As historians who have heavily researched and debated the causes of the Civil War, you are charged with considering the following:
- determine what you believe were the most significant long and short term causes;
- who, if anyone, had the power to prevent these issues from exploding into disunion?;
- what should have been the priorities of reconstruction?;
- do you see evidence, in America today, of continued conflict over the issues surrounding the Civil War?
You shall create a focused and well-organized post that draws from the sources we've covered, primary, Zinn, etc.
The Civil War was, from almost the very beginning of our country, an inevitability, and the only people I think could have any possible effect on the tensions between North and South are Jefferson and Hamilton themselves. For proof, look no further than the Constitution itself, in which two clauses directly contradict each other. These can be found in Article 1 Section 8, which states that Congress has the power, “To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof,” and the tenth amendment in the Bill of Rights, which says that, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people” (Constitution). These two clauses, argued over by primarily Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton, laid the groundwork for a South-North rivalry stretching far deeper than just slavery. Jefferson, a Virginian, argued for states rights and the tenth amendment, which the South eventually toted in its decision to leave the Union, whereas Hamilton, from New York, pushed for Federal power and the central government. Both of these people created, with their arguments and bickerings, a line between the North and South that could not be repaired. Another issue that they fought over, closely related to the first, deepened the line. The placement of the National Bank in Philadelphia, a Northern city, not only set a precedent for central governmental power but also made the North an economic, industrial powerhouse, leaving the South eventually bereft of railroads and factories. After about 1800, the country was divided for good, never to fully combine again.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you Charlie, but I think it wasn’t exactly the leaders, but what they did with their power and the viewpoints they picked. These leaders established 2 views that the people had no choice but to follow and forcibly the people had to pick a side which further created a animosity between the north and the south—and the representative leaders of these two areas. I believe that the Constitution also contributed to the failure of the Union. The Constitution was a written document that was regulation for every person in our country, and by only having one document that all must abide by there is no way that all the people could entirely agree with the fact that the Constitution is right for everyone. Zinn said in a Peoples History of the United States “Historically, the most terrible things - war, genocide, and slavery - have resulted not from disobedience, but from obedience.” I believe that is exactly right in relation to the civil war. If people had to all follow one Constitution, there is no middle idea for example if slaves should be freed, or if their should be a stronger federal government. In article 1 section 8 of the Constitution, Hamilton clearly states that “all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof” which was really only beneficial for the government and not for American as a whole because it supported more of a federal government. While Jefferson on the other hand made a completely opposite statement of that of Hamilton’s in amendment 10 stating “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Therefore, although both Hamilton and Jefferson (Jefferson more so) had people supporting what they believed in, they still were in positions of power which only allowed them to pick their views allowing the people to either follow one side or the other. I agree with Zinn in the fact that the obedience of the Constitution in the end led to the disobedience of the people and eventually a war among the people.
DeleteIn response to Charlie’s opinion agree with him, as I too believe that it had to do with states rights affecting many people in the country, specifically the south. While researching my designated historian Alexander Stephens, I learned about all the many rights not addressed in the constitution that could have affected many southerners; slavery was the biggest issue not stated in the constitution at the time. The south needed states rights and saw rebelling as their best chance of getting them, ““Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is that people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of leaders” (Zinn). The south decided that it was time to stop obeying and to start getting what they wanted. As for people who could have prevented this from occurring I believe that Robert E. Lee could have put a stop to the south’s enthusiastic attack. He was the main war general during this time and seeing as how the south was willing to trust him, to the point where they would lose slavery if they lost, makes me believe that he could have said something to the people of the south in order to make them rethink their eager attack. Robert E lee wanted the union to stay intact and if it weren’t for his loyalty to Virginia and if he had addressed the south warning them of the reproductions war could bring, I believe it could have been prevented or at least delayed. It was interesting to me that many people who were heavily involved with the south were those who wanted the union to stay together. Robert E Lee and Alexander Stephens both important leaders of the south were too loyal to go against their states and suggest preventing war, but if they had I believe it would have been taken under serious consideration but the south.
ReplyDelete-Emily Smolka
I agree with Charlie in that the Civil War was inevitable, largely due to the fact that the very foundation of our government is a living document and is written, interpreted, and followed by people, who are of course prone to err. The confusion of interpreting the Constitution arises, as Charlie mentioned earlier, from the contradictions between Section 1, Article 8 and the 10th Amendment in the Bill of Rights, and dates back to the days of Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson, the Founding Fathers of our nation. With such a history of misinterpretation and confusion over what the laws actually mean, and how to apply them to the present day, it is no wonder that the Civil War happened. I believe the lack of organization and clarity in the Constitution, as well as later in determining whether the government was compact (which would in essence make secession legal) or contract (which would do otherwise), was the main reason for the Civil War, and the inevitability of the Civil War stems from the very human mistakes made along the way. It is for this reason that issues over the "correct" way of interpreting the Constitution still find their way into our society today, as shown by two Supreme Court Cases: Tinker and Hazelwood, which were comparably equal, but treated differently mainly because they happened in such different eras of the United States's history. This shows that although a living document can be successful - and Jefferson was extreme in his 10-year-then-revolution plan - it can only really work for a country "For the People, By the People" if all the people share a common outlook on the nation's future, and this was clearly not the case in 1860, when the election proved how divided the Union was.
ReplyDeleteI will be starting a new topic as I have nothing to say which hasn't been covered by Emily and Charlie. I believe that based on the research done over the past few weeks or so that the most important part of reconstruction, or rather the part that should have been the focus was repairing the delicate relationship between the north and south. As was made clear by several speeches made in around the horn as well as information that we gathered as a class reconstruction was far from equal, the north was given a lot where as the south was given very little. A popular statistic was that Maine got somewhere around a million dollars to reconstruct where as war torn South Carolina got only 33,000. This statistic shows the alarming lack of respect the north had for the south and had the potential to cause ever more conflict that had already happened. Had the north focused more adequately on repairing places like South Carolina and Georgia which had been literally burned to the ground by Sherman's march then perhaps reconstruction would have gone much more smoothly than it did. Had the north actually considered that giving Maine, a state in which no battles were fought over 1 million dollars, while giving states whose cities were now nothing more than piles of ash less than 40,000 dollars, might not go over so well with the south and probably made them feel inferior despite being one united country. Had the north considered these things then reconstruction would have been quicker. Reconstructions most important element was repairing relationships between the north and south which was not done adequately.
ReplyDelete-Benjamin Miller Cion Esquire
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ReplyDeleteIn response to Benjamin, his last sentence is where my reflection kicks off, talking about the relationships between the south and north
ReplyDeleteThe goals of reconstruction were quixotic. Restoring the south to its pre-war civil state was unrealistic and there was no real viable plan to accomplish reconstruction.
The south had been both physically and economically devastated by the war and all its income generating industry was destroyed. The amount of aid the north needed to provide was greater than their ability to do so at the time. While slaves in the south became free men, and received rights under the two new amendments, the bad feelings that had existed between the North and South were exacerbated immediately following the war by reconstruction efforts. The South’s inability to emotionally move past their hatred towards the North prevented progress in reuniting, but also resulted in anti-black sentiments that currently persist today.
As noted by Zinn, “from this point until the end of the 19th century, the KKK organized hundreds of lynchings, burnings, and beatings in revenge.” The primary goal of reconstruction should have been peace-making efforts between the significant and powerful figures of the North and South and “these deaths and clashes could have been avoided if the North had helped the South, instead of hampering it”(Zinn 203). With this type of reconciliation leaders would have been put in place, resulting in progress for the South. There are infrequent, but however shocking reminders in America today of violence that ensued following the Civil War. New groups such as the Brotherhood of Klans exhibited high activity in 2005-2006, organizing speeches and cross-burnings in an attempt to reunite. The causes of the Civil War, which clearly were relevant to a fundamental dispute of interpretation of the Constitution with regard to state and federal powers, was only worsened during the reconstruction period. Through reconstruction the federal government attempted to exert its powers over the Southern states, causing resentment and further alienation. That federal interference was at the heart of the South’s original agitations and any attempt at reconciliation by the federal government was a painful reminder of the South’s defeat. Similarly to the coming of the war, it was improbable that anyone could have potentially changed the outcome of the reconstruction, other than perhaps Lincoln, Stephen A. Douglas, and Johnson. But it was truly doubtful that any of the individuals could have changed the outcome of the Civil War or Reconstruction itself.
It is of great interest that all the historical figures we were given as a class to represent had something in common, except one. All had lived up to and during the Civil War and had a role in either the immediate years running up to the Civil War or the years during the great conflict. The one exception is the man our team portrayed, Henry Clay, who died in 1852 before Bleeding Kansas, the Dred Scott decision, the Lincoln-Douglas debates, the election of 1860, and the bombing of Fort Sumter.
ReplyDeleteIn researching the other men and listening to their responses to the variety of questions, I began wondering why more of them had not tried and succeeded, as Clay had, to come up with a grand compromise to save the Union. Lincoln himself wrote to Horace Greeley in an August 1862 letter his thoughts on the Union. He wrote “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 do it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that” (Zinn, 191). This was written, of course, well into the war but it reveals that Lincoln, like so many others, did want the war to happen and was open to compromise. It was not just Northerners and Westerners who wanted to avoid war. Many Southerners of great stature (Robert E. Lee and Alexander Stevens for example) also were greatly in favor of keeping together the Union.
The answer is that as great as Henry Clay was, and he was the most important reason why the Civil War was not fought earlier than 1861, there was nobody who could have saved the Union from falling apart. The issue of slavery and the history of conflict between North and South over the issue of slavery going back to the first great compromise of 1820, was more powerful than any one or several individuals could overcome. Some southerners at the time had said that if Henry Clay were around, we would not have had a war. This is simply false. Nobody could stop it.
In Response to Charlie:
ReplyDeleteI have to agree with your statement that the Civil War was inevitable, but I start to disagree when you say that Hamilton and Jefferson’s argument concerning the Constitution was the core cause of the separation between the North and the South. One, if that were the case the Constitution itself would be to blame, because it - from the beginning - set it self up to be debated endlessly. However, I think that this debate is just another symptom of the actual cause – the opposing cultures of the North and the South. The strain between the two sides date back to before the Revolution, when a good portion of the Loyalists originated in the South and many of the Patriots were from Boston and other cities in the North. It was this long history of underlying tension that stemmed from two different areas of the country with two different, and sometimes contradictory, cultures that ultimately caused the Civil War to erupt. As Avery Craven wrote “compromise or yielding [was] impossible because issues appear in the form of right and wrong and involve the fundamental structure of society.” The North and the South lost the ability to compromise because each respective side felt they were in the right due to their personal opinions that were created during their upbringing. This resulted in a “complete breakdown of the democratic process” that inhibited the country to the point where it was no longer truly the United States of America (Craven). In order to become a functioning country again, the issue of which side’s culture would become dominant needed to be solved. And as Zinn wrote, “It would take…a full-scale war to end such a deeply entrenched system.” The Civil War was inevitable due to the stress that existed between the North and the South that was caused by opposing belief systems.
I concur with my esteemed colleague Charlie’s point that the Civil War was instigated by the conflict between the Hamiltonian North and the Jeffersonian South. The two men possessed political theories that would become the core principles of the North and the South. Jefferson’s vision of an agrarian nation with the preponderance of power reserved to the states directly contrasted Hamilton’s views of a strongly industrial nation based on a strong central government. These beliefs were taken into account during the secession of the South, as they created the line between the two halves of the country. If any, it was these two men who had the power to maintain the cohesiveness of our country. In my opinion, the priorities of Reconstruction should have been to restore our nation to its former state, and welcome the South back into the union as equals, not inferiors. I believe that the North was wrong in the way that they invited the South back, treating it poorly and punishing it for its actions. For example, not one battle was fought in Maine. However, Maine received $1,000,000 in reparations for the war, whereas Georgia received a mere $50,000. The way that the North brought the South back into the country was wrong, and more sympathy for the distraught South should have been shown. It was this same utter disregard to the needs of the South that caused the war in the first place. It is unfathomable as to why the North would perform similar actions, when their prior endeavors divided the nation. The priorities for Reconstruction should have been to repair the damage done, and to take all measures possible to ensure that such a calamity never happen again. I conclude with a quote from Abraham Lincoln, “A house divided against itself cannot stand”.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Charlie’s statement, which was that the placement of the country capital towards the north of the country was a long-term cause of the war. It was moved to the North because at that time it was more industrialized, but what they didn’t acknowledge was that this left the South in the dust. Due to this, the South had less technology, for example 70% of the railroads were concentrated in the North, which ultimately left the South disconnected from the North location wise and transportation wise. Not only was there the physical differences and geographical differences, but for the most part there were moral differences as well. The people of the South thought differently from the people in the North, which is something we still experience today. Slavery was how the South made all of their money, so when the North tried to take this away the South was left with no way to make a profit. This reason is why I disagree when people say that slavery was not a cause of the war, but instead the war was caused by political and economic reasons. They fail to acknowledge that slavery was the economic reason the South had for entering the war. Slavery was the economic cause for the South, so when the North tried to halt that and put a stop on the expansion of slavery it affected the south. It was evident that by 1860 when Lincoln ran for president on a platform that included the opposition of slavery that the North was trying to smother the south. They were also trying to force their moral ways on the south without really seeing that the South could not run effectively without slavery. As a result the South needed to make sure that they could still make money. That was not possible when the North wanted to stop slavery, or at least the expansion of it. Succession, in the eyes of the South, was the only way they could hold on to their way of life.
ReplyDelete-Crystal
Up until very recently, I had never considered how difficult Reconstruction of the Civil War had to have been. Tension between the North and South began years before the war even began. As we learned from the causes of the Civil War packet, there were political, economic, and social problems that caused the north and south to “resort to the use of force,” and begin a war. Before this year, I had never considered that the North might have been at fault for this war. As I’m sure many of you were, I was under the impression that the south was made up of horrible slave owners who decided to secede in order to keep their slaves. When I began researching Robert E. Lee, I realized that the north had much more to do with the war than I imagined, and in fact, it pushed the south so far away that they felt they had no choice other than to break away. However, I’m not sure anyone could have prevented this polarity from creating a war. The north and south lived completely different lives and played opposite roles in the country. The north relied on the south just as the southerners relied on their slaves. It did not occur to me before that maybe the southerners didn’t want to free their slaves because they were immoral people, but because they could not function without them. I agree completely that the south should have received much more money during reconstruction. The south was burned to the ground, and needed the reparations far more than the north did. We learned in Zinn’s chapter that the slaves did not experience true freedom when they were released. Instead, sharecropping replaced slavery. Without reparation money, the southerners still could not afford to raise their crops without free labor. Based on these facts, this unit has caused my opinion on the north and south to switch completely. Though both the north and south contributed to the mess that was the Civil War, as a whole, I see the north as causing more problems for the south, than the south did for the north.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with Gabbie on the great points she made on the South needing slavery to function economically, and the North disrupting that system. I also have my opinions on this. Though I agree that the North has caused many problems, I also believe that the South was overly dependent on the black slaves to work the land. By the time the Civil War came, many slaves ran away and joined the Union army. One historian, James McPherson, said “Without their [the black slaves] help, the North could not have won the war as soon as it did, and perhaps it could not have won at all” (Zinn 194). Of course, other slaves still stayed with their masters, but still, “when opportunity came, they left, often joining the Union army” (194). So in the end, many slaves left their masters, leaving the Southern people with lower numbers and no one to grow any crops to feed the troops. And later, the land would be burned down to ashes because of Sherman. I do believe that the South needed the black slaves, but that was a weakness. But the North was also reliant on the South, and therefore reliant on the slaves. Either way, the relationship the two parties shared was a bitter one after the Civil War. I agree with Gabbie when she, as well as many others, said that more money be given to the South for reparations since it was their land that was destroyed. I don’t think that even with Reconstruction anything was or will be completely repaired. The brutality that the North showed in fighting the South revealed just what lengths that they would go in order to keep the Union together, as well as their only source to create crops for food and trade. The Radical Republicans also wanted to treat the Southern states as a conquered people, which would not be a good mentality to improve the situation. The biggest problem that will always remain a problem, no matter what time, is that people’s beliefs and bias create problems, as is evident in the events before, during, and after the Civil War.
DeleteCharlie (and everyone else it seems) said something along the lines of the Civil War being inevitable, which I believe to be true. Many different causes, all acting at the same time, angered the South and frustrated the North, which became an unstoppable force that brought the United States to it’s knees.
ReplyDeleteThere really wasn’t much anyone could do about it.
Then again, Charlie said, “the only people I think could have any possible effect on the tensions between North and South are Jefferson and Hamilton”. First of all, can you imagine what it would be like to have them sitting in congress again and duking it out, starting the war right there in the upholstered Congress chairs, starting the duel of the millennium? But Charlie also says, “both of theses people created…a line between the North and south that could not be repaired, “which is something I do believe.
In my opinion, as I mentioned before, the government messed it up big-time. Avery Craven says of the Civil War, “Concrete issues were reduced to abstract principles… conflicts between interests simplified to basic levels where men feel more than reason, and where compromise or yielding is impossible because issues appear in the form of right and wrong”. The government became an unbiased ruler and turned every decision they made into life or death. This made the winning team feel as if they were really “winners” and the losing team feels as if they had just lost their first-born child, causing them to lose faith in their government. This disaster of a government was but one of the causes of the war. You could also argue that the theories of majority rule and the imperial North caused anger amongst the Southern population (Craven Packet). This, along with the tariffs that the South deemed unfair and the anti-slavery forces of the North, pushed the South over the edge which created the tension that led to the Civil War.
-Maddy
As I read Gabbie’s response I found myself agreeing with some of her points regarding why the north and south were such polar opposites. For this “reflection” post I decided to focus on two things I believe were short term causes of the war, and also things greatly responsible for the tensions that existed between the two sides. I believe that a very significant cause of the Civil War was the Supreme Court decision of the Dred Scott case. In this court case, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney declared that all enslaved and free blacks were not and cold never become citizens of the United States, and also believed that "no rights which the white man was bound to respect." This decision not only impacted the fate of Dred Scott but also the four million other slaves at the time, and also as a result of this case, the Missouri Compromise was declared unconstitutional, saying it violated the and Congress could not stop slavery in new territories. While southerners approved greatly of this decision, it enraged the northerners, who were certain that this decision meant that the southerners wanted slavery to exist in the entire nation, and that the south intended on taking over. Not only did this pit the two sides head to head, it also played a significant role in Abraham Lincoln’s election of office. At first, I had not completely understood how Lincoln’s campaign impacted the outbreak of the war. At the time of his campaign, the majority of the north belonged to the Republican party, lead by Lincoln, and opposed the expansion of slavery, calling it an “immoral institution” and “a relic of barbarism.” Lincoln spoke out against slavery in his campaign. The republican platform was 1) exclude slavery from the territories; 2) adopt a protective tariff 3) enact a free homestead law 4) support railroad building with federal aid. Because the southern economy depended on slaves to work the fields, Lincoln’s election and desire to abolish slavery seemed to justify the secession of the south.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI read many of the responses, and I found that I agreed with many of them when they said that the Civil War was inevitable. I believe that no one had any sort of power to prevent to the issues, but many have laid the foundation for a strong rivalry between the North and the South. For example, in the US Constitution of Article 1 Section 8, it says, “To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.” A big problem with this was that people in the North were not necessarily facing the same issues that the people of the South were facing. This clause would invite many battle of opposing opinions and conflicts because of the differences between the people. I researched Thaddeus Stevens, and on January 22, 1862, he said, “The war will not end until the government shall more fully recognize the magnitude of the crisis; until they have discovered that this is an internecine war in which one party must be reduced to hopeless feebleness and the power of further effort be further annihilated.” Though admittedly, Thaddeus Stevens is a Radical Republican, he was right about how the roots of the problem were deeply ingrained, and that a war would not simply fix the problems. The people’s own personal beliefs and for some, their self-centered mentality, is what contributed greatly to the issues faced then and even now. In the documentary our class observed, Right America, Feeling Wronged, there was criticism between the people who were living in the South and in the North. While some people in the North said that the people of the South were rednecks, the people of the South said the North was not even part of America. So with the conflicts came insults and personal opinions that aren’t really helping the issue at hand.
ReplyDeleteAs, I believe, the first second-comment poster, I’m going to say something very quick about what I wrote about before in response to Sarah, and then move on to a different topic. It’s quite flattering that out of the 11 posts so far, 7 have at least mentioned me.
ReplyDeleteIn response to Sarah, I have to say that I quite agree. Social and geographical upbringing is definitely a huge factor in how a person’s opinions are shaped. Just look at the sectional differences between parties; on an electoral map, the entire middle of the country is red, while the coasts are both blue, with some of the south-east ocean states being red. This displays how an area, and the opinions of the people around a person as they grow up, can shape who someone is and what they will think about certain issues. If this were not true, then the map would look more like a scatter plot, with each region being a medley of red and blue. In further support of this, Albert Einstein once said that, “Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen.” This is definitely true in light of what I just discussed. The area in which a person lives dictates who they will be, and this is one of the major reasons why the South was so socially different than the North in the United States.
Now, on to a different topic.
Few people so far have mentioned the importance of slavery to the secession of the South, and it is a topic that cannot be ignored. As Steven A. Channing says in his study on the secession crisis of South Carolina, “The fear of insurrection abolition syndrome was the core of the secession persuasion, not its vehicle.” He goes on to say that, “[It] was believed that [Lincoln’s] election had signaled an acceptance of antislavery dogmas by a clear majorities of Northerners,” and quotes Baptist minister James Furman as saying, “Then every negro in South Carolina and every other Southern State will be his own master; nay, more than that, will be the equal of every one of you” (Causes of Civil War packet). South Carolinians were afraid not only of the blacks in general, but more specifically the existence of a free black population in their state. They saw the emergence of the John Browns and Nat Turners as direct threats to their way of life, and were afraid of what free blacks might do. And, based on what they saw, they had good reason to be fearful; As George Rawick writes on the interviews with ex-slaves done in the 1930’s, “The slave community acted like a generalized extended kinship system in which all adults looked after all children and there was little division between “my children for whom I’m responsible” and “your children for whom you are responsible” (Zinn). The kind of family and closeness displayed by all slaves made for an immense, looming possibility for Southern slave owners: if the blacks went free and became the state majority, who is to say that they will not turn the subjugation around and enslave or become more powerful than whites? After all, they would work as a unit, each caring for the other and increasing the general strength of the population until they became wealthier than the whites themselves, or so the Southerners thought. In addition, the possibility of full-scale violence loomed high and daunting as a result of black emancipation. In 1860 alone, Mississippi saw 12 slave revolts, both armed and unarmed (slaverebellion.org). If the blacks, currently without legal use of guns or weapons, were released from their legal shackles, who knew what they might do to their white oppressors? Channing sums up the general feeling of the South quite nicely when he says, “For the people of South Carolina perpetuation of the Union beyond 1860 meant the steady and irresistible destruction of slavery, which was the first and last principle of life in that society, the only conceivable pattern of essential race control.” Fear, fear of the free black and what might become of the South as a result, drove South Carolina to secession, and was truly the ultimate factor in their decision to dissolve the Union.
As Gabbie said above, I agree that it was ultimately the North that was responsible for the Civil War, even though the South started it, and the political, economic, and social differences between the two escalated to a point beyond control. The differences between the two were far to great to be overlooked, and arose from the fundamental elements of our government; as mentioned in the Causes of the Civil War Packet, "The discontent of South Carolina is not one to be allayed by an concessions which the Free States can make...it is neither more nor less than a disbelief in the very principles on which our government is founded." It is clear that, as Gabbie wrote, the North "pushed the south so far away that they felt they had no choice other than to break away" and this reaffirms my belief that the war was inevitable by then, and in reality, it always had been. So long as there existed any doubt over whether the government was compact or contract, whether power rested in the states or the nation, there was an incentive for war, and each new compromise and resolution only delayed its beginning - nothing could prevent it. This is what I previously believed (before reading others' posts), and Gabbie's post has confirmed what I held to be true, and although we can argue over initiatives that could have abated the war, I believe it would make more sense to look back and consider how it could be prevented from repeating. History has a habit of repeating itself, and Right America, Feeling Wronged shows how pertinent the Civil War is to the modern United States, and how we must work to resolve our differences before they escalate to such a point.
ReplyDeleteI believe that essentially, the land itself made the Civil War inevitable. By this I mean that the natural disparities between the North and South in terms of their sources for revenue caused them to be divided from the start- with the South gaining money from plantations and farms, and the North with “rocky soil,” remaining mostly on industrial means which relied on the South’s crop production. Theoretically this could have been a mutually beneficial relationship, with the South producing the crops and sending them to the North to sell, both gaining an equal profit. However, as the North was in the ultimate possession of the merchandise, they were the ones who had more freedom in their actions, and soon “the North forged rapidly ahead, the South fell behind” (“Social Causes”). The South soon came to blaming themselves for the North’s increasing status, as the Vicksburg Daily Whig stated, “the people of the South have permitted the Yankees to monopolize the carrying trade… at the expense of the South” (“Economic Causes”). The North was being pretty hypocritical in its demands, as they wanted the South to keep increasing their production, while decreasing their own economy to benefit the North's. They caused the war in their mistreatment of the South for their own economic advantages, and ultimately fought it to maintain the economy. Though Andrew Johnson believed that “there were two parties, one for destroying the Government to preserve slavery, and the other to break up the Government to destroy slavery,” I believe that though slavery was a cause of the war- and an economic one, at that- the ultimate motive of the North’s decision to fight was caused by economic security. If the South seceded and the North did not go after them, the South would be able, according to the Boston Herald in 1860, to “immediately form commercial alliances with European countries who will readily acquiesce in any arrangement which will help English manufacturing at the expense of New England” (“Economic Causes”). The fear of the South’s ultimate revenge in destroying the Northern economy by becoming both an industrial and agricultural force was a significant cause in the North’s decision to fight. Therefore, as the economic separations between the North and South were mainly caused by the natural tendencies of the land to be rocky or good for planting, that inevitable force caused the Civil War.
ReplyDeleteI had never deeply considered Jen’s point that the land was what made the war inevitable. I think it is an extremely rational and interesting argument, and it is one that I have skipped over in my head when forming my own opinions on the matter. Every time that I said “north” or “south” in my first post, I was referring to the people only. In my mind, it was the people and their actions and their opinions that shaped the polarity. However, I know see that the land had so much to do with it. The land in the south was suitable for farming and agriculture, while the north was not. The south was spread apart and did not have as easy access to communication as the north did. So really, it had nothing to do with the people themselves. Any group of people living in the south or the north would have resulted in the exact same conflicts. So yes, the vast differences between the north and the south was inevitable. However, I still hesitate to declare that war itself was inevitable.
ReplyDeleteAs Charlie and Michelle said, the misinterpretations of the Constitution did cause extreme problems for our country. But to say that this was a cause of the war, and that the war was inevitable, seems like a stretch to me. Avery Craven states, “After years of strain, men ceased to discuss their problems and dropped the effort to compromise their differences.” I see this as their choice. The economic pressure put on the south, along with many of the issues that resulted in war were unbearable, however I still believe that they could have found some way other than war to work out their problems. After all, our country was built around the fact that everyone would have some say in the government, inevitably leading to opposing opinions. It would have taken a ton of will power, self-control, and patience, but I feel strongly that the war could have been avoided. Maybe the country was so rattled by the differences in opinions and lifestyles of their so-called “united” nation, but if everyone took one giant breath, maybe they could have settled their differences without “the use of force.”
I would also like to bring up the question: did the war even work? Did it have the desired outcome? Yes, it brought the union back together (technically), but remember “Right America, Feeling Wronged”? Our country still has completely opposite lifestyles and views in the north and south. So instead of asking if the war was inevitable, I think a better question would be is there ever a way to improve these social differences. Do we still have the need to?
I agree with everyone that the Civil War was inevitable. The tensions and discrepancies between South and North were so big that it led to many conflicts which is why South and North could not meet half way. My quarter group represented Henry Clay and I found him very interesting and shocking. I did not anticipate when researching about him how much role he had in all of those Compromises that were made with the intention to delay the war; however, regardless of his attempts to prevent the war, the war still took place. And I think the reason why it took place was because of lack of compromise. North wanted to be more industrialized whereas the South was still mostly agriculturally based. Just like it was mentioned in Vicksburg Daily Whig, “New York city, like a mighty queen of commerce, sits proudly upon her island throne, sparkling in jewels and waving an undisputed commercial scepter over the South”. North puts taxes on the South for economic growth, but actually created more tension with South. South wanted to be industrialized as the North but it was oppressed by the North. Therefore I believe that the war was inevitable because the South was tired of the oppression and the North was frustrated. But also in the same paragraph with the North domination, it said that “the people of the South have permitted the Yankees to monopolize the carrying trade…” The South chose to take the responsibility to do “all of the imports and most of the exporting business for the whole Union, and the reason why the North took advantage of the South’s labor and then the South depending so much on slaves and then slaves becoming dissatisfied, and then slavery became one of the main causes of the Civil War.
ReplyDeleteI understand where people are coming from when they say that the Civil War was inevitable, but I think it is at the point where we should address some other possible topics because there are already tons of posts on why the war needed to happen. I think that even though the civil war very well may have been inevitable, freeing the slaves would have certainty slowed down the cause. I feel this way for many reasons, first of all freeing the slaves would have appealed to the normal, moral human in both the North and the South who agreed with Zinn when he said, "the principle is that a human being cannot justly own another” (Zinn 192). Not only would freeing the slaves have helped many Radical Republicans and their followers, but it also would have helped the country. Even though slaves were eventually freed during the times of reconstruction, Andrew Johnson noted that the slaves were extremely helpful in completing rail ways and rail lines that united the North and the South. Before these rail lines, the country was more divided and it was harder to get information, but with the help of the slaves, the country was becoming closer. Had this happened before the civil war, I believe that the outcome would have been the same and the country would have become closer. One of the main problems with the way freeing the slaves happened after the civil war was that it was handled very sloppily. The freed slaves were not “free,” in fact Zinn noted that “black men could only vote in nineteen out of the twenty-four more radical northern states” (Zinn, 207). This meant that in many places were slaves should have been freed, the slaves were not actually free at all. This lead to many different racial conflicts such as the Black Codes, Jim Crow Laws, and the rise of the Klu Klux Klan in the South. Had the freeing of the slaves been done correctly, I strongly believe that the civil war would have AT LEAST been delayed.
ReplyDeleteToph
2nd post:
ReplyDeleteI believe that the main priorities of reconstruction should have been focusing on creating peace between the two newly assembled parts of America. They had to focus on getting people to see America as a great thing, and instead of fighting the people in it, should just enjoy being a part of it, “It is a country so powerful, so big, so pleasing to so many of its citizens that it can afford to give freedom of dissent to the small number who are not pleased.” (Zinn). While people did eventually learn to do this as seen in the loyalist of the wars to come, I believe that the bitterness some people were left with after the war can still be seen in today’s society. For example racism is still a problem in the south. I believe that the mentality of blacks being slaves there and having slaves being taken away from them when losing the civil war is part of what made racism so common in the south. This is the biggest conflict of the civil war that I am able to detect in today’s society. Today, Mississippi, Georgia, and Texas are still the states with the highest number of lynches per year. I believe that this is form the mentality instilled in the southerner since the civil war, saying the they could do whatever they wanted to blacks because they owned them at the time.
- Emily Smolka
Originally, like Gabbie, I had never really thought that the environmental differences of the North and South could have been overcome. I just thought that the North would have always been industrial and the South would always be agricultural, and the North would take from the South unfairly. Now that I think about it, it seems I assumed that the North would always be more successful than the South. This leads me into one of the questions raised by Dancz… Is there evidence of a continued conflict over the issues surrounding the war?
ReplyDeleteThe automatic answer is “of course”. Just by looking at any of the past elections you can tell that we are still fighting as North vs. South. However, it’s not just in political disputes. Just like my previous assumption, people from the North still think of the South as inferior, and people from the South still think that Northerners are stuck up and cold. Although the tensions may have cooled, the underlying issues were merely placed on hold in the back of our minds.
Also, replying to Gabbie’s question: “did the war even work?”… No. If the North’s goal was to reunite the union it was impossible in the first place. Who ever thought that they could get the South to change their way of life? If you think about it, most successful countries that have been up and around for thousands of years happen to be a lot smaller. The fact that the United States is so large, and our geological divides are so great, creates a huge social divide between our citizens. If you look back into history you can see that big empires don’t seem to last, for example Rome. While it may have lasted quite a few generations the problems with controlling such a large empire eventually caused it’s demise. The question is, could this happen to the United States? We aren’t Rome, but the problems that arise from our square mileage may break us, just like the Romans.
As Robert E Lee in the Around the Horn activity in class, I gained a radical new perspective on the widely disputed topic of slavery. To me, and Robert E Lee, slavery was and still is fundamentally, politically, and most of all, morally unsound both in theory and in effect. Howard Zinn expresses these same sentiments in his book, A People’s History of the United States, when he states, "the principle is that a human being cannot justly own another” (Zinn 192). That being said, however, I do not believe that it was this debate that sparked the Civil War. That can be attributed to many sources, and not just slavery. To aptly describe the causes of the Civil War, I can compare it to a cake. All these different and varied components come together to form one cohesive entity, creating a whole that is greater than just the parts themselves. The social, economical, political, and moral debates that were caused by infighting between the two political parties of America amalgamated into one issue that came to be a dividing force which split the country and caused the Civil War. Although I am going against my peers in saying this, I must reiterate that this war was not inevitable. Had the issues that arose been dealt with in a mature, timely fashion, there would have been no Confederate States of America, no “North vs. South, and perhaps most importantly, no such thing as a Civil War. However, this war, which split our nation, might have been a good thing for our country.
ReplyDeleteThere have been times in our history as humans where progress can be spawned from the ashes of destruction. An example that comes to mind is the Dark Ages, the intellectual blackout following the collapse of the Roman Empire. However, out of these dark times, the Renaissance was born. Even today, the Renaissance is known to be the age where the human race made the jump from primeval times to the current era we live in. A huge amount of enormous progressions were accomplished from this era, which shaped the modern world in which we live in today. How is it possible that coming out of the medieval age we experienced, a period of such development rose so quickly? It is because humans learn from their mistakes, and derive their decisions based on history.
Ok, back from that little ramble (sorry). The United States has grown since the Civil War, and while it may be argued that this war was a hindrance to our country, I elect to argue otherwise. This war completely altered the dynamic of our country, and was completely necessary to our advancement as a nation and as a people. Through this rough patch in our history, we were able to find fault with our roots, and revise them accordingly. As a closing statement, I would like to raise the point that this war was evitable, but unquestionably helped us in our quest to tailor our country to our needs and our desires.
Priorities of Reconstruction- in response to mainly George and others
ReplyDeleteThe post war era began with lenient plans put out by presidents Andrew Johnson and Abraham Lincoln. Reconstruction focused on the reuniting of the eleven seceding states in order for them to obtain self-government and seats in Congress. Through reconstruction the federal government attempted to exert its powers over the Southern states, causing resentment and further alienation. I strongly agree with George when he says, “I believe that the North was wrong in the way that they invited the South back, treating it poorly and punishing it for its actions”, because federal interference was at the heart of the South’s original agitations and any attempt at reconciliation by the federal government was a painful reminder of the South’s defeat. Whitelaw Reid, a U.S. politician and newspaper editor said, "The first feelings were those of baffled rage. Men who had fought four years for an idea smarted with actual anguish under the stroke, which showed their utter failure. Then followed a sense of bewilderment and helplessness”. The actions of the federal government were forcing the North and South into the same disputes that started the war itself. Radical Republicans were a congressional group that aimed to punish the South for succeeding and tried to create hardships for confederate states rejoining the Union. Instead of heavy taxations and economic cruelty towards the South, the North should have prioritized Lincoln’s proposal of the “ten percent plan”. The plan that Lincoln created was a versatile idea that declared a state could be reintegrated into the Union once 10% of the 1860 vote pledged to abide by emancipation. With this plan he aimed to shorten the war and it proved to be a success because by 1864 Louisiana, Arkansas, and Tennessee were fully operating unionist states. Although this plan was mainly to increase popularity for his Emancipation Proclamation and had some major flaws (such as potentially forcing blacks back into slavery), another moderate peace plan should have been prioritized as an approach to ease the confederate states to reunite with the Union.
-Foster
I'm going to disagree with Charlie's original point, as I do not believe the Civil War was inevitable. I think compromise should have played a much larger role in many aspects of our political leadership during the beginnings of our country, and had it done so, the Civil War may have been avoided
ReplyDeleteNow, I suppose that playing Henry Clay has affected my opinion, but I truly believe that his philosophy on how to resolve (or "postpone," as some may argue) the social and political issues that have plagued our country through compromise is sincerely the best course of action that could have been taken.
Though the lines of communication were nowhere near as instant or effective as they are today, the people who became political leaders during the crucial moments of our history (eg. the authors of the constitution) should have made much more of an effort to compromise on their ideas. The childish methods of Hamilton v. Jefferson that shone through in the obvious contradictions in the constitution (that have been previously mentioned) allowed for the development of severely different philosophies in both the northern and southern regions of the country.
In this particular example, the founding fathers should have been much clearer and more concise about the rights of states and the federal government. Even though opposing ideas had already existed at the time of the making of the constitution, the authors must have realized that their vagueness would allow their "posterity" to develop into a divided group of polarized and partisan individuals.
I believe this was a primary long term cause of the civil war.
Just as one last thought to add to my second post, perhaps it was the incompetence of our politicians in resolving these conflicts that caused the Civil War. The issues that arose should have been dealt with, and there would have been no Civil War at all. What do you guys think?
ReplyDeleteAfter reading Toph’s post, I understand completely where he was coming from. I agree that the freeing of slaves was “handled sloppily,” and that reconstruction was not the right time to free the slaves, as the South was so upset with their loss of the war that the loss of one of their major sources of revenue only increased their hostility towards the Union and the North. However, I do not think that freeing the slaves earlier would have helped in delaying the Civil War. First of all, it is not exactly reasonable that the slaves would have been freed while the Union was still together. Though the South did not have much economic power in the Union, they still had power, theoretically, in the government, and I highly doubt that any member of government from the South, most likely a rich plantation owner, would limit their own economic independence by freeing the slaves that they relied so heavily on. As Zinn states, there was a “frenzy for limitless profit that comes from capatilistic agriculture,” and in one instance, James Madison noted how “he could make $256 on every Negro in a year, and spend only $12 or $13 on his keep” (Zinn). Though we would all like to think that everyone would be willing to sacrifice their own wealth for the lives of others, that is not realistic, and Zinn states how “it would take either a full-scale slave rebellion or a full-scale war to end such a deeply entrenched system” (Zinn). The Civil War was this full-scale war mentioned by Zinn, and even the war itself would not be able to end the discrimination against blacks in the country. Either way, I think it was almost impossible to come up with a “right” solution to freeing the slaves. Though they obviously needed to be freed, the mentality of the nation needed changing, and cannot be changed as easily and quickly as the passing of an amendment. I think that Gabbie’s question as to whether there is a way to improve our social differences is a good one. The resentment between the North and the South still remains, and will be difficult to change after so many years of suppressed hostility.
ReplyDeleteSorry, I meant capitalistic
DeleteI think the priorities of reconstruction should have been to repair the country as a whole. Based on what actually happened, I would argue that it did exactly the opposite. For example, Maine received more reparation money than Kentucky (When no part of the war was fought there). I think that if the North really wanted to repair things with the South, then they should’ve been supportive of the South and helped them to join back with the rest of the country. Not only that, but in a supplementary act for "An Act to provide for the more efficient Government of the Rebel States", any government that was in place before wasn’t legal and that if they continued with these government the North would be allowed to appoint people to run their governments. This just furthered the tension by restricting them from appointing their own officers, which just stripped them of more freedoms. They could have better handled this situation by letting the South keep their governments in tact, as long as the south was willing to cooperate and adapt to the laws that had been set forth by the North. Also when the radical republicans refused to accept Lincoln’s Ten Percent plan, they only further worsened the situation by not recognizing some states as a legitimate part of Congress. The radical republicans had the priorities of reconstruction all mixed up. They wanted to punish the south for their actions, but if they punished the south enough then the south would be in an even bigger ruin. That would hurt the south rather than helping the south, which was the general intention of reconstruction. Overall as a country, especially the North since it won, they should’ve provided more funds to the South and allow them to gradually rebuild their states on their own terms instead of having Congress impose state officials on them.
ReplyDelete- Crystal
Second Post:
ReplyDeleteOn a totally different note, and after reading through many of my colleagues' comments, I must bring up two fundamental, though unrelated points.
The first being that slavery was most certainly not fundamental for the South to function economically. After the concept of slavery exploded in the South, it did become a fundamental economic system, however, had slavery not been allowed in the first place, the South would have found other ways to farm copious amounts of produce. In fact, had the South instead employed colonists to farm the land, the incentive to have such vast plantations and not focus on industrialization would have been much smaller, as the workers would have to be payed.
I don't mean to speculate, but I honestly believe that if slavery had not been introduced to the south, economic diversity would have been much more beneficial, and the beliefs and culture that were rooted in geographical location wouldn't have been so radically different.
Since that may be far-fetched, my next point is all too real.
The beliefs that were rooted in the civil war are omnipresent in congress's current inability to function properly. With the majority of the southern economy staying very traditional and agricultural, the south's social ideas stayed conservative as well, as southerns were not prone to change.
As the north expanded its horizons and industrialized, new ideas and social issues were more broadly accepted.
So when issues such as states' rights are brought up, one must look at the differences in opinion from the north and south and how the discrepancies in belief caused the civil war.
Those same basic principles that tore apart our country during the civil war are still rooted in the two-party system today, with conservatives vouching for state's rights and liberals endorsing federal control and regulation.
This provokes the question: is congress essentially in a civil war right now?
To respond to Max's comment about slavery not being fundamental to economic success, I see your point but I disagree entirely. To say that the south would have functioned perfectly if slavery had not been an option in the first place is all well and good but that's also like saying a bird could survive without the ability to fly or a person could survive without the ability to speak, while both are fathomable people can talk and birds can fly so why dwell on what ifs? To go further into the importance of slavery to the southern economy you have to bring up the fact that while it may sound fine to not have the plantation and have gone more into industrialism it is entirely possible that this would not work. The south provided the raw materials which the north used to manufacture with it's industrialized factories so if you take away the plantations which produce the raw materials then the whole economic foundation of the country is shaken not just that of the south. After having looked at that it becomes apparent why slave labor was so important to the success of the southern economy, it was free work. Rather than pay hundreds of white men to do the field work at plantations plantation owners were able to have free labor which reduced production costs. The end to slavery meant an end to that which undoubtedly made the pockets of many slave owners much lighter. Max, the hypothetical world in which slavery never existed sounds nice but it is just that, hyptohetical.
ReplyDeleteCauses of the Civil war- in response to George
ReplyDeleteWhile I agree that slavery was a terrible thing, I wouldn’t say that slavery wasn’t the spark to the Civil war. Obviously, there were numerous factors that lead to the Civil war- slavery wasn’t even close to the only cause- but slavery was really the deciding factory for the war. The south’s’ whole world revolved around slavery. The plantations that wealthy southerners owned relied on slaves, and because the culture of the south was so rooted in tradition, all of society essentially rotated around slavery as an institution.
Overall, I agree that like George said, you can compare the Civil war to a cake, and the true causes were wide and varied. I just disagree with the opinion that slavery wasn’t the decisive factor. I think that slavery was the most tangible issue leading to the Civil war.
Response to Maddy’s Response to Gabbie’s Question:
I would definitely agree that the Civil war didn’t work- you are not going to re- establish and strengthen a country by treating half of it terribly and upholding the belief that the seceding half deserves punishment. Holding this grudge can only lead to problems later on, even if the problem at hand was temporarily solved. I would also agree that attempting to get the south to change its’ way of life is unrealistic at best, and that because of the geological divides, the U.S. will never be as unified of a country as some small European countries, for example France. France is the size of Texas, which is the second biggest state. But there are 49 (yes, not at the time… but now) other states as a part of our country, and that is something that the government needs to recognize: the country is never going to be completely unified regarding controversial issues, even smaller countries aren’t. However, moving on from opinions stated in Maddy’s response, I believe that that should have been one of the things worked out during Reconstruction. Had the federal government realized that the U.S. is not going to be a super close-knit country because of cultural and geographical divides, Reconstruction would have gone more smoothly. The federal government should have given more power to the states. This would mean less arguments over laws because, like a clique, the people are more likely to have the same opinions on what should and shouldn’t be allowed. I think that in any big country this is an issue because as peoples’ lifestyles get increasingly different, their opinions are going to be different, too. The lifestyle and beliefs of New Yorkers are going to be vastly different than those of a native Alaskan. Trying to enforce strict laws that cover both would just be a waste of time, as neither will be completely happy with the end result.
In Response to Crystal’s Post:
ReplyDeleteI would agree that Radical Republicans were completely going in the wrong direction in believing that the south deserved punishment for seceding. If anything, they did a good thing- they were keeping the government the way that it was supposed to be by bringing a national focus to the fact that there was something majorley wrong with the government. I would also go as far to say that they were being immature with this belief. Of course, if someone disagrees with you, you aren’t going to be happy with them. But that doesn’t mean that they deserve to be punished. (And I digress) as Zinn said when he said that the north, including a state like Maine that never even saw the war, got significantly more funding that the south did. I think that by saying that the south deserved to be punished, it shows that the Radical Republicans were holding a grudge against the south. This shows that if anything there are going to be more problems in the future, not a peaceful settlement on controversial issues, because holding grudges leads to later problems. In terms of funding given to the North and the South, I believe that there should have been some kind of scale to weight the damages that a state suffered rather than handing out federal aid randomly. For example, the South could get a certain amount of money for physical property damages, and the North could get money for economic losses. This would prevent unfair distribution of federal funds.
As Gabbie said in her first post, I never really thought about how the north could have anything to do with starting the civil war, and after this unit I am well aware that the north was not always the good guy in this situation. However, I do not think the war was completely inevitable. When we are growing up we are taught to not fight with each other, even with our differences, we should just work things out peacefully. This makes what the north look incredibly childish. What I am trying to say is, I think that the war could have been avoided if people were willing to compromise.
ReplyDeleteHowever, the south had a great reason to secede, the north basically tore up all the land from under their feet. After researching Robert E Lee for this project it helped me notice a lot more of the other side. I am sure that many of the people in the south, like Lee, felt that slavery was unnecessary but still went with the beliefs of his state, to stay true to where they were from.
This leads me to the topic of how the civil war has affected today's society. By just watching "Right America, Feeling Wronged" You can clearly see the differences there are and may always be between the north and south. To answer Max's question, This may even spark a new civil war of sorts, on a different topic. I do believe that congress or basically our entire nation is essentially in a civil war right now, with out the violence in the civil war.
In my opinion, slavery was a major cause of the civil war because both the North (who neglected) and the South (who supported) slavery were inspired by their own white supremacist beliefs. During Around the Horn, while impersonating Roger Taney I quoted an English Journalist, Charles Mackay, who said, “One characteristic of both the Slave States and the Free…” is the strong view “as regards the aristocracy of colour.” I believe the tension between the North and South was strongly rooted to slavery, although there were many other factors. The South depended on slavery for their economic progress, “The plantation system based on tobacco growing…expanded into lush new cotton lands in Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi- and needed more slaves” (Zinn 172). It was a way of life and however morally wrong, Southerners were either used to enslaving another human or ignored the unjust treatment and wanted to keep rolling in the money, or both. On the other hand, (or not quite), the North prided themselves in supporting the anti-slavery movement by calling themselves “abolitionists.” However, “It [the national government] would end slavery only under conditions controlled by whites, and only when required by the political and economic needs of the business elite of the North” (Zinn 187). The North continued to disguise their racism as displayed in the misinterpreted Emancipation Proclamation in which Lincoln’s goal was not to end slavery. Also, Northern racism was not only within the elite, but as we know an overwhelming number of poor whites hated slavery, but not for good reasons. During Bleeding Kansas, many free state voters wanted an end to slavery so that there would be more jobs for whites and decrease the large number of black people that slavery brought in. “The Free Staters voted 1,287 to 453 to outlaw black people, slave or free, from Kansas. Their territory would be white” (PBS). The slavery dispute was a clear argument that divided the North and the South, becoming just another cause to the Civil war. Although many Northerners were no more moral than plantation owners, the idea of such a defined disagreement was what created two opposing sides that felt that there was no satisfying compromise.
ReplyDeleteI absolutely do see evidence of continued conflict over the issues surrounding the Civil War? This is visible primarily in the disparity of wealth between blacks and whites in America, terrible urban conditions for minorities, and the disparity of quality of education for black students.
ReplyDeleteIn terms of income, whites make considerably more than blacks on average. According to census information from 2004, the average white person makes $24,509.50 per year, while an average black person makes $20,559.50. We can see the beginning of this gap in A People’s History of the United States ,in which Zinn writes of Sojourner Truth’s speech in which she states that “men doing no more, [work] got twice the pay.” (Zinn 202) This was common in the South for blacks during this period. Blacks were kept down by “the Ku Kluz Clan and other terrorist groups…. [which] organized raids, lynchings, beatings, burnings,” (Zinn 203) of blacks throughout the South. The fear inspired by the threat of murder silenced many (though not all) black people during this time period by using threats of murder to create a silent second-class.
Meanwhile, education for blacks and other minorities is much worse than that available for whites. As Drop-Out nation pointed out, for whites, the drop-out rate is “nearly 1 out of 3,” but for Latinos and African Americans, “the rate approaches an alarming 50%.” Evidence of this disparity is clear to residents of CT especially, because we have, as Ms. Dancz pointed out, “the largest amount of disparity between the top and bottom schools in the entire country.” The inequality of education in the Us can perhaps best be summed up by looking at Staples, and the public schools of Camden which are chillingly portrayed in Savage Inequalities as having guidance counselors who tell students who want to be lawyers to “’choose another job.’” This, at Staples, would result in that guidance counselor getting fired. In Camden though, that’s a standard answer. This also shows the economic disparity because “Chilly,” the student who was told to “choose another job,” is deemed unqualified for a high-paying job as a lawyer, and is told to pursue a lower-paying career.
The lack of economic opportunity that the average black person had as a sharecropper, combined with the absurd amounts of terrorism perpetrated by white supremacist groups in rural areas, led to many blacks moving to cities to find prosperity. (note: there were also acts of barbarism against blacks that took place in urban environments; Red Summer of 1919) Evidence of this is prevalent in Savage Inequalities, which states that “Camden, New Jersey is the fourth-poorest city of more than 50,000 people in America.” Camden also has an almost-entirely minority population. It is not a pleasant place to live.
In response to Crystal:
ReplyDeleteI agree that the priorities of reconstruction should have been to repair the country as a whole, as reconstruction went in the complete other direction. Only one of the prominent issues was dealing with the newly freed slaves assimilating into life alongside the acrimonious whites, while also dealing with the new economy. The government was faced with the task of whether or not to aide the newly freed slaves, and how much. As the nation tried to determine under what conditions the southern states should be reinstated into the Union, who should establish them, and what should happen to the slaves, it just became more and more divided. After acting as Andrew Johnson in our “Around the Horn” activity, I realize that Andrew Johnson did have a hand in the turmoil that existed between the north and south during the reconstruction era. As Johnson made efforts to pardon most white southerners and give them “a free hand in regulating the transition from slavery to freedom,” the northerners just became more and more opposed to him. As the southerners gained more power, the whole idea of freed slaves became nonexistent. The economy became so limited it was almost as if the blacks were slaves once again, because they were forced to become “dependent laborers.” This did not please the north. The Radical Republicans became more and more enraged. Yet, as Crystal said, punishing the south would only hurt them more. Like some other people mentioned in their posts, compromise could’ve played a bigger role in the resolving of the post-war mayhem. Had the north given in to the south while setting some reasonable conditions that the south could’ve cooperated with, resolving could’ve come quicker.
In a quick response to Ben, I definitely see your point, I didn't mean to be too hypothetical. I guess slavery had such an impact on our history that it would be impossible to see it any other way. Good point.
ReplyDeleteStill, I think there is some validity in saying that since slavery is one of the exacerbating issues of the civil war, the war would have definitely been different had it not existed in America.
Also, I don't really see how else to approach the question of what could have been done, as really no matter what you choose to argue, most points are still hypothetical. There are so many variables that would have changed.
I guess it's still up for discussion.
To respond to Ramey’s post about the continued disparity of wealth between whites and blacks in American today, I can completely see where your coming from and could not agree more, however I think that this goes further than just race and actually plays on location as well. The North has had such an easier in all of its financial endeavors, Zinn even noted “The United States in 1865 had spent $103,294,501 on public works, but the South received on $9,469,363” (Zinn). A considerably greater amount of money went to the North and because the North had a lot more white people and non-minorities than the South, I think it was already easier for the white people at this time to make money. Therefore I think georgraph should be taken into account when talking about the difference of the whites and the blacks economically.
ReplyDeleteNow I wanted to have a some what original idea, after reading more of the posts I saw that I could take another approach for a specific time of when the civil war basics could have been set down. Many different opinions have been said about the war being inevitable because of geography, or succession and such, but I found that the Declaration of Independence was actually a major factor contributing to why the civil war had to happen. In the Declaration of Independence, the people are incouraged to revolt against their government when they are against something that is being done to them. This has been shown through the sentence, “When a government fails to derive its power from the consent of the governed, it is the Right of the People to abolish it, or declare separation” (Declaration). This is an extremely significant cause to the civil war because the very own government that should be trying to prevent the war, has already encouraged it through writing. The Southerners feeling oppressed for a variety of reasons was enough to have them want to secede, which was a very big sign of rebellion. According to the Declaration of Independence, these Southern states had every right to secede. Zinn noted when it did happen that, “when Lincoln was elected, seven southern states seceded from the Union” (189). This cannot be considered rebellious when it is a privilege given to the people of America just like freedom of speech, or the right to own a gun. The Declaration of Independence later exploded the country into a state of disunion and disorganization that led to war.
In response to Gabbie’s questions about the current issue of opposing viewpoints between the North and South, I believe that there still are major differences that negatively affect Northern and Southern interactions. As Camilla said, the differences may not be changeable. For a country that is called the United States of America, obviously being viewed as a powerful, unified, and put-together body of people is important. This is why I believe there remains to be definitive tension even after two sides battled it out. Actually, especially after the North and South battled it out. Once our country split in two and fought in a full-fledged, bloody war, history could not be erased and it would be remembered that the North and South turned against each other.
ReplyDeleteAs Chris Ramey said, “According to census information from 2004, the average white person makes $24,509.50 per year, while an average black person makes $20,559.50.” I found this interesting because the Civil War was between the North and South, but today, the tension or obvious differences are between all whites and blacks. Northern or Southern doesn’t matter, because white people were racist everywhere, even it was subconscious. I remember in the video Right America Feeling Wronged that when Pelosi was talking to a black man he snapped at her saying that she was just trying to make the South look bad meanwhile the Northerners are the same. Then after rereading Zinn, I noticed that in the 1800s blacks had a similar mentality that no matter where they went, white people would act superior. Even a radical abolitionist such as William Lloyd Garrison who was editor of The Liberator did not take as strong of a stand in the anti slavery movement as most blacks did. In 1854, a group of black rebels said “…it is emphatically our battle; no one else can fight it for us…” (184). A new mentality of action and leading the movement instead of following white abolitionists, proved how slaves knew that the only people who would truly fight for their justice were themselves. Then and today, black people know that because they were the ones in slavery, the conditions remain unfair for them and no one else.
I agree with the majority of the class, especially Ben, that the Civil War was inevitable. The tension between the South and the North began years before the war broke out for many reasons, mostly for the social and economic differences between the two opposing areas. The South was angry with the idea that the North had more control then they deserved, which resulted in frustration from the North. These feelings of animosity made the short term causes of the war more intensified. Because of this, I believe that no one had the power to prevent these issues from exploding into disunion. Thus, what is most important is what had to be done to fix the inevitable, the destructive results of the war. Robert E. Lee's main argument for reconstruction is a valid one, he wanted to stress the importance of how the North decided to treat the South. He insisted the North resisted from treating the South as prisoners or captives of war, or else there would never be peace between the two territories, and reconstruction would be impossible. Unfortunately, this did not happen. The south was burned to the ground by Northern Soldiers, and was now in more trouble than it had been in before the secession from the Union.
ReplyDeleteBefore I move on to my next point, I'd like to highlight Toph's response to my post, because it was really excellent. His inclusion of geography as a factor in poverty was something that I didn't even consider before he brought it up, and I thought it was a really fantastic point.
ReplyDeleteMoving on,
I think that the priorities of reconstruction should have been to reconstruct the South’s economy, but in a different, less agrarian, more diverse system of farms with some factories to help support it, along with the railroads and infrastructure to support it. There also would have been many more, smaller, farms, where farmers could grow both the cash crops (cotton and tobacco) to keep the factories in the North open, as well as food. As Charlie pointed out during the speeches, Zinn stated that cotton production went from “a thousand tons… to a million tons” (Zinn 171) from 1790-1860. However, I think that the plantation system was at least under-effective because slaves engaged in “quiet resistance,” as put by Zinn, wherein their methods included “stealing property, sabotage and slowness, killing overseers and masters, burning down plantation buildings, running away.” (Zinn 175) Had they been given land, (such as the land mentioned in Carolina that was sold to all who could afford it, among whom few were blacks) they could have worked towards their future, and would have done so as free-men. This would have improved the Southern economy, and the political power they gained would have been maintained by their fiscal independence. They would have been able to maintain it because the owners of the sharecropping plots would not have been able to “influence” them. By “influence,” I mean terrorize with lynching’s.
A reply to Maddy’s comparison between Rome and the United States:
ReplyDeleteWhile I understand your thought process, and do agree that the vastness of this country has posed – and continues to pose – a problem, I don’t think the U.S. is facing all the same problems that the Roman Empire faced. One of their main obstacles was that it took so long for people to move around. The government could only really control the area that they could reach on horseback (even with the amazing roads the Empire is famous for), and the Emperor didn’t really have much reach over the farthest city in the empire. Now with cars, planes, and most importantly the Internet, that is not such a problem. However the size of the country is still a difficulty.
As mentioned previously, the differences in the land that people grow up on have created contrasting cultures that continue to play a role in current society, and certainly had an impact on the Civil War and Reconstruction. During the Civil War each side of the war was raised with different belief systems that created prejudicial hatred. This had a significant impact on the Reconstruction, because the Radical Republicans that made up Congress during that time were thirsting for the blood of the South. Instead of placing an emphasis on building a bridge between the North and the South that could reunite the Union, they tried to, as President Johnson said, “deal with a whole people in the spirit of revenge.” This maltreatment inflicted a wound on the psyche of the South so deep that as recently as 2009, politicians have been recorded calling it “The War of Northern Aggression.”
The split of the United States into the “North” and the “South,” is a problem that must be addressed if we are going to continue to function as a country. The mini-civil war that has been playing itself out in Congress, where legislators are starting to fight bills simply because they come from the opposing side, needs to stop so Congress can actually start doing its job. The question is how are we going to approach a problem that has been plaguing this country since before it began?
The Civil War was indeed unavoidable, there were men like Henry Clay who tried to postpone the war by creating the Compromise or 1850 which only allowed slaves to be free in the states that had seceded from the Union, but this taste of freedom only made slaves want to be free even more and made more people want slaves to be free. I believe that people’s views on slavery during the war was completely dependent on their geography. The south needed the slaves to pick their crops because that was their main way to generate revenue and it was a common aspect of their society, while the North only benefitted from the south because they had all the big manufactures and made more of a profit than the South did. The North was able to better understand that slavery should not be socially accepted because it had not affect on them, but eradicating slavery would completely affect the revenue that the south received. Henry Clay once said “All of America acknowledges the existence of slavery to be an evil, which, while it deprives the slave of the best gift of heaven, in the end injures the master too by laying waste to his lands, enabling him to live independently, and, thus, contracting all the vices generated by a state of idleness.” Henry Clay supported the freeing of slaves, but the geography of the North and the South allowed only a territory that allowed people to house their beliefs with other people who had similar beliefs, which made it that much easier to radically fight against one another. This then directly linked the differences in people’s opinions on state versus federal powers and when the federal government, and the leaders such as Hamilton and Jefferson that had their territories that northerners and southerners followed them in. After the south was destroyed by the war, this created Hostility not only to the fact that they lost then but a hostility that still lingers in today’s society. After watching “Right America, Feeling Wronged” there are still racist leaving in southern parts of America, which brings me to the conclusion of questioning if the war really got the affect that it wanted, which was to bring the country together. Yes we are a united front but when it comes down to it, we are geographically separated by the north, south, east, and west and regardless of how much time goes by the views of the previous generations will continue to be passed down to our youth because like slavery that is what people are accustomed to and the there is no one side that is right. A in order to be a country, it must be united, and having an inner battle in a country with one winner and a looser could only be predicted that it would create an ongoing resentment.
ReplyDeleteToph- Your idea is interesting, but I am hesitant to agree with you that it was the Declaration of Independence that started the war that divided America. You are correct in your ideas that it was indeed encouraged in the timeless document to revolt against a government. However, that is to be taken in context. There was no government treating the South nor the North unfairly. This was an inner conflict, one within the constraints of this country. A fight between sides. On the topic of ending slavery Zinn writes it would only happen under the conditions of "the political and economic needs of the business elite of the North." The South was for slavery and the North was the juggernaut in their way. While you are right about the people's right to rebel against a government, in this case, it was an inner conflict between a country. This was not the American rebels vs. the British Parliament, it was the people vs. the people.
ReplyDeleteTo correct myself, yes, there WAS a government treating the north and south poorly. However, it was not the reason these two sides faught.
ReplyDelete