and for much of the Old South...if not for the aid redirected toward them by the other states they would be even more worse off than they are now.....

 

 

No state will ever secede from the Union again. No state can afford to do so anyway.

hey i'm new and i have an exam on the civil war tomorrow actually and i was wondering if anyone mentioned slavery in the west because that was a huge issue. that was one of the main points of difference between the south and the north. Obviously, the big picture is states' rights though. Slavery was not one of the main reasons for those fighting.

 

For example, U.S. Grant only fought on the Confederate side because his home state of Virginia had already seceded from the union. His state meant more to him than keeping the union together. Overall, in the south people had a lot of pride in their state. And I apologize if some of this has already been said.

you mean Robert E. Lee.

 

 

and yes the issue of slavery expanding was one of the biggest reasons of the war.

 

 

which comes back to the issue of slavery.

 

 

however there are far too many professors who believe this idea of slavery not being a cause that its just funny, then when you factor in the apolagetic (sp) mindset of many of these same people and it just goes nuts.

 

Lincoln would of been perfectly content with leaving the South as it was...i.e. without abolishing slavery.

 

But the South wanted to perserve the ablility to move West with their slaves and setting up plantations throughout the West, whenever they exhausted the land or whenever their heirs needed land.

 

 

so again to say that slavery was not an issue is a misconstruction of facts.

 

the South was about states' rights.....true.

 

 

and their biggest 'right' was focused on the ability to hold slaves.

you mean Robert E. Lee.

ya thanks for the correction, if i put that on the exam tomorrow that would be a sure F.

the main right was not slavery, but the right for a say in government. They were being crushed by high tarriffs, and nothing can be done when someone who probably didn't get a single vote in the South, wins the presidential election (Lincoln). That is the right.

 

Jefferson Davis himself said that slavery as an institution would probably not last more than 10 years, whether the South won or not. So, if it weren't going to last another 10 years, why would the South risk lives just to spread it west....just so that in 10 years, slavery in the South AND West would die out. Hell, slavery almost died out until the invention of the cotton gin.

P.S. NC Marlin...im guessin ur from North Carolina...where at?

ya im from Greensboro, NC the third largest city in the state and home of the Greensboro Bats the A level affiliate of the Florida Marlins

 

Oh, and slavery in the west just got the fire stoked. Lincoln's election really just threw gasoline onto the fire.

Greensboro. Alright, I know where that is. I'm in Greenville, SC (not far from NC). I know a few people from High Point, which I dont think is that far from you.

slavery in the South was an issue, but not a major issue. Bleeding Kansas, etc. was important....but it all comes back to tarriffs and the Presidential vote.

ya High Point isn't far at all part of it is in the same county as Greensboro.

 

Isn't Furman in the Southern Conference. If so then they are in the same conference as UNC Greensboro. But UNCG doesn't have a football team. Its got basketball and a good baseball team. You might already know that.

 

O ya and over on the espn boards i post sometimes although i haven't in quite a while but there i post as 4flasprtz.

explain why the South was so commited to having an equal number of slave states to free states if slavery didnt matter.

1) Slavery DID matter...but was not the most important issue.

 

2) The issue was more of representation, not slavery. If a state was a "slave state" it would be more representation in Congress (particularly the Senate).

without the proper representation the slave states felt that slavery as an instution would die.

 

 

so again it comes back to slavery.

I refuse to blame the fact that blacks have higher percentages of crime than whites because they are simply lazier. There are other reasons, and I feel a lot of it stems from how they were emancipated 150 years ago.

lazy and negative social phenomena are two different things.

without the proper representation the slave states felt that slavery as an instution would die.

 

 

so again it comes back to slavery.

without the proper representation, the "slave states", if you will, would not get proper representation such as states' rights, lower tarriffs, etc.

 

Once again, just as 95% of the soldiers who died in battle for the South did not die to keep slavery, 95% of the voters did not vote so that slavery would continue.

I refuse to blame the fact that blacks have higher percentages of crime than whites because they are simply lazier. There are other reasons, and I feel a lot of it stems from how they were emancipated 150 years ago.

lazy and negative social phenomena are two different things. maybe, I'm just a little dumb or slow, but explain social phenomena.

without the proper representation the slave states felt that slavery as an instution would die.

 

 

so again it comes back to slavery.

without the proper representation, the "slave states", if you will, would not get proper representation such as states' rights, lower tarriffs, etc.

 

Once again, just as 95% of the soldiers who died in battle for the South did not die to keep slavery, 95% of the voters did not vote so that slavery would continue. 95% of the voters had no clue what they were voting for....

 

 

the Congressmen wielded all the power and sure as hell didnt do things for the good of the people, but for hte good of themselves and their economic class.

I dont exactly know how I can argue with that, when that is speculation.

 

1) I don't think you give 1850s and 1860s Southerners enough credit.

2) Not all Congressmen were plantation owners and slave-owners.

3) Some Congressmen...scratch that...a lot of Congressmen want to get reelected, therefore they must help the poor. Helping their own agenda (as you say, slavery) does nothing for the majority of the population.

i think you are unaware of how politics worked in the 1850s...

 

 

politics was a lot different than it is now.

 

 

there were no causes working to help the poor and such....

 

 

the majority pushed the agenda of the party and as such themselves.

So what you are saying is that the politicians owned slaves. These slaveowning politicians wanted to do nothing but push slavery west, and help themselves. And eventually, they decided that they will convince they dumb public that they are gonna go to war with the evil Yankees, because they don't want slavery to expand. And these dumb Southerners are just gonna risk their lives for that cause.

 

Wow, they must have been damn good politicians.

i am saying it was becaue of hte slave question that the Civil War occured.

 

 

no matter what other cause you try to push, it ultimately comes back to the North not having slavery and the South having slavery.

but it really doesnt. Maybe indirectly. But, anything can be an indirect cause of a war.

 

Tarriffs, no representation. Similar (but not exactly alike) to the Revolutionary War, we (South) wanted representation. We had representation, but it did no good. When Lincoln is the president, when there are no Southern ballots with his name even on there, there is a problem.

Slavery was the main UNDERLYING issue, but it really was not the main issue.

bottom line the South had no organization leading up the 1860 election.

 

 

Look at how many candidates they voted for....

 

 

They rally behind one candidate and they probably defeat Lincoln.....

either way....he WASNT EVEN ON THE BALLOTS IN THE SOUTH! I mean, it just shows that the South had no representation.

 

Not to mention, whether they could have had representation in the South in that election is besides the point. The fact is, they THOUGHT they didnt have representation.