It's Confederate History Month in Dixie

[PanzerJaeger]

Slavery isn't a horrible injustice? Fascinating.

That's not exactly what I said...

Certainly by today's standards slavery is an injustice; but by the standards of 1861, things get a bit murkier. Taking things all the way back to 1776, it becomes even more difficult for me to justify land redistribution and reparations without completely ignoring the historical context in which slavery was practiced. As I said, it become subjective.

That’s just me though. You obviously feel differently. That's why the law is important, and why the framers specifically wrote ex post facto language into the Constitution. You're arguing from an emotional level - essentially "the evil slave owners deserved to be punished". However, the question isn't about the morality of slavery - that was decided with the emancipation, but with the legality of retroactively punishing formerly legal behavior - that was decided in the Constitution.

Were the lands given to the people who had worked them, or to peasants in general.

They were given the land on which they lived and worked.

And if we must defend slaveowner's plantations in the name of productivity, what do you think of my suggestion that freed slaves be paid the wages they should've earned if they were white laborers? Keep in mind that that is much less than the value the slaveowners received from having those slaves.

I think that would be equivalent to cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face. Damaging the Southern economy more than it already had been during the war in the name of retribution would end up helping no one. Further, as can be seen in the Mexican example, land distribution schemes can have negative repercussions far beyond the immediate generation effected by them. I would venture to say that even after the North abandoned Southern blacks after Reconstruction, they still fared better than most of the Mexican peasantry during the land reform period. Their progeny certainly have.

If we’re looking to give the former slaves a boost after coming out of such conditions, may I suggest looking westward? America in 1865 still had vast tracts of rich, arable land that the government was literally paying people to settle. Aiding the former slaves in homesteading this land could have been the basis of strong and productive communities.

With proper government support in things such as capital investment, social organization, protection from the natives, and education in farming techniques, such a plan could have worked out well.

[Horatius]

I really think the perspective should be kept that the South was fighting for slavery, now I got all of this information from the BBC, but isn't it true that after the war was over the returning confederates with local support waged war against the freed slaves and often killed white supporters? Wasn't that violence even against the expressed instructions of Robert E Lee?

On the same documentary I also learned that the massacre was a favorite tool of the ex rebels, and that local police would massacre political allies of the North during their rallies as long as the military wasn't around in force.

For more see

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scalawag
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carpetbagger

If slavery wasn't the cause of the civil war, why didn't the South just agree to radical reconstruction, and to step forward?

That said I freely agree and admit I know nothing at all about the American Civil War, it is not a field I have touched very much if at all, and I also know the BBC is not unbiased, and wikipedia shouldn't be relied on, so I invite anyone who disagrees with what I said to say why, I'm not trying to start a fight.

[Fisherking]

As for the causes of the war, slavery was not the primary reason. The reasons were economic. Slavery was the heated issue used to stoke the fires in the north for an otherwise unpopular war.

It was not much more popular in the south by the way. There were riots in both places.

As to compensation. Any former slave who asked for it received 40 acres and a mule to start a farm.

Lincoln had proposed sending them all back to their homelands, though no one was sure exactly where that was. Those few who chose to return to Africa founded the nation of Liberia.

I am not going to touch the aftermath of the war nor the causes of racism. But it should be sufficient to say that the people, mostly nonslave holders saw the former slaves as being placed above them for the purpose of retribution and political control.

[Strike For The South]

As for the causes of the war, slavery was not the primary reason. The reasons were economic. Slavery was the heated issue used to stoke the fires in the north for an otherwise unpopular war.
.

Slavery and the Antebellum economy are hand in hand.

The secession speechs bear themselves out, Slavery was the primary reason.

[Fisherking]

Slavery was the emotional issue. Just as abortion takes center stage in arguments over states’ rights today.

But only 10% or less of the population owned slaves. Why was it that South Carolina fired on Ft. Sumter? I don’t think slaves were involved in that.

[Strike For The South]

Slavery was the emotional issue. Just as abortion takes center stage in arguments over states’ rights today.

But only 10% or less of the population owned slaves. Why was it that South Carolina fired on Ft. Sumter? I don’t think slaves were involved in that.

Those 10% were the most powerful people though, and the most powerful people tend to get there way...

I was always under the impression the taking of Ft.Summter was for the weapons cache there....The CSA plea for surrender was ignored and the rest is history.

The point is you can not talk about states rights nor the south economy without talking about the slavery issue because those areguments stemmed out of things like the fugtive slave act (commonly reffered to in the ordinances of secesion) and tariffs (which really only hurt the south because they had created a false market by using slave labor)

[Fisherking]

No. They attacked Ft. Sumter because Lincoln would not with draw the troops from there.

They saw it as foreign occupation. The Union was sending reinforcements.

It was still a dumb thing to do. I am from one of the 4 states that didn’t join in until after the crises.

It also caused a civil war among the Cherokee but most of the tribes of what is now Oklahoma were friendly to the Confederacy.

I would agree that it was all about slavery as far as South Carolina was concerned but the causes run far deeper and farther back than 1861.

The rank and file were not concerned with slavery which was a rich mans problem but joined and fought for different reasons.

Even is the 7 deep south states there was lots of anti war sentiment from the beginning.

It is much more complicated than slave and free. It has been an issue of division for almost 200 years and there have been no slaves for more than 147 of those.