Ignoring the issue of slavery, who would you have wanted to win the civil war?

[SpencerH]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
Do you mean the cotton gin, by Eli Whitney?

I thought it was the cotton gin, but that was invented about 1800 and actually triggered an increase in the number of slaves.
It might have been some improvement though?

[SlowwHand]

You are correct on the approximate date of patent.
I would assume improvements were made.

[SpencerH]

I have a vague memory about a discussion where this came up. At sometime fairly shortly after the war there was less need for manual labor beacause of this technological change. Therefore, the plantation owners didnt need to hire the newly freed slaves. The lack of income was a driving force for the black population to move out of the south.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by SpencerH


Its funny, but I've only seen you retaliate to these kinds of comments. I guess you're learning how to sling it yourself now.

Rebutt not retaliate. But if you want you can think of it as learning from you.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by Sava


They wanted the land that IS theirs, and has been theirs for hundreds of years. What would the US do if illegal immigrants in the Southwest tried to secede from the Union?

I am not going to debate the reasons why they did it since its clear even in your post that you agreeing that its about taking the land.

However both sides were immigrants at one time. Give it back to the Parthians and the Macedonians. I think the Scythians were in there too. If you want to go back hundreds of years I can go back also. The key is that the fighting was over land.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by History Guy
A good number of Confederates actually fought for no other reason than that they felt they had to go with their state when it seceded, and that they could not fight against their people, Virginians against Virginians, that sort of thing.

The war started because of the secession. The secession was over slavery. Why people fought in the war is not the reason the war started in the first place.

And Virginia, many people conviently forget, seems to have seceded mainly due to the fact that U.S. troops were crossing the border to go down and destroy already seceded areas. They saw this as invasion, and no one was going to tell them anything otherwise. The whole thing was one bloody mess. Nuff said.

Virginia was not exactly the only state that seceeded. The question is about the South as a whole. Most of the South seceeded before the shooting started.

The reason, of course, that Fort Sumter was fired upon, was because the people of South Carolina, who had claimed independence, believed that this was a sign of Northern aggression, and Major Anderson's hops around from fort to fort in Charleston harbor wasn't a help to the Union at all. In short, the Union brought about the firing by their own unflexibility. Of course, Lincoln had opted not to accept secession as legal, and so nothing was done at all about it. Nuff said.

The Fort was a US fort and even the land it was built on was built with federal money. The island was artificial. The South chose to start the fighting. The North did not thus showing that the decisions that led to the War were Southern decisions. The could have just negotiated. In fact the Fort was near to surrender since the South had ALLREADY blockaded the fort. They were nearly out of food when the shooting started.

I still can't shake the feeling, however, that slavery was already on it's last legs. I do doubt that, even had the South seceded peacefully, it would have survived much longer at all. That seems also to be the informed opinions of several major Civil War historians. Nuff said.

Slavery was on its last legs prior to the cotton gin. That revived slavery. Still I doubt that slavery could have lasted till now but it certainly would have lasted decades more.

[SpencerH]

Originally posted by Ethelred
Rebutt not retaliate. But if you want you can think of it as learning from you.

Show me a personal attack that I've made against anyone on any thread and you might have a point. There are none, I see no point in slinging mud. I assure you, you wouldnt make the comments up close and personal.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by SpencerH


Show me a personal attack that I've made against anyone on any thread and you might have a point. There are none, I see no point in slinging mud. I assure you, you wouldnt make the comments up close and personal.

Show where I made a personal attack and you might have a point. Pointing out that you would need to be a mind reader is rather difficult for most people to construe as a personal attack.

You are being just a touch too sensitve here.

[SlowwHand]

Ignorance is when one doesn't know, and just is mistaken, Ethelred.
Stupidity, on the other hand, is when facts are presented, and ignored.
Your figures are wrong.
Your statement about secession before the firing on Ft. Sumter, is wrong.
Your belief about why the South wanted out of the Union, wrong.

150 years ago, no different than today, evidently.
The South was tired of hearing the North talk smack about them.
Frankly, I'm beginning to fully understand how they felt.

[KrazyHorse]

Get it over with already and secede...

[SlowwHand]

Nice avatar.

[SpencerH]

Originally posted by Ethelred

You are being just a touch too sensitve here.

Perhaps so, but then I didnt precede my serious comments with one about the naivete of yours.

[ZaphodBeeblebrx]

I don't know, these days it looks as though the Northeast, and the West will Secede first.

Just look at the 2000 Voting Records, if you can find them, and just compare them to the 1828 Voting Records.

If you're still interested, then check out the 1840, Voting Records, it's Positively Ugly!

[KrazyHorse]

For those of us who don't understand what you're talking about, do you mind explaining?

In other words,

[SlowwHand]

He's a Blue Belly. He doesn't know WTF he's talking about.

[ZaphodBeeblebrx]

Well, I'm a firm believer that History repeats itself.

If you compare the Modern Voting Records, to the ones, from the Decades leading up to the American Civil War, you'll notice a Disturbing Similarity.

It's this sort of analysis, that made me really worried about The Taliban, back when they destroyed those Buddhist Statues.

[KrazyHorse]

And what is this disturbing similarity?

[SpencerH]

Just a guess (until we get the answer) but I'd say its the 50-50 split between the predominantly ( liberal) democrat north-east and west coast vs the (conservative) republican remainder of the country. Prior to the war the country was split with the south democrat and the north republican.

[KrazyHorse]

I'd like to know what historical precedent he saw for the Taliban that worried him...

[SlowwHand]

Just so I can get called a dumbass again by Boris, Ethelred, and MrFun:

The North wasn't all that keen on Lincoln The Ape, as he was called. The only President who talked to himself more was Richard Nixon.
By the same token, the South wasn't fanatical about Jeff Davis.

[ZaphodBeeblebrx]

Well, check out the following Link:

US Presidential Elections

Look especially at the Records from the 1840s, and take a Good, Long, Look at the 1860 Voting Records. See anything familiar?

[ZaphodBeeblebrx]

Originally posted by SpencerH
Just a guess (until we get the answer) but I'd say its the 50-50 split between the predominantly ( liberal) democrat north-east and west coast vs the (conservative) republican remainder of the country. Prior to the war the country was split with the south democrat and the north republican.

Exactly my thought.

I'd include the Northern Mid-West, as well, but the Mid-West, as a whole, doesn't seem to be quite as fanatical, as the rest of the Nation, although they did spawn the Smiley-Face Mailbox Bomber, from just this Past Spring.

[SpencerH]

I forgot about the electoral college mal-distribution in comparison to the popular vote which isnt quite as true today, but it is still a factor in terms of sentiment amongst the democrat supporters.

[ZaphodBeeblebrx]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
I'd like to know what historical precedent he saw for the Taliban that worried him...

Oh, it's just the Typical Behavior, of any Monotheistic Religion, when around anything Old, and/or Beautiful, especially and, that belongs to, any other Culture; suffice it to say, they don’t play Very Well, with other People’s Toys!

That, and the Hindu, Gold Star, Debacle, makes me glad that we took them out, albeit, later than I would have liked; otherwise, the Next we would have heard from them, would have been in 2008, when they would have asked, for The Sudetenland!

[SpencerH]

Otherwise known as Kashmir

[ZaphodBeeblebrx]

Probably, either that or the Kurdish part of Pakistan.

As for Electoral College Mal-Distribution, that problem has been Solved; don't worry, Dubya and Ashrot, are certain to win in 2004.

Now, where did I put my Complaint-Writin' Pen?

[SpencerH]

Ah, you've given yourself away Yankee

[ZaphodBeeblebrx]

Yankee?

I'm from New Hampshire, we're All actually Southerners.

Unfortunately, that, also, gives us Senator Bob Smith, but he's too Crazy, even for us; Jean Shaheen for Senate!

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
Ignorance is when one doesn't know, and just is mistaken, Ethelred.
Stupidity, on the other hand, is when facts are presented, and ignored.

Well I didn't see any presented that were wrong except maybe yours. I sure didn't get anything wrong and I note here that you are unable to show anything wrong in what I said. You are just complaining about it.

I can back everything I have said. If there is something you particularly thought was wrong how about you give us all a clue about what it was?

Did you think the South didn't seceed?

Did you think Ft Sumter starting the shooting and blockaded the port?

Do you have some for thinking the secession documents were a pack of lies?

Did you somehow have the impression that Lincoln had said he was going to invade the South and free all the humans down there that were enslaved by force during his campaign for the Presidency?

Perhaps you think all the slaves in the South were owned by Northerners through off shore accounts and they also owned all the Southern State Legislature and they bribed them to seceed so they could make money on military coffin sales.

Your figures are wrong.
Your statement about secession before the firing on Ft. Sumter, is wrong.

It was absolutely right. Where the heck did you get the silly idea that Southerners were firing on Ft. Sumter BEFORE they seceded? Most of the states seceded before Lincoln was even in office.

Your belief about why the South wanted out of the Union, wrong.

Remarkable! Then there was no secession or a Civil War. We have been lied too all are lives and now Slowhand has showed us the truth. Someone fired on Ft. Sumter for no reason at all and the story about the Civil War was a cover up.


Do you think you give some sort of support for these remarkable claims of yours Slowhand? I really had no idea that the South wanted to stay in the Union all along and that was all a nefarious plot to make it look like they ever seceeded. I always thought they Seceeded and went to war. The facts do lend themselves to that.

150 years ago, no different than today, evidently.
The South was tired of hearing the North talk smack about them.
Frankly, I'm beginning to fully understand how they felt.

Frankly you sound delusional on this.

They Seceded and they did so over slavery. They said so. Most of the states seceeded shortly after the election. Ft. Sumter was blockaded before Lincoln was in office. The South chose to fire on Ft Sumter thus starting the Civil War.

[Guynemer]

You know that "Flame Warriors" website? The address eludes me, but more and more, Sloww is resembling "Stone Deaf".

People (Boris in particular) present cited passages from documents and books and speeches, and Sloww just has his fingers in his ears, "la la la la, I can't hear you, it was all the North's fault, la la la la."

I've never understood why this particular issue was so particularly touchy with some southerners. Yeah, we never like to admit past wrongs, but come on; we're all Americans here.