It wasn’t about slavery, I mean yeah the vice president of the confederacy made a speech saying slavery was the cornerstone of the CSA, and multiple seceding states released documents that explicitly stated they were seceding in large part because of slavery, and all the seceding states were slave owning states, and West Virginia exists because they split from Virginia as they had no slaves and thus no reason to fight to hold them, and the CSA constitution mandated that any new state would be required to be a slave state… but… umm…
Whenever a chud gives me the “it wASnT AbOut SLavErY!” Line I always go ask them to read the seceding states articles of secession. South Carolina is my particular favorite since they started all.
 But an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the Institution of slavery has led to a disregard of their obligations… [The northern] States…have enacted laws which either nullify the Acts of Congress, or render useless any attempt to execute them… Thus the constitutional compact has been deliberately broken…
The right of property in slaves was recognized by giving to free persons distinct political rights, by giving them the right to represent, and burthening them with direct taxes for three-fifths of their slaves; by authorizing the importation of slaves for twenty years; and by stipulating for the rendition of fugitives from labor.
Those [non-slaveholding] States have assumed the right of deciding upon the propriety of our domestic institutions; and have denied the rights of property established in fifteen of the States and recognized by the Constitution; they have denounced as sinful the institution of Slavery; they have permitted the open establishment among them of societies, whose avowed object is to disturb the peace…property of the citizens of other States. They have encouraged and assisted thousands of our slaves to leave their homes; and those who remain, have been incited by emissaries, books and pictures to servile insurrection.
For twenty-five years this agitation has been steadily increasing, until it has now secured to its aid the power of the Common Government. Observing the forms of the Constitution, a sectional party has found within that article establishing the Executive Department, the means of subverting the Constitution itself. A geographical line has been drawn across the Union, and all the States north of that line have united in the election of a man to the high office of President of the United States whose opinions and purposes are hostile to slavery. He is to be entrusted with the administration of the Common Government, because he has declared that the “Government cannot endure permanently half slave, half free,” and that the public mind must rest in the belief that Slavery is in the course of ultimate extinction.
This sectional combination for the subversion of the Constitution, has been aided in some of the States by elevating to citizenship persons, who, by the Supreme Law of the land, are incapable of becoming citizens; and their votes have been used to inaugurate a new policy, hostile to the South, and destructive to its peace and safety.
Not about slavery though… fucking dipshits
Mississippi’s is exclusively about slavery as well
A few years ago one of my conservative neighbors tried to drop the line on me that the Civil War wasn’t about slavery. I opened up the South Carolina Articles of Succession and read it out loud to him. To his credit, he accepted it and changed his mind.
You have to really have some heavy cognitive dissonance to hear the words and not realize the lost cause myth is bullshit.
Seceding / secession.
Whoops, my mistake
Insert the Bobby Hill meme “if those guys could read they’d be really upset.””
You missed that CSA states weren’t allowed to end slavery.
So if conservatives meant things when they say words - the civil war was coincidentally about slavery-having states seeking new slavery-having allies to continue doing slavery together, after flipping out when an anti-slavery party took the white house.
But it was totes mcgoats about states’ rights. Except the right to end slavery.
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No it was about states rights, like the right to, ummm, nevermind.
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I mean they’re not entirely wrong, fighting slavery was a political tool not a moral imperative as it should have been and Lincoln didn’t in fact want to unilaterally shut it down he wanted the nation to figure it out ideally without violence.
Ed: books people, I’m not interpreting anything Lincoln was extremely vocal about it. Listen to Lincoln, he knows Lincoln weirdly enough.
No, they are entirely wrong.
You are right that Lincoln didn’t want a war and only went to war to preserve the union. The North had the votes to end slavery without war and that is how they wanted to end it.
Which is why the southern states seceded and started the war in order to preserve their right to own slaves.
This ain’t difficult, people. Photocopies of the documents from that time are easily accessible and written in modern English.
You don’t need to decipher Egyptian hieroglyphs.
You’re part of the problem when you give “but ackshually” cover to them to continue this nonsense
Yes yes, history is nuanced but your actually a Nazi if you recognize that fact…
You see the problem there boss?
It’s only nuanced if you ignore all the primary evidence that it really was over the issue of slavery and almost entirely about preserving slavery.
Most of those “Well it was more nuanced because states rights and they got beneficial skills” reasons are made up by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
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almost entirely about preserving slavery.
That my friend is called nuance.
Most of those “Well it was more nuanced because states rights and they got beneficial skills” reasons are made up by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
Please quote my statements amounting to such implied accusation.
history is nuanced but your actually a Nazi if you recognize that fact…
Because not all nuance is created equal nor is it accurate. Much of the “nuance” of the civil war beyond southern cecession and the ensuing war was over the institution of slavery and its abolition are falsehoods spread by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
We have plenty of primary evidence from the cornerstone speech, to the actual confederate constitution, to letters of secession to the journal entries of soldiers who fought. None of that supports the “Well it was states rights and the soldiers didn’t know better and the south was just a peace loving society that didn’t want to hurt anyone, and the north are the real aggressors (despite the confederates firing the first shots in the first battle on Northern territory).”
But hey keep falling propaganda by apologists for a dead slaver nation-state that Hitler wrote about his admiration of in mein kampf.
“Your actions are morally wrong.”
“Well that’s just name-calling.”
Incorrect.
You’ll find historians agreeing since Lincoln was pretty upfront about it.
The south said ‘it’s about slavery’ as often and as clearly as possible.
People saying ‘it wasn’t about slavery’ are entirely wrong. Regardless of what Lincoln said. Pounding the table about what Lincon said is a misleading horseshit argument regardless of whether its claims are factual. It’s not fucking relevant. The issue is: the south started a war, and they started that war over slavery.
Yes slavery was certainly part of it and if you can point to where I said it’s not about slavery I’d love to see it.
It seems to me you and a few others here have seen what you wanted in my comments rather than what was actually said.
Historians can be assholes too
Yes and so can chefs that doesn’t mean what a chef makes isn’t food.
History is nuanced, yes. Lost Cause bullshit and slavery apologists can GTFO tho. They’re not arguing in good faith so when you chime in to let everyone know how smart you are by supporting that nonsense, you know what it looks like, right?
Bro it’s factually correct, you can read Lincoln’s diary discussing it. The statement “the civil war was about slavery” isn’t wrong it just lacking nuance in the same way the statement I added to was.
Resolutions upon the subject of domestic slavery having passed both branches of the General Assembly at its present session, the undersigned hereby protest against the passage of the same.
They believe that the institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy; but that the promulgation of abolition doctrines tends rather to increase than to abate its evils.
They believe that the Congress of the United States has no power, under the constitution, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the different States.
They believe that the Congress of the United States has the power, under the constitution, to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia; but that that power ought not to be exercised unless at the request of the people of said District.
The difference between these opinions and those contained in the said resolutions, is their reason for entering this protest."
Dan Stone, A. Lincoln, Representatives from the county of Sangamon
Okay let’s try this another way .
You are 100% correct in your assertion that the civil war was a culmination of much more than just moral outrage over slavery, and it’s a subject worth continued study.
However, there are people who are exploiting that nuance for despicable reasons. So when you comment trying to clarify what you see as a matter of historical record, some of us see it as unhelpful because it’s continuing to provide conversational cover to those who want to use that historical record in bad faith.
It’s true, some slaves learned trade skills, but would you come in talking that ish if the OP was about the benefits of being enslaved?
Sure.
Agreed.
Why do you believe I’m one of these exploitative people and you aren’t.
I don’t get involved in subjectives and things I’m not particularly experienced in so I wouldn’t touch it.
That said, if you agree with me then what is the drama and downvote barrage about?
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Point to where I said it’s wasn’t. You’ll be like the third person who can’t find it because I didn’t say it nor ever imply it.
Dude, you think if chattel slavery never existed in the South that there still would have been a civil war?
The civil war was 100% about slavery.
Please quote me on that one boss.
Please refer to where I said it wasn’t.
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Oh hello pot, I’m Mr kettle.
It was a moral imperative for much of the North. Lincoln only barely scraped out the Republican nomination. His main opponent was William Seward who was a “radical” abolitionist. Had Seward won the nomination, there may have been some fracturing of the newly formed Republican party. So while there was indeed a portion of the population who felt the complete abolition of slavery was too far, a huge chunk agreed with Seward. In particular, his own wife, Francis Seward. She abhorred slavery and I urge everyone to read her writings upon the subject.
Not enough to change it by force federally, clearly. I’m well aware, that doesn’t change the fact Seward did not win and Lincoln and his supporters didn’t want radical emancipation they wanted to slow roll everything.
And to be clear the South viewed a loss of slaves to the North as a loss of property and thus trade to the North. It’s dumb and tedious but very accurate to say it was a trade dispute, a horrific hard to visualize in full one but a trade dispute none the less.
I’m neither american nor well versed in american history. That being said, from the quotes I read in your linked article about Lincoln’s views on slavery it does not seem to me that the northern states had a lot of money/resources to gain from freeing slaves in the south. So, correct me if i’m wrong, but how can you call it a trade dispute if one side views it as losing property while the other side does not view it as obtaining property?
Well, I’ve had a neighbor claim I was doing things on his side of the property line, which he placed in the middle of my driveway. For him, it was a property dispute. For me, it was the ravings of a not-quite sane person. Think of it that way.
You are right, it was not a trade dispute, but the raving slave-owners would say whatever they could to justify their actions and make it sound noble. Much like Putin says he invaded Ukraine to “save them” from “embedded Nazis”. For Putin, it’s a mission of peace. For everyone else, it’s an unjustified invasion.
Fair enough.
That being said, from the quotes I read in your linked article about Lincoln’s views on slavery it does not seem to me that the northern states had a lot of money/resources to gain from freeing slaves in the south.
They wouldn’t gain money or resources no, they would instead reach a more even economical footing with the South. It’s one of those things I think I would have to provide links to because I don’t think I could adequately explain it myself.
So, correct me if i’m wrong, but how can you call it a trade dispute if one side views it as losing property while the other side does not view it as obtaining property?
I mentioned the South specifically but both sides took it as a loss of valuable property to the free North. The North in many actual laws regarding freemen specifically refer to slaves as property as does the Confederate Constitution if I’m not mistaken.
It feels disingenuous to remove morality from the equation. Morality clearly played a role which is why thinkers like Frederick Douglass are still remembered to this day. Clearly there were other forces at play- political and economic which shaped how this played out, but morality was certainly involved.
Gonna get a little preachy here - skip this part if you don’t wanna hear that.
All of American history from the Revolutionary war to today can be summed up with people trying to reconcile the conflict of individual freedom and equality. Those two cannot coexist, and a boundary must be placed on one in order to allow the other ideal to flourish.
The civil war is a great example, individual freedom allows one to own another person if that is their desire. Equality says that your individual freedom cannot impede another person’s. This means slavery cannot exist in such a value system and equality was valued above individual freedom.
The current abortion debate has the same bedrock conflict. Does an individual’s personal freedom allow them the right to stop being pregnant if they wish? Well equality says the unborn child should be considered, as the choice to terminate violates their individual freedom to exist.
Let me be clear - in this post I am not advocating for either side in the abortion debate. I am merely trying to show that most of American history has been defined by trying to draw the line between the two founding principles of the nation.
Resolutions upon the subject of domestic slavery having passed both branches of the General Assembly at its present session, the undersigned hereby protest against the passage of the same.
They believe that the institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy; but that the promulgation of abolition doctrines tends rather to increase than to abate its evils.
They believe that the Congress of the United States has no power, under the constitution, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the different States.
They believe that the Congress of the United States has the power, under the constitution, to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia; but that that power ought not to be exercised unless at the request of the people of said District.
The difference between these opinions and those contained in the said resolutions, is their reason for entering this protest."
Dan Stone, A. Lincoln, Representatives from the county of Sangamon
Listen to Lincoln about Lincoln boss.
It depends on the answer to this question:
Did the South start the Civil War by seceding, or did the North start the Civil War by not letting them?
If the South started it by seceding, it was absolutely, unquestionably over slavery. A simple look at the various articles of secession makes that abundantly clear.
If the North started it by not letting them secede, then the Civil War was about preserving the Union, which the South was trying to leave because of slavery. The North wasn’t fighting to end slavery. The north in general may or may not have wanted that, but that wasn’t why they went to war.
I would say the constitution didn’t let them secede.
Sure.
The South literally declared war so that would be hard to argue plus the whole succession thing.
Correct.
Also correct, those that l two things aren’t mutually exclusive nor are they in this case. I mean they don’t particularly care about the union, they wanted to keep the territories and keep the trade. If all the people of the South wanted to leave with their slaves the North world have cheered it on and in fact did with a number of southerners who went to places like Brazil and Argentina before during and after the war. Weirdly enough much like Nazis.
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So, this annoys me to no end, because the first dude is technically right, Lincoln came in to office with no intention to outlaw slavery, although he did want to keep it confined to the states it was already legal in. And what he’s actually wrong about is that Lincoln made it about slavery to get the support of the northerners - he actually made sure that it northerners believed it was about “keeping the union together.” Remember the union still had the slave states of Kentucky, West Virginia, Maryland, Delaware and Missouri. He wanted to keep these states in the union.
Lincoln (through Seward) stressed the anti-slavery stuff to Europeans, many of whom wanted to intervene on the side of the confederacy because that was where they got their cotton. The industrial north also was a threat to industrial Europe, but the agrarian south was a source of raw materials. But by stressing the anti-slavery stuff in Europe (and then of course the emancipation proclamation which didn’t actually outlaw slavery in the border states) he ensured Europe could not intervene on behalf of the confederacy since it would be so unpopular. So, in the states it was about the union, abroad it was about slavery.
But anyway, he’s right on a technicality that, for Lincoln, it was not really about slavery. But this does not mean the war itself was not about slavery. His conclusion rests on the assumption that in a war, two sides must be diametrically opposed to one another, so if Lincoln and the north were not fighting against slavery, therefore the south could not be fighting for slavery.
But as others have pointed out, the south explicitly says they are fighting to preserve the institution of slavery. They are worried about waning political power also - if Lincoln stopped the spread of slavery across the continent as he desired, the growth of free states would mean congress would not be as evenly split between slave and free states, opening up the possibility of legislating an end to slavery.
So the war was about slavery, and would not have occurred without slavery. Often we point to the Battle of Sumter as the beginning of the civil war, but many historians also point out the popular civil war could instead be said to begin in 1859 in Harper’s Ferry, or with Bleeding Kansas and the Pottawotamie Massacre, or maybe the caning of Charles sumner or the murder of Elijah Lovejoy, or any of the political battles that arose when the US began to expand west and the question arose “what about slavery.” All of these events are directly about slavery and it would be difficult to argue otherwise.
And also, just as a last thing “many southern generals didn’t care about slavery.” I have no idea how true that is and it doesn’t matter, because the war was not fought because of southern generals but because of politicians, southern landowners, and an economy resting on the subjugation of Black people, and that’s why they were fighting.
This is a really well thought out and written comment. Thanks for an excellent contribution 👍🏼
Thank you! I deal with these people in my daily life so I’m always primed for an effort post on it
Init. I love that people like this exist.
Thank you!
I try to always emphasize the existential threat to the South that abolishing slavery was. As another user pointed out in Mississippi’s declaration of secession, their “position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery”. If you abolish slavery, the South dies (in the economic sense, and in the cultural sense for white people) immediately. If you simply restrict slavery to this one corner of the country, the South dies slowly as its political power is curbed.
Remember the Upton Sinclair quote: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” Similarly, people who would otherwise be on the fence about slavery were firmly in the pro-slavery camp because of the political and economic power inextricably tied to it.
That’s not to say that the South was full of reluctant slave owners or anything. It was still one of the most racist times and places in human history. The South brutalized their slaves and they enjoyed doing it, or at best were indifferent to the brutality.
The South liked slavery. But it was the economic and political threat that meant fighting was their only course of action if they wanted to survive as a socio-economic bloc at all. If it weren’t for the economic impact, they probably would have done like the North: got rid of their slaves (though not their racism…the North was extremely racist at the time too, a fact which history glosses over).
And we can see proof of this in the history of the South after they lost: abject poverty for generations. That was what they feared.
It’s way more complicated than pro-slavery vs anti-slavery. On both sides. Yes, that was a central theme but there’s an important distinction between “fighting to keep slaves” and “fighting to keep the economy built on slaves”. The former is pure evil, the latter is the same kind of evil we all promote when we buy iphones or leggings assembled by child laborers in China.
I grew up in the South and went to college in the South, so I learned all of this. But I’ve since discovered that in the rest of the country, none of this context is taught. It’s literally “these guys were all unrepentantly evil and we, the good people, defeated them”. Like a fairy tale.
On the southern side it’s really not any more complicated than being pro-slavery. Not only secession, but throughout the 19th century southern states were pushing for the continuance and expansion of slavery, and actually resisted industrial development in the south because of the threat it posed, then as you point out fought to preserve slavery. And I’d love to know the difference between fighting to keep slaves and fighting to keep an economy built on slaves, and how a southern plantation owner who owns slaves and has great sway in government (or is in government) is in any way comparable to me with no political power buying an iPhone (or other smartphone) because of the difficulty surviving in the modern world without one.
And I’m sorry, I did not realize that southerners were all given in depth lessons about bleeding Kansas and the lead up to the civil war. You must be hiding them somewhere because all I ever get from southerners is the rote memorization of basic historical facts that seem to (but don’t) contradict popular narratives of the civil war with absolutely zero historical analysis, just like the picture. I’d much rather a layperson have the northern “fairy tale” understanding of the civil war that actually gets its reasons for occurring correct, than some both sides attitude towards it. I honestly cannot believe I typed out that whole thing above and what I get in response is some sort of “nuanced” confederate apologia.
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And I’d love to know the difference between fighting to keep slaves and fighting to keep an economy built on slaves
I doubt that, but I’ll play along.
First though, we should make a distinction. Most people are ignorant. If we are to leave people ignorant of history, yes the Northern fairy tale is better than the Southern one. At least then they’re not ignorant and racist. But here I’m arguing against fairy tales AT ALL.
Nuance can be weaponized, yes. That’s a poor argument for always striving against nuance and contextualizing things. I haven’t seen any pro confederate racism in this thread at all. I think we are not in danger of that happening here, now, in this conversation specifically.
I think we can afford nuance in this space. We don’t need to silence it for fear of it being weaponized by bigots. There’s very few if any bigots here, and the pro-nuance camp here doesn’t deserve to be accused of bigotry. Maaaaybe pedantry, at worst.
Back to my first point:
The difference is one of degree. The North faced a similar dilemma of pro-slavery racism vs abolitionism a hundred years prior, but without the economic or political implications. That was a pure “racism good” vs “racism bad” debate, and “racism bad” won. Not a complete victory, but enough to undo slavery and some of the worst dehumanizing aspects of racism.
If you could, today, abolish slavery and child labor without giving up your iphones and milk chocolate and cheap clothes, that’s an easy battle to undertake, morally. But you can’t extricate the economic implications. Removing yourself from consumerism is HARD. We have fought wars to protect our oil even though we know it’s bad for the planet. No, we didn’t all agree with it, but enough people put their immediate quality of life above concerns for the climate and for the well being of locals. These people, you and I included, are not all unrepentantly evil.
It’s a tradeoff. It’s a spectrum. It’s not all yes or no, black or white, good or evil.
“I will fight a war to preserve my right to be evil” is not a thing that anyone has ever thought or done. “I will fight a war to maintain my standard of living” is a thing that happens all the time, even when that standard of living is based on evil.
In many cases, the evil that the standard of life is based on is SO EVIL, it must be stopped. That’s why the North was right. I’m not making some sort of both sides bullshit argument here. The Confederacy was wrong, and should not have existed. The tradeoff between harm done and standard of living for those on top was too much, by far. It was a morally good thing that slavery was destroyed, despite the harm that came to Southern whites because of it.
But the reason for understanding all this is so we don’t fall into the trap of dehumanizing the Confederacy. They’re not cartoon villains. They had rational reasons for why they were willing to fight to preserve slavery.
“People who disagree with me are evil, full stop” is a dangerous place for one’s mind to go, and I’ll always try to combat it. With the understanding, like I mentioned above, that nuance can be weaponized, and when that happens (not before), we can take the gloves off, ignore nuance, and berate the bigots into submission. Then once the bigots are gone, we can go back to discussing nuanced and contextualized hostory.
The difference is one of degree. The North faced a similar dilemma of pro-slavery racism vs abolitionism a hundred years prior, but without the economic or political implications.
Granted, this early history of abolitionism in the north is not as much in my wheelhouse, but I have to doubt the charge that northern slavers so willingly gave up their slaves based on idealistic appeals of “racism is bad.” The real reason slavery did not gain as much of a foothold in the north is one of environment - the south is blessed with low, flat and extremely fertile plains, longer growing seasons and a warmer climate, which lends itself to agriculture and the large plantations so common in the south. The north is rocky, colder, and growing seasons are shorter. That’s not to say the north did not have large slaveowners, but the plantation economy of the south could never have existed in the north. What the north does have is harbors. While slavery might not have looked the same in the north, there were plenty of people involved in the slave trade in the north because of the importance of shipping to the northern economy. I don’t imagine the slaveowners and slave traders so willingly gave up the slave economy in the north, but slavery just never had the foothold in the north that it did in the south, and when the industrial economy gets going the north is just better suited for it, especially with its shipping capabilities, and many slave traders I imagine could be flexible since it wasn’t so much “slaves” they were tied to as “trade.”
The rest of this, I don’t know, I don’t understand the nuance you believe there should be with regards to the south. I’m not dehumanizing confederates, they were in fact all too human, which I believe is even scarier, that human beings are able to rationalize the subjugation of another human being, or rationalize themselves into supporting it. I understand exactly what you’re saying they wanted to maintain their lifestyles, privileges, and class position, but I take the opposite position which is they are bad people for doing so. And yeah maybe they were raised that way, propagandized that way, never had a chance to form differing opinions - I don’t care. At one point they were upholding slavery and maintaining it, and I’m not going to be gentle with them while Black people were being worked to death, killed, beaten, and kept in bondage through their actions.
My concern when it comes to nuance IS the dehumanizing. Removing context inevitably causes “othering” of the perpetrators. We begin to think they’re some other species, nothing like you and I or our friends. So then when it happens again it sneaks up on us.
Nuance allows us to LEARN from the tragedies of the past.
I am telling you that I am not dehumanizing confederates, and the fact that they are human makes it even worse. What is the nuance you think I need to avoid dehumanizing confederates?
I’m not specifically talking about your responses when I’m talking about dehumanizing. Just the general conversation in this thread.
Edit: in fact of all the responses here, yours is probably the most level headed and rational.
The fact that the confederates were not cartoon characters but people makes their collective crime against humanity worse, not more sympathetic as you seem to believe.
I in fact do not believe that. And in fact I never said or implied that.
Slave owners and their drivers are unrepentantly evil in my book, there’s no amount of apologia you can offer to make me feel good about Preston Brooks or any of the big Charleston plantation owners.
Knowledge can be a burden. It’s definitely easier to just rabble rabble rabble
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It’s literally slaves
They’re just over there instead of over here
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Rofl those were examples. It’s obviously very difficult to tell exactly what they’re producing but they definitely work in manufacturing producing goods that come to the West.
Sometimes even the way slavery is taught, as if the point of slavery was to produce white supremacy rather than cotton and not the other way around, an economic system which these notions of race and white supremacy developed to explain and justify.
Then post-Civil War you have this Populist movement which condensed the interests of both black and white labor and really threatened the landowners, and out of that comes things like Booker T Washington’s “Atlantic Compromise” and notions of race relations. It isn’t really until the New Deal and the 50-60s with A. Philip Randolph and MLK Jr that you get any kind of serious civil rights connections to labor organizing again.
as if the point of slavery was to produce white supremacy rather than cotton and not the other way around
This is a perfect summary of how I feel the civil war is taught in the north.
It can become very hypocritical when it comes to neighborhood development and mortgage redlining. Not the same as Jim Crow but basically a system of segregation, not to mention the policing in the mix. “I mean I’m not racist but think of our real estate value here…”
That isn’t “technically correct”. His statement said the Civil War. Not Lincoln. If you want to go and support the racial ramblings of a moron on Twitter, it would help to technically correct yourself.
If someone means “both sides thought it was about slavery” then initially no. The south absolutely left over slavery and stuff like the fugitive slave act (“states rights” and “right to property” 💀) but originally the union was just trying to get everything back together.
That’s part of why it feels off.
Imagine this contrived metaphor. The union is a barber. The south paid for a haircut. The south says “This haircut sucks, I’m getting a refund with the bank.” Then the union says “Actually you owe me money and can’t do that.” Is it correct to say this spat is about a haircut? I’d think so, yes. Let’s say later the union decided “actually, I’m a good barber and it isn’t just about the money.” Is it correct to say the spat is now about a haircut? Definitely. So when someone says “The spat wasn’t initially about a haircut, the union didn’t care about their barber skills until later”… Is that correct? Technically. Does it make me suspicious they’re trying to spread Lost Cause of the South propaganda? It definitely makes me suspicious.
Even if both sides didn’t agree the war was about slaves originally the fucking Confederacy definitely believed it was about slavery the entire time and they were founded on slavery and mentioned it in their letters of secession and their founding documents. There’s no ambiguity about that. Everything else is just a linguistic trick of whether a war being about something means both sides have to agree what it is about.
His entire train of thought is based on the idea that “Lincoln didn’t oppose slavery” which is “technically correct.” Except it leaves out all historical analysis which allows him to come to the fallacious conclusion that “the civil war wasn’t about slavery.”
Wars aren’t one person. Even the President.
Yes, this was literally my entire point. Did you miss this?
His conclusion rests on the assumption that in a war, two sides must be diametrically opposed to one another, so if Lincoln and the north were not fighting against slavery, therefore the south could not be fighting for slavery.
Edit: if you need it spelled out, I am implying that this is a fallacious assumption
Edit 2: to spell it out further, I am implying this is a fallacious assumption based in part on the reason you just laid out
Then you need you access your writing capabilities. Your initial response was he was “technically correct”. He is not technically correct. He’s technically stretching the truth to match click bait on a garbage platform and spew anti racism rhetoric.
Lincoln was not the only person fighting the Civil War. There were hundreds of thousands. You disrespect every soldier that died and for their causes by reducing it to two people making choices.
I took History of the United States. As an undergrad. With an emphasis on the time period. Slavery was very much part of the landscape for every single American. It is utterly inept to even try and justify it otherwise.
Most people who read my original comment seemed to have no issues with it. You however should work on your reading comprehension if you came away from it thinking that it’s justifying slavery.
Did Lincoln want to outlaw slavery? Maybe we can begin there.
I straight up don’t even know what the fuck you’re talking about in the rest of this comment. Or rather, I don’t know how it’s responding in any way to my original comment.
Then take a more comprehensive English course and don’t respond until you do.
Most Americans naturally want the war to be about slavery—and they object to allegations it’s not—because that’s the morally righteous position, which is the position they want to believe their side held. So telling them the war was about slavery for the South, but the North really didn’t give a shit, is not what they want to hear.
yeah I agree, people have a hard time hearing any criticism of Lincoln. I wouldn’t say that he “didn’t give a shit” because he was committed to stopping it’s spread into the western territories (the position that caused secession). And he did express moral opposition to slavery. But he was a moderate and felt bound by the constitution that he couldn’t actually outlaw slavery in the south, hoping that to stop its spread west would cause a gradual end to slavery as slaveowner political power wanes.
So he’s a liberal who goes to war mostly to keep the union together, and his first thought is not really about the slaves. But he did do things, like when he issues the emancipation proclamation he ensures there is a legal argument that the slaves freed by it will remain free after the war. So it’s not like Lincoln didn’t care about the slaves. He was extremely moderate, but he did hold generally anti-slavery views.
Also it’s hard to say “the north didn’t give a shit” since abolitionism was strong in the north, John Brown was celebrated in the north. There were a lot of people who cared and were extremely opposed to slavery in the north. You have soldiers singing songs celebrating John Brown. Of course this was definitely not true of everyone lol.
So I don’t think it’s fair to just say the north was completely unconcerned with slavery, but there’s a lot of complexity there, especially with Lincoln, and ultimately at the end of the day Lincoln had no plans to outlaw slavery and didn’t declare war because of slavery.
As bad as this lie is, it’s not as bad as the lie that “slavery was good for the slaves” that republicans are pushing now.
They were pushing that line before the civil war. Claimed that forcing Christianity on them made up for the slavery.
That’s like saying “Yes, I gave you AIDS, but you should be thankful because I also gave you syphilis.”
It’s the same bullshit religious people say about the Bible. They are not slaves! Just indentured servants, that you can beat and brand! It’s totally cool! They loved it!
It’s a funny way of saying that they tried to thrive in an extremely shitty situation.
💀
Slavery and abuse apologists are the most terrifying people in existence.
fr fr
“People who say things that make me uncomfortable should be blocked” lol
So far I haven’t seen one person in this whole thread say slavery was a good thing. The entire debate is “the Civil War was a simple good vs evil” or “the Civil War, like all things, had nuance and context”.
I’m guessing you’re in the simple camp.
iT wAs AbOuT sTaTeS rIgHtS!
yeah states rights to do what exactly?
Well, the south lost their RIGHTS, and that’s why NASCAR only turns LEFT.
Thanks dad.
Of course it was about slavery. Aka money. They were intrinsically linked, and outlawing slavery would have trashed their largely cash crop economy while the North’s industrialization kept right on chugging away. The racism was more complicated but primarily served to keep the poor - free - white citizenry from realizing that the rich elite were the real enemy. Just like today, really.
Which is doubly asinine on their part when we remember that was the time industrial agriculture machines were invented, like the cotton gin, that made slavery largely unnecessary.
They just wanted to have victims to feel superior to.
It’s actually even worse than that, they would have made more money by industrialization if they adopted it. They are just always slow to adopt shit.
While I was in school, “hyuck hyuck, lookuhtem queers in ‘em pipe paynts. Geigh as hay-uhl! Hyuck hyuck.”
The next year, pipe pants with big belt buckles were in fashion. Jnco cowboys. Not practical for goat roping at all.
If you’re making $30/hr now, and you could join a trade union and make $65/hr as a journeyman, you’d do it, no question. But if you first have to take a 5 year apprenticeship where you’re only making $15/hr, that’s a hard sell. Eventually it will work out, but you’re making good enough money now and you don’t want to go through 5 years of hardship.
Retooling an entire economy isn’t easy.
I had some teachers pushing this bullshit. And they want to claim systemic racism doesn’t exist.
The best part is when they refer to it as “The War of Northern Aggression.” I suspect they will someday refer to WWII as “The War of Liberal Aggression.”
The War of Anti-Fascist Aggression
or more succinctly:
The War of Antifa AggressionThey would call it socialist agression because of the Z in NAZI.
The party was the NSDAP (Nationalsozialistische deutsche Arbeiterpartei / National Socialist German Workers’ Party). Nazi was just the abbreviation. So yes, but not because of the Z.
It’s, I think, sort of true that the Civil War wasn’t always going to necessarily mean the end of slavery if the north won.
It started as a war to keep the union together, and initially a lot of people in the north thought that it would end quickly and that the states would return to the union and give up their rebellion.
However, as time went on and the losses started to pile up, it became clear to Lincoln and the other northern leaders that a war with this much bloodshed must end the slavery debate for good. That is why Lincoln ultimately wrote and delivered the Emancipation Proclamation.
But it’s a point that’s splitting a lot of hairs and very nuanced, because the Civil War started when pro-slavery states seceded from the union because they were afraid that a president elected without consent from any of the southern states might move to eliminate slavery…so summarily, the Civil War was definitely about slavery from beginning to end.
TL;DR: The Civil War was about slavery.
Right: the north wasn’t fighting about slavery, it was fighting secession.
But the south was seceding about slavery.
The south started the civil war, over slavery.
The confederacy only existed to preserve and expand slavery.
I’ve found this quote from Lincoln to be illustrative.
“If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union.”
I also find the fact that the Emancipation Proclamation did not free slaves living in border States, but only States that seceded to corroborate this.
That being said, Lincoln had long been know to oppose slavery and supported its abolition.
Read the Confederate constitution and that’ll put this debate to rest.
Yes, the reasons lie somewhere between “it wasn’t about it” and “it was only about it”. Slavery was a major issue of course but a deeper feeling of cultural separation was under it. The nation back then wasn’t nearly as federal as it is now, it was much more a collection of states and people felt that way. Gen Lee always said his loyalty was first to Virginia, he didn’t say the US and not the Confederacy. The north was much more industrialized and the south much more rural. Also slaves were expensive and you had a southern elite of wealthy landowners who owned the vast majority of slaves who had much more to lose from abolition than the average poor white person. In fact West Virginia broke away and Tennessee remained mostly neutral because the people in the mountainous areas rarely had slaves. When states became free or slave then it became a matter of whether new states should be free or slave states, further fanning the fires. “Bleeding Kansas” was a mini civil war before the civil war. The wealthy southern landowners saw every free state as a step towards abolition, others saw it as a threat to state’s rights by an increasingly powerful federal gov. Ironically the cotton gin actually increased the demand for slaves instead of reducing it.
The war wasn’t always popular in the north, especially early on and you had vicious draft riots in NYC and a Massachusetts unit was viciously attacked while passing through Baltimore.
I’ll add to your comment on the Emancipation Proclamation that Lincoln also wanted to make the war more than just about reuniting the nation and for a higher cause. He also wanted to make it clear to the now abolitionist British that siding with the Confederates (the British were big consumers of southern cotton) would put them on the wrong side.
Just to clarify, the union then was MUCH more federal (small “f”)–the power was more divided between states and Washington. What we always call the Federal government they often called the National or General government since federal rule inherently has regional governments.
The Civil War, while not about States’ Rights in the sense neo-Confederates claim, did weaken the states, though the 16th and 17th Amendments and the New Deal really did them in. It’s hard for our generation to conceive of every topic not being a national issue.
Nonono. It was about Cotton Picking Rights.
The Civil War didn’t begin over slavery but the South seceded over slavery. It’s complex but yeah Lincoln was originally ambivalent towards abolition in 1861.
Ambivalent isn’t correct. Lincoln wanted to end slavery, but wasn’t willing to risk the country being split in two over it.
Lincoln’s personal beliefs =/= the agenda of his administration. Lincoln originally campaigned against full abolition because he knew it would split the Union. It’s nuanced.
The civil war absolutely begin over slavery. What do you think started it if not for slavery? The south succeeded over slavery issues. The south fired on Fort Sumter because they succeeded. It all stemmed from the political fight over slavery.
Did you read my comment at all? The Civil War started over slavery 100%, but the Union didn’t go to war to abolish slavery, they wanted to preserve the Union
Your comment reads
The Civil War didn’t begin over slavery
This is a bad take. The trend in the US and elsewhere was abolition. One reason for secession was the South could see the writing on the wall. Lincoln’s election being the most obvious sign.
We could imagine the South losing the war and keeping slavery, but only for a short while.
The easiest counter to the States’ Rights argument is “States’ Rights to do what?”.
The easiest way is to just show them each state’s letter of secession. They were not shy about it. No need for a deep historical analysis, it’s right there many times over in plain English.
Even today tbh. They never advocate for state’s rights to make life better for people, only for oppression.
This is why we need school standards. I was taught this at home and believed it till I got to college.
Now, hear me out! It wasn’t about Slavery, it was about not ending Slavery!
It was about states’ rights…to slavery!
exactly!
They are part right, if we really want to give them the benefit of the doubt. For the south it was absolutely about preserving slavery, but for the north abolishing it was still kind of a controversial topic.
The decision to make it about ending slavery from Lincoln’s part was part tactical, even though he personally always wanted to do so anyway. It made a lot of former slaves and other black people available for enlistment and also secured the support of people opposing slavery.
But initially it was more about the southern paranoia of the north forcing them to abolish slavery and since the north could not provide any security about this, they decided to quit, which lead the north to try and preserve the union.
At least as far as I know.
Lincoln believed that the Founding Fathers intended for slavery to eventually fade away to extinction. But for this to happen, there could be no further spread of slavery into new states. The Compromise of 1850 and the Kansas-Nebraska Act both steered slavery down a different path of proliferation.
Lincoln’s policy during the Republican nomination and general election was to follow the path laid out by the Constitution. Meaning: honor the fugitive slave law and to make no infringements upon the South’s right to slavery. However, Lincoln made it very clear that slavery will remain only where it currently was in place. There would be no further spreading of slavery into newly adopted states.
Most of my information comes from the book Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin. I highly recommend it for anyone looking for a Lincoln biography.
Such a great read. Goodwin is a national treasure.
There was an article I read a wile back so I may be misremembering. It claimed they the wealth of southern plantations was the slaves, the land and other assets were worth hardly anything. Many of these places had large amounts of debt tied to the value of their slaves. The fear was not just that the north would make slavery illegal, but that the actions being taken to limit slavery in new states would cause the price of slaves to drop and make all the rich slave owners broke.
fighting a war over slavery was so fun for texas; they did it twice and the american civil war was the second one.
and then continued with segregation; you would think they learn their lesson by now. lol
No one ever accused Texans of being smart.
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As a born and raised Texan, I completely agree.
Hey fuck you buddy! 🖕What intellectual stronghold are you a resident of?
Just look at the primary source documents that declare the purpose of the war, Mississippi is a good example:
A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of the State of Mississippi from the Federal Union.
In the momentous step which our State has taken of dissolving its connection with the government of which we so long formed a part, it is but just that we should declare the prominent reasons which have induced our course.
Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin. That we do not overstate the dangers to our institution, a reference to a few facts will sufficiently prove.
none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun.
I mean I know this was pre-sunscreen, but still, the slavers were a bunch of pussies.
All of SE Asia: am I a joke to you?
(answer is probably yes tbh)
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I love the info, but a citation would have been good. Here you go: https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/historic-document-library/detail/a-declaration-of-the-immediate-causes-which-induce-and-justify-the-secession-of-the-state-of-mississippi-from-the-federal-union-1861
