Kmarion wrote:
Turquoise wrote:
The only reason why the South lost was because Lincoln and the Radical Republicans were too arrogant to just leave things be. Things would have turned out better if the Civil War had never occurred, because slavery would have eventually disappeared due to sheer economics. Slavery is simply not an efficient system in the long term. It makes far more sense for your labor to be free and able to fend for itself, because as the Industrial Age progressed, the number of workers mattered less and less -- and technology mattered more and more. Technology is expensive in the short run, but it brings labor savings in the long run. If you have to feed and provide shelter for your labor, you don't have enough money to spend on improving your technology (and therefore require less labor).
Wowser. Hindsight is 20/20. I'm sure all of those slaves that were freed would appreciate your idea of just waiting it out. You know, since it's not economically feesable to own someone. Forget about the morality of the issue, freedom for all men regardless of race, and the Deceleration of independence... lets wait for the market to take care of the issue itself. War was on the horizon anyways. The slavery issue just made it more likely. If you are going to go to war...freedom and equality might be one of the few noble reasons to do so.
But it wasn't... The North fought the South because it wanted to take the South's resources for itself, which it did through carpetbagging.
There was nothing moral about the Civil War, but Lincoln was good at pretending that morals were the issue.
Kmarion wrote:
This trumps economics any day of the week...
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
Those are hollow words in a harsh world devoid of ideals and most morality. I don't believe in such lofty ideas, because I've seen that what humans more often do than anything else is vex and oppress each other.
Kmarion wrote:
Lincoln understood what the founding father had in mind.
Lincoln: I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence. … It was not the mere matter of the separation of the Colonies from the motherland; but that sentiment in the Declaration of Independence which gave liberty, not alone to the people of this country, but, I hope, to the world, for all future time. It was that which gave promise that in due time the weight would be lifted from the shoulders of all men. This is a sentiment embodied in the Declaration of Independence.
...and who's to say that the revolution wasn't mostly a rebellion of rich people who no longer wanted to pay taxes to a distant monarchy?
Kmarion wrote:
Lincoln wanted to stop the spread of Slavery. Before the war he never proposed ending slavery completely. In fact it wasn't until after the war began that he put forth the effort to abolish slavery (A year later). Since the war was already happening that goal was added in order to reduce the divisive issue and prevent further conflicts of the same nature. Lincoln was against the morality of slaves (see previous paragraph) but he still but the union first.
Lincoln:I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored; the nearer the Union will be "the Union as it was." ... My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.
For the record Lincolns economic ideals were very liberal. Also, I am extremely confused with your idea that Lincolns actions were strictly based on economics. Nothing like loosing half of your country in a civil war to boost the economy.
Again, carpetbagging was the proof of the North's real interests. The Civil War resulted from a few decades of antagonism between the North and South, which Lincoln caught the tail end of.
All that the Civil War proved is that the side with the most money and best technology usually wins a war. The Civil War itself involved the rich industrialists of the North and the plantation owners of the South pitting their poor against each other.