TexasCHLforum.com

chasfm11 wrote:

anygunanywhere wrote:Goodness. Talk about .

The only reason I want to fly the stars and bars is because the prog's (the ones who want to disarm me and take what is left of my other fredoms) want to remove it. Anything the prog left socialists want to do I am against because they NEVER do anything for the right and proper reason.

I tried to buy one but everyone I checked with is sold out. I wanted one to hang next to my upside down US flag.

These folks were still selling them. I have no affiliation other than being a customer.
http://www.patriotic-flags.com/

Now you've got my curiosity up. Wonder what the design considerations were behind the South Carolina Secessionist flag? Anybody know?

jmra wrote:Does the Democratic Party say they want to keep Black people impoverished and a financial slave to the state? No, but does that make it less true?
The federal government was heavily taxing the South and through import taxes kept most of the imports coming to Nothern ports. This required the South to buy goods from the North and pay companies from the North to ship the goods. The North was sticking it to the South every which way but loose. When the South lowered or even waived import fees to bring trade to Southern ports is when things got real nasty. The South was a gravy train for the North pure and simple. Money was the one and only reason the North was not going to let the South go.

They were doing that to force the South to end slavery. When the South skirted the restrictions, the North didn't react because they were losing money. They reacted because 1) the South attacked them (Fort Sumter) and because they were dead set on ending slavery. Is there ANY documentation that shows the leadership of the Union (Congressional or Executive) were upset about the loss of revenues from the South?

What you posit is a theory. You need evidence to back up a theory.

This seems to be the best evidence that I've been able to find - https://www.lewrockwell.com/2006/01/joh ... the-south/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;. At best I would say it's as likely to be incorrect as it is to be correct. First of all, the Hampton Roads Conference was not recorded, so we only have the word of the participants as to what was said. Given that people perceive things differently and that their own biases influence their "record", it's hard to say if what is described is what actually took place. The only real evidence he adduces as proof of the revenue claims is an oped in the Chicago Daily Times, which is hardly evidence of anything except someone's opinion.

I will grant you that the theory has been proposed, but I have yet to see any hard evidence that it was the deciding factor that started the war.

I think this is probably as accurate a portrayal of the causes of the war as I have found - http://millercenter.org/academic/americ ... iography/4" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Abraham Lincoln's presidential campaign victory lit the fuse that would explode into the Civil War. Between the time of his election in November and his inauguration in March of 1861, seven states from the lower South seceded from the Union. Delegates from these states met in Montgomery, Alabama, and formed the Confederate States of America. They drafted and passed a constitution that was similar to the U.S. Constitution, except in four areas. The Confederate constitution supported states' sovereignty, guaranteed the perpetual existence of slavery in the states and territories, prohibited Congress from enacting a protective tariff and giving government aid to internal improvements, and limited the presidential term to six-years.

I think it's pretty clear that the Confederate states had four basic disagreements with the North; states' sovereignty, slavery, protective tariffs and the power of the Executive. Whether one or more of those was more important than the others is hard to say, but it cannot be said that slavery and its abolition was not an issue.

While it is true that Lincoln stated he did not want to interfere with slavery in the South, his true intentions were different.

However, Lincoln drew the line at supporting a package of compromises sponsored by Senator John J. Crittenden of Kentucky, known as the Crittenden Compromise. This proposal included a series of constitutional amendments to guarantee slavery in the states. Furthermore, the compromise sought to prohibit Congress from abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia and deny Congress the power to interfere with the interstate slave trade. Crittenden's legislation also empowered Congress to compensate slaveholders who lost runaway slaves to the North and protected slavery south of latitude 36'30' in all territories "now held or hereafter acquired." Lincoln understood that to accept the amendments would be to overturn the Republican platform, and he instructed party leaders to make no concessions whatsoever on the slavery expansion issue.

So he was unwilling to allow slavery where it did not already exist, unwilling to cease interference with interstate slave trade and unwilling to stop the harboring of fugitive slaves.

His "support" for slavery in the South seems to have been a practical one - he felt abolishing it would be too disruptive, and it would die of natural causes anyway. IOW, he wanted to avoid war, not continue slavery.

jmra wrote:

baldeagle wrote:

jmra wrote:Slavery was a flashpoint used by the Northern states to rally support for the war with the South. Ending slavery was without a doubt war worthy, but it was not the driving motive behind the governments desire to keep the union together. The North went to war with the South in order to preserve the Union for the simple fact that the North needed the South much more than the South needed the North. The South was a cash cow for the North, one that they were not willing to give up.

OK, help me understand your position. Every one of the seceding states claimed that they left over slavery. http://www.civilwar.org/education/histo ... auses.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

This is from Georgia's declaration:

The party of Lincoln, called the Republican party, under its present name and organization, is of recent origin. It is admitted to be an anti-slavery party. While it attracts to itself by its creed the scattered advocates of exploded political heresies, of condemned theories in political economy, the advocates of commercial restrictions, of protection, of special privileges, of waste and corruption in the administration of Government, anti-slavery is its mission and its purpose. By anti-slavery it is made a power in the state. The question of slavery was the great difficulty in the way of the formation of the Constitution.

The Republicans were elected specifically to abolish slavery. They had a two-fold plan; starve slavery out by making all the surrounding states non-slave states, prohibit the import of slaves, make life difficult for the south economically, etc. If that didn't work, then they were prepared to abolish slavery by force, the Constitution notwithstanding.

All these reasons I see being articulated are secondary to the primary cause of the whole problem. So how do you explain this? Why did all the seceding states claim they left because of the North's attempts to abolish slavery? Was it all just rhetoric?

You obviously didn't read my post. I stated why the North went to war with the South, not why the South left the Union. Had the South not been a cash cow the North would have said good riddance.

Where is the evidence that that is true? Can you adduce evidence that the leaders of the nation stated that they couldn't let the South secede because they couldn't afford it?

jmra wrote:Slavery was a flashpoint used by the Northern states to rally support for the war with the South. Ending slavery was without a doubt war worthy, but it was not the driving motive behind the governments desire to keep the union together. The North went to war with the South in order to preserve the Union for the simple fact that the North needed the South much more than the South needed the North. The South was a cash cow for the North, one that they were not willing to give up.

OK, help me understand your position. Every one of the seceding states claimed that they left over slavery. http://www.civilwar.org/education/histo ... auses.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

This is from Georgia's declaration:

The party of Lincoln, called the Republican party, under its present name and organization, is of recent origin. It is admitted to be an anti-slavery party. While it attracts to itself by its creed the scattered advocates of exploded political heresies, of condemned theories in political economy, the advocates of commercial restrictions, of protection, of special privileges, of waste and corruption in the administration of Government, anti-slavery is its mission and its purpose. By anti-slavery it is made a power in the state. The question of slavery was the great difficulty in the way of the formation of the Constitution.

The Republicans were elected specifically to abolish slavery. They had a two-fold plan; starve slavery out by making all the surrounding states non-slave states, prohibit the import of slaves, make life difficult for the south economically, etc. If that didn't work, then they were prepared to abolish slavery by force, the Constitution notwithstanding.

All these reasons I see being articulated are secondary to the primary cause of the whole problem. So how do you explain this? Why did all the seceding states claim they left because of the North's attempts to abolish slavery? Was it all just rhetoric?

Here's the problem that I have. Many people are saying that the Civil War was not about slavery. That's just as dogmatic as saying it was about slavery. Yes, there were other issues, as there always are. But as jimlongley admitted slavery was "among the root causes of the rebellion". So saying it wasn't about slavery is just as disingenuous as saying it was only about slavery (which, of course, I did not say.)

There is no question that there were many complexities involved in the causes of the Civil War, and Southerners were right about some things (e.g. states' rights) but they were wrong about slavery. And yes, I understand the economic implications of instantly freeing every slave.

Note that none of this has anything to do with the Northern Virginia Battle Flag, but when the controversy arose, I immediately began to see people arguing that the war was about this, that and the other thing but not about slavery, and that is flatly false.

Let me give you a personal perspective on the flag. At one time my daughter was dating a black man. He was and is a fine person and a personal friend, someone I would have been proud to call son. When we traveled, my daughter had to urinate quite frequently. So we worked out a signal system. When she had to go, he would flash his headlights three times, and I would know it was time to get off the highway and find a restroom.

On one trip we got off and I pulled in to the first thing I found, a motel. They go out, went in, and then came back out immediately. He came over to my door and said, "Can we go somewhere else? They have a Confederate flag behind the counter, and I don't feel comfortable being in there." Now, keep in mind, this young man holds a Masters Degree and is very intelligent, soft-spoken and gentlemanly in every way.

I said sure, and we headed further down the road. I came upon a pizza restaurant, so I pulled over again. They went inside, and shortly thereafter he came back out. I rolled my window down and asked if there was a problem. He said, "There's a Confederate flag in there. She can't hold it any longer, so she's gone to the bathroom. Would you mind going back in with me?"

Of course I did. But I also learned something. To him, and to millions of others, the battle flag meant danger. You are not welcome here, and if you stay, something bad might happen.

If there was a flag that made YOU feel that way, would you want it flying over the capitol of your state?

The flag has a place. It's a symbol of heritage and pride and many other positive attributes. But it is also a symbol of hatred and racism to some. You have southern Democrats to thank for that. So, the same party that started the KKK and fought tooth and nail against civil rights for blacks, lynched them by the thousands without blinking an eye, is now attacking that flag and insisting it be taken down. The irony is a thick as molasses.

The flag should not fly on an buildings owned by the state governments or on any of their grounds. It has no place there and sends a very wrong message. The flag should certainly be flown elsewhere. NASCAR is now banning the flag at their races, which to me is the height of insanity. They are committing suicide for political correctness.

To Beiruty, yes, the Constitution originally protected slavery. This article gives you some of the background and explains how slavery was dealt with in the Constitution. Suffice it to say that we would never have had a United States had slavery not been accommodated at the time of the creation of the Constitution. The Founding Fathers, although some were vehemently opposed to slavery and saw its glaring inconsistency with the principles of freedom, realized that to form a nation it would have to be allowed for a while.

Article 1 Section 9 forbade the banning of the importation of slaves until 1808. Congress passed a law forbidding any further importation of slaves that became effective on January 1, 1808.

I hate to disagree with you guys, but the war was over slavery. The southern states seceded because they correctly believed that the Republicans intended to abolish slavery. Everyone at that time believed that. And as soon as the Republicans took office they passed a bill intended to emancipate the slaves, The First Confiscation Act of 1861. It is a matter of historical record that the act contained an Emancipation Clause, which was gutted by Congress. The War of Northern Aggression.

The first act of the war was the attack on Fort Sumter. South Carolina believed that a Federal fort on their coast was a threat to their independence. Lincoln believed it would be a tacit acknowledgment of South Carolina's independence to abandon the fort, so he ordered immediate reinforcement. The Confederate Army asked the occupants to surrender. They refused, so South Carolina began bombarding the fort and thus the war began. The First Shot of the Civil War The Surrender of Fort Sumter, 1861

South Carolina seceded in Dec 1860, before Lincoln had even been sworn into office. Fort Sumter was attacked in April, 1861. The First Confiscation Act was passed in August, 1861. All eleven states had seceded by June, before the act was passed.

If you read South Carolina's Declaration of Causes of Seceding, slavery is mentioned 38 times, including this:

The Presidential election of 1852 resulted in the total overthrow of the advocates of restriction and their party friends. Immediately after this result the anti-slavery portion of the defeated party resolved to unite all the elements in the North opposed to slavery and to stake their future political fortunes upon their hostility to slavery everywhere. This is the party two whom the people of the North have committed the Government. They raised their standard in 1856 and were barely defeated. They entered the Presidential contest again in 1860 and succeeded.
The prohibition of slavery in the Territories, hostility to it everywhere, the equality of the black and white races, disregard of all constitutional guarantees in its favor, were boldly proclaimed by its leaders and applauded by its followers.

I think it's abundantly clear what the cause of the Civil War was - the Republicans wanted to abolish slavery and were willing to use every means they could employ to succeed. The southern states did not want slavery abolished and chose to leave the Union rather than submit to the government.