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Was the civil war worth it all

Was the civil war worth it

  • yes

    Votes: 30 75.0%

  • no

    Votes: 10 25.0%
  • Total voters
    40
rocket88 said:
You're making some VERY big assumptions. The first is that slavery would have been abolished. The value of slaves had grown to a point where their value to a plantation holder was second only to the value of his land. Now if that value went down over time, it would be abolished. However, the value increased greatly between 1820 and 1860. If it had increased at a similar rate between 1860 and 1900, there's no way until the 1930s.

Your second assumption is that only 2 nations would exist. If the South had been allowed to secede, what would stop Vermont. Or say Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan forming their own Union. I also think it's very doubtful that the Confederacy stays together. That whole union was based on the idea that anybody could leave any time, so it's very likely that at least one of the States would have seceded from the Confederacy by 1920 if not before that.

Then you build the "close allies" assumption on the other 2. Unless those other 2 assumptions played out, it's hard to say that the 3rd would


So if you make a those assumptions, then no. If you make different assumptions, then maybe. I'd have to say yes because I'm not prepared to make assumptions, and things worked out OK.
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I stand by his first assumption. It's basically a simple question of economics. The rest of the civilized world had, for the most part, outlawed slavery and the slave trade.....and that means many of our potential trade partners. Simple supply and demand would have dictated an end to slavery. As other nations began to industrialize and find ways to produce commodoties such as sugar, tobacco and cotton more efficiently (and cheaply) .....the United States would have been forced to adapt or die economically speaking in the world markets. Nations that we supplied with cotton and other agricultural products would simply find cheaper sources for their goods.

The Industrial Revolution was happening with or without the U.S. Question is....do you think that our free-market ideals and laissez faire mentality would have allowed us to lag that far behind by simply holding on to an outdated and inefficient method of production?
 
FluffyNinja said:
I stand by his first assumption. It's basically a simple question of economics. The rest of the civilized world had, for the most part, outlawed slavery and the slave trade.....and that means many of our potential trade partners. Simple supply and demand would have dictated an end to slavery. As other nations began to industrialize and find ways to produce commodoties such as sugar, tobacco and cotton more efficiently (and cheaply) .....the United States would have been forced to adapt or die economically speaking in the world markets. Nations that we supplied with cotton and other agricultural products would simply find cheaper sources for their goods.

The Industrial Revolution was happening with or without the U.S. Question is....do you think that our free-market ideals and laissez faire mentality would have allowed us to lag that far behind by simply holding on to an outdated and inefficient method of production?
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And, ultimately, Obama will no longer be president so really no one should bother evaluating him one way or another. To claim the present is irrelevant because the future will inevitably be different never has any merit. If the present it entirely intolerable, doing nothing speculating of better days in the future is just pure apathy - and sometimes pure selfishness and cowardice when it come to the most fundamental civil and human rights - which the question of slavery was.
 
It is such opinions as the OP being linked to terms such as "conservative," "libertarian" and "Republican" that is devastating to the political success of all 3 of those ideologies. It is one reason 95% of African-Americans continue to vote Democrat. It is a reason so many see white conservatives and Republicans as racists.

While Ron Paul built his career on such extreme racist positions creating a niche circle of blindly devoted angry white men, it also assured he had no national viability. The OP is the Ron Paul perspective.

The same will happen to Rand Paul if he continues to declare that businesses, neighborhoods, apartments etc can engage in racial segregation and discrimination in economic, housing and job equality. Building piles of words - calling it logic - never disguises racism to anyone.

Condemning Lincoln and advocating the position of the Confederacy is not something people tend to be neutral or unemotional about. Personally, I see the Civil War as one of the highest moments of integrity in the history of the United States. IT is when the USA - the North - stood above the whole world in ethicals and morality.
 
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joko104 said:
It is such opinions as the OP being linked to terms such as "conservative," "libertarian" and "Republican" that is devastating to the political success of all 3 of those ideologies.

While Ron Paul built his career on such extreme racist positions creating a niche circle of blindly devoted angry white men, it also assured he had no national viability. The OP is the Ron Paul perspective.
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Why does someone always have to go and derail a good thread with their analogies to modern-day politics which really have nothing to do with the OP? :shrug:
 
rocket88 said:
You're making some VERY big assumptions. The first is that slavery would have been abolished. The value of slaves had grown to a point where their value to a plantation holder was second only to the value of his land. Now if that value went down over time, it would be abolished. However, the value increased greatly between 1820 and 1860. If it had increased at a similar rate between 1860 and 1900, there's no way until the 1930s.

Your second assumption is that only 2 nations would exist. If the South had been allowed to secede, what would stop Vermont. Or say Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan forming their own Union. I also think it's very doubtful that the Confederacy stays together. That whole union was based on the idea that anybody could leave any time, so it's very likely that at least one of the States would have seceded from the Confederacy by 1920 if not before that.

Then you build the "close allies" assumption on the other 2. Unless those other 2 assumptions played out, it's hard to say that the 3rd would


So if you make a those assumptions, then no. If you make different assumptions, then maybe. I'd have to say yes because I'm not prepared to make assumptions, and things worked out OK.
Click to expand...

I stand by his first assumption. It's basically a simple question of economics. The rest of the civilized world had, for the most part, outlawed slavery and the slave trade.....and that means many of our potential trade partners. Simple supply and demand would have dictated an end to slavery. As other nations began to industrialize and find ways to produce commodoties such as sugar, tobacco and cotton more efficiently (and cheaply) .....the United States would have been forced to adapt or die economically speaking in the world markets. Nations that we supplied with cotton and other agricultural products would simply find cheaper sources for their goods.

The Industrial Revolution was happening with or without the U.S. Question is....do you think that our free-market ideals and laissez faire mentality would have allowed us to lag that far behind by simply holding on to an outdated and inefficient method of production?
 
To the wealthy of the South, "slavery" and "economics" were the same. The 10 wealthiest Americans were all Southern plantation slave owners.
 
joko104 said:
To the wealthy of the South, "slavery" and "economics" were the same. The 10 wealthiest Americans were all Southern plantation slave owners.
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I'm talking decisions which would effect national economies in the aggregate .....you know, as a macroeconomics issue. You seem to be looking at it from a microeconomics perspective......or how it only effects local or regionalized producers. Two very different approaches to the same issue. :shrug:
 
FluffyNinja said:
I'm talking decisions which would effect national economies in the aggregate .....you know, as a macroeconomics issue. You seem to be looking at it from a microeconomics perspective......or how it only effects local or regionalized producers. Two very different approaches to the same issue. :shrug:
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Example your view then, rather than assert it is your view without really explaining what you mean?
 
ThePlayDrive said:
*Anybody who's planning on responding to me with some revisionist "but the war wasn't even about slavery" nonsense can move on. Most, if not all, of seceding states listed slavery as their primary concerns and all of the "other" reasons people give for the South wanting to secede from economics to states rights were based in slavery as well.
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Well, too bad because I'm going to respond anyway.

1. There was never at any time prior to the Civil War a threat of emancipation.

2. The Southern States never argued that they feared emancipation in existing slave States. Their arguments centered around whether or not NEW States would be slave-holding or free and whether or not Northern States would return fugitive slaves as the law mandated at that time.

3. There were FAR more pressing issues with real-world consequences in the South, namely import tariffs, than legal and academic debates regarding slavery in future States.

4. Abraham Lincoln did not have the moral conviction or political support to emancipate slaves without some politically expedient pretext. That pretext turned out to be the fact that emancipating slaves would deal a crippling economic blow to the Confederate States in the middle of a war in which the Union was being thrashed.

The Civil War was not about slavery, but it brought about its end much sooner than it would have happened had Southerners been content with paying their taxes. So, the answer to the poll question is YES. It was worth it.
 
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FluffyNinja said:
I stand by his first assumption. It's basically a simple question of economics. The rest of the civilized world had, for the most part, outlawed slavery and the slave trade.....and that means many of our potential trade partners. Simple supply and demand would have dictated an end to slavery. As other nations began to industrialize and find ways to produce commodoties such as sugar, tobacco and cotton more efficiently (and cheaply) .....the United States would have been forced to adapt or die economically speaking in the world markets. Nations that we supplied with cotton and other agricultural products would simply find cheaper sources for their goods.

The Industrial Revolution was happening with or without the U.S. Question is....do you think that our free-market ideals and laissez faire mentality would have allowed us to lag that far behind by simply holding on to an outdated and inefficient method of production?
Click to expand...


Yes. They would have had slaves working in Southern factories. At least for a while. Realistically, until about the 1930s factory workers in the US were essentially slaves anyway. EVENTUALLY slavery would be illegal. Maybe by now, maybe not. It would make us more competitive in the labor market with China. Why should they have slaves but not us?
 
ThePlayDrive said:
It was worth it given that civil war seemed to be what was required to end slavery.

If they could have ended slavery without having war that would have been preferable, but the South decided to act like a little bitch. Obviously, I would prefer that over 600,000 people not had to die over some bull****.

*Anybody who's planning on responding to me with some revisionist "but the war wasn't even about slavery" nonsense can move on. Most, if not all, of seceding states listed slavery as their primary concerns and all of the "other" reasons people give for the South wanting to secede from economics to states rights were based in slavery as well.

**Anybody who's planning on responding to me with some "but the South tried to resolve their differences peacefully, the North got us into this" nonsense can move on too. The South wanted to keep its slaves and it also wanted to secede which isn't permissible, so the North had to shut that **** down. And for those who had to do a double take, you read it right: secession wasn't permissible. Read Texas v. White for more information and if you've got a problem with that, take it up with the Supreme Court.
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(if you'll allow me to add)

***Anyone who's planning on responding with the "the US committed an act of aggression by invading the CSA," don't. The war wasn't an invasion of the Confederacy by the United States as the apologists like to pretend. The battle of Fort Sumter was CSA-initiated, on territory that was legally Union territory even if the secession of the states was legal, because Ft. Sumter was military property. Therefore the CSA was the aggressor.
 
joko104 said:
It seems rather clear the Confederacy as a nation would have sided with Germany. Although slavery ended in the South via the Civil War, widespread total bigotry against non-white, non-Christians certainly overwhelmingly dominated Southern society in the 1930s.
Click to expand...

Then the Allies would be less likely to win because the United States would engage in a brutal war with the Confederacy instead of being able to send troops to fight the Japanese in the Pacific and the Nazis in Europe. Even if slavery had ended, as you say it, the South was anti-black and anti-Jewish. Allying with Nazi Germany wouldn't have been beyond the Confederacy.
 
Eynon said:
I'll go there...so the premise is that the US stays out of Europe during WW2? ok so then:
-Red Army still wins.
-Hilter still winds up in a ditch on fire.
-The longer war weakens the Soviets even more.
-The weaker Soviet Union stays out of Asia.
-US focuses more on Pacific.
-Soviet puppet states of France and Holland are not allowed to re-occupy their Asian possessions.
-Nationalists defeat Communists in China.
-Korea is unified under an American backed government.
-No Korea War, No Great-leap Forward, No Vietnam War, no Cambodian Kill Fields.
-Millions of lives are saved.
-backpacking across the recently liberalized european continent is cheaper.
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France was a Soviet puppet state? :lol:
 
Perotista said:
Abraham Lincoln Said the following: "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.”

Also when Lincoln issued his Emancipation Proclamation freeing the slaves, it only applied to the Southern states. Missouri, Kentucky, Deleware and Maryland, slave holding states that remained in the Union were exempted from it.
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And he heavily supported the Thirteenth Amendment. He expressed his abolitionism many times over. He did see the preserving of the Union as more important, but he also intended to free the slaves.
 
MadLib said:
And he heavily supported the Thirteenth Amendment. He expressed his abolitionism many times over. He did see the preserving of the Union as more important, but he also intended to free the slaves.
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Which he did.
 
joko104 said:
It was not slander at all. To claim he believed that eventually slaves would have been freed anyway decades later - as if time stands still and if there would be no more slaves breed by rape and seized imported over the next decades - if slavery ever stopped at all - is not the irrelevancy as he asserts in silence.

There would be no different than if I claimed WWII was not worth it because eventually Nazism would have failed, ultimately all nations would have regained their freedom and ultimately the killing of Jews would eventually stop... with all that happening within a few decades and no more than 1 or 2 more generations - and - because I speculate all that - I claim WWII was an unnecessary waste of lives and resources.

Such is absurd and declares enslaving nations, people and genocide doesn't really matter much if you believe that will not continue for all eternity - as if when you are confident that within only half a century more or so it will end. Slavery is the ultimate evil. The number to suffer and die as slaves in his model? 4,000,000. Now many more imported, enslaved, and enslaved from birth within his time frame? 2-4,000,000 more - for which he shrugs his shoulders at all that... not even worth consideration to him. They were just cattle.

How many decades are you willing for you, your children and all your relative now and born being slaves with no legal protections whatsoever?

The OP is well known for bigotries. Raging that people with HIV/AIDS should not only be allowed to die, but deserve to die. Raging incessantly against people with religious bigotries... etc. The consistencies of the OP and the history is relevant - and to claim otherwise is to claim a person cannot claim the KKK is a racist organization by looking to it's history. The OPer has a history on this forum. So his OP trivializing blacks in slavery and that entire generation, an entire next generation born, and all those also seized in African all are just ... well, NOTHING. He ONLY counts white people who died in war. Not the millions dying in slavery.

At least those who died in war died as free men - and they were in war at least as the result of a Democratic Republic. Not one slave voted to be a slave. Not to be born as a slave. Not to be worked as a slave. Not to be beaten, whipped, raped, inpregnated and murdered as a slave. Not to be captures and pressed into slavery. Not to die as a slave.
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Given your outrage over slavery and your characterization of it as "the ultimate evil" I'm curious as to why you never seem to post anything about slavery that goes on today all over the world. It's not just you, there seems to be a lack of concern and attention for this in general. Why is this the case? Why is the plight of people enslaved in modern times getting so little attention from the bleeding hearts in the West?

Perhaps they never really cared. Certainly, progressives in America in pre-Civil War days had no problem at all with slavery. Indeed, they had "scientific" explanations for why people of color were inferior and bondage was justified. The only strong push toward abolition of slavery came from strongly Christian groups, the same sort that are routinely derided these days. The main attention that progressives had for people of color after the Civil War was mainly in terms of eugenics -- eliminating undesirable blood lines. Such was the impulse behind the founding of Planned Parenthood, to reduce the numbers of people of color and other "undesirables", and it's an effort that goes on even today and is highly effective.

If progressives had established as an aim the destruction of the black community, the destruction of black society and the black family, and the genocidal elimination of the black race, then white progressives could hardly have done a better job of it short of organizing death squads. (Here I might mention the KKK, which were all Democrats, but I hesitate to call them progressive.)

It's almost like all this concern for slavery in America coming from the left is just a bunch of partisan rhetoric and protective coloration that hides their true aims. The same goes for the obsessive harping on identity politics and the constant effort to demonize and marginalize political opponents.
 
joko104 said:
It was not slander at all. To claim he believed that eventually slaves would have been freed anyway decades later - as if time stands still and if there would be no more slaves breed by rape and seized imported over the next decades
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just to point out one that you can do away with -- The importation of slaves was made outlaw before the War of Aggression took place. The South led the charge on its abolition.

Also, while no doubt some of the atrocities you've mentioned took place, as they do today where all men are free, but we will not dwell upon that, i'd also say that raped pregnant women can'tpick cotton, beaten to a bloody pulp slaves can't pick cotton, murdered slaves CAN'T PICK COTTON.

You think slaves were cheap? Like say a dime a dozen? Slaves weren't treated like they should (read free men here) but to propagate a brutality so extreme that it would make the purpose of their servitude null and void is not only hyperbolic, but soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo unnecessary.
 
Napoleon said:
Well, too bad because I'm going to respond anyway.

1. There was never at any time prior to the Civil War a threat of emancipation.

2. The Southern States never argued that they feared emancipation in existing slave States. Their arguments centered around whether or not NEW States would be slave-holding or free and whether or not Northern States would return fugitive slaves as the law mandated at that time.

3. There were FAR more pressing issues with real-world consequences in the South, namely import tariffs, than legal and academic debates regarding slavery in future States.

4. Abraham Lincoln did not have the moral conviction or political support to emancipate slaves without some politically expedient pretext. That pretext turned out to be the fact that emancipating slaves would deal a crippling economic blow to the Confederate States in the middle of a war in which the Union was being thrashed.

The Civil War was not about slavery, but it brought about its end much sooner than it would have happened had Southerners been content with paying their taxes. So, the answer to the poll question is YES. It was worth it.
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In #4, the part I bolded is pure bull****.

The Proclamation could not be enforced in areas still under rebellion, but as the army took control of Confederate regions, the slaves in those regions were emancipated rather than returned to their masters.
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The North only freed slaves in regions they took back, meaning places where they beat up the South. The Proclamation meant nothing in places the South still held. So, your assertion is nonsense.

The Emancipation Proclamation did not weaken the South's war effort in any way shape or form. The South simply lost their slaves when they lost territory. If the slave holders had won, they could have kept their slaves. But, they lost.
 
Another question about the poll is: Was the Civil War worth it to who?
 
MadLib said:
(if you'll allow me to add)

***Anyone who's planning on responding with the "the US committed an act of aggression by invading the CSA," don't. The war wasn't an invasion of the Confederacy by the United States as the apologists like to pretend. The battle of Fort Sumter was CSA-initiated, on territory that was legally Union territory even if the secession of the states was legal, because Ft. Sumter was military property. Therefore the CSA was the aggressor.
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I'm glad you were given the final say on that...:roll:
 
ChezC3 said:
just to point out one that you can do away with -- The importation of slaves was made outlaw before the War of Aggression took place. The South led the charge on its abolition.

Also, while no doubt some of the atrocities you've mentioned took place, as they do today where all men are free, but we will not dwell upon that, i'd also say that raped pregnant women can'tpick cotton, beaten to a bloody pulp slaves can't pick cotton, murdered slaves CAN'T PICK COTTON.

You think slaves were cheap? Like say a dime a dozen? Slaves weren't treated like they should (read free men here) but to propagate a brutality so extreme that it would make the purpose of their servitude null and void is not only hyperbolic, but soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo unnecessary.
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Your message reads like a holocaust denier. The Nazis would not have starved, brutalized or murdered Jews because they were too valuable as slave labor. That's the logic you use to "prove" slaves were not brutalized. Raping slave women certainly is well documented - contrary to your opinion that rapists are driven by logic - and of course your disregarding the value of slave babies for sale and resale.

I've only seen 1 place where slaves who "picked cotton" had actually been "housed." It was a thick, crude brick wall that used to be part of a shed for the slaves on one side of a field. The derrelict rusted iron shackles were still hanging from the wall.
 
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