of blacks as bloodthirsty monsters. You’re arguing that it was okay for white southerners to be racist, and okay for them to support slavery. From that perspective, then yes, the South was right. But that requires you to take up the John C. Calhoun argument that slavery was good.

Oh, and by the way: none of it happened after emancipation. There was no race war in the South. Terrorism by the KKK in some areas, maybe, but a flat-out race war: never happenned. So the fears were groundless. Except for one: blacks got rights.

 

[Lujack]

It’s unfair to compare this by current standards. Remember there were no laws in Africa except tribal social mores. As well remember that Europe before Chrisian law was establised were just pagan and old Roman law. Slavery was a common thing in Africa and the laws were a first step in bring a rule of order that would give uniform treatment rather than arbitrary punishment. It was entirely fair at the time since the black slaves and their descendants were in fact a different nation living within a nation.

Ladies and gentlemen, John C. Calhoun! “A different nation living within a nation” and thus entitled to no rights?

This was not unprecedented. Recall how America put the Tribal native Indians on the reservations to segregate them so they could have their own tribal laws - and some still prefer it over “white man cival law”.

Are you arguing that the treatment of the Native Americans was okay? It was wrong. It was a century of dishonor. The Native Americans who do stay on the reservations do so because that’s the only way they have left to hold on to what they can of their old way of life…but if they want to become American citizens and vote, they can. They have rights. Unlike slaves did.

What if American Muslims try to politically demand its own segregation from America and wants to have its own Sharia laws seperate from its Christian host country? Will you feel the same way and permit them to ELECT to be seperate but equal?

James

What on earth are you talking about?

 

[CentralFLJames]

Point me to those constitutional provisions.

I will only address the provisions for succession. The truth is the constitution itself is subordinate to other precedent in this area. But we can generally point to the 10th amendment if one wants to take a constitution-only view. To see the authority one really has to go back to how America was formed and the philosophy that was used. We must be careful to avoid an anachronistic rendering of current constitutional case law back into history as well as be honest that the current norm for the question of succession was settled by FORCE not by “we the people”. But by natural law that can all go away again by natural law. Lincoln had no personal authority to declare war on another sovereign state as he did when he ordered his general to engage the South in a Total War.

This country was founded on the basis of a federal system, which is quite different from today’s de-facto “national government”. Authority comes only from a prior authority. And America derives its authority first from natural law to rise up against oppression as it did in the Revolutionary war. But that authority was only recognized and respected when after successful persecution of that right it was codified in The Treaty of Paris with Great Britain (the principal power objecting to concede the right) which acknowledged that each of the colonies was a free, sovereign and independent state. No other country since then has ever challenged that organic authority won by the blood of the first American patriots revolting from the British colonies.

Federalist Paper No. 39 states that “The foundation of the Constitution is Federal, which regards the Union as a Confederacy of** sovereign states**, instead of a national government, which regards the Union as a consolidation of the states.” Federalist No. 39 continues that “each state, in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body, independent of all the others.”

The Constitution has nothing at all to do with state’s authority since the states VOLUNTARILY surrendered only some few limited rights for a minimal Federal body of governance - but NOT MOST and certainly NOT ALL rights. The rights of the states are not derived from the Constitution at all. On the contrary all of the rights, powers and authorities of the Constitution are derived from the states themselves. The states never surrendered their sovereignty though today we have a de facto surrender in permitting the large Federal Government to completely dominate state’s rights through a an assimilation of various pressures (political, money, intimidation, central taxing authority and federal law and military etc.).

Many states rightfully did not trust a Federal Government but in the interest of a greater common good cooperated to grant certain rights – but some explicitly reserved rights to reclaim their sovereign rights at any time. For example The Virginia Ordinance of Ratification reserved the right to resume the powers delegated to the federal government in the Constitution “whenever the same shall be perverted to their injury or oppression.” Likewise the Resolution of Ratification of New York stated that the powers of government may be re-assumed [by the state]whenever it may become necessary to their happiness. Even if not explicitly declared as a reservation the organic right to rise up against oppression still exists in the validity of the original American Revolution itself. To deny that is to deny the legitimacy of America as a collection of sovereign states and we should immediately vacate and give it all back to the American Indians who were here first.

These reservations inure to the benefit of all parties to the Constitutional Compact, since all compacts are mutual and no one party can be under any greater obligation than any other. A condition in favor of one is a condition in favor of all.

Lincoln simply acted without constitutional authority when he took it upon himself to take the same role of the King of England to deny southern states their independence as the Southern states resumed their prior status as sovereign states, free from the federal government. From a legal perspective, it is difficult to reach any other conclusion.

Secession was legal in 1861, but the South did not have the power to protect its legal position, and now 140 years later we have morphed into a national system. And now the de facto law of the “nation” is set by precedence of force where the more prevailing force can crush the liberties and sovereign rights of states whenever it desires and not resolve the matter by democratic process that would dare to vote itself out of the union through majority rule.

James

 

[CentralFLJames]

Point me to the source that notes that 50,000 Southern civilians were “murdered”.

This was conservative. I have not read these books but if you want to look into adversarial perspectives of what happened read these accounts. The North were not so upright as you imagine and there are accounts of union forces robbing corpses and wounded southerners - both white and black.

“War Crimes Against Southern Civilians”, and
“A City Laid Waste”.
Some Civil War History buffs use these figures from 2 campaign areas to come up with a total of about 1.4 million dead civilians.

And of course, Sherman’s actions are no more monstrous than the kidnappings perpetrated by Robert E. Lee during the Gettysburg campaign; hundreds of free Pennsylvania blacks were dragged back south and back into slavery (but the war wasn’t about slavery, and Lee hated slavery, so he never would have done anything like that, right?)

A standard thing to do to captured prisoners and AWOL convicts - incarceration and hard labor.

Oh, and no sources, either?

Sorry I am not going to write a thesis online - one paragraph at a time. This is not a history forum and I can’t put forth anymore time on this. The war was illegal and slavery was NOT illegal at the time. PERIOD.

And for the record least you try to paint me as advocating slavery - I do not advocate it but recognize that it was practised and legal in America in the day. Catholics had long spoke out against slavery - but the Catholics were not in political control of the country - the pluralistic and ever morphing Protestant morality was dominant in the culture of both the South and the North - a perfect recipe for protest, conflict and war.

James

 

[Odell]

If virginia was offered to keep slaves if they stayed. Then why did they still want to succeed if this again was all about slavery? Look I’m proud of my heritage and I support state rights what I don’t support is the South’s use of slaves.

 

[CentralFLJames]

One more comment for LuJack. I used to hold Lincoln up as a giant of virtue but the more I am reading over the years the more I am dissuaded to think he had a level head about the costs to the country in going to war. The Civil War could have been avoided had someone figured out a way to help the common Southerner who had nothing at all to do with the Big Slave Power Empire get out of their trap. They were being outnumbered in some states by a mass importation of Africans who had completely alien social mores than the mostly European Christian Americans had. It would have been impossible to even form a court jury and trial by one’s peers since they had a completely alien culture and ethic.

At any rate Lincoln seems to have subscribed to a double standard when it comes to state’s rights, morality and authority. That double standard led directly to killing and wounding more Americans than ALL other wars America has ever been in combined!
– Abraham Lincoln Statement January 12, 1848 - 12 years BEFORE Civil War
Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right - a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world. Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people, that can, may revolutionize, and make their own of so much of the territory as they inhabit.

–Abraham Lincoln 12 years later when he is in control
No state, upon its own mere motion, can lawfully get out of the Union. Plainly, the central idea of secession, is the essence of anarchy. *

James

 

[Major_Tom]

The Civil War could have been avoided had someone figured out a way to help the common Southerner who had nothing at all to do with the Big Slave Power Empire get out of their trap.

James

You may have already left…

Your statement is keen, and I would agree with it.

However, it is unfair to sink everything on Lincoln and the North. The failure that you cite should have (could have) also been solved by Jefferson Davis, John Calhoun, et al…

 

[Lujack]

I will only address the provisions for succession. The truth is the constitution itself is subordinate to other precedent in this area. But we can generally point to the 10th amendment if one wants to take a constitution-only view. To see the authority one really has to go back to how America was formed and the philosophy that was used. We must be careful to avoid an anachronistic rendering of current constitutional case law back into history as well as be honest that the current norm for the question of succession was settled by FORCE not by “we the people”. But by natural law that can all go away again by natural law. Lincoln had no personal authority to declare war on another sovereign state as he did when he ordered his general to engage the South in a Total War.

Let’s use natural law the way that Founders would have interpreted it; a nation fighting for a just cause has a right to revolution. If the rebels are fighting for a legitimate right and a just cause, than they have the right on their side. If they don’t, though, they are just rebels and the state has a right to suppress their rebellion. By that interpretation, Lincoln, as the head of the executive branch, has the right to take actions to suppress an illegitimate rebellion.

Now, on the constitutional basis, the 10th amendment states that powers not granted to the federal government and not prohibited to the states are reserved to the states. But the states are specifically prohibited from signing treaties and conducting foreign diplomacy, in Article I, Section 10. They are banned from conducting their own relations with a foreign power; that would seem to ban them from becoming a foreign power, would it not? By that logic, the Confederacy was never a sovereign state, but, as Lincoln put it, was simply a combination of powers that could not be suppressed by normal means.

This country was founded on the basis of a federal system, which is quite different from today’s de-facto “national government”. Authority comes only from a prior authority. And America derives its authority first from natural law to rise up against oppression as it did in the Revolutionary war. But that authority was only recognized and respected when after successful persecution of that right it was codified in The Treaty of Paris with Great Britain (the principal power objecting to concede the right) which acknowledged that each of the colonies was a free, sovereign and independent state. No other country since then has ever challenged that organic authority won by the blood of the first American patriots revolting from the British colonies.

Okay.

Federalist Paper No. 39 states that “The foundation of the Constitution is Federal, which regards the Union as a Confederacy of** sovereign states**, instead of a national government, which regards the Union as a consolidation of the states.” Federalist No. 39 continues that “each state, in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body, independent of all the others.”

But the Federalist Papers are not binding upon the Constitution. They represent an interpretation of the Constitution.

The Constitution has nothing at all to do with state’s authority since the states VOLUNTARILY surrendered only some few limited rights for a minimal Federal body of governance - but NOT MOST and certainly NOT ALL rights.

They surrendered quite a lot of rights; the right to conduct diplomacy alone is one of the most important prerogatives of an independent state, let alone the right to coin money, control imports and exports, and maintain an army.

 

[Lujack]

The rights of the states are not derived from the Constitution at all. On the contrary all of the rights, powers and authorities of the Constitution are derived from the states themselves. The states never surrendered their sovereignty though today we have a de facto surrender in permitting the large Federal Government to completely dominate state’s rights through a an assimilation of various pressures (political, money, intimidation, central taxing authority and federal law and military etc.).

That statement can really only be applied, if it can be applied at all, to the original 13 colonies, Texas, and California. Ohio, for example, is a creation of the federal government; what inherent rights does it have? It was never anything but a creature of the Constitution. And I would argue that surrendering the right to maintain an army, to conduct diplomacy, and to coin money is surrendering sovereignty. If the United States suddenly agreed that they would not conduct diplomacy on their own, but would do it through China, wouldn’t you argue that this is surrendering the sovereignty of the USA to China? I would.

And of course, at least one of the central federal taxes is clearly constitutional, as it was amended into the Constitution.

Many states rightfully did not trust a Federal Government but in the interest of a greater common good cooperated to grant certain rights – but some explicitly reserved rights to reclaim their sovereign rights at any time.

That’s great, but that’s not the way the Constitution has been interpreted. You can try and claim a seat, you can try and call shotgun, and you can try to reserve rights you no longer have, but that doesn’t mean that it works.

For example The Virginia Ordinance of Ratification reserved the right to resume the powers delegated to the federal government in the Constitution “whenever the same shall be perverted to their injury or oppression.” Likewise the Resolution of Ratification of New York stated that the powers of government may be re-assumed [by the state]whenever it may become necessary to their happiness. Even if not explicitly declared as a reservation the organic right to rise up against oppression still exists in the validity of the original American Revolution itself. To deny that is to deny the legitimacy of America as a collection of sovereign states and we should immediately vacate and give it all back to the American Indians who were here first.

I do deny that America is a collection of sovereign states. States are not sovereign, and they have not been since the Constitution was ratified. They are part of a federal system, but that does not make them sovereign.

I do not deny that the right to revolution exists, but I do deny that the South possessed it. To have the right to revolution, one has to be fighting for a good and noble cause; that is not the case of the Southern Confederacy.

These reservations inure to the benefit of all parties to the Constitutional Compact, since all compacts are mutual and no one party can be under any greater obligation than any other. A condition in favor of one is a condition in favor of all.

Lincoln simply acted without constitutional authority when he took it upon himself to take the same role of the King of England to deny southern states their independence as the Southern states resumed their prior status as sovereign states, free from the federal government. From a legal perspective, it is difficult to reach any other conclusion.

No, from a legal perspective the only possible conclusion is that the states were no longer sovereign. You can’t be a sovereign nation and have none of the rights of a sovereign nation. The only possible conclusion is that as of 1789, states were no longer sovereign, and that Lincoln, as President, was required to defend the Constitution in areas where it was under attack.

Secession was legal in 1861, but the South did not have the power to protect its legal position, and now 140 years later we have morphed into a national system. And now the de facto law of the “nation” is set by precedence of force where the more prevailing force can crush the liberties and sovereign rights of states whenever it desires and not resolve the matter by democratic process that would dare to vote itself out of the union through majority rule.

States are not sovereign. Secession was never legal. The South lost. Constitutional liberties are protected against force through the right of revolution, but the South didn’t have that right because they were fighting for the wrong cause.

 

[Lujack]

One more comment for LuJack. I used to hold Lincoln up as a giant of virtue but the more I am reading over the years the more I am dissuaded to think he had a level head about the costs to the country in going to war. The Civil War could have been avoided had someone figured out a way to help the common Southerner who had nothing at all to do with the Big Slave Power Empire get out of their trap. They were being outnumbered in some states by a mass importation of Africans who had completely alien social mores than the mostly European Christian Americans had. It would have been impossible to even form a court jury and trial by one’s peers since they had a completely alien culture and ethic.

Wow. European Christian Americans against Alien Africans and their culture. Wow. And in order to protect the power of those European Christian Americans, the Alien Africans had to be denied their rights. Again, wow.

At any rate Lincoln seems to have subscribed to a double standard when it comes to state’s rights, morality and authority. That double standard led directly to killing and wounding more Americans than ALL other wars America has ever been in combined!

It is not a double standard. You don’t always get the right of revolution; you have to earn by fighting for a legitimate cause. If the slaves were to rise against their owners, they would have had the right of revolution, because they were fighting against slavery. But the beloved European Christian Americans didn’t get that right, because they were fighting to keep other men, other people, other human beings enslaved.

And if you don’t have the right of revolution, then it is actually the duty of the state to suppress the rebellion. Lincoln would have been worse than Buchanan had he not attempted to preserve the integrity of the United States.

 

[Lujack]

If virginia was offered to keep slaves if they stayed. Then why did they still want to succeed if this again was all about slavery?

Because keeping their slaves wasn’t good enough. They wanted Kansas and the territories, too. The South wanted the expansion of slavery, that’s why they broke the Missouri Compromise. The specter of losing the territories was enough to prompt a southern rebellion.

Look I’m proud of my heritage and I support state rights what I don’t support is the South’s use of slaves.

Well, I’m proud of my heritage as a Northerner, and I have just a legitimate claim to being proud of it as you do. Or do Northerners not get heritage?

 

[Odell]

Because keeping their slaves wasn’t good enough. They wanted Kansas and the territories, too. The South wanted the expansion of slavery, that’s why they broke the Missouri Compromise. The specter of losing the territories was enough to prompt a southern rebellion.

Well, I’m proud of my heritage as a Northerner, and I have just a legitimate claim to being proud of it as you do. Or do Northerners not get heritage?

Be proud of your heritage my friend. But do realize there is a strong movement going on and it is our right. We have the right to stand up against big government. States that are doing well are getting tired of being taxed without representation paying for states like california. Don’t think there is a movement where you sleeping when Brown was elected? States are getting fed up with the imperial government. I would say there are a lot of Yankees out there who feel the same!

 

[brotherhrolf]

I really hesitate to post. There are two sides to any conflict and I have no desire to debate the pros and cons of the the War of Northern Aggression.

I would like to point out that most of the Gulf Coast from New Orleans over to Pensacola and from New Orleans down to Brownsville was Catholic. There were black people who were freed slaves or Creoles in Louisiana who owned slaves and who fought for the South until New Orleans fell in 1862 and the Yankees convinced them otherwise.

Louisiana was different from the rest of the South in that we were Catholic before we joined the Union in 1803 with the Louisiana Purchase (yes, yes, I understand that we did not become a state until later).

Holy Mother Church influenced the laws of Louisiana to at least ameliorate the harsh laws of Anglo-Saxon southern America regarding slaves. Slaves were not required to work in Louisiana on Sundays. They went to Mass and then were free to congregate and recreate on Sundays. They could buy their freedom and it was not an unusual situation for them to be freed upon the death of their master.

South Louisiana has numerous predominately black parishes. The idea of holding a fellow human being in thrall is repulsive to me. The fact that my genealogical research found records where some of my ancestors sold human beings chills me to the bone. But, we cannot judge our ancestors with the same values that we hold dear today.

There are way too many on this thread who are willing to reduce everything to the question of slavery. History is written by the victor but it does not explain the fact that there were black Catholics here in Louisiana who owned slaves and who joined the Southern cause.

 

[LookAWayDixieLd]

The United States was the only country to go to a Civil War over Slavery. Every other slave trading country got rid of Slavery with out an internal war. This is what Ron Paul has to say.

youtube.com/watch?v=jbOE4Ip7In0

All Lincoln had to do was buy out the contracts and set the slaves free that would have been a lot cheaper in money and human cost. But Lincoln was by and large an Expansionist and he could not afford to have a competing Nation that was so rich in farmland, ocean ports, inland river transportation, etc. competing with him. The CSA most likely would have settled not only the South, but New Mexico, Arizona and Souther California.

At the time the North was really form the Panic/Depression of 1857. As well the South was providing up to 75% of the Federal Taxes, in large part due to the economic turmoil in the North so in his mind he had no option but to find a way to keep the South from becoming it’s own independent nation at any cost and that’s what he did.

The vast majority of Northerners could care less if the South left or stayed. So Slavery was straw-man to stir emotion and support to fight the South. Only 3-4% of whites owned slaves, whereas 28% free blacks owned slaves, throughout the South. South Carolina and Louisiana had some of the largest populations black slave owners. These are statistics in the US Census of 1860.

Slavery was only a small part of the schema of things.

 

[Lujack]

All Lincoln had to do was buy out the contracts and set the slaves free that would have been a lot cheaper in money and human cost.

That assumes that the owners were willing to sell. They clearly were not; Virginia’s attempt at compensated emancipation went down in flames, and the Border States resoundingly rejected the feelers Lincoln put out towards buying the salves.

But Lincoln was by and large an Expansionist and he could not afford to have a competing Nation that was so rich in farmland, ocean ports, inland river transportation, etc. competing with him. The CSA most likely would have settled not only the South, but New Mexico, Arizona and Souther California.

How was Lincoln an expansionist? As a Whig, he had opposed the Mexican War so much that it cost him his seat in Congress; that’s not really the act of an expansionist. And how would the South have taken Southern California? California was already a state at the start of the war, and had no intention of seceding or of becoming slave territory.

At the time the North was really form the Panic/Depression of 1857. As well the South was providing up to 75% of the Federal Taxes, in large part due to the economic turmoil in the North so in his mind he had no option but to find a way to keep the South from becoming it’s own independent nation at any cost and that’s what he did.

Where is the source for this 75% of federal taxes claim? That doesn’t seem to make sense; the Northern population was significantly larger and had significantly more manufacturing base.

The vast majority of Northerners could care less if the South left or stayed.

That’s not true. If the vast majority of Northerners could care less, why was the North able to keep the war going for three years with no draft? Why was Lincoln re-elected in a rout of George B. McClellan? Why was Ulysses S. Grant an unbelievably popular figure in the North? The war was at times unpopular, but never was there a vast majority opposed to it; the only real Copperhead to ever run for Northern office was Clement Vallandigham and he got stomped, kicked out of the North, and then kicked out of the South.

So Slavery was straw-man to stir emotion and support to fight the South.

I don’t think that works either. Lincoln took a bit of a beating as a result of the Emancipation Proclamation, with the 1862 elections not ending well for his party (Horatio Seymour, in particular, became the governor of New York). It was a risky move to emancipate the slaves, and at least in 1862, war for union alone was more popular than war for the abolition of slavery.

Only 3-4% of whites owned slaves, whereas 28% free blacks owned slaves, throughout the South. South Carolina and Louisiana had some of the largest populations black slave owners. These are statistics in the US Census of 1860.

The 28% stat may be true, but it is also skewed by extremely low numbers of free blacks living in the South and being reported on the Census. Black slaveholders, while they did exist, were extremely rare (except in Louisiana, which was different in a lot of ways, and even there they weren’t all that common), and often were the sons of white slaveholders. For obvious reasons, being the son of a white slaveholder is an advantage that most Southern blacks could not claim.

It also ignores that the Southern system was largely built on slavery; the antebellum South could not really have existed the way it did without the slave system, and the vast, vast majority of Southerners were touched in at least some way by slavery, whether they owned slaves or not. The areas that weren’t touched by slavery tended to be the really rural upcountry mountainous regions, and they were generally hotbeds of anti-war sentiment, like in East Tennessee.

Slavery was only a small part of the schema of things.

I don’t think you can say that. Every major political figure in the Union during the 1850’s was defined by their position on slavery in the territories. The tariff was so minor in comparison that when the Republicans tried to use it to ride to victory in Pennsylvania during the 1860 election that the Democrats called them out for using it as a dodge of the real issue: slavery in the territories.

 

[Lujack]

I really hesitate to post. There are two sides to any conflict and I have no desire to debate the pros and cons of the the War of Northern Aggression.

I would like to point out that most of the Gulf Coast from New Orleans over to Pensacola and from New Orleans down to Brownsville was Catholic. There were black people who were freed slaves or Creoles in Louisiana who owned slaves and who fought for the South until New Orleans fell in 1862 and the Yankees convinced them otherwise.

That’s true, and you know a lot more about Louisiana history than I do (or ever will, probably) but wasn’t the Gulf Coast of Louisiana very different from the rest of the South in a lot of ways, with its Catholicism and its greater influence from the French?

Louisiana was different from the rest of the South in that we were Catholic before we joined the Union in 1803 with the Louisiana Purchase (yes, yes, I understand that we did not become a state until later).

Holy Mother Church influenced the laws of Louisiana to at least ameliorate the harsh laws of Anglo-Saxon southern America regarding slaves. Slaves were not required to work in Louisiana on Sundays. They went to Mass and then were free to congregate and recreate on Sundays. They could buy their freedom and it was not an unusual situation for them to be freed upon the death of their master.

I think this is a real difference from somewhere like South Carolina, where it was legally very difficult to free slaves (despite Charleston being one of the oldest dioceses in the United States).

Do you know where I might be able to read anything about these Louisiana laws? It sounds like it would be something worth learning about.

South Louisiana has numerous predominately black parishes. The idea of holding a fellow human being in thrall is repulsive to me. The fact that my genealogical research found records where some of my ancestors sold human beings chills me to the bone. But, we cannot judge our ancestors with the same values that we hold dear today.

There are way too many on this thread who are willing to reduce everything to the question of slavery. History is written by the victor but it does not explain the fact that there were black Catholics here in Louisiana who owned slaves and who joined the Southern cause.

While I understand that black Catholics in Louisiana who owned slaves did fight for the Confederacy, and that the motivations of individual soldiers who joined the armies may have been different, I can’t see how slavery can be passed down to being a minor issue. I really do believe it was at the heart of many of the differences of the turbulent 1850’s, and was the central theme of the issue of the 1860’s.

I do have to admit, though, that I’ve been guilty of blurring the difference between the issue of slavery in the territories and slavery as it existed in the South. Only the abolitionists, who were a small minority, wanted to wipe out slavery as it existed in Louisiana, but I think the vast majority of Northerners wanted Kansas as free soil in 1860, and the South wasn’t willing to give that up. And the expansion of slavery sure seems to me to be the issue at the heart of that election.

But that’s on a grand scale, and what Jefferson Davis’s Confederate government was fighting for may have been, and probably was, very different from what individual soldiers were fighting for, in the same way that the Northern armies had both immediate abolitionists, conditional abolitionists, and “Constitution as it is, Union as it was”-ers fighting under the same flag (with this last group being very large and very small at different points in the war).

 

[Odell]

But that’s on a grand scale, and what Jefferson Davis’s Confederate government was fighting for may have been, and probably was, very different from what individual soldiers were fighting for, in the same way that the Northern armies had both immediate abolitionists, conditional abolitionists, and “Constitution as it is, Union as it was”-ers fighting under the same flag (with this last group being very large and very small at different points in the war).

Well I’m going to have to agree with you. I just can’t see all the confederates fighting for slavery and there was a lot of them. But there is no doubt there was confederates who knew that the out come would abolish slavery

 

[Major_Tom]

Nice postings, Lujack…

All Lincoln had to do was buy out the contracts and set the slaves free that would have been a lot cheaper in money and human cost.

I’m sorry, but no. That idea is far, far too simplistic. Where would these newly liberated citizens live, work and vote? In the south, of course. Would the average Southerner, who is relatively poor already, now facing a mass of newly liberated African Americans looking for work, welcome this? Oh, and these former slaves can now vote, also? Certainly not.

 

[CentralFLJames]

Nice postings, Lujack…

I’m sorry, but no. That idea is far, far too simplistic. Where would these newly liberated citizens live, work and vote? In the south, of course. Would the average Southerner, who is relatively poor already, now facing a mass of newly liberated African Americans looking for work, welcome this? Oh, and these former slaves can now vote, also? Certainly not.

The truth of the matter is that given the large # of slaves the only viable option was to ship them back (itself not a small feat and it would take 10 or so years to do) or to resettle them out west in the new territories and give them their own mini-state or self contained nation within nation like America did with the native Indians. Expecting the south to socially integrate them and educate them etc. in even 1 or 2 generations was untennable and absolutely a no go. Anyone with a shred of honesty has to admit that the social chaos that came out of this whole area still haunts us this day if one merely looks at the demographics and who is in jail and who is fatherless. It’s not a race issue so much as it is a social & cultural issue. My heart goes out to blacks who were total victims in this whole mess.

James

 

[Major_Tom]

The truth of the matter is that given the large # of slaves the only viable option was to ship them back (itself not a small feat and it would take 10 or so years to do)
James

This was advocated by some in the north also (black and white), and was done so to a small degree to the country of Liberia. Their capital city, Monrovia, was named after James Monroe, who had assisted in the endeavor. The Liberian flag was intentionally designed to be similar to the U.S. flag.

Implementation of this policy on a larger scale would have been much harder, I suggest, and untenable. Also, the phrase “ship them back” hints at some of these potential problems. Forced eviction or relocations would be so laden with problems. The source of economic industry out west would have been what?

When forced relocations of Native Americans were attempted, they were either short-lived or just failed miserably.

It’s not a race issue so much as it is a social & cultural issue. My heart goes out to blacks who were total victims in this whole mess.

James

Agreed.