Was the civil war about slavery?

Maybe most southerners were pleased to be drafted to be able to have a crack at the north?
Same applies to Northern conscripts, maybe most were happy to go fight against the south?
Were there any big anti-war protests in north and south like there were protests in the US against the Vietnam war?

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@Romeo Fabulini,

If they were all that happy and eager to fight, maybe they would have enlisted.

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@roger,

If the southern politicians hadn't been so gung-ho maybe war could have been avoided completely. They could simply have announced secession by saying "We're breaking away from the North" and left it at that.
That would have put the ball into the North's court and forced them to either come to the negotiating table or invade the South.
Instead, the South announced secession, bombarded Fort Sumter and then marched an army on Washington, thereby leaving the North no choice but to mobilise in self-defence.

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@Romeo Fabulini,

You're an idiot . . . but we already knew that.

The political powers that were in the American south in 1861 were idiots, too--mostly, they were spoiling for a fight. Had they remained in the Union, no amendment to the constitution abolishing slavery could have been passed. There were fifteen slave-holding states. To send an amendment to the states to abolish slavery would have required a two thirds vote of both houses of the Congress. That meant that there would have had to have been 46 states, and that all the slave states voted one way, and all the other states voted the other way. There were not 46 states until Oklahoma was admitted to the union in 1907. More than that, though, it takes three quarters of the states to ratify an amendment. There are fifty states, which means it takes thirty-eight states to ratify an amendment. To this day, fifteen states can block the ratification of any proposed amendment.

The "leaders" of southern society in 1861 were bellicose hotheads who had been spoiling for a fight for years. They got one, and the United States handed them their military ass. They've been whining about it ever since, and trying to pretend, first, that the United States started the war (and they usually specifically mention Lincoln) which is utter bullshit; and second, that it was not about slavery. They're just as delusional as fanatical christians--which is to say, bat-**** crazy.

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@Setanta,

U failed to mention the Southern filibuster,
but I don t believe that defines u as an idiot!

David

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Quote:

Setanta said: @RF- You're an idiot....The political powers that were in the American south in 1861 were idiots, too--mostly, they were spoiling for a fight....The "leaders" of southern society in 1861 were bellicose hotheads who had been spoiling for a fight for years

I know, that's why I said they were too gung-ho, so how can i be an "idiot" for agreeing with you?
Are you a gung-ho southerner knee-jerkingly spoiling for a needless fight? ha ha.. Smile

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@OmSigDAVID,

Filibusters can be ended of a point of order. The tactic is usually referred to as "the nuclear option."

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@Romeo Fabulini,

You're an idiot because you attempted to claim that they could just have said "we're seceding," and could have gone their way n peace. Of course, you're an idiot for an extraordinary variety of other reasons, but that's not germane to this discussion.

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Quote:

Setanta said: You're an idiot because you attempted to claim that they could just have said "we're seceding," and could have gone their way n peace

You're still too gung-ho like the South mate, didn't John Lennon sing "Give peace a chance"?

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Leaving aside that Lennon was not born until almost 90 years after that war began (idiot), there are several reasons why secession inevitably lead to war. I don't expect to know them, or to even understand them if i wasted my time attempting to explain them to you.

You're an idiotic f*cking troll. You just come here to attempt to take over threads and make them about you. You post the same witless images again and again, and seem to think that discussions here are opportunities for you to post them a dozen more times. If you had more maturity than a 12-year-old, and the ability to see yourself as others see you, you would be embarrassed. No matter how old you claim to be, you act like an adolescent.

The only thing here that bothers me is that i've wasted this much time on such an idiot.

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@Setanta,

Are you a northerner or southerner mate? If we knew, we'd be able to figger you out better.
Your profile's a complete blank and you'd have been no use to Grant or Lee hiding under the bed like that.. Smile

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/nite-eyesB.gif~original

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

They're just as delusional as fanatical christians--which is to say, bat-**** crazy.

Well, believing that one can ask a saint to ask Jesus for a favor (aka, intercession); or, that Vatican city connotes the poverty that emulates Jesus; or, that doing a Boy Scout good deed, so to speak, can bargain one's way into Heaven; or, the head Rabbi (aka, Pope) is divinely inspired during his time in office.

I am just saying that most religions have its fair share of preposterous beliefs, whether it is being Raptured Up, or the God of the Hebrews disguised as a burning bush.

But, naturally, if Northerners don't have any white trash living in trailer parks, one might conclude that Northern folk aren't as over zealous in their religious beliefs? 'Tis a pity that one was not alive to have seen the Negro orphanage burning in Manhattan, due to the mischief of the rioting during the 1863 Draft Riots. Dem guys really wanted to free the slaves.

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Old wounds festering:
Blue and Gray Still in Conflict at a Battle Site

Last year, nearly a century and a half after the Battle of Olustee, the Florida chapter of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War made a request to the state parks department. It asked for permission to place an obelisk to honor Union soldiers (who lost the battle on Feb. 20, 1864) inside the three-acre Olustee Battlefield Historic State Park, the same patch of land that holds three monuments commemorating Confederate soldiers.

State officials agreed that the park favored the Confederate side and began to act on the request, first by holding a public hearing and then by choosing a precise location in the park.

“There were twice as many Union casualties there as Confederate,” said Charles Custer, 83, whose ancestors fought on both sides of the war and who supports the push for a Union monument. “They fought. They bled. And they are really not recognized anywhere.”

But the request has enraged many in the Sons of Confederate Veterans, which views the state’s decision as a betrayal of the small park’s legacy. As word spread, an online call to arms was issued by the national Confederate group’s leader to oppose the “Darth Vader-esque obscene obsidian obelisk” in what the group’s members see as the Second Battle of Olustee. Reinforcements were drafted, namely State Representative Dennis Baxley, the Republican chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans.
more...

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Quote:

Setanta said: @RF- You're an idiot because you attempted to claim that they could just have said "we're seceding," and could have gone their way n peace.

When the Rhodesian govt announced it was going independent by cutting ties with Britain in the 1960's, they simply announced it, they never went and invaded Britain.
Britain said "Okay, if you don't want to stick with us we won't force you to, good luck and goodbye".
But the gung-ho South never tried that approach, they announced secession, bombarded Ft Sumter and marched an army on Washington.
They went looking for trouble and they found it.. Smile

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@Romeo Fabulini,

Romeo Fabulini wrote:

Quote:
Setanta said: @RF- You're an idiot because you attempted to claim that they could just have said "we're seceding," and could have gone their way n peace.

When the Rhodesian govt announced it was going independent by cutting ties with Britain in the 1960's, they simply announced it, they never went and invaded Britain.
Britain said "Okay, if you don't want to stick with us we won't force you to, good luck and goodbye".
But the gung-ho South never tried that approach, they announced secession, bombarded Ft Sumter and marched an army on Washington.
They went looking for trouble and they found it..

You are comparing apples to oranges, in time and place. You are also leaving out of your equation the western territories. Which nation was going to claim the west?

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@Foofie,

Foofie wrote:

You are comparing apples to oranges, in time and place.

It's much worse than that. He's comparing chestnuts to lug nuts. There can be no valid analogy between the American South's secession from the United States and former colonies throwing off their old occupiers and declaring independence. The comparison is absurd.

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As a matter of interest I wonder what the North's response would have been if the South had said to Washington-
"We don't want to be part of the Union any more, we're now to be known as the "Confederate States of America".
We don't want any trouble so we'll just peaceably go our way, and you'll peaceably go your way with our best wishes"

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@Romeo Fabulini,

Romeo Fabulini wrote:

As a matter of interest I wonder what the North's response would have been if the South had said to Washington-
"We don't want to be part of the Union any more, we're now to be known as the "Confederate States of America".
We don't want any trouble so we'll just peaceably go our way, and you'll peaceably go your way with our best wishes"

But that's exactly what the South did.

The problem was, the United States wasn't buying it and kept on maintaining military forts in the Southern states, as it always had. So, then, the South Carolina militia fired on the troops at Fort Sumner and other scuffles broke out and then the war was on.

Please read up on your history before you post any more nonsense, Romeo.

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@Lustig Andrei,

Lustig Andrei wrote:

Romeo Fabulini wrote:

As a matter of interest I wonder what the North's response would have been if the South had said to Washington-
"We don't want to be part of the Union any more, we're now to be known as the "Confederate States of America".
We don't want any trouble so we'll just peaceably go our way, and you'll peaceably go your way with our best wishes"

But that's exactly what the South did.

The problem was, the United States wasn't buying it and kept on maintaining military forts in the Southern states, as it always had. So, then, the South Carolina militia fired on the troops at Fort Sumner and other scuffles broke out and then the war was on.

Please read up on your history before you post any more nonsense, Romeo.

Romeo is bringing out the point,
and u r refusing to recognize,
the possibility that an available strategy
that the South coud have employed was NOT firing on the Flag.

Historically, there was a repeated appeal to emotions
in that the South had fired on the Flag of the USA.

David

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@OmSigDAVID,

What you say may be true, David, but my point is that the United States, by its refusal to withdrawn Federal forces from the so-called CSA territory,. was indicating quite clearly that it was not about to accept the South's declaration of independence.

In my opinion -- never humble -- there was no conceivable way that the war could have been avoided. A confrontation is what the two sides had been headed for ever since adoption of the wrong-headed articles in the Constitution which endorsed the "peculiar institution" of slavery and counted persons of color as "five-eighths" of a man.

I know you consider the Constitution a sacred document, Dave. But the fact is that in its original version it is absolutely loaded with wrong=headed solutions to real problems. That's why it's been amended so many times.

1 Reply

Was the civil war about slavery?

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