[jeffkrol]

War of words on the Civil War...........

States about slavery? No way

Published: April 25, 2011

I am responding to a column by Leonard Pitts Jr., a noted black columnist for The Miami Herald, entitled, "The Civil War was about slavery, nothing more" (Other Views, April 15).

I found this article to be very misleading and grossly riddled with distortions of the real causes of the War Between the States. I find it so amusing that such an educated person would not know the facts.

I am a proud native of South Carolina. I have spent my entire life in what was once the Confederate States of America. I am currently associated with Southern Heritage causes, including the Sons of Confederate Veterans in Tampa.

It's been 150 years since brave, patriotic Southerners drove the imperialist Yankee army from Fort Sumter, S.C. It also marked the beginning of the Confederates' fight to expel this foreign army from the entire Southern homeland.

After all these years, there still exists national historical ignorance and lies about this war. The War Between the States was about states' rights — not about slavery.
Blah, blah, blah...............
Al Mccray is a Tampa businessman and managing editor of TampaNewsAndTalk.com.

...............

Not even sure why I'm posting this.............

[Oso]

People are stupid, that's why you post it, and like a train wreck or a scab under a band-aid, you just have to look.

We are still fighting the civil war, all these years later.

And we are still fighting over slavery.

our biggest mistake was allowing slavery in the constitution in the first place. How could we, as a free country, have allowed slavery in the first place? And why we have been appeasing the slave holders all these many years.

[normhead]

That's too funny. I marched in the civil rights movement, with my parents because I was like 8-13 years old. I've seen Martin Luther King speek, I had the place I was lving with other people working to end segregation, bombed by the Klan. We had a burning cross left on our lawn.

But according to the poitical wing of the Klan, who posed as chiefs of police, Judges in the courts and politicians in the halls of power, the issue was not desegregation, the right to vote or the right og be free of the lynchings shootings and bombings perpetrated by that terrorists organization. NO those were just smoke screens, the real issue was (you guessed it) states rights. They were just denying those black people service in hotels and motels , restaurants, golf courses where ever, taking their taxes and providing them with substandard schools and denying them access to hostpitals, running lynch mobs and leaving bodies hanging in trees in black communities, to make a point about State's rights.

So yes , this war will never end. And people will continue to fight until these terrorists are all dead.

A few years ago, a white friend of mine was vacationing in North Carolina. She went into a bank to cash a travelers check. There was a elderly black man waiting in line ahead of her. A yound white woman, well dresses and professional looking cut in line ahead of both of them. My friend said to the old black man, "that's not right". He said to her " You don't live here, you come from some place where you have the luxury of openly discussing what's right and doing something about it, but, I have to live here with these people every day.. just leave this be." Yes, to this day, there are still terrorists in the south, they are still opposed to the basic dignity of man, unwilling to do to others what they would have others do to themselves, still people willing to oppress others for their own gain and deny others basic human rights. And this war will never end, until every one of the bastards is dead.

There is no place for this kind of mentality. If the "south" were to rise again under the banner of states rights, thousands, all of us that are still left will march again, and we'll raise a new generation of marchers. And this war will truly, never end. It's the South's choice. But they will never own, me or my people again, no matter what they do.

[GeneV]

Well, the state's rights to keep slaves, I guess.

Yes and no. One of the grievances set out in the declaration supporting secession was that the federal government had, through lack of enforcement of the Runaway Slave Act, allowed new states the right not to recognize property rights in a human being within their borders. The confederate states were against states rights if they diminished the legitimacy of slavery.

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Last edited by GeneV; 04-25-2011 at 06:42 AM.

[Ratmagiclady]

People are stupid, that's why you post it, and like a train wreck or a scab under a band-aid, you just have to look.

We are still fighting the civil war, all these years later.

And we are still fighting over slavery.

our biggest mistake was allowing slavery in the constitution in the first place. How could we, as a free country, have allowed slavery in the first place? And why we have been appeasing the slave holders all these many years.

Well, the why of it was pretty much strategic: any slave state with a coastline staying out of the Revolution would have meant the British army and navy operating right where they'd want to be. Particularly regarding Virginia. Checkmate in two moves. The slave states knew it, and so did the rest of the Union, and there was no way to force the matter unless the slave states were willing to free slaves.

[reeftool]

While there were other issues, states rights, cotton tarrifs, etc, I doubt the war would have taken place over any of them. Abolishing slavery would have had a huge economic impact on the slave states so you can really say the war was about money. Their biggest industry was agriculture and the biggest and richest plantations depended on slave labor. All the other issues centered around money also. While the arguement is made that slavery wasn't abolished until mid war, the southern states saw it coming.

[GeneV]

I think it is doubtful that outright abolition would have come for a long time. What the southern states saw coming is that they would be surrounded by states that would not recognize property rights in a human being, and, despite the Dredd Scott decision, there would, as Ross Perot put it, be a tremendous sucking sound.

[jogiba]

[normhead]

There is an image I really didn't need to see. I'd forgotten about those guys. I guess for them, the war will never end. They are too cowardly to fight for what they believe in and too ignorant to see the errors of their ways. What hope is there for them?

[wildman]

How could we, as a free country, have allowed slavery in the first place?

I think we have forgotten how relatively primitive social thinking was among the general populous at the time of the writing of the constitution. Well into the 18th century, for instance, a person could still be drawn and quartered for crimes against the state in England for instance.

I have no trouble at all believing that the average white person of this time could look upon the black man, with his apparent difference, and see him as something other than fully human.

"They [black people] had for more than a century before been regarded as beings of an inferior order and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations; and so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect; and that the Negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit. He was bought and sold and treated as an ordinary article of merchandise and traffic whenever a profit could be made by it. This opinion was at that time fixed and universal in the civilized portion of the white race.... "
Dred Scott Decision of US Supreme Court 1857

[ihasa]

I have no trouble at all believing that the average white person of this time could look upon the black man, with his apparent difference, and see him as something other than fully human.

I have no trouble believing that the Devils who perpetuated the slave trade or owned slaves helped promote that belief, and 'the average person' not having contact with black slaves would know no better.

Back home in Britain in the 18th Century, slaves finding themselves here had sued successfully for their freedom (or slave owners had had their claims of ownership rejected) around a century before the Dred Scott case - See Joseph Knight and James Somersett. Their humanity seems not to have been a point of contention, for the Judges at least.

The puzzle is why slavery was permitted to continue in the colonies for so long after the principle of slavery was rejected on British soil. Probably 'out of sight out of mind' and GREED.

[GeneV]

The puzzle is why slavery was permitted to continue in the colonies for so long after the principle of slavery was rejected on British soil. Probably 'out of sight out of mind' and GREED.

Or perceived necessity. The colonies were severely underpopulated for European standards.

[newarts]

The war will continue forever in the sense that some people are firm believers in a highly patriarchal system where the boss knows best and therefore should rightfully rule over others. Slavery is but one extreme example of that belief system, extending to thinking of others as property rather than servants or children to be ordered about.

We see daily examples of that basic belief when one party thinks it is right & proper to exercise dictatorial control over others. Clearly some think that others are at best servants if not slaves; often this distinction is by class; race is certainly not the only determinant.

This is natural in our species; unfortunately, people with such tendencies tend to acquire power.

[ihasa]

The war will continue forever in the sense that some people are firm believers in a highly patriarchal system where the boss knows best and therefore should rightfully rule over others.

It goes without saying that these are also often the religious fundamentalists.

[seacapt]

While there were other issues, states rights, cotton tarrifs, etc, I doubt the war would have taken place over any of them. Abolishing slavery would have had a huge economic impact on the slave states so you can really say the war was about money. Their biggest industry was agriculture and the biggest and richest plantations depended on slave labor. All the other issues centered around money also. While the arguement is made that slavery wasn't abolished until mid war, the southern states saw it coming.

Give that man a cigar! He's the first person I've seen mention "cotton tariffs" or given any consideration to the economic causes of the War Between the States..
Here is a pretty objective light read with many frequently overlooked FACTS.
Causes of the Civil War-a North Georgia perspective