My Southern blood runs thick. Great-Great Granpap was captured by the Yankees at Vicksburg. My dad was a segregationist and voted for George Wallace, even campaigned for him. I came to Christian Faith at 16 and turned away from southern racism, and came to reject some of my father's values. Nonetheless some of the cause for which the South fought was just and good. But here of late after more study and reconsideration I think I would have "betrayed" the Sacred Soil of the Old Dominion, and would have fought for the North, just to put down the evils of slavery. Southern Plantation Slavery was cruel beyond description, and what is that quote from T Jefferson? "I tremble for the future of our nation when I contemplate that God is just."
So, now I have come to view John Brown as a hero's hero, in the footsteps of perhaps the ancient Hebrew prophets such as Jeremiah or Amos...
After all the espousing the glories of the lost cause, and how it was all about State's rights, I will make a bold statement, the Civil War was about slavery, right from the start, but few wanted to admit then or now. John Brown was the spark to the tinder. He galvanized the South, woke them up to man up their militias and brought on the war.
'Twould be nice if the Civil War were about Slavery, but so many Northerners, including Lincoln, seem to have thought otherwise. On the other hand, very possibly there would have been no actual secession WITHOUT the catalyst and polarizing effect of that "peculiar institution".
I dunno about John Brown, correct me if I'm wrong but didn't he gun down some innocent folks in Kansas in the years prior to Harper's Ferry?
Count me in as pro-Union too.
Birdwatcher
"...if the gentlemen of Virginia shall send us a dozen of their sons, we would take great care in their education, instruct them in all we know, and make men of them." Canasatego 1744
To most of the people who fought for the South, it was more about invasion and state's rights than about slavery. Remember state's rights? That was before No Child Left Behind, Free Trade, the Patriot Act, codified marriage, and laws that say what you can do to -and with - your own body.
Mornin Bird; "Pottawatomie Massacre.�This tragedy occurred on the night of May 24, 1856, near the place called Dutch Henry's crossing on Pottawatomie creek in Franklin county. Five men were killed, and it ..."
John Brown was responsible for this, but the free Kansas folks had been butchered up before this to put it in perspective.
Morning Mule; I still believe strongly in the tenth ammendment, and I know folks fought to toss off the invasion, but just prior to the war it was a death sentence to preach against slavery as a sin in at least two states, I think it was North Carolina and Lousiana. So much for freedom of speech and freedom of religion.
You gotta remember, the South was agricultural. I'm not making excuses, but under the plantation system of agriculture, massive amounts of man-power were necessary to the clearing and planting of virgin soils could proceed. There was no such thing as fertilization or crop rotation. You simply wore it out and moved to the new fields cleared the previous year. Ending slavery was seen as a threat to the livelihood of almost everyone. Think how upset loggers get nowadays when the feds want to protect some rare species of bird. Now imagine the whole half of the country is employed as loggers, and the protected species is in every forest. Slavery was a blight on humanity and not consistent with the values that made this country come about in the first place, but to the ignorant souls who depended on that system to feed their families, it was necessary. In a civilized world, you can't ever put a terrorist up as a hero. Osama Bin Laden and John Brown have a lot in common.
The Civil War was about money and nothing more than that. If the South had secceded the North would have gone bankrupt. Don't forget but slavery started in the North before it did the South. After the Civil War some of the Northen states even passed laws not allowing freed slaves to move into their states.
And good morning to you too, Dixie. I'd rather be asleep, but its reassuring to see there's other's about at this hour. Got my second appointment with the sleep doctor next week. They gave me a machine that blows air up your nose while you sleep (or try to). Nothing like trying to doze off with a hose on your face. I think plan B involves carving of the palette, whatever that means.
Mule; Sleep Apnia? If they get that tube sleeping deal going they say it is a real huge change. I sometimes wonder if I got that sleep apnia. Good luck!
Here in the Ohio Valley, the general consensus I've seen is that John Brown was a scoundrel. There were a lot of folks on both sides of the river that were risking everything to free slaves. The stretch from Cincinnati upriver to Portsmouth was a major gateway to freedom along the Underground Railroad. What John Brown did in this neck of the woods was to sour relations between neighbors. Folks uninvolved in the railroad began to fear that Abolitionists in the region might try the same thing. Those who were active in the railroad had to be much more careful after the raid at Harper's Ferry.
I grew up in a neighborhood of Cincinnati that had several houses with secret rooms, trapdoors and tunnels dating from this period. Those houses were far enough from the river that they were probably the second night's stop after crossing Jordan. Those folks were fighting the fight one soul at a time. They did not need John Brown to carry on the Lord's work.
By the way, Grant and Sherman both grew up here on the front lines -- Grant just upriver at Point Pleasant and Sherman at Lancaster. One of Sherman's kin is a co-worker of mine at the foundry-- took my job after I moved back to the front office. He's a good guy. Folks can argue all they want about how the war started, but they can't much argue about who put an end to it.
I'm just a half-German Cincinnati Krauthead; Gramps landed at Ellis Island in '23. It wasn't our fight then or now. But the other half is Plymouth Rock and Union all the way. We came from Pennsylvania and fought at Kings Mountain against Ferguson, then chased the Tories and Lobsterbacks back to Yorktown. We fought at Gettysburg and taught Lee to see the light. Go Backwoods! Go Blue!
John Brown may have espoused a good cause, but he was still several bricks shy of a load. For crying out loud, the guy used BROAD SWORDS to hack up his victims at Pottawatomie Creek. Not really the actions of a guy with both oars completely in the water, even in 1858.
Kansas wasn't a very nice place to be in them days, and Brown was just another reason. If my memory's correct, he hacked up a farmer and two sons for supporting slavery. They didn't own any. There was alot of nasty business, on both sides.
As for causes of the "Late Un-Pleasantness", lets just say there were alot of big fish in that pond. Slavery may have fueled alot of fiery people on both sides, but the bottom line came to a rich mans war, and a poor mans fight. But then, ain't they all? <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> 7mm
"Preserving the Constitution, fighting off the nibblers and chippers, even nibblers and chippers with good intentions, was once regarded by conservatives as the first duty of the citizen. It still is." � Wesley Pruden
As one who had ancestral kin killed on the second day of Gettysburg, another who died in a yankee hospital in Nashville after being wounded and captured at Peach Tree Creek, another who was wounded at Fredricksburg trying to keep the yanks from crossing the river, and one who came home with tuberculosis I'll speak.
First I do believe that the Nation is a lot better off being one nation instead of two or three as it would have been had the South won. (My ancestors spin in their graves <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> )
I do agree that without slavery secession and the war probably would not have occured.
I do not believe that the war was about aboliton of the "pecular institution" to begin with. It was about states rights and preserving the union.
It was fought over a conjunction:
The United States is The United States are
There was little support for abolition in the north outside of hardcore abolitionist circles either among the people or the government. There was much support both ways in keeping the southern states dependent on northern manufacturing and trade.
Lincoln was a politician. In a very astute political move he tied the war to abolition. This accomplished several things: 1 it absolutely precluded European intervention 2 it gave a " noble cause" to the north at a time when war weariness and a "let them go" sentiment was rising. 3 it guaranteed that even if the south conquered territory they could not hold it because the conquered territories people would resist to support the cause of abolition. 4 It incited servile rebellion in the south, John Browns' cause, a fifth column if you will. ( Fortunately that didn't happen. ) 5 it cast the south in the role of sinners and the north in the role of saviors to most observers. 6 it assured that the border states would remain with the north.
The it refered to above is the emancipation proclamation which freed no slaves and didn't touch those in the border states.
It is an intresting fact that the first secession movements were in the north not the south.
Human slavery is/was a vile institution but its death in the southern states was assured via economics and a war was not necessary. The majority of southern farmers were not slave holders or at best only owned one or two, at great cost both in purchase and upkeep. They were ripe for the labor saving machines that were on the horizon. Why feed a slave all year when you could purchase a corn harvester you did not have to feed and clothe? Why invest in all that human muscle power when steam engines were working and the internal combustion engine was just over the hill?
To the question of John Brown he was a freaking maniac and a terrorist.
I have a lot of friends who are "of color" who seem generally suprised when I tell them TCW had nothing to do with slavery at first. Lincoln was more then willing to accept slavery, in its then current form, if thats what it took to hold the Union together.
John Brown was a fanatic who had a thing for seeing his name in the papers. It was fanatics like him, on both sides, that led to TCW. To think he was going to "arm the Negros and leed them to kill the Southern whites in their beds" was just lunacy. This actions of this moronic meglomaniac was a huge boost for the war drum beaters on both sides, and the moderates both north and south of the line saw their positions crumbleing.
Brown, or Smith, or whoever he thought he was , brought us this much closer to a gut wrenching war. Lincoln knew slavery would eventually die on its own. Midway thru TCW, with the North in need of a spark, Lincoln harnessed the slavery issue to try and give his troops a moral boost.............10
"Like with any House of Prostitution we ought to charge admission at the United Nations building"
"Even better, we should bulldoze it down and put a public shooting range in its place." "We'd be a safer country for it".
john brown was against slavery.[religious nut!!] linclon wanted to get relected[strangley a republican ,my how times change]. this brought on the war of northern aggesion .. sad sad day when . yankees invaded . seems now that they have had to pay for there rotten deeds ... look how they live!!! yankee's are like a disease that ruins every thing good that they touch! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />
John Brown was a messianic nutball, whose antics in Kansas and at Harper's Ferry fed the fears of the extremists on both sides and made war inevitable. I am a southern man, and lost kin on both sides of the family to the Yankees. Our family ranch in Texas was burned out by the Comanch when the Yankees abandoned the fort line and the Indians were raiding as far east as Fort Worth. My great great uncle was shot in the stomach at the Wilderness and died a month later in a Yankee prison camp. He was an East Tennessee man who never owned a slave. I am a member of SCV and damn proud of it. Nobody can know whether the war was necessary to end slavery or not--I believe that moral pressure, together with economics, would have doomed the peculiar institution. Maybe in ten years, maybe thirty. Was it worth it to kill off a generation of young men and destroy the southern economy? I guess maybe that depends on whether you're a slave or not. But one fact is clear--while Lincoln personally opposed slavery, it was not an original Northern war aim.
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The war had to happen to realaign the power-base of the nation,it wasn't going to happen without a split or a war.The south controlled the union before the war due to the 3 for 5 rule.It ment a northern voter was only worth 1/2 a southern voter,that's not democracy.
As most thing is life it is a mixture of currents ... but without slavery there would have been no civil war, just as without the abolishition of slavery there would have been no final victory.
I will draw a parrallel to Iraq. There are many cries as to why to invade Iraq ...
WMD Defying the UN Sadam an evil leader
and all such .. For me it is very simple, Global terrorism. With out that as the back drop there would have been no invasion of Iraq. I will be the first to agree the link between O'sama and Sadam is questionable, the link between Sadam and several other terrorist groups was not in question.
In many away it is simalar to the Civil war on a global scale. It is clear who are 'real' allies are and are not. But this is another point. I just merely want to point out it is not so easy to understand in the moment and there are many influences.
Anybody that thinks Iraq is anything more than an attempt to garner public support for a second term, line the pockets of a few campaign contributors, and exact a lil' vengence for dear ol' dad, ain't living in the real world, or has had his brain destroyed from too much 78 RPM Rush Limbaugh rhetoric while the bastard was high on greenies.
