Lincoln being on the ballot or not is kinda irrelevant, the reason he won is because the vote against him was split because of how many candidates shit themselves and ran for the office because he was a presidential candidate from an openly anti-slavery party and ensuantly split the vote against him.
Is this claim in vogue again?
For some, it always has been.
trump supporters say 1/6 was because Joe Biden stole the election…
That doesn’t mean Joe Biden stole the election. It doesn’t even mean that’s what the people who planned it thought.
It just means that was the lie they told the public to get their supporters to show up.
Lincoln literally wouldn’t shut up about how he wasn’t going to ban slavery, it was in his inauguration speech even. And not just mezntioned in passing, it was literally his opening statement:
Fellow-Citizens of the United States:
In compliance with a custom as old as the Government itself, I appear before you to address you briefly and to take in your presence the oath prescribed by the Constitution of the United States to be taken by the President before he enters on the execution of this office."
I do not consider it necessary at present for me to discuss those matters of administration about which there is no special anxiety or excitement.
Apprehension seems to exist among the people of the Southern States that by the accession of a Republican Administration their property and their peace and personal security are to be endangered. There has never been any reasonable cause for such apprehension. Indeed, the most ample evidence to the contrary has all the while existed and been open to their inspection. It is found in nearly all the published speeches of him who now addresses you. I do but quote from one of those speeches when I declare that–
I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.
Those who nominated and elected me did so with full knowledge that I had made this and many similar declarations and had never recanted them; and more than this, they placed in the platform for my acceptance, and as a law to themselves and to me, the clear and emphatic resolution which I now read:
Now I’m going to chime in here, because the part coming up is what the civil war was really started over
Resolved, That the maintenance inviolate of the rights of the States, and especially the right of each State to order and control its own domestic institutions according to its own judgment exclusively, is essential to that balance of power on which the perfection and endurance of our political fabric depend; and we denounce the lawless invasion by armed force of the soil of any State or Territory, no matter what pretext, as among the gravest of crimes.
https://www.battlefields.org/learn/primary-sources/lincolns-first-inaugural-address
The South wanted a strong Federal government that would force Northern states to capture and returned escaped slaves and any children they may have, even if born after their escape.
The North advocated for a small and much less powerful federal government and said no state had to follow another’s laws.
So the South lost the war and got what they wanted in a twisted monkey paw fashion: a stronger federal government with the power to force states to comply.
Is it faster to say “slavery”?
Absolutely.
But reasons for why the last civil war happened isn’t just important for historical reasons unfortunately.
It’s worth understanding it on a deeper level than a single word.
Tldr:
Believing the separatists during the civil war makes as much sense as believing trump for what happened 1/6.
Documents from Confederate leaders saying it was to protect slavery means as much to me as transcripts of Rudy Ghoulani’s texts messages.
Listen to Lincoln.
Your logic’s kind of circular here. You’re arguing that the war was really over the role of the Federal Government and its size. But the soul and only reason why the South wanted that stronger government was slavery as you pointed out. So it’s not easier to say slavery it’s still the accurate answer. Slavery is behind every single aspect of the Civil War. It is the one true origin point of the entire issue.
Also it is important what the vast majority of Confederate generals said, just as it’s important what the vast majority of normal Confederate citizens said. Because those feelings indicate truth. They reflect the views of the society. They reflect the populace that was behind the Civil War because of slavery. It’s important we listen to them because one of the false arguments made by Confederate revisionists is that the people were dragged into the Civil War even though they didn’t approve of slavery themselves. We know that is complete and utter fiction. Though I’ve noticed that argument seems to have fallen somewhat in popularity in the current political climate.
It’s a particularly questionable take considering that the Southern states were often against a strong Federal government when it opposed their interests - see, the nullification crisis. It wasn’t “North wants weak Feds, South wants strong Feds”, the cause of the Civil War came down overwhelmingly to the issue of slavery any time the causes are traced back to the root of the complaint, again, and again, and again; almost exclusively.
Well yes and no. That’s certainly the rhetoric they used. They like to say they didn’t like a strong federal government. But the original poster was correct in that they really wanted a very strong federal government in regards to pursuing slaves. The Confederacy was also very much in favor of a very strong federal government when they created their government. The makeup of the Confederacy had a lot of strong federal powers. More so than the US government in some ways. It just really comes down to them being Hypocrites. Like in most things.
They wanted a strong Federal government when it suited them, and a weak Federal government when it suited them. It wasn’t a matter of a general principle - it came down to economic interests, and the economic interests of the South were built almost exclusively around slavery. The Confederacy was more centralized in some ways - such as the absolute prohibition against states’ rights to regulate slavery - but in others, it was weak, such as the right of individual states to nullify Federal (or, rather, Confederal?) officers in their state.
They wanted a strong Federal government when it suited them, and a weak Federal government when it suited them.
Sounds familiar. Regressives just being themselves.
So if the North agreed on slavery, there would have been no war because escaped slaves wouldn’t have been a problem? So, slavery I think is perhaps the most accurate one word answer.
You’re on the right track, but it was still all about slavery. It’s just that the secessionists wanted a stronger federal enforcement of slavery, and Lincoln wasn’t going to do that. The lack of enforcement, and the election of Lincoln, were the breaking points that secessionists needed to declare they no longer wished to be Americans.
It was still about slavery. The only part people get wrong was the “state’s rights” horseshit. That became a conservative value during the Civil Rights era, when bigots wanted state’s rights to keep discrimination as the law. At that point, bigots no longer had a majority in the federal government, and they didn’t want the feds saying they had to desegregate schools and stop murdering black people.
You are correct that there was more going on at the time than only slavery. However, slavery was the primary catalyst the tipped the scales far enough for open rebellion, so it isn’t wrong to say that the civil war was about slavery
Edit: not that you did say it was wrong per se, but bringing up all the other nuance leaves room for the people arguing in bad faith to say it wasnt about slavery, despite the primary argument being about if other states had the right to force other states to obey their slave laws. There’s a time and place for it, such as people genuinely interested in the deeper history of that time. In the current climate, it tends to come off as dismissive to the root cause.
There’s a time and place for it, such as people genuinely interested in the deeper history of that time. In the current climate, it tends to come off as dismissive to the root cause.
Mate…
But reasons for why the last civil war happened isn’t just important for historical reasons unfortunately.
It’s worth understanding it on a deeper level than a single word.
It’s more important to understand how enough people can be tricked into fighting a civil war than ever.
Now is the time for people to know about it, because it really looks like it could happen again.
I think you misunderstood what I meant. There’s a notable amount of people what try to deflect and say that the civil war was in fact not about slavery and point to all the discourse surrounding state rights/federal overreach. However true that may be, the entire reason that discourse even took place was because of slavery, so the civil war was definitely about slavery. I was simply stating that bringing up all the other information is unnecessary/counterproductive 99% of the time in casual conversation.
and point to all the discourse surrounding state rights/federal overreach.
And the correct response is that the South was the one wanting a strong federal government with the ability to force states to follow laws that weren’t laws in their own state, while the North was the one fighting for “states rights”
You don’t fight misinformation with more misinformation.
I was simply stating that bringing up all the other information is unnecessary/counterproductive 99% of the time in casual conversation.
I disagree.
I think when we’re staring down civil war 2.0, it’s important for people to understand deeper than a single word, because a single word doesn’t explain why the war happened.
Distilling it down to just that one word just validates the misinformation from the South, hundreds of years later when no American has an excuse to not know what really happened.
“Conservatives” are literally still trying to force others to do what they want while disquising it as “freedom” so obviously the details still matter and it’s worth the couple minutes (and usually downvotes) to get specific
You don’t fight misinformation with more misinformation.
What misinformation? Please tell me how it wasn’t ultimately about slavery.
I think when we’re staring down civil war 2.0, it’s important for people to understand deeper than a single word, because a single word doesn’t explain why the war happened.
But again, slavery is exactly why the war happened. But if you wanted to get truly technical, the war was fought to preserve the Union. Preventing secession was the formal justification that North declared for going to war with the Confederacy.
Regardless, my main point is that every time a “Confederate/Rebel pride” person talks about the civil war not being about slavery, they inevitably bring up the whole state rights vs federal power debate to try and detract from it ultimately being about slavery.
