“It’s utterly misleading to say, as you do, that only 3.2% of Virginians owned slaves, when fully 25% of Virginians lived in slave-owning homes. “
And there is the rub. ‘fully 25% of Virginians lived in slave owing homes’
25%....and yet the left and some here who call themselves conservatives want to hang the entire South and all their descendants, when only 25% had ANYTHING to do with slavery. I have several ‘Southern’ relatives who volunteered and died fighting for the Union, who never owned a slave. I was pretty smug about my ancestors being ‘slave free’ for 50 years, then I found out my Cherokee relatives did indeed own slaves and fought for the Confederacy.
Some of you ‘Northerners’ are wearing out your broad brush. If your family has been in this country for more than a few generations, I could find a ‘Trailer trash Southerner in YOUR backgrounds, too! Maybe that’s the problem, are you proud Eastern/Northerners new comers with NO sweat equity in this game? Just askin’....
First of all, I don't know where this kind of talk comes from, since nobody on Free Republic posts anything remotely resembling what you're saying, i.e., "hang the entire South"!
I've posted here before: half my extended family are southerners, the other half eastern, northern and westerners, and I certainly don't want to see any of the "hanged".
Second, it's important to remember that the number of slave-holding families declined as you traveled north from Deep South (circa 50%) to Border States (i.e., Delaware at 3%).
Virginia, North Carolina and Tennessee fell roughly in the middle, at about 25%.
Indeed, that's what made them so reluctant to declare secession, since they had more families not invested in slaves than slave-holders.
Third, in all three Upper South states of Virginia, North Carolina and Tennessee, families which did not own slaves were concentrated in the Appalachian Mountain regions, and that explains their efforts to secede from the Confederacy.
Therefore, in other areas of those same states, slave-holding families might be just as numerous as the Deep South.
AuntB: "If your family has been in this country for more than a few generations, I could find a ‘Trailer trash Southerner in YOUR backgrounds, too!"
I don't even know what that means.
Some poor people live in trailers, right?
So do retired people on vacation, right?
Am I supposed to know and care about which is which?
What if I don't, is that a crime?
And why would you call anyone "trash" -- is there "black trash", or "yellow trash", "brown trash" what about "Catholic trash" or I don't know, "Mormon trash" or "Presbyterian trash"??
So what exactly is your problem, lady, that you want to be calling some people "trash"?
Did you ever think, if you'd just quit calling them "trash" they might be less reluctant to vote with Conservatives?
I'm just saying, not everybody has that problem.
;-)