I have had that debate with several here before.  It was undoubtably SLAVERY.  Some refused to accept the obvious.  If you won't believe me perhaps you will believe the people who seceeded themselves,  They made no bones about it. 

http://sunsite.utk.edu/civil-war/reasons.html

shsdawg wrote:

I have had that debate with several here before.  It was undoubtably SLAVERY.  Some refused to accept the obvious.  If you won't believe me perhaps you will believe the people who seceeded themselves,  They made no bones about it. 

http://sunsite.utk.edu/civil-war/reasons.html

The National Finances.; PROBABLE DEMANDS UPON THE TREASURY FOR 1861 STATEMENT OF THE SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY. TREASURY DEPARTMENT, June 15, 1860.

Published: June 23, 1860

SIR: In view of the early adjournment of Congress, I submit to you a statement of the probable means of the Treasury, and the probable demands upon it, for the fiscal year ending 30th June, 1861.

The modification of the estimates now submitted, is based upon the actual operations of the Department since the time my annual report of 22d December, 1859, was prepared:

The probable amount in the Treasury on the 30th of June, 1860, will be........... $4,750,000

The receipts for the next fiscal year are estimated as follows:

From customs............................. 58,000,000

From lands................................ 2 000,000

Miscellaneous............................. 1,225,000

Making an aggregate of means for the year of.................................. 65,975,000

The estimated expenditures for the same period are:

For unexpended balances of appropriations for the present fiscal year.................. 17,825,614

Permanent appropriations................. 8,173,582

New appropriations estimated for......... 46 278,893

Making an aggregate of................. $72,278,089

If the same amount of unexpended balances should remain at the end of the next fiscal year as will remain at the close of the present, there will be of the above amount $17,825,614 uncalled for during the year, and should therefore be deducted from the above aggregate of $72,278,089, which would leave the sum of $54,452,475.

The unexpended balance, however, at the close of the present fiscal year is much larger than usual, owing to peculiar causes, and should not be taken as the bases of a safe estimate. The usual unexpended balance at the end of a fiscal year does not ordinarily much exceed the sum of $12,000,000. Deducting that amount from the aggregate estimated expenditures of the next fiscal year, and it leaves the sum of $60,278,-089 to be provided for. Deducting this amount from the estimated means of the treasury for the same period, and it would leave the sum of $5,696 911 in the treasury on the 30th of June, 1861. This amount would be increased by any excess of unexpended balances over and above the $12,000,000 estimated to remain unexpended at the end of the next fiscal year.

The statement shows that the means of the Treasury will be ample to meet all the demands which were estimated for. The necessity for additional means depends entirely upon the excess of appropriations made and to be made by Congress over the amount estimated for.

The bill providing for the increase of the pay of the Navy will require an additional appropriation of $500,000.

The sum of $350,000 is required to meet the expense of returning the captured Africans to Africa.

The amount that will be required to pay the private bills passed by Congress cannot be estimated with, any accuracy. It will, however, in all probability, not fall below $1,500,000.

Your obedient servant.

HOWELL COBB,

Secretary of the Treasury.

http://www.nytimes.com/1860/06...-secretary.html

You are disagreeing with the people who seceeded.  Read the Mississippi one.   They seceeded because they were afraid that the north would end slavery, end of story.   The war started because they seceeded, end of story.   Why individuals said they fought is a totally different arguement.  I would bet that the vast majority of Germans who fought in WWII wouldn't say they fought to spread Nazism either or German rule either.

shsdawg wrote:

They seceeded because they were afraid that the north would end slavery, end of story.

Corwin Amendment

The Corwin Amendment is a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution passed by the 36th Congress, 2nd Session, on March 2, 1861, in the form of House (Joint) Resolution No. 80. It would forbid subsequent attempts to amend the Constitution to empower the Congress to "abolish or interfere" with the "domestic institutions" of the states, including "persons held to labor or service" (a reference to slavery).

Ohio Republican Representative Thomas Corwin offered the amendment in an attempt to forestall the secession of Southern states. Corwin's resolution emerged as the House of Representatives's version of an earlier, identical proposal in the Senate offered by New York Republican Senator William H. Seward. However, the newly formed Confederate States of America was committed to independence and so it ignored the Corwin Amendment.

This proposed amendment is still pending before the state legislatures for ratification, because Congress submitted it to the state legislatures without a deadline.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corwin_Amendment

I expected this.  Y'all won't even take the words of the actual leaders of the time as to what the cause was.   By the way SS, my direct paternal line great to the 4th grandfather, who fought with Blythe's Mississippi Infantry at Shiloh,  was a poor dirt farmer living with his inlaws.   He was part owner of two slaves.  My other three paternal side G4s were all in MS Infantry Regiments.  The entire economic system of the south was based on slavery.  Even the people who didn't own slaves were in some way dependent own it.  You can't take that much wealth out of a economy and not have it collapse.

Grahf wrote: You do understand that a proposed amendment is just that -- merely a proposal -- right? The existence of a proposal by one or two congressmen doesn't inherently mean that it will be majority-supported. Proposals have come and gone many times over.

"The Corwin Amendment is a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution passed by the 36th Congress,"

"I understand a proposed amendment to the Constitution—which amendment, however, I have not seen—has passed Congress, to the effect that the Federal Government shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the States, including that of persons held to service. To avoid misconstruction of what I have said, I depart from my purpose not to speak of particular amendments so far as to say that, holding such a provision to now be implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable."

-Abraham Lincoln, 1st Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861

MillardH wrote:

Grahf wrote: You do understand that a proposed amendment is just that -- merely a proposal -- right? The existence of a proposal by one or two congressmen doesn't inherently mean that it will be majority-supported. Proposals have come and gone many times over.

You do understand that the resolution passed both the House & Senate on March 2, 1861, don't you?:

SaratogaSprings wrote:
The ones making the argument for the south are not the ones who started the topic. It's always the ones who argue against the South who seem to keep bringing it up.

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--- wildbill07 wrote:

Ok, here's a troll bomb for good measure:

THE SOUTH LOST. GET OVER IT.

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Grahf wrote:

Allow me to rephrase. The existence of a proposal by one or two congressmen doesn't inherently mean that it will be majority-supported by the Congress and/or by the states for ratification. As your own Wiki link shows, it failed ratification. In other words, the proposal effectively amounted to little more than a gesture. The formation of the CSA was inevitable. 

Was the North clean of dirty, underhanded, manipulative tactics before, during, and after the Civil War? History says absolutely not, and you will not find a soul here who claims to the contrary. But let's not pretend the South wanted nothing more than "freedom" either.

MillardH wrote: What was the purpose of the Corwin Amendment then?

SaratogaSprings wrote: You haven't shown me anything I haven't seen before. If slavery was their cause, and they weren't ashamed that it was their cause, they woul have stated it. Instead they stated the exact opposite. Jefferson Davis himself stated it. Robert E. Lee stated it. Only 10% of confederate soldiers practiced slavery. To suggest the other 90% left their families and fought and died so that the 10% could keep their slaves is just wrong. It's not that simple. It's much more complex than you are making it. Secession led to civil war between the states. What led to secession was a lot more.

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--- shsdawg wrote:

I expected this.  Y'all won't even take the words of the actual leaders of the time as to what the cause was.   By the way SS, my direct paternal line great to the 4th grandfather, who fought with Blythe's Mississippi Infantry at Shiloh,  was a poor dirt farmer living with his inlaws.   He was part owner of two slaves.  My other three paternal side G4s were all in MS Infantry Regiments.  The entire economic system of the south was based on slavery.  Even the people who didn't own slaves were in some way dependent own it.  You can't take that much wealth out of a economy and not have it collapse.



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shsdawg wrote:

The SOLE cause of secession was slavery.  It's couched in a lot of other stuff like States Rights, but it all leads back to slavery.  The leaders of the time said so.  Why won't  you take them at their word?

SaratogaSprings wrote:
It's not so much propping up a side, it's more defending one side. Nobody who defends the south defends slavery. It when people try to make it seem as cut and dry as "North was good because they fought to end slavery, South was bad because they fought to protect slavery" that we get defensive. Nobody here can understand what life was like 200 years ago, it was a completely different world. Things that are accepted as good now were seen as immoral just 50 years ago, much less 200 years ago. Both sides practiced slavery, neither side fought to preserve it nor abolish it. Te cause of the conflict cannot be singled down to one single issue. If there was one word that could be used it would be secession.
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--- Grahf wrote:

Let's throw the cards down and be honest with ourselves. This country, in many ways, was founded on and nurtured by inhumanity and injustice as much as it was by freedom and idealism. Our nation's history is so completely far from being linear. Our beacons have sometimes been lit for "the people" and sometimes they have not been.

However, we hold a unique position in world history and we have periodically advanced past the various stages of social injustices we were mired in at various times. The days of American slavery have long been over, but it will serve us well to accept the realities of history from all facets, and not just one, so that we may truly learn from our past.

In other words, don't prop one "side" up over the other.

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MillardH wrote:

shsdawg wrote:

The SOLE cause of secession was slavery.  It's couched in a lot of other stuff like States Rights, but it all leads back to slavery.  The leaders of the time said so.  Why won't  you take them at their word?

Why would both sides fight over an issue that they are in 100% agreement with one another on though?

Usually you don't fight somebody over something that you both agree on.

shsdawg wrote:

So the North and South agreed about slavery did they?  REALLY?  The fact is hat the election of Lincoln WAS the handwriting on the wall for slavery in the United States.  The leaders of the time knew it and, except for Lincoln, mostly said so.  The leaders in the South certainly did.

"I understand a proposed amendment to the Constitution—which amendment, however, I have not seen—has passed Congress, to the effect that the Federal Government shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the States, including that of persons held to service. To avoid misconstruction of what I have said, I depart from my purpose not to speak of particular amendments so far as to say that, holding such a provision to now be implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable."

-Abraham Lincoln, 1st Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861