The real reason for the Civil War.

originally posted by: ignorant_ape
a reply to: Raggedyman

hi - to aid discussion - could you list 3 countries that :

"ended slavery with little or no blood shed. "

Well, there was that 'country' called the British Empire.

Secondly, if I'm not mistaken, didn't the Emancipation Proclamation only free the slaves that were not under Lincoln's control anyway? (ie northern slaves were not freed at that time)

originally posted by: ignorant_ape
a reply to: JoshuaCox

my view on it - is that :

the sothern states were victims of thier own [ flawed ] sucess

thier entire ecconomy became utterly dependant on slavery as any other business model could not compete with a slave based market

thus - they were not prepared to abandon the system

Yup, the interesting thing to me was how much the slaves were worth...

More than every factory and store in all of America...

More than all the cotton, more than all the horses, COMBINED...


COMBINED!!

originally posted by: Raggedyman
Wouldnt that be politics rather than slavery?

Slavery is wrong and cruel in most cases, no excuses and it should be noted how many white people died ending slavery in the US. Its worth noting other countries ended slavery with little or no blood shed.

I think there was more at stake than slavery, control and finances being paramount

I disagree..and don't lol.

For all the modern day States rights revisionism, there was no controversial policy that wasn't based on slavery.

There was a group of fire eaters (out spoken pro slavery southerners) who destroyed/split the democrat party on the eve of the election. Knowing that would ensure lincoins win and jump started succession. But they didn't think the US would go to war to keep its soverign southern soil.

They did it for political gain, but for most others it was slavery..

Look how much there was to lose..


Everything is based on politics and finances, but slavery was the abortion of its day, except on a cocktail of crack rock and steroids.

originally posted by: ignorant_ape
a reply to: Raggedyman

hi - to aid discussion - could you list 3 countries that :

ended slavery with little or no blood shed.

i am not taking the piss - i know they exist - but the counter contention to your premise is that :

the countries that abandoned slavery painlessly were not so utterly dependant on it as the sothern states of america were

you list the countries that you feel best represent your claim - and i shall attempt to show that they are not a fair comparison to the US southern states

That's an interesting point...

The abolition of slavery isn't really remembered except in America.


Sure the American south was one of only 3 modern places at the time to still allow slavery, but you don't hear the story of slaveries fall elsewhere.

Normal history books go from Persian to greek, to Roman slavery. Then skip straight to the end of the African only slavery at the time of the civil war.

The slow decline as people first abolished it when concerning their own race, then slowly decided this or that race shouldn't be enslaved either. With Africans being the last openly exceptable "race" to enslave.

That story really isn't told at all. Hell I don't know it.

originally posted by: JoshuaCox
The abolition of slavery isn't really remembered except in America.

Well, perhaps in America, but in Her Majesty's realms we are aware of the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833.

The value of people is something subjectively added.

Lincoln estimated that in 1860 the total value of all slaves in the United States was equal to $2,000,000,000 (two billion dollars.)

This source says 3.5 billion!
www.theatlantic.com...

It's funny how he's wondering where all this money went, yet a Billion Dollars was magically added to Lincolns statement!

The 3 billion dollar estimate includes Banking, Railroads and the combine capital assets of the ENTIRE United States. Not just Slaves.

3 billion

But when it comes to how much they were 'worth' the subjection only gets even more stupid. You want to know how much that is worth today? Well, the answer isn't so simple because it's completely based opinion.

Some would argue even applying a number could be Racist, lol.

Anyway, the confirmation bias in this math is huge, and the value of the Slaves 'with today's money' is literally placed between 1 and 200 Trillion dollars, with almost no accuracy at all by anyone, I might add.

a reply to: JoshuaCox

So, the Civil War was fought over money, then, not slavery...I think that your title is wrong.

Yes, slavery was a major underlying cause of the war, but it wasn't the cause. The cause was greed, and money, and state's rights, and numerous other things that all came together to ignite the powder keg which had a burning wick heading towards it for a while.

Slavery was just a pawn in the game that was used to incite emotional support on both sides of the battle lines.

originally posted by: SlapMonkey
a reply to: JoshuaCox

So, the Civil War was fought over money, then, not slavery...I think that your title is wrong.

Yes, slavery was a major underlying cause of the war, but it wasn't the cause. The cause was greed, and money, and state's rights, and numerous other things that all came together to ignite the powder keg which had a burning wick heading towards it for a while.

Slavery was just a pawn in the game that was used to incite emotional support on both sides of the battle lines.

The civil war was fought over the economic ramifications of ending slavery, or the fear there of.


There was no hot button issue of the day that was not specifically slavery centric.

It was the abortion issue of its day, on crack and steroids..

Not because of some benevolent push for freedom by the free states, but because of the norths inability to compete with slave labor and unemployment of the average joe, because slaves were stealing all the jobs.

The civil war was fought over succession.. succession was done because they feared slavery would be outlawed.

It all goes back to slavery. From any angle.. but to be fair mainly because of economic issues.

originally posted by: imjack
The value of people is something subjectively added.

Lincoln estimated that in 1860 the total value of all slaves in the United States was equal to $2,000,000,000 (two billion dollars.)

This source says 3.5 billion!
www.theatlantic.com...

It's funny how he's wondering where all this money went, yet a Billion Dollars was magically added to Lincolns statement!

The 3 billion dollar estimate includes Banking, Railroads and the combine capital assets of the ENTIRE United States. Not just Slaves.

3 billion

But when it comes to how much they were 'worth' the subjection only gets even more stupid. You want to know how much that is worth today? Well, the answer isn't so simple because it's completely based opinion.

Some would argue even applying a number could be Racist, lol.

Anyway, the confirmation bias in this math is huge, and the value of the Slaves 'with today's money' is literally placed between 1 and 200 Trillion dollars, with almost no accuracy at all by anyone, I might add.

That's because even one billion dollars is way more than was even printed that century, but I disagree it is hard to calculate.

I'm sure we know the average price of a slave and the rough population. That makes the math fairly easy...

Just a little multiplication is all.

Slaves have always been insanely valuable. I mean come on it is an entire genetic line!! You not only get the slaves smarts and labor, you also get their children's smarts and labor.

In back then money your cheapest slaves ere prob at least a thousand dollars.. that's more than your average house.

So (and I haven't looked this up but).

It only takes 2 million slaves at 2grand a pop to equal 4 billion, right?

So not a very hard nut to crack.

originally posted by: JoshuaCox
Not because of some benevolent push for freedom by the free states, but because of the norths inability to compete with slave labor and unemployment of the average joe, because slaves were stealing all the jobs.

But the North's economy was not based upon slave labour. The South had its plantation economies which were labour intensive and geared towards slavery. Slaves were not 'stealing all the jobs', as they comprised a capital investment for their 'owners'. (Feels sick to even have that discussion)
Seems to me that the war was fought over states rights, and slavery was an aspect of that argument, but not the key issue.

originally posted by: Vector99
a reply to: JoshuaCox

You do realize the civil war started a couple years before the emancipation proclamation right?

Yup, the south jumped the gun. The north was no where near ending slavery before the war.

The whole battle was over if slavery could expand into the new states.

Very similar to gun control, a percent of the southern aristocracy decided that meant "they are comming for all our slaves!!"

So the southern fire eaters split the democrat party right before the election. Ensuring Lincoln wins (and he wouldn't have otherwise) and use his win to perpetrate a rebellion. The fire eaters assumed that Lincoln wouldn't like it but wouldn't fight for a third of soverign US soil..

Ha what would leader wouldn't fight for a third of his countries territory, lol..

Emancipation was a military strategy and a "well might as well end it now, rather than do this all again next generation."

But even though the north wasn't gonna end southern slavery the south rebelled because they thought they might..

originally posted by: Edumakated
Industrialization vs agricultural...

I had always assumed this thanks to an elementary school teacher! Its fairly clear that the north wasnt throwing all in just for blacks, of course it had to do with money.
Then again a war was inevitable when the South tried to secede.

originally posted by: Edumakated
Industrialization vs agricultural...

Not so much..

More slave labor vs paid labor....

The arguments against slavery had little to do with civil rights, but instead were very similar to the immigration arguments..


"We can't compete with slave labor"

"They are bringing the pay rates down"

"Do you want them deciding elections?"

Capitalism doesn't work with slave labor sitting on the scale...

Welll, if you don't own slaves it doesn't.

originally posted by: JoshuaCox

But even though the north wasn't gonna end southern slavery the south rebelled because they thought they might..

The South was going to "rebel to end slavery"?

Whatever helps Southerners sleep at night. Some Germans deny the holocaust too, so it's not that uncommon to live in such a delusion.


Edit: Actually, I think I misread this. He means the South fought the North because the North might try to abolish slavery.
Not that the South fought against Slavery.

originally posted by: FamCore

originally posted by: CulturalResilience
During a discussion on another site some years ago a commenter suggested that the campaign to abolish slavery was about changing one set of bondage for another. Essentially what was happening was the release from actual slavery was only to facilitate the transition into the slavery of mass consumerism, monetarism, and debt. The commenter was roundly shouted down but others thought as I did, that this was a possibly valid point and worthy of exploration.

would make perfect sense, wouldn't it?

That ship sailed centuries before slavery ended..

Consumerism exploded in every empire and major civilization in history.

Slavery just ensures a massive wage gap.

originally posted by: Justso
That is quite a simplistic assumption. The Civil War was not wanted by either side; President Lincoln nor President Davis.

You need a good history lesson.

The northern states were making the laws which effected who controlled the economics and it certainly was more than just slavery. At that time, many states north and south were slowly converting to anti-slavery.

As you stated, slavery was a large part of finances so an immediate change would cause economic ruin, especially for the agrarian south but the north wanted more control in every area of life.

As a descendant of President Davis, I am aware that the winners write the history-but, really, most scholars are aware why the north wanted war-and it wasn't for slavery-it was to control the south-bend them to their rules.

The Supreme Court, congress and the senate were all from southern slave states.

The democrats held every branch of government.

There was one policy taxing foreign imports that sorta pissed off southern states because they imported more than they made, but not even remotely enough to cause the civil war.

As you said, Lincoln nor Davis wanted to end southern slavery nor have a war.. hell Davis didn't want to succeed nor the job of president..

Davis had been to war, he knew better.

Slavery became the "they are comming to get your guns!" Of the day. And a group of southern fire eaters used their position to purposefully split the democrat party on the eve of the election. Letting a nobody Republican Party, nobody win.

They then used his election to succeed before Lincoln even took office.


Davis was the well respected front man they saddled with cleaning up their mess.

So though I am always happy to get a history lesson, I'm not sure I need one.

originally posted by: ezramullins
a reply to: JoshuaCox


I hope you have upped your game. You got spanked the last
few times you played.

Only to people who already made their mind up long before playing.

I doubt anyone impartial would agree..

I mean stating "states rights" without listing anything resembling a policy not slavery centric that caused the civil war, is not winning..

It's just you thinking "nailed it" as you walk away all full of yourself..

Real debates require counter points, which I have in spades, not "states rights (nailed it)".

Lol

originally posted by: intrptr
a reply to: JoshuaCox

Contrary to popular belief the civil war was fought over slavery.

Every States rights policy issue that can be pointed to was directly related to slavery and here is why.

Slaves were the most valuable commodity in all of America!!

In other words, its about the frggin money.

Naw it was about slavery..just had no idea the value of all the slaves trumped EVERYTHING ELSE ...together..

That's wild.

originally posted by: the2ofusr1
a reply to: CulturalResilience

Not sure if I had read the same thing as you but yea what you said . One of the big costs to owning slaves was you had to feed them and all of the other stuff that goes with it . The new system basically made slaves of us all and the Feds got to extract their pound of flesh from us all with the tax schemes .If you were a slave then you didn't own property and didn't pay property tax . New system was you either paid rent or owned your own place and paid the tax to the state .

I remember growing up that we had our own place but it was not registered and we didn't pay any tax .There was a campaine where we could get it registered for free and that way no one could take our place . My dad did and the next year we got a small tax bill .The tax bill grew every year after that . I am 60ish and live in Canada so it wasn't all that long ago these schemes were being brought in . We were what you would call off reserve Indians with no status . Same thing happened to all my uncles and cousins .

Taxes and consumerism started with human civilization, not after slavery ended.

it was about money,
the federal governments source of revenue was from tariffs (there was no income tax then) the south being a major exporter of food and cotton was financing %80 of the governments revenue through tariffs collected on cotton and food exports.

The south wasn`t happy about having to pay such high tariffs while the north was receiving the major share of federal government benefits financed with the tariff money that was collected.

The northern industrialists had already figured out that it was cheaper to hire immigrants right off the ship for below poverty wages than it was to own slaves and have them work in sweat shops.

the slave owner is responsible for feeding, housing,clothing,medical care etc for each slave that they own.
a newly arrived immigrant could be hired for below poverty wages and would be responsible for paying for their own, clothes, food,housing,medical care etc.
Slavery would have ended within ten years anyway after the southern plantation owners saw and copied the northern business model.
even back then it was all about money and greed,once the plantation owners figured out that they could make a lot more money by freeing the slaves and then hiring them back for pennies a day to work the fields, slavery would be dead.