GOP candidate: Civil war wasn’t about slavery

The Hill ^ | June 25th, 2018 | Lisa Hagen

[MarineBrat]

Go to hell arrogant. (Hint: that’s actually an answer to your pretend question)

[MarineBrat]

Disparaging WWII vets on the net. That’s neato! Big man!

[DiogenesLamp]

Where is your proof that the two tugs were armed.

Will you not give me a break? I have looked up this information before. It takes awhile to do it. I commit some of it to memory because it helps me paint a picture in my mind of what is going on. Sometimes I get details wrong. Sometimes I find information that contradicts what I had previously found.

We know the "Thomas Freeborn" was armed whenever that picture was taken, and I don't recall if I had found it to be taken in 1863. This isn't the only conversation i'm having.

If I have gotten it wrong on the tugs, does it really matter? The primary warships were most definitely armed, and that describes the nature of that "Resupply" mission.

Here is the information I can find on the "Uncle Ben." It was later armed, so I assume it wasn't previously armed.

This article says the "Thomas Freeborn" was a "sidewheel gunboat."

And here is the final Tugboat, USS Yankee. Wikipedia says it was armed with two 32 pounders.

Every school child knows that A USS is probably armed. Why do you make an issue of it. They were war ships.

Yes they were. What were they going to do? When you pull out a gun on someone, what are you going to do with it?

She was not armed for the Sumter expedition.

That isn't clear from all I have been able to find, but it does make sense. A commercial tugboat shouldn't need cannons, but we know for a fact it had cannons by May of 1861.

[DiogenesLamp]

You know that they were authorized to use force if the resupply mission was resisted by Confederate authorities.

Well everyone knew they were going to be resisted. Lincoln knew it. His cabinet knew it. Major Anderson knew it, so let's move past the point of wondering if they were going to be resisted and move straight to the "What were they going to do?"

More importantly, what did the Confederates believe they were going to do? What was the impression that Lincoln wanted the Confederates to believe?

[DiogenesLamp]

States Rights vs. slavery.........This has going on forever as long as I've been here........

There is a new twist. I identify the 200 million dollars per year money that was at stake. If the South became independent, New York and Washington DC immediately lost 200 million dollars per year in income, and I point out that there would be even worse economic losses with each passing year.

If you've seen anything about this in past discussions, I would very much like it if you point me to them. I've never seen anyone else point this out besides me.

Here is a graphic showing indirectly how much money was at stake.

Notice all the money that would be lost is from New York?

[Bull Snipe]

Davis ordered Beauregard to reduce the fort by force if necessary before the resupply mission arrived. Beauregard followed those orders, Anderson would not surrender the Fort. Beauregard order his artillery to open fire. Will gladly listen to what your insight, supported by something more substantial that your opinion, into Jefferson Davis believed they were going to do.

[Bull Snipe]

Not one red cent of that money belonged to New York. It was tariffs collected by U.S. Government employees and turned over to the Federal Treasury. That was the case with all of the cities you have listed.

In your fantasy world, the instant the South seceded, virtually all the shipping entering into the United States would shift to Southern ports. What the port of New York could handle in a month, All the Southern ports combined could not handle in a year.

[DiogenesLamp]

Davis ordered Beauregard to reduce the fort by force if necessary before the resupply mission arrived.

He said if Beauregard believed the agent. (Robert Chew)

Beauregard obviously believed the agent. I also have little doubt that word was "flashed across the wires" as David Porter told Lincoln it would be.

This confirmation from Robert Chew is what triggered the bombardment. Prior to that they had told Anderson if he would but name a date to evacuate, they would wait while taking no action. They told Anderson that if he agreed to not fire on them if those Warships engaged, they would not fire on him. He refused.

A reasonable man would believe that when the President sends 8 Ships, at least half of them armed warships, it means he is going to use those ships. One does not ordinarily pull out a gun and threaten someone unless they mean to do something.

What were those warships going to do? What were the Confederates led to believe they were going to do?

[DoodleDawg]

And yet by 1864 tariff revenue was pushing $115 million per year. How?

[Bull Snipe]

In May of 1861 Thomas Freedom was no longer a commercial tugboat. She was a ship of the U.S. Navy. That was when she was armed.
At the time of the Sumter expedition tug Yankee was a civilian owned ship and not armed. like the Thomas Freedom she was purchased by the Navy after the Sumter expedition, then armed.

[DiogenesLamp]

Not one red cent of that money belonged to New York. It was tariffs collected by U.S. Government employees and turned over to the Federal Treasury. That was the case with all of the cities you have listed.

In other words, Washington's cut. Yeah, I know that. New York's cut was about 40% of Gross, according to an article BroJoeK linked me to a long time ago.

In your fantasy world, the instant the South seceded, virtually all the shipping entering into the United States would shift to Southern ports.

It would not have shifted instantly, but in the months after December, it was already shifting. You should read some of the news in the Charleston Mercury from that period. They hit the jackpot. People were streaming into town, massive Warehouse construction projects were going on, hotels were booked, and the shipping traffic was greatly increased.

European merchants could make an additional 30% or so profit on all their merchandise, and in those days, a 30% additional profit was a pretty big draw.

If you think the tariff differential and the release from the US law banning foreign owned, or crewed ships from moving cargo between ports, wouldn't have made a difference, then you are being deliberately obtuse.

What the port of New York could handle in a month, All the Southern ports combined could not handle in a year.

I have no idea if that's true, but as time passed, facilities would be improved until they could handle all the traffic they needed to handle. It is an amazing thing what capital can do to anyplace at which it is applied.

[DiogenesLamp]

I am not going to go down this stupid road where we compare what happens when you have F***ing warships stopping all traffic from one side, and forcing all the shipping traffic over to the other, all the while borrowing, spending, inflating, and so forth.

Numbers after the economic tampering caused by blockade are meaningless.

Yes, if you hold back your opponent in the race, you are going to win.

[DiogenesLamp]

That could all be true. It may also be true that they were armed when they were chartered. It hardly changes the point that most of the Fleet was belligerent.

[Bull Snipe]

doubtful that the navy would make any effort to arm a chartered tug. Arming a ship built for commercial service requires a little more than strapping a 32 pounder to the deck. A 32 pounder weights 3 tons. The deck beams beneath it has to be reinforced as well as the frames where the gun is positioned. This work is done below deck to support the weight. A suitable magazine for the gun powder has to be built.

[Bull Snipe]

European merchants could make an additional 30% or so profit on all their merchandise.

Only if the didn’t reduce the price of their goods from what they paid in Tariff to the U.S. Government. If they didn’t the Southerners would have been paying the same price with or without tariffs.

[Bull Snipe]

“It is an amazing thing what capital can do to anyplace at which it is applied”

Well, if the previous thirty years are any indication, the application of capital in the South was pretty much limited to buying more acreage to grow cotton, and more slaves to work the expanded acreage. What makes you think that in the bling of an eye, they would all of a sudden start building iron foundries, textile mills, shoe factories, railroads, shipyards etc.

[jeffersondem]

“He (Lincoln) fought the war forced upon him.”

In the same way that King George fought the war “forced upon him.”

The Prince had to kill those people. Had to.

[jeffersondem]

“The Confederacy would never make more than modest and early gains until the economic might of the Federal government destroyed the resistance and won.”

I am not certain what “economic might” the Federal government was producing then or now.

People and states were certainly creating wealth; rarely, if ever, does any government. The Federal government was best at taking wealth, small amounts at first and later at confiscatory rates. Then, redistributing to favored groups.

From history I'm more familiar with the Federal government's 1860s military might - which did stem from the northern states’ industrial engines and population advantages.

From the phrasing “destroyed the resistance and won” I'm not sure if you are condemning or commending Lincoln's attack on the Constitution.

You are right about one thing: we cannot change history.

But history can change us.

[jeffersondem]

“Which (the popular notion that the Lincoln-side was fighting for the high moral cause of “freeing the slaves”) has been dismissed by most people here and just about every reputable biographer that I know.”

Not everyone has dismissed the idea. I can show you right here on this board - post 562 for example - where a very strong advocate of Lincoln's War stated the North had, what was called, “moral high ground” compared to the South.

Let's look at the actual claim: “The South launched a bloody and protracted rebellion to protect their institution of slavery. Just about any position is a moral high ground compared to that.”

And so, critic answers critic.

[jeffersondem]

“What is the point of continuing to advocate what was always a losing cause?”

Yes, we all know about the awful toll of the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

Still, we persist. Some of us are not quite ready to junk the principles contained in the Declaration of Independence, or the wisdom of the Constitution.

And with the Federal Register now at an unfeasibly large two million pages it is just about time to say “no” to the Feral government in the District of Corruption.

That’s the point. And yes, it is controversial.