Posted on 03/20/2013 9:57:49 AM PDT by mnehring
Zo has strong words for neo-confederate libertarians, especially those who infiltrated the CPAC conference. He reminds viewers why some libertarians have no place in the conservative movement, and why Republicans should embrace the vision of Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass.
(Video at link)
(Excerpt) Read more at pjtv.com ...
Does that not seem wrong in some way in your thinking?
The issue was the loss of value of the products being produced in the South due to the increased percentage cost of the tariff that deflated overseas demand and produced drastic inflation in the US market pricing.
Between 1816 and 1830 there had been four major successive tariff hikes (1816, 1819, 1824, 1828) plus several dozen minor ones. Only at the threat of secession did tariff advocates even attempt compromise in 1832-33, and then in ways that still retained heavily protectionist elements.
As a result America operated under a policy of constant heavy protectionism for over 30 years after the conclusion of the War of 1812.
The Walker Tariff in 1846 was the first and only tariff schedule even remotely favorable to free trade.
But that was to change drasticlly. The 1860-61 Morrill Tariff was about to double and triple the tariff rates.
You said: "Also, tariffs in 1860 were the lowest they’d been in 30 years. 15%, if I remember correctly.”
You are providing a very misleading conclusion by saying that since in May of 1860 and strictly on a sectional vote, the US House of Representatives passed their version of the Morrill Tariff. Congress' passage of the Morrill Tariff and the Senate doing the same in 1861 essentially meant tripling the rates in one broad sweep.
Data from the US Treasury and Census reports as compiled by Kettell:
1859 Value of Southern Produce sold to the North...$200,000,000.
1859 Value of produce and grains exported from the North to Europe...$40,047,700.
Quote: "The exports of bread stuffs and provisions are also due to the South, since but for the quantities of these which are sent North to feed the Eastern States, little or no Western produce could be spared for Europe, even at high prices. (pg. 72, Kettell).
Quote: "The barren hills of New England...they have hitherto had their food and materials brought to them." (pg. 72, Kettell).
Quote: (1859 food exports from the North)"...The quantity of these articles which went direct from the Northern States did not exceed the quantities which that section received from the South and from Canada." (pg. 73, Kettell).
This is presented not to pick a fight about what some might consider a minor point, but to illustrate the magnitude of the demand and therefore profitability of Southern agriculture.
While criticizing the South for not embracing industrialization according to your purview, it must be admitted that manufacturing was moving South but not at the same rate as in other parts of the country. That was a function of demand, technology gains, finance, and cultural adaptation.
While keeping this in mind, it is important to not minimize the severe impact on profit and land value of the impending Morrill Tariff, which was a well planned scheme of the Republican party.
Your reference says nothing about declaration of war, and nothing was said about whether your link worked.
The fact is that your assertion about the ‘declaration of war’ is not factual.
It is obvious that any exchange with you will not provide progress since you are unwilling to acknowledge truth in fact.
Perhaps you find humor in creating fallacy, but that is a fool’s errand.
Do you really want to get into the semantic discussion of the shades of meaning between "An act recognizing the existence of war" and "An Act Declaring that war exists" (Spanish American War, 1898), "war be and the same is hereby declared to exist" (War of 1812), "the state of war ... which has thus been thrust upon the United States is hereby formally declared" (WW1) and "Declaring that a state of war exists..." (WW2)?
Are you going to argue that some form of the infinitive "to declare" must be used for something to have legal or moral effect?
It would appear that some folks would be happy with spinning around three times while chanting “I break with thee, I break with thee, I break with thee!”
The Northeast was producing food for home consumption, not for export, so how much grain they exported wasn't strictly relevant. The Old Northwest may not have been the great exporter today's Midwest is, but they were the country's great producer of corn, wheat and other foodstuffs.
I don't have time to research all of this, but I would not be surprised if the food that New England needed and didn't produce domestically, came from the Great Lakes states, rather than from the South (and when we talk about "the South" in this context we're mostly talking about Virginia, rather than Mississippi, South Carolina and the other Deep South states). And in 1860, New York and Pennsylvania were still major agricultural states.
While criticizing the South for not embracing industrialization according to your purview, it must be admitted that manufacturing was moving South but not at the same rate as in other parts of the country. That was a function of demand, technology gains, finance, and cultural adaptation.
"It must be admitted"? By whom? "Moving South"? What we would now call industry was new and growing in various parts of the country, but it wasn't "moving South" in the same way that it did in recent decades. And yes, back then slavery and the unwillingness to industrialize were major factors holding the Southern states back.
While keeping this in mind, it is important to not minimize the severe impact on profit and land value of the impending Morrill Tariff, which was a well planned scheme of the Republican party.
The "impending" tariff didn't have any effects since it hadn't happened yet. It wasn't even "impending." That is to say, nobody could foresee what would happen. There would probably have been a rise in tariffs, though nothing like what eventually happened. In any case, that wouldn't have made trends that had started decades before.
from the link May 6, 1861: "An act recognizing the existence of war between the United States and the Confederate States..."
PeaRidge: "The fact is that your assertion about the ‘declaration of war’ is not factual.
It is obvious that any exchange with you will not provide progress since you are unwilling to acknowledge truth in fact."
And you have refused to answer my questions:
PeaRidge: "Perhaps you find humor in creating fallacy, but that is a fool’s errand."
Answer the questions.
While you're at it, compare to FDR's Day of Infamy Speech:
First of all, thanks for the link.
You seem to have inherited rusty's talents for finding actual source material, not just reports on reports. ;-)
Second, these words from Banks' in September 1857 are obviously a campaign speech -- in his first and successful run for Massachusetts governor.
And quite frankly, I like this guy!
To me he sounds just like a Republican should have sounded in those days, and for the most part, even today.
I mean, how can you do better than this? --
So how could you not vote for this guy in 1857?
And wait until you read what he said about the old partisan press and immigration issues of his time.
So far as I know, that's pretty much what Republicans have been from the beginning.
But, nowhere in this 1857 speech does Banks suggest the Federal government should abolish slavery in slave-states, or that military force should be used to accomplish that.
Any of that kind of talk only arrived later, after secessionists began rebelling and making war on the United States.
First of all, if you think the Morrill Tariff had anything to do with Deep South declarations of secession, then I'd challenge you to quote any of their Declarations of Reasons for Secession which say as much.
They don't.
Second, average tariffs were 15% in 1792 when Virginian George Washington was President.
Then rates when up and down, peaking at 35% in 1830, when Carolina-born Andrew Jackson was President and South Carolinian John C. Calhoun Vice-President.
The results were not pretty, as a result tariff rates fell to 13% in 1840, up to 23% in 1850 and back to 15% in 1860.
So in 1860 when the Deep South began to secede, tariffs were the lowest in 20 years and the same average rate as in 1792.
The 1860 Morrill Tariff increased tariffs back to levels of 1825 and 1845, but could not pass the Senate until seceeding states walked out in 1861.
Indeed, there were more than enough Southern votes in the House to defeat Morrill in 1860, if they had all stood in opposition to it.
But they weren't united and so the bill passed the House.
Morrill was not a reason for secession.
More importantly, the Tariff of Abominations was a bill assembled by Calhoun and his cronies, as he publicly admitted 10 years later.
He loaded it with poison pills so New England congressmen would reject it, at which point the southerners would join in voting down their own bill.
He outsmarted himself, and the bill passed.
Exactly why this example of extreme southern stupidity should instead by considered an example of northern oppression is quite beyond me.
“What that plan was, Calhoun explained very frankly nine years later, in a speech reviewing the events of 1828 and defending the course taken by himself and his southern fellow members. A high-tariff bill was to be laid before the House. It was to contain not only a high general range of duties, but duties especially high on those raw materials on which New England wanted the duties to be low. It was to satisfy the protective demands of the Western and Middle States, and at the same time to be obnoxious to the New England members. The Jackson men of all shades, the protectionists from the North and the free-traders from the South, were to unite in preventing any amendments; that bill, and no other, was to be voted on. When the final vote came, the southern men were to turn around and vote against their own measure. The New England men, and the Adams men in general, would be unable to swallow it, and would also vote against it. Combined, they would prevent its passage, even though the Jackson men from the North voted for it. The result expected was that no tariff bill at all would be passed during the session, which was the object of the southern wing of the opposition. On the other hand, the obloquy of defeating it would be cast on the Adams party, which was the object of the Jacksonians of the North. The tariff bill would be defeated, and yet the Jackson men would be able to parade as the true “friends.”
http://mises.org/etexts/taussig.pdf page 55
Interesting book I just found. If we’re going to argue about tariffs, we might as well have some actual data. I suspect the actual history turns out to be a great deal more complex than “northern oppression of southern innocents.”
Well, no, it’s not in the least misleading. As you state yourself, throughout 1860 the tariff was indeed 15%, the same it had been in G. Washington’s day. That a higher tariff passed in 1861 as the direct result of southern congressmen leaving due to secession doesn’t invalidate my point at all.
More critically, I think you are getting a free ride by claiming that tariff rates justify secession and war. Absolutely nobody made this claim in 1860, since they openly and proudly proclaimed that the purpose of secession was to protect the institution of slavery.
By the end of the war, it was no longer possible to even try to justify secession in defense of slavery, so another “reason” had to be found.
Look, here, under the cushions! It’s the tariff we’d all forgotten about! That’s why we seceded! That’s the ticket!
Yet this in itself makes the unexamined claim that if tariff rates were indeed raised, secesssion and therefore by implication war or at least the risk of war would have been fully justified.
Really? Does any tariff rate really justify such extreme action? If killing 600,000 to 750,000 men isn’t justified by defense (or abolition) of slavery, we are somehow supposed to agree that killing them over a tariff rate is right and proper?
[x]: The "impending" tariff didn't have any effects since it hadn't happened yet. It wasn't even "impending." That is to say, nobody could foresee what would happen. There would probably have been a rise in tariffs, though nothing like what eventually happened. In any case, that wouldn't have made trends that had started decades before.
x, I think you underestimate the effect the impending Morrill Tariff had on Northern ports and the business people whose livelihood depended on those ports. Although you apparently don’t think so, they could foresee what would happen. I suspect those Northerners were lobbying Lincoln like crazy for something to be done (e.g., repeal the Morrill Tariff) before it killed business at the Northern ports. I’ve seen it argued somewhere that there was a possibility Lincoln’s government might collapse if something was not done to avoid the coming catastrophe on Northern commerce. In my opinion, that may have been the impetus or reason Lincoln provoked the war – for economic reasons to prevent the Southern tariff from destroying Northern commerce.
The South seceded to protect slavery, the basis of their economy, but IMO an underlying reason for secession was the tariff which was harming the Southern economy and benefiting the North. The North shot itself in the foot by passing the Morrill Tariff. By contrast, the Confederate tariff was lower than the tariff of 1857. The difference in tariff rates would greatly boost Southern ports and Southern commerce and greatly harm Northern commerce if nothing happened to prevent that from happening.
Here is a sampling on opinions in the Northern press:
The New York Herald, March 2, 1861
The effect of these two tariffs, then, upon our trade with the best, and most reliable part of the country will most disastrously be felt in all the Northern cities. We learn that even now some of the largest houses in the Southern trade in this city, who have not already failed, are preparing to wind up their affairs and abandon business entirely. The result of this as regards the value of property, rents, and real estate, can be readily seen. Within two months from this time it will probably be depreciated from twenty to forty percent.
The New York Herald, March 19, 1861 [posted by GOPcapitalist in 2003]:
The combined effects of these two tariffs must be to desolate the entire North, to stop its importations, cripple its commerce and turn its capital into another channel … There is nothing to be predicted of the combination of results produced by the Northern and Southern tariffs but general ruin to the commerce of the Northern confederacy... The tariff of the South opens its ports upon fair and equitable terms to the manufacturers of foreign countries, which it were folly to suppose will not be eagerly availed of; which the stupid and suicidal tariff just adopted by the Northern Congress imposes excessive and almost prohibitory duties upon the same articles.
The Daily Picayune of New Orleans, April 3, 1861, quoting two New York papers:
The New York Evening Post: Bad as the law is in itself, the injustice of many of its provisions is hardly as gross as the stupidity of passing it at the very moment when the quarrel with the seceding states had reached its climax, and thus playing into their hands.
The New York Times: How can we maintain any national spirit under such humiliation? We take the step of all others most calculated to alienate the border states and foreign nations.
The New York Herald, as quoted in the March 28, 1861, Memphis Daily Appeal [paragraph breaks mine]:
The last Congress, in a spirit of mingled vengeance and fanaticism, enacted a tariff doubling the duties on many articles of foreign manufacture, and advancing them to a prohibitory point on others; and this was done to protect the manufacturing interests of the Northern States at the expense of the South.
It is doubtful, however, if this blundering instrument can ever be intelligibly interpreted by any collector of custom, or enforced at all in its present shape.
But at the same time the Congress of the Southern Confederacy has adopted a tariff reducing the duties on imports, the consequence of which will be that the importations will abandon the ports of the North and enter those of the South, and will then find their way to the interior by the Mississippi river and the railroads of the border States.
The result of this proceeding will be of course to destroy the trade of the North; and the very first portions of it to suffer will be New York, New Jersey, and New England. The imports here will be cut down to an insignificant figure; and the manufactures in the New England States will be seriously damaged; both business houses and factories will be transferred to the South; and, in fact, the northern tariff adopted to protect the manufacturing interests of the North will have no interests left to protect. The actual effect of the tariff, then, will be to reduce the revenues of the Government at Washington and increase the revenues of the Southern Government.
The Congress at Washington may attempt to avert this course of affairs, even to the extent of inaugurating a blockade of all the southern ports; vessels of war have been ordered home from all the foreign stations to enable the Administration to be prepared for this policy; but to such an event France and England would act as they did with regard to Texas; they would acknowledge the independence of the Southern Confederacy, and send their fleets across the Atlantic to open every port in the South.
Thus we find the country involved in a fearful commercial revolution through the policy of a fanatical party, which, for thirty years, has been endeavoring to overthrow all the best interests of the Republic for the sake of an abstraction. We see the whole current of commercial prosperity turned out of its channel, the wealth and importance of the northern cities struck down at a blow. We have experienced many commercial revulsions before now from time to time -- in 1817, 1825, 1837 and 1857 -- but these were the results of overtrading, of excessive speculation, and other financial causes which may produce like consequences in any country. The present revulsion, on the contrary, arises from purely political causes, and will be as disastrous in its effects as it is novel in its origin.
The Cincinnati Enquirer as reported in the Memphis Daily Appeal of March 27, 1861:
The New York and all Eastern Republicans are getting clamorous for an extra session. They now admit that, critical and extraordinary as the condition of the country is, the President is without power to take any effectual step toward its relief. He can effect no fixed and decisive policy toward the seceding States, because no laws give him authority to carry it into effect.
He cannot enforce the laws, because no power has been put at his command for that purpose. He cannot close the ports which refuse to pay Federal duties, nor has he the authority to enforce payment except through the local authorities. These, moreover, are the least of the difficulties which embarrass the action of the Government. This loan is called for, but there is no prospect of revenue to render it safe. The seceded States invite imports under the tariff of 1857, at least ten per cent. lower than that which the Federal Government has just adopted. As a matter of course, foreign trade will seek southern ports, because it will be driven there by the Morrill tariff. It has been stated that Secretary Chase has been heard to say that the tariff bill must be repealed.
Lincoln ignored the calls for a session of Congress and set off on a course that he knew would provoke war. War would enable him to blockade Southern ports rendering moot the difference in tariff rates that would otherwise destroy Northern commerce.
Businesses in New York began suffering greatly here are two accounts of what was happening to businesses in New York City as a result of the difference in tariff rates
The New Orleans Daily Crescent, May 15, 1861 quoting the New York Day Book [my bold emphasis on the last sentence of the article below]:
[There] have been over 200 failures in New York since the 22d April, and within the last month not less than 300. Real estate has no sale at any price and rents are comparatively normal. Total bankruptcy stares all in the face, and starvation will become a daily visitor to the abode of the poor.
All New York is failing. The suspensions and failures of the past few days have been fearful, and the war promises to bankrupt every merchant in New York. The retail business is as bad off as the wholesale. Nobody is purchasing anything, and trade is killed.
The foreign bill market continues very dull and heavy.
The following is a comparative statement of the imports of foreign dry goods at the port of New York for the week ending April 27:
For the week. 1860 ..... 1861
Entered at the port, $1,503,483 ..... $393,061
Thrown on the market, $1,650,790 ..... $396,992
The imports of dry goods are very small this week, probably the least reported for many years.
Well may Mr. Lincoln ask, "What will become of my revenue?"
On December 12, 1860, before any state seceded, Texas Senator Louis Wigfall projected what the future vote counts would be on contentious issues. Before the new Congress convened Southern senators had the votes to stop the Morrill Tariff from being approved by the Senate as they had done earlier in that Congress. On the other hand, once the new Congress convened, Wigfall's vote projections indicated that the new makeup of Congress would pass the Morrill Tariff. The Morrill Tariff had already passed the House earlier in 1860. The country was going to get the impending Morrill Tariff whether Southern senators stayed for the rest of the outgoing session or not.
From an old post by GOPcapitalist quoting Wigfall on December 12, 1860 [Link]:
Tell me not that we have got the legislative department of this Government, for I say we have not. As to this body, where do we stand? Why, sir, there are now eighteen non-slaveholding States. In a few weeks we shall have the nineteenth, for Kansas will be brought in. Then arithmetic which settles our position is simple and easy. Thirty-eight northern Senators you will have upon this floor. We shall have thirty to your thirty-eight. After the 4th of March, the Senator from California, the Senator from Indiana, the Senator from New Jersey, and the Senator from Minnesota will be here. That reduces the northern phalanx to thirty-four...There are four of the northern Senators upon whom we can rely, whom we know to be friends, whom we have trusted in our days of trial heretofore, and in whom, as Constitution-loving men, we will trust. Then we stand thirty-four to thirty-four, and your Black Republican Vice President to give the casting vote. Mr. Lincoln can make his own nominations with perfect security that they will be confirmed by this body, even if every slaveholding State should remain in the Union, which, thank God, they will not do.
The Confederate government never declared war on the Union. If you disagree, please quote the declaration.
But the obvious response is, "so what"? Lately the pubbies have gotten a raw deal on a number of fronts, notably Øbamacare but that shouldn't mean that we blow up the country.
None of my quotes were from the president. All of them were from the actual text of the war declarations passed by congress. What I want to know is what, in your opinion, is a Declaration of War required to say?
He did present an apology for the war.
The point is that New England was a net importer of food as documented by the Treasury records.
Argue that if you like, but that is the fact.
Show any record of the Confederacy declaring war on the Union.
Answer the questions.
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