Comments on: George Bush, Protectionist

By: J Meng

J Meng — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 16:10:56 +0000

Dr. Wilson @ 43 & MAP @ 44,

Although I was not born in the South, unless you grant me some affiliation by being born in Southern California, I have known for a very long time from my study of history, that the War between the States was over the issue of whether or not a State could secede from the Union established in 1787. Personally, my sympathies have fallen on the side of the South, primarily, because there is nothing in the Constitution against it, and because the North was economically raping the South, especially, with its tariffs. Slavery did not become an issue until 1862, I believe, after the Battle of Antietam (correct me if I am wrong). Of course, Lincoln worked it to the bone. Many, many Americans believe the war was fought to free the slaves, thanks to MSM and politically-correct textbooks from politically-correct book publishers.
Still, as you know from other threads, I am against chattel slavery, but that does not blind me to the truth of what the South fought for.

By: MAP

MAP — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 15:28:15 +0000

Our local South Georgia newspaper has a section everyday that lists the historical events that occurred on the date. NEVER is there any mention of the events during Lincoln’s war or Reconstruction. Sixteen years of history are silenced, forgotten. Granted the paper is one of a Yankee chain, but why are sixteen years of history missing? From almost the founding, two different views of the Union prevailed. What is happening is an attempt to completely obliterate one side of that debate. Slavery serves as one of the tools to accomplish that. Truth and facts are poisons and are avoided. Alas, our age appears devoid of any honor. If memory serves me, George Mason and Patrick Henry (to name only two) were opposed to the Constitution being ratified as they believed it would be used by the North to subjugate the South. Too bad they were not heeded.

By: Clyde Wilson

Clyde Wilson — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 12:43:45 +0000

#42. This is nonsense. Blacks have been a majority of the population in a large part of the South from early colonial times until the present day. There has never been the least concern with what you suggest. There was never any problem except that instigated by outside attack. The film you refer to is Afro-centric propaganda. There was not even any fear of insurrection during The War when most of the white men were at the front.
The worst that happened was that the able-bodied blacks were carried off by the Yankees or ran away. Something approaching that happened in Reconstruction, entirely at the instigation of Yankees for their own evil motives. It is better to see American history from actual knowledge of the context rather than from fictional fantasies based on present assumptions and idelogies.

By: george

george — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 23:52:15 +0000

@40Joseph Salemi

I thought the real reason behind slavery being abolished was because black slaves were starting to outnumber native whites in parts of the South and they feared there would be Zimbabwe style retribution against the native white population.

Anyone saw the film the Confederate States of America?

It is an alternative fictionalised take on US history if Lincoln had lost and the Confederacy had won.

By: Clyde Wilson

Clyde Wilson — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 22:59:05 +0000

I think there is no doubt that the institution of domestic servitude in the South was and had been evolving into something better.
It would have evolved even faster except for the fanaticism of the abolitionists, a point which Daniel Webster, another great man of the North, made emphatically clear in the debates over the Compromise of 1850, asking his fellow Northerners for restraint and justice to their Southern fellow countrymen. Had the South won its independence, this evolution would have continued even faster, and with good will, since the overwhelming trend of conditions and opinion of the Confederate leaders was committed to this. Historians who are honest and really know the times in some depth will recognise the truth of this, although those motivated by irrational hatred of Southerners will deny it Instead of evolution we had the horrors of emancipation by violence and in bad faith. Even that did not destroy the good faith between blacks and whites in the South---but Reconstruction, in which outsiders used the black people as a tool to dominate and rob the white South, did.

By: Joseph Salemi

Joseph Salemi — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 18:06:43 +0000

Dr. Wilson, do you believe that slavery would have died a natural death in the course of time, without the political agitation of abolitionists, Northern capitalists, and the subsequent war? I have always believed that it certainly would have been gone by 1885, but I would like to hear your opinion.

By: Irving Babbitt

Irving Babbitt — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 12:24:21 +0000

#31

You should be able to see or at least hear the McLaughlin Group at the website listed below.

http://www.mclaughlin.com/

By: MAP

MAP — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 13:45:48 +0000

The immense profitability of “free labor” over slave labor is easy to see. Since it is free it requires no investment. Nor does there have to be any consideration beyond production and profit. If the employee starves, is unclothed, or homeless, it is of no concern. If he becomes ill or dies, he is merely replaced. It is no wonder that dangerous jobs in the old South were done by free labor. Slaves were too valuable to risk. In England, the mother of industrialism, children as young as six were removed from the orphanages and put to the most brutal labor in the factories. Many died; others committed suicide. Human life truly looses all value under such a system of labor and profit.

By: Clyde Wilson

Clyde Wilson — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:49:10 +0000

Before and during The War it was commonplace for Northern capitalists to say they wanted to abolish slavery because they believed it was less profitable than free labour. They understood that slavery as practiced in the Old South involved lifetime welfare of the workers, while "free labour" could be bought with wages and disposed of easily. Many of those Republicans stole Southern plantations and thought they would get rich quick growing cotton with "free labour." They were disappointed.
The Republicans of Lincoln's time passed a Contract Law which allowed manufacturers to bring in gangs of impoverished European workers---the obvious consequence being to bring down the wages of native born workers. Immigrant workers were needed, then as now, only because they were cheaper for certain interests. Without such immigrants the labour of free American workers would have been more valuable and we would today have a smaller and much more prosperous and free population. (Of course, not all immigrants fit that category.)

By: pablo H

pablo H — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 16:19:36 +0000

Dr. Wilson, thanks for the response. However, this statement confuses me:

"They also wanted “free labour,” by which they meant to eliminate slavery and substitute more profitable “free labour” which was cheaper and could be more easily controlled by the threat of unemployment. They also contrived a contract law to encourage cheap labour through foreign immigration. That is, the Republicans are directly responsible for origination of the alien problem."

Are you attacking the motives of the Republicans in opposing the expansion of slavery and the use of free labor or supporting slavery? I assume you're simply attacking the self-righteous moralism of the abolitionist capitalist,

But obviously free labor is superior to slave labor. And by superior I mean both to the economically and morally. I also think that 19th century immigration was different than that of the 20th century. The vast majority of immigrants were hard-working Europeans and Britons and we had an empty continent to fill. We also needed strength of numbers.