re: History Topic: Did R.E. Lee Betray His Countrymen?

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Not being screwed over economically by the industrial North for one.

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How exactly were they being screwed over? They had bumper cotton crops with high prices, the value of slaves was increasing, and many people were becoming very wealthy due to the domestic slave trade.

The cause of the civil war was the secession of the southern states. The cause of that was the election of Lincoln as president. The cause of that was decades of the issue of slavery coming to a critical boiling point. Lincoln's election demonstrated that the southern aristocratic ruling class was losing clout in the US legislative and executive branches. The response of this hot headed group was to commit treason and start a new country. When they inked a constitution, it was almost verbatim to the US constitution, except it guaranteed the right to own slaves.

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I'm not ashamed. It's directed toward the "Lee was a traitorous a-hole" crowd. They pick and chose the history of a nation that best suits their present day ideology.

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That question was also direct to them, I just responded to your post.

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My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that." -Abraham Lincoln, 1862

Seems the issue for Lincoln was states rights as well.

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If Lincoln wasn't interested in ending slavery why did every Southern leader secede before he was even sworn in?

Why did EVERY CSA state constitution point out Lincolns ultimate desire was to end slavery?


(S.Carolina):
: ......This party(GOP) will take possession of Government. It has announced...that a war must be waged against slavery until it shall cease throughout the US.


(Texas):

...They have elected as President (Lincoln) & VP.......2 men who schemes for ruin of slaveholding states.


(Georgia) : They (GOP) entered the Presidential contest & succeeded. ...(based upon)..... The Prohibition of slavery .......hostility to it everywhere,the equality of Blacks & Whites & ..disregard of all guarantees in its (slavery) favor.



What was it ? Did Lincoln want to end slavery & not run as the candidate for the newly created 'abolitionist' Party(GOP)?


Some odd revisionist history despite what those Confederate traitors at the time thought Lincoln was up to.

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This.

Everyone says that it's more complex than that, but take slavery out of the equation, and there would not have been a war. Sure, states rights was a part of it, but the "main right" they were fighting over was the right to own slaves and how that should be a decision made at the state level (not federal). Notice that at the very core of the argument, it always goes back to one thing... slavery.

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I am calling bullshite. A war was bound to happen, it almost broke out 30 years earlier thanks to the tarriff and nullification crisis. If the other southern states had not been scared of Jackson they would hace stood with SC and the Civil War was going to be in the 1830s. It is hard to guess what the trigger would have been without slavery, but it was just a matter of time. When 2 cultures as different as the north and south try to exist as one country civil war is just bound to happen.

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It's like talking to a bunch of KAs in here...

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GFY

ETA: If it was all about slavery why did they seceed before Lincoln or anyone else threatened to abolish it? The leaders of the CSA were extremely politcally savy and skilled, it would have taken almost 10 more states to approve an amendment abolishing it (the only way to get rid of it). Lincoln and the republicans getting elected was the final straw, but that fire had been lit years earlier and was just a matter of time. Saying it was all about slaver or slavery period just shows you only have an middle school understanding of the causes of the Civil War.

BTW: I am not CSA apologist (or whatever you want to call it) because I think it is a good thing the south lost, but I am extremely well read and versed on the stances of both sides prior to and after the war.

Here is an argument int the Huffington Post:

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I disagree. Yes, slavery was of course the central point of contention, but as an example of state sovereignty versus federal authority. The war was fought over state's rights and the limits of federal power in a union of states. The perceived threat to state autonomy became an existential one through the specific dispute over slavery. The issue was not slavery per se, but who decided whether slavery was acceptable, local institutions or a distant central government power. That distinction is not one of semantics: this question of local or federal control to permit or prohibit slavery as the country expanded west became increasingly acute in new states, eventually leading to that fateful artillery volley at Fort Sumter.

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LINK

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The cause of the civil war was the secession of the southern states. The cause of that was the election of Lincoln as president. The cause of that was decades of the issue of slavery coming to a critical boiling point. Lincoln's election demonstrated that the southern aristocratic ruling class was losing clout in the US legislative and executive branches. The response of this hot headed group was to commit treason and start a new country. When they inked a constitution, it was almost verbatim to the US constitution, except it guaranteed the right to own slaves.

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Pretty much.

Not only did they proclaim their right to remain slaveholding territories every single one of them negatively attacked Lincoln(GOP) as those who seeked to destroy slavery.


"Hotheaded' is correct. Lincoln hadn't been sworn in before they had acted .

The South had been winning the political battle with laws like the Fugitive Slave Act , Kansaa.-Nebraska act ,Dred Scott Decision,etc...,

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If it was all about slavery why did they seceed before Lincoln or anyone else threatened to abolish it? The leaders of the CSA were extremely politcally savy and skilled, it would have taken almost 10 more states to approve an amendment abolishing it (the only way to get rid of it). Lincoln and the republicans getting elected was the final straw, but that fire had been lit years earlier and was just a matter of time. Saying it was all about slaver or slavery period just shows you only have an middle school understanding of the causes of the Civil War.

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"Christian men"...yep, men who degraded/murdered an entire group of people and were okay with it. Great Christians...yeah..Nope.

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The North was more religious than the South back then. In fact, the abolitionist movement was an evangelical movement, and one of the factors in opposing slavery was the Puritan work ethic (which held that you didn't have the right to live off of someone else's labor).

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one of the factors in opposing slavery was the Puritan work ethic (which held that you didn't have the right to live off of someone else's labor).

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But the North had no problem taking all the money made with it.

I swear there are some absolute dumb motherfrickers around here. Yall have walking around sense and that's about it.

Easy to say that with 150 years of hindsight. I'd like to think that even if I was born on a southern plantation that I would think slavery was wrong but how you are raised is a strong influence.