Union goon threatens Republicans (don't look for reporting of this story)...

Isn't it interesting that 146 years after the Civil War/War of Northern Agression ended it is still such an emotional issue?

No judgement, just observation.

 

I don't know, all of us here in the North still seem to be satisfied with the results and willing to leave it in the past. It's Southerners who still whine about how they wish they would have won and kept slavery legal.

 

No, and I don't CARE. IT'S ANCIENT HISTORY! The only thing about the whole episode that has any relevance now is that pre-war our African-American brothers and sisters were not considered fully human, and post-war they had the same rights as the rest of us. I have no reason to believe the CSA would ever have abolished slavery, since it was an integral part of the southern economy. As far as I am concerned, if you don't like the way the Civil War turned out, you want slavery to have stayed legal. And yes, people like me who love other people regardless of color DO get emotional about that sometimes, such as when Southerners cry about how it wasn't about slavery, it was about states rights. Yes, but the state right that was in dispute was SLAVERY. They are not separate issues, they are parts of the same thing. So as long as southerners keep expressing how they wish the Civil War had turned out differently, people like me who DON'T wish slavery had continued are going to react negatively to it. If you don't like that reaction, LET THE RESULT OF THE CIVIL WAR GO AND ONCE AND FOR ALL MOVE ON!!

 

The CSA constitution gave the states less rights. For example, it took away their rights to extend voting rights to non-citizens and to outlaw slavery. It also barely limited federal powers.

 

WALGUY- I think the whole issue of state's rights was, in the eyes of the CSA, about individual states' sovereignty. The issue of slavery was just one part of that.

 

Talk about getting off topic- union goons to the Civil War!

 

But it was the part that caused the CSA to be formed in the first place. These people act like slavery was just this peripheral matter when in fact it was the center of the whole dispute. 'States rights' is a legitimate issue, but people who don't like how the Civil War turned out hide behind that issue to try to avoid facing the REAL issue, which was 'Should some human beings be treated as the property of other human beings?' If someone's answer to that question is 'yes' (and if they think the South should have won the Civil War, that IS their answer), they should have the honesty to just admit their bigotry, instead of trying to hide it behind 'states rights.'

 

>IT'S ANCIENT HISTORY!

Whatshisface engineered the Twin Towers demolition because Ferdenand and Isabella kicked the Moslems out of Spain in 1490.

 

:godisgood:

Walguy- Are you also aware that the vast majority of southerners did not own slaves?

The automatic title of bigot bestowed on someone who wishes the War turned out differently is unfair. The reason for the wish is what must be looked at.

 

That's really interesting, as I was born and raised in the South and never in all my forty-four years heard anyone say that slavery should be legal. Perhaps you should be more specific. Who, specifically, have you heard say that slavery should be legal?

So then, I guess you don't believe that Jim Crow or the Civil Rights Movement ever happened.

Actually, it wasn't. In fact, slavery was already starting to come to a slow and gradual close by the time the war began. It was economically untenable and most historians believe it would have faded out altogether on its own by 1880.

Out of curiousity, do you have any idea how childish that makes you sound?

Actually, it was about far more than that. There was also the issue of the federal government attempting to intimidate the Southern states with unweildly tarrifs and regulations that would have crippled industry and railroads throughout the South.

You keep saying that. I think it's interesting that you have to keep repeating that in every breath. I wonder if you're not a closet racist and you're just trying to convince us (or perhaps, yourself) that you're not. Methinks thou doth protest too much.

...or that a significant number of free slaves fought for the Confederacy?

It's interesting to note that, after Charleston, the three biggest entry points for slaves being brought into the country were Baltimore, Philadelphia, and Boston, all Northern cities. It's also interesting to note that slavery was legal in New York as late as 1848, a mere twelve years before the start of the war.

 

Walguy is just like many folks from the north who think that most folks from Alabama and other southern states are patently racist and have lynchings every Saturday night out by the oak tree in their back yards.

 

You know what's really ironic is that I grew up in Alabama in the late 60s and 70's and never really saw any personal racism. I saw some traces of leftover institutional racism, but I didn't really know any real racists (and by "real racists", I mean people who have a sincere hatred of others based on skin color).

But then I moved to New Jersey and I never heard the "N" word thrown around so much in all my life.

I'll tell you what I did see, though. I saw my mom going into black churches to help register voters (actually, I heard about that more than I saw it because most of that happened before I was born) and I saw my dad going into the poorest parts of Birmingham and Bessemer to establish mentoring programs for inner city black children (or, at least, as "inner city" as Bessemer got).

We had black friends, our parents had black friends, my nanny when I was a child was black (Her name was Miss Eloise. She taught me how to whistle. I loved her like she was my second mama.) we were taught to treat blacks with respect and dignity.

Ironically, the only time race was ever even an issue for us was when it was brought up as part of the never ending campaign of cartoons and comic books trying to teach us not to notice race (I remember Little Lotta was big about this and there was a "Christian" themed comic book I think was called Wee Kids or something like that that was always talking about race and bigotry).

My theory is that these efforts probably produced more racism than it solves. If a child isn't a bigot and doesn't know what a bigot is, then constantly telling him not to be a bigot has to create at least some validity of bigotry in his mind.

When I first moved to New Jersey in the 70's, it was stunning how many people just assumed I must be a racist, for no other reason than that I have a Southern accent.

Even today, I'll still run into the occasional person of the "Well, you're from the South. You know how them colored are" variety.

 

Slavery died a natural death in the industrialized nations because theoretically free workers (industrial serfs) are more economical. Free workers don't have to be fed when business is slow. As long as there is a labor surplus low labor bid gets the job, a fight to the bottom of the food chain.

Scab workers in S. Carolina are willing to underbid union workers in Washington but complain about illegal aliens underbidding them. If the illegals are eliminated the scab workers will ultimately assume the standard of living of the illegals. Getting rid of the illegals will not erase the race to the bottom.

In the 1950's one male worker could pay the rent and food bill leaving the wife for child care. Now days most families have two working people. (In S. Dak. it is 2.8 working people). As expenses rise and pay falls the choice is giving up the house and moving to an apartment near one's work or putting the teenage kids to work to pay the food bills instead of buying gas for their own cars.

Buy bicycle stock!

 

On a related note:

What's ironic about this is that Reconstruction policies created a sharecropper system that wasn't much better for blacks than slavery.