Confederate artillery opens fire on the United States flag and military garrison at Fort Sumter.
"The firing upon that fort will inaugurate a civil war greater than any the world has yet seen. Mr. President, at this time it is suicide, murder, and will lose us every friend at the North. You will wantonly strike a hornet's nest which extends from mountains to ocean and legions now quiet will swarm out and sting us to death. It is unnecessary; it puts us in the wrong; it is fatal."
-Robert Toombs: Confederate Secretary of State to President Jefferson Davis on learning of plans to attack Fort Sumter.
The frightening thing about all this is that I was born and reared in Charleston and I remember the centennial celebrations like they were yesterday. I must be getting really old!
ReplyDeleteThere were reenactments by the cadets when they fired on The Star of the West, reproductions of coins and newspapers (The Mercury), weeks of everything Civil War (or "the recent unpleasantness" as it was known in my family. My paternal grandfather was born in 1861 and his sister, born in 1865, lived to be 104 years old and told us stories of Reconstruction. None of it was pretty. For anyone involved.
My paternal grandmother (born in 1870) was the child of a Union soldier who came to South Carolina and married her mother in 1865. So we have stories from both sides of the war.
But despite what anyone wants to say, no one, not one person, none of my aunts, uncles, cousins or older siblings who heard stories firsthand in my family (I only knew my great aunt) has EVER had the understanding/believed that the war was BEGUN for ANYTHING other than States Rights. Any one who tells you differently is probably trying to promote slavery as the PRIMARY issue. It was not. That is an attempt to rewrite history.
It may have been an underlying issue, but slavery was legal at the time. Saying it was THE reason for the Civil War (and the accompanying denial of States Rights playing any part except to say the states wanted to keep slaves) is wrong. Most of the people who fought for the South in the Civil War didn't own a single slave. Why would they give up their lives for something they didn't have or ever expect to have? They fought because they knew the economic realities of the tariffs effected their quality of life, too!
The instigators were actually the tariffs unequally imposed on the South, the higher interest rates that Southern banks had to pay to bail out Northern banks which had made bad investments - more financial/economic than simply slavery to keep the economy going. All these are included in the term "States Rights" but everyone seems to think that "states rights" means "a right to own slaves." It is much more than that! Students are more easily taught "history" than economics so very few learn about the protective tariffs and the triangle trade with Europe through NY that cost the South 40% of every dollar earned from cotton going to NY!
Of course, unless you really look for it, you will never be able to find that information because everyone wants the Civil War to be about how bad the South was and how good and noble the North was. (Slavery was bad and the South owned slaves, so it is/was bad. The North was good and noble and didn't have slaves. See how good the North is!) all this despite the fact that there were still slaves in NJ until 1865 and didn't ratify the 13th amendment until 1866 (specifically rejected it in 1865!) and Delaware didn't ratify it until 1901!
For some reason, scholars in this country think they can discern the motives of people from 100 years later better than the people did themselves at the time.....
I ought to see if I still have any of that stuff in the basement. It might be worth something to someone right about now.
Anam
ReplyDeleteSee my post of 12-01-10 here
http://tinyurl.com/3f2hwa3
The "it was all about states rights" myth has no basis in historical fact.
In ICXC
John
In retrospect, 618,000 dead and permanent Progressivist rule was really not a good outcome.
ReplyDeleteHow does the first poster (and the other "it was all about states' rights" folks) address the following from Alexander Stephens, Vice President of the CSA" "Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth"
ReplyDeleteJust wondering
@Anon> So the majority of Americans now believe everything that Obama or Biden says? The majority believed Al Gore when he produced his movie?
ReplyDeleteThat was one man speaking about a document that was written by a handful of people. So now every American agrees with everything our Congress says and does? Every American agreed with the 18th amendment and then everyone, every single one, changed his mind and wanted the 20th amendment, right? Everyone of us stands behind everything someone in our government says.
I am talking about why the average man in the street took up arms against the Union. Why the average man in the street wanted "freedom" from the Union. The average man didn't own slaves - didn't expect to - but knew his economic worth was being stifled by the tariffs imposed by the majority of the Congress (Northerners) who were benefiting at his expense. And he wanted that to change. And he was willing to risk his life to keep those in power from taking away what little he had. He life for those he loved to not be worse due to unfair tariffs and trade practices!
If our economy were regionalized liked it was then with only agriculture in one section and only manufacturing in another - only ports in one section doing all international trade the Tea Party of today might be seen more as a secessionist group. Now we are so integrated in a melting pot, one doesn't see something one group considers unfair as affecting just one region of the US. And that is why there will never be a secession again - not because people might not want it, but because they are so intermingled with those who do not that it could never happen.
Many people who post on this blog are appalled at actions of our government. They see various things as harmful to themselves, their homes, their finances. This is how those people in the South felt about things happening in Washington at the time.
In the US you find some who are wild about ObamaCare and those who think it was an idea from the pit of hell. If those people only lived in certain regions of the US, and one group decided to separate from the US, would you dare to say the primary cause of the separation was that one group demanded no cuts in Medicare? That's silly! It is much larger than one little thing.
I am really surprised that this blog, where economy and history of economies is a primary topic, people have not looked at the history of the political economics of the 1800's which led to the Civil War!
Scholars have been focusing on slavery since Rosa Parks refused to sit in the back of the bus. No one looks at any other causes for the Civil War - why it is too obvious - it had to be slavery! Someday there will be a brave soul who looks at the whole picture (and if he isn't pooh,poohed by all the one minded "scholars") will show that it was much more complex than that. If people would open their minds they would see that slavery as the primary issue came from the North!
I am not saying it wasn't an issue, I am saying it is not the primary issue!