Basis of 1996 Hostilities ?
Dave Gorski
Since I've been lurking in this NG for the last
few weeks I've been struck by what seems to be a huge
amount of hostility towards people with the same supposed
intrests (ACW). I'm not refering to the spirited
discussions of Yank vs. Reb, we all learn from and enjoy
these. I'm refering to the mean spirited personal attacks,
Yank to Reb and Reb to Yank. I realize that the ACW
involves some very emotional issues, and that people are
very passionate in their stands on these issues, but these
attacks have raised some questions that perhaps someone
from the group can help me with.
As a "northerner", with a relative who served to
preserve the Union, I'm thankful that thousands made
sacrifices to form this country and move us forward.
I also understand and admire the extraordinary sense
of LOYALTY, DUTY, and HONOR displayed by Confederate
troops. the sacrifices of BOTH groups of men are what
formed this country.
I respectfully ask, do the folks who take a
Confederate position on issues belive that they would be
better off today if the South had been successful in
separating from the North ? Are the personal attacks that I
read in this NG just a re-enactment of the hostilities of
the Civil War era ? Maybe I'm reading more into these
posts than really exists ?
While I was in the military I served with men from the
North as well as the South and never noticed any hostility
becouse of the part of the country you came from.Is there still
a hostility between the regions ? If so what is the basis of
this hostility ? Since 1865 I've felt that in many ways the
North has become more like the South and the South more like
the North.
Any civil comments or explanations would be welcome. I am
particularly interested in the Southern perspective.
Thanks,
Dave Gorski
Linda Teasley
Dave Gorski (bi...@execpc.com) wrote:
[introductory post about reflections on Unionist/Confederate hostility
on this newsgroup snipped]
: Any civil comments or explanations would be welcome. I am
: particularly interested in the Southern perspective.
As one of the grumpier Confederates on this newsgroup, I will
tentatively offer a couple of comments. The American Civil War was
terribly costly and occurrred just a little over one hundred years ago.
Most of us can almost touch relatives who fought in it. The fruits of
its devastation lasted and its impact thus still felt.
Most people honor those who suffered through it, and it is a source of
intense irritation to be told that, "Your military history was mediocre,
and your political history absolutely shameful." We can say that about
ourselves, mind you, but will not tolerate that from other small-minded
people. Our efforts to demonstrate the hypocrisy of statements like that
will not end soon.
This set of circumstances should not surprise you. Every village in
England has an impressive memorial to their sons who fought in WWI.
Homer's rhapsodes sang about the Greeks and the Trojans five hundred years
after
the actual event and drew passionate acclaim from audiences. Events
associated with the life of a whole people have a privileged place and
this has been true time out of mind.
Linda Teasley
--
Five pelican bedecked battle flags began to flap. . . three thousand
men stepped off on the left foot. With strict cadence, ninety paces per
minute, a forest of burnished steel paraded up the hill.
Winchester --- 25 May 1862
Al Lewis
bi...@execpc.com (Dave Gorski) wrote:
> Any civil comments or explanations would be welcome. I am
>particularly interested in the Southern perspective.
> Thanks,
> Dave Gorski
Dave,
Suggest you check out the Southern League website at www.dixienet.org.
Read all the articles, get a feel for what a " reasoned " southern
perspective is in this day and time.
Probably the greatest barrier to non-Southerners' understanding of the
Southern perspective has been ( as with many other areas and issues in
today's society ) the less than objective, shallow, stereotype
maintaining coverage by the national media of issues related to the
South, the War for Southern Independence, symbols of the War, etc.
After all, if I relied on the mass media for my impressions of various
cities, regions, groups in this country I would be way off the mark
much of the time.
To understand the historical Southern mindset, it is extremely
important to understand the roots of the majority of people who
settled in the South. They were not merchants, seamen, tradesmen
from the old country. Most were of Celtic stock. This meant that
they were tremendously independent in spirit, liked to be left alone
to determine their own destinies, etc. Understanding the nature of
the people who settled the South then gives you insight into why
you hear the argument from Southerners that the War for Southern
Independence was about states' rights, not slavery!! Slavery was an
instutition of the times resulting from a number of primarily economic
reasons. Slavery was simply one of many issues that Southerners felt
were not the business of a far-off government which was not
understanding of local issues They felt very, very strongly about
local determination.
Yes, many modern Southerners would say that we would be better off
if the North had not invaded and subjugated the Conferates States.
Why? Perhaps we would have much more local control over what
government we might need. It's that simple. It's basically a
centralist vs. provinicialist argument.
As to current hostilities, I can only say that, IMHO, there is simply
a reaction by modern Southerners against what they perceive are
unwarranted attacks on various aspects of their unique Southern
heritage, most often by people who don't live in the South and who
don't understand that much about the South. Again, the mass media has
done such a wonderful job of associating the Confederate Battle Flag
with hate groups only that we now have various institutions (schools,
local municipalities, etc.) ruling that the display of Confederate
symbols simply can't be tolerated because of the negative
connotations. How would the majority of Americans feel if Old Glory
was banned from display because of atrocities committed in Vietnam.
Do we throw the baby out with the bath water?
Oh well, I'll get down off my box now. Maybe this will give some
insight into how one Southerner feels, at least.
Al Lewis in Fort Worth "Cowtown", Texas
"Where the West Begins and the East peters out"
"All opinions expressed are not necessarily yours, but most likely mine"
----------------- INDICOM BUILDINGS, INC. ----------------------
E-Mail: Ind...@airmail.net 721 N. Burleson Blvd.
Voice: 817-447-1213 Burleson, TX 76028
Fax: 817-447-2528
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
liz leigh
(snip)
> I respectfully ask, do the folks who take a
>Confederate position on issues belive that they would be
>better off today if the South had been successful in
>separating from the North ? Are the personal attacks that I
>read in this NG just a re-enactment of the hostilities of
>the Civil War era ? Maybe I'm reading more into these
>posts than really exists ?
(snip)
> Any civil comments or explanations would be welcome. I am
>particularly interested in the Southern perspective.
> Thanks,
> Dave Gorski
According to James McPherson who is a noted historian of marked Yankee
tendencies, about 2/3 rds of the soldiers in the Confederate armies
were from non-slave holding families (DRAWN WITH THE SWORD P. 121) They
were typically backwoods 'yeomen' farmers. Many observers today might
regard the Southern 'yeoman' farmer as a 'cracker' with a lifestyle
characterized by the stereotyped image of the Clampet family in THE
BEVERLY HILLBILLIES -- West Virginians, but 'crakers' nonetheless.
Now, consider the following questions:
1. When was the last time you saw a re-run of THE BEVERLY HILLBILLIES?
2. When was the last time you saw a re-run of AMOS & ANDY?
3. Why has one of the above been banned as an unfair representation of
a class of Americans while the other has not?
4. Why is it okay to ridicule the often false stereotypical image of a
'cracker' but it is an unforgivable evil to do so for virtually any
other class of American citizens?
5. Why shud anyone be surprised when individuals whose heritage is
ridiculed occasionally respond with vigor?
Consider also the following:
About 20 years ago there was a made-for-tv drama entitled THE MISSLES
OF OCTOBER which was about the Cuban missle crisis. At one point
Khrushcev sent a private message to John Kennedy warning of the total
destruction of nuclear war. He reminisced about the wasteland the
Germans left behind in Russia during WW II. Nikita added that, as an
American, Kennedy would not likely understand the point he was trying
to make because, EXCEPT FOR THE AMERICAN SOUTH, our country had never
experienced the horror of total war.
Indeed, Kennedy and his staff were mystified by Khrushcev's
'ramblings'. But Southerners have some appreciatin for what the Russian
Premier was trying to say. Again according to Mc Pherson, 2/3rds of the
property values in the South were wiped out by the war. We have
ancestors who lived thru that and had to recover or move on. One fourth
of the white males (McPherson again) from the South did not return
home. That is a far larger percentage than up North. Yet when we want
only to honor their memory with the St. Andrew's Cross we are condemned
as racists.
When we watch the Clampets on tv we demonstrate an ability to laugh at
ourselves and our forebears. We also want the power to honor our
heritage and may get downright mean, wicked, dirty, and nasty when told
that heritage is nothing but evil.
Phil Leigh
=======================================================================
Most things are praised or decried because it is fashionalbe to praise
or decry them.
La Rochefoucauld
=======================================================================
Mark T Pitcavage
In article <4qpor7$a...@news-f.iadfw.net>, Al Lewis <ind...@airmail.net> wrote:
>bi...@execpc.com (Dave Gorski) wrote:
>
>> Since I've been lurking in this NG for the last
>>few weeks I've been struck by what seems to be a huge
>>amount of hostility towards people with the same supposed
>>intrests (ACW). I'm not refering to the spirited
>>discussions of Yank vs. Reb, we all learn from and enjoy
>>these. I'm refering to the mean spirited personal attacks,
>>Yank to Reb and Reb to Yank. I realize that the ACW
>>involves some very emotional issues, and that people are
>>very passionate in their stands on these issues, but these
>>attacks have raised some questions that perhaps someone
>>from the group can help me with.
>> As a "northerner", with a relative who served to
>>preserve the Union, I'm thankful that thousands made
>>sacrifices to form this country and move us forward.
>> I also understand and admire the extraordinary sense
>>of LOYALTY, DUTY, and HONOR displayed by Confederate
>>troops. the sacrifices of BOTH groups of men are what
>>formed this country.
>>Confederate position on issues belive that they would be
>>better off today if the South had been successful in
>>separating from the North ? Are the personal attacks that I
>>read in this NG just a re-enactment of the hostilities of
>>the Civil War era ? Maybe I'm reading more into these
>>posts than really exists ?
>>North as well as the South and never noticed any hostility
>>becouse of the part of the country you came from.Is there still
>>a hostility between the regions ? If so what is the basis of
>>this hostility ? Since 1865 I've felt that in many ways the
>>North has become more like the South and the South more like
>>the North.
>>particularly interested in the Southern perspective.
>> Thanks,
>> Dave Gorski
>
the above response appears to be meaningless unless one goes back and inserts
the word "white" before every mention of the word "Southerner."
Stephen Schmidt
liz...@ix.netcom.com (liz leigh ) writes:
>Again according to Mc Pherson, 2/3rds of the
>property values in the South were wiped out by the war.
I'm away from my McPherson and can't doublecheck the source,
but with that qualification:
1) About 1/3 of the wealth of the South was held in the form
of slaves, which were emancipated. I wouldn't really say that
qualifies as "wiped out by the war" except in the most
metaphysical sense.
2) Much of the remaining fall of property values was caused
by the change in value of plantations and other property which
had depended on slavery.
There was also, of course, considerable damage and destruction
of the sort more normally associated with war (burned buildings,
damaged bridges, farm fields dug up for trenches, and so forth)
but the amount of this is nothing like 2/3 of the prewar value
of Southern property. One might also note that much of this
damage was done by the CSA army rather than the USA; perhaps
this should serve as a reminder not to shoot first at someone
stronger than you.
Steve
--
Stephen Schmidt Department of Economics
210A Social Sciences Union College
(518) 388-6078 Schenectady NY 12308
efr...@cc.memphis.edu
[Most of Phil Leigh's heartfelt reply to Al Gorski
snipped]
> According to James McPherson who is a noted historian of marked Yankee
> tendencies, about 2/3 rds of the soldiers in the Confederate armies
> were from non-slave holding families (DRAWN WITH THE SWORD P. 121) They
> were typically backwoods 'yeomen' farmers. Many observers today might
> regard the Southern 'yeoman' farmer as a 'cracker' with a lifestyle
> characterized by the stereotyped image of the Clampet family in THE
> BEVERLY HILLBILLIES -- West Virginians, but 'crakers' nonetheless.
Hey! The Clampitts wuz fum Tennessee.
Ed "weren't they?" Frank
Meanwhile
: 4. Why is it okay to ridicule the often false stereotypical image of a
: 'cracker' but it is an unforgivable evil to do so for virtually any
: other class of American citizens?
: Phil Leigh
Yep, ridicule you and your family right to your face.
God forbid you object, that *must* mean you're in
favor of slavery. Certainly it *can't* mean that
you just don't like having someone say that you and
your family are garbage.
d.
Southern Witch
schm...@unvax.union.edu (Stephen Schmidt) wrote:
~~~snips~~~
> There was also, of course, considerable damage and destruction
> of the sort more normally associated with war (burned buildings,
> damaged bridges, farm fields dug up for trenches, and so forth)
> but the amount of this is nothing like 2/3 of the prewar value
> of Southern property.
~~~more snips~~~
To quote from Foner's "A Short History of Reconstruction" (p. 56):
Agricultural statistics reveal the full extent of the economic disaster
the South had suffered. Between 1860 and 1870, while farm output expanded
in the rest of the nation, the South experienced precipitous declines in
the value of farm land and the amount of acreage under cultivation. The
number of horses fell by twenty-nince percent, swine by thirty-fice
percent, and farm values by half. The real value of all property, even
discounting that represented by slaves, stood thirty percent lower in 1870
than its prewar figure, and the output of the staple crops cotton, rice,
sugar, and tobacco, and food crops like corn and potatoes, remained far
below their antebellum levels. Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg returned
from the war to his '"once propserous" Alabama home to find "-all, all-
was lost, except my debts."
Despite the grim reality of desolation and poverty, the South's economic
recovery involved more than rebuilding shattered farms and repairing
broken bridges. An entire social order had been swept away, and on its
ruins a new one had to be constructed. The process by which a new social
and economic order replaced the old followed different paths in different
parts of the South. But for black and white alike, the war's end ushered
in what South Carolina planter William H. Trescott called "the perpetual
trouble that belongs to a time of social change."
[end quote]
To argue about whether the destruction amounted to 1/3 or 2/3 of pre-war
values is somewhat pointless. What Foner seems to be saying is that the
South was devastated in every conceivable way and would take years to
recover from the physical and psychological beatings administered by the
victorious Union Army. There are those who would argue (with much
validity) that the process remains unfinished to this day.
Kathie "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing" Fraser
--
Kathie Fraser http://www.erols.com/kfraser
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"The South is a land that has known sorrows...a land of legend,
a land of song, a land of hallowed and heroic memories."
--Edward Ward Carmack
Andrew Stooksbury
Sherman and his March to the sea that destroyed Georgia. I guess it
was not Sheridan in the Valley either. I guess the Northern scorched
earth policy had nothing to do with it.
David S.
Mark T Pitcavage
Have you actually read a history of Sherman's march to the sea? If you have,
then you will know that the Confederates destroyed a great amount of things,
and that Confederate troops "foraged" a great amount more. If you think that
Union troops were the only people doing damage, guess again.
RStacy2229
In article <4r4bts$q...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>,
mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes:
>
>Have you actually read a history of Sherman's march to the sea?
Yes, by the man himself, in his own words, both in official correspondence
and in his biography. You can revise anything else you want, but the man
who vowed to "make Georgia howl" did just that, and you can't cover it up.
He started by burning Rome, Ga., an account of which I can provide you
from a civilian eyewitness.
I would like someone to explain to me how Sherman's treatment of the
largely female workforce at the New Manchester and Roswell mills served
any logical military purpose.
Get a grip, Mark. One of these days I expect to log on and find that you
are somehow blaming Hiroshima, the sinking of the Lusitania and original
sin on the South.
Robert Stacy McCain
Dennis Maggard
kfr...@erols.com (Southern Witch) wrote:
>~~~snips~~~
>~~~more snips~~~
>[end quote]
This may well be the first time Foner has ever been quoted on this
newsgroup in support of the South and the southern point of view!
It's common enough to see the devil quote scripture for his purposes,
but seeing an angel return the compliment is a real treat! :-)
Dennis
System Janitor
>and that Confederate troops "foraged" a great amount more. If you think that
>Union troops were the only people doing damage, guess again.
The 40 mile wide burnt path through South Carolina was the track
of Sherman's army, not Wheeler's foragers.
-Mike
Maury
In article <4r73ia$7...@news4.digex.net>, dmag...@access.digex.net says...
>
>kfr...@erols.com (Southern Witch) wrote:
>
>>In article <1996Jun26.1...@unvax.union.edu>,
>>schm...@unvax.union.edu (Stephen Schmidt) wrote:
>
>>~~~snips~~~
>
>>> There was also, of course, considerable damage and destruction
>>> of the sort more normally associated with war (burned buildings,
>>> damaged bridges, farm fields dug up for trenches, and so forth)
>>> but the amount of this is nothing like 2/3 of the prewar value
>>> of Southern property.
>
>>~~~more snips~~~
>
>>To quote from Foner's "A Short History of Reconstruction" (p. 56):
>
>>Agricultural statistics reveal the full extent of the economic disaster
>>the South had suffered. Between 1860 and 1870, while farm output expanded
>>in the rest of the nation, the South experienced precipitous declines in
Snippettes galore, see original
=======================================================
>This may well be the first time Foner has ever been quoted on this
>newsgroup in support of the South and the southern point of view!
>It's common enough to see the devil quote scripture for his purposes,
>but seeing an angel return the compliment is a real treat! :-)
>Dennis
<SMILE>, way to go, Kathie!
Good point, Dennis -- well said.
-- Maury
A. Chilton Lannen
rstac...@aol.com (RStacy2229) wrote:
>In article <4r4bts$q...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>,
>mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes:
>>
>>Have you actually read a history of Sherman's march to the sea?
>
>Yes, by the man himself, in his own words, both in official correspondence
>and in his biography. You can revise anything else you want, but the man
>who vowed to "make Georgia howl" did just that, and you can't cover it up.
>He started by burning Rome, Ga., an account of which I can provide you
>from a civilian eyewitness.
What is there to cover up? Sherman's goal was to break the
morale of the Southern people by hurting them badly, and, at the same
time, cut off the Lower South from the Upper. He accomplished his
mission on both counts. You don't shatter a peoples' will to fight
by slapping them on the wrist.
>I would like someone to explain to me how Sherman's treatment of the
>largely female workforce at the New Manchester and Roswell mills served
>any logical military purpose.
Did the mills continue to operate? If not, then the military
purpose was served.
>Get a grip, Mark. One of these days I expect to log on and find that you
>are somehow blaming Hiroshima, the sinking of the Lusitania and original
>sin on the South.
>
>Robert Stacy McCain
In devastating portions of Georgia along his route to Savannah,
Sherman was following precedent established as far back as the Roman
Republic. When the Romans (whom Southern elites often admired
greatly) began to re-establish control over Italy near the end of the
Second Punic War, most of the cities that had rebelled and joined
Hannibal surrendered -- others did not. So the Romans torched a few
of the formerly rebellious towns and put every man, woman, and child
to the sword. This made the holdouts fold rather quickly. To break
an entire population's will to fight you have to devastate them.
I'm not saying it's wrong or right, just an aspect of wars.
--Andrew
-------
and...@ix.netcom.com
"God cannot alter the past; that is why he is obliged to connive
at the existence of historians." -- Samuel Butler
Mark T Pitcavage
In article <4r5tca$m...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>,
RStacy2229 <rstac...@aol.com> wrote:
>In article <4r4bts$q...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>,
>mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes:
>>
>>Have you actually read a history of Sherman's march to the sea?
>
>Yes, by the man himself, in his own words, both in official correspondence
>and in his biography. You can revise anything else you want, but the man
>who vowed to "make Georgia howl" did just that, and you can't cover it up.
>He started by burning Rome, Ga., an account of which I can provide you
>from a civilian eyewitness.
>
>largely female workforce at the New Manchester and Roswell mills served
>any logical military purpose.
>
>are somehow blaming Hiroshima, the sinking of the Lusitania and original
>sin on the South.
I asked if you had read a history of the march, not a memoir. If you had read
a history of the march, you would have known the damage done by the
Confederates themselves. What Sherman did or did not do is irrelevant to the
discussion.
Mark T Pitcavage
In article <hubcap.836171990@hubcap>,
System Janitor <hub...@hubcap.clemson.edu> wrote:
>mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes:
>>and that Confederate troops "foraged" a great amount more. If you think that
>>Union troops were the only people doing damage, guess again.
>
>The 40 mile wide burnt path through South Carolina was the track
>of Sherman's army, not Wheeler's foragers.
Not only is that hyperbole, but it doesn't even address the Confederate
scorched earth policy.
gary charbonneau
>So, what you are saying is that it was the Southern troops and not
>Sherman and his March to the sea that destroyed Georgia.
Look at it this way. Sherman estimated that the March to the Sea
cost Georgia and the Confederacy $100,000,000 ($20,000,000 in supplies
and property seized by the Union army, and $80,000,000 in waste and
destruction). By way of comparison, estimates of the total value
of all slaves prior to the war were on the order of two to three
billion dollars. Simple arithmetic suggests that emancipation cost
Southern whites as much as twenty to thirty Marches to the Sea.
Suppose that the Union armies had not invaded the Confederacy.
Would Southerners then willingly have freed their slaves, thus subjecting
themselves to the economic equivalent of twenty or thirty Marches to the Sea?
Unthinkable. They would only have freed their slaves if and when slavery
became unprofitable. But if slavery had become unprofitable, the
result would have been a catastrophic fall in slave prices as slaves
ceased to be an asset and became a liability, essentially wiping out
two to three billion dollars of capital investment (not including the
fall in land values which would probably have occurred at the same time).
White Southerners found themselves in a box in which emancipation must
either _cause_ their impoverishment or _result_ from it. Barring
the continuing survival and profitability, they were doomed to become
drastically poorer whether Yankee armies invaded or not.
- Gary Charbonneau
System Janitor
mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes:
>Not only is that hyperbole, but it doesn't even address the Confederate
>scorched earth policy.
The ``Confederate scorched earth policy'' isn't relevant to
Sherman's March.
-Mike
Maury
>rstac...@aol.com (RStacy2229) wrote:
>
>>In article <4r4bts$q...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>,
>>mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Snippity-Do-dah ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~ <31d7554f...@nntp.netcruiser>,
~ and...@ix.netcom.com wrote:
>You don't shatter a peoples' will to fight >by slapping them
>on the wrist.
That same line of thinking, I do believe, could and did
assist in the maintaining of the system of slavery. -- Maury
>--Andrew > And...@ix.netcom.com
RStacy2229
In article <4r8o1k$g...@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>,
char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) writes:
>Simple arithmetic suggests that emancipation cost
>Southern whites as much as twenty to thirty Marches to the Sea.
>
Yes, but the damage was not distributed as a statistic. Consider the poor
women living in little cottages at the New Manchester mills on Sweetwater
Creek. One day, the Yankees show up, herd the women up (allegedly
accosting some in the process) and ship them off to Kentucky, where the
women and their children are treated as POWs for the next several months.
Meanwhile, the mill and the surrounding cottages are burned to the ground
by the Yankees. Never mind the lost wages for the workers and the trauma
of their forcible relocation, but even if they do manage to make it back
home, they find that they have no homes and no jobs. Those working women
were not plantation mistresses, but the "glorious war to end slavery"
deprived them of their livelihood.
And since Sherman's army plundered and pillaged randomly across its path,
visiting destruction on whatever homes were encountered, the theft,
vandalism and rapine were fairly universal. Something more than half the
white families in that region owned no slaves, yet their smokehouses were
emptied, what few possessions they owned were stolen and, often enough,
the women were insulted or worse. Orders were to destroy every mill and
every factory along the way, thereby destroying what little industry that
agricultural region possessed.
And why? Tell me. Why? As Jefferson Davis had said, the South asked
nothing but to be let alone. This war of conquest and subjugation was
necessary under what theory of government?
Robert Stacy McCain
RStacy2229
In article <4r8o1k$g...@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>,
char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) writes:
>char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu
Why is it that the amount of hostility exhibited toward the South is, in
most cases, directly proportional to the likelihood of the person posting
from an "edu" address?
Think about it: Pitcavage, Simpson, Epperson, Schmidt. Except for Mike at
Clemson, I don't think the Southrons have a single "edu" poster.
RSMC
RStacy2229
In article <4r8o1k$g...@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>,
char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) writes:
>White Southerners found themselves in a box in which emancipation must
>either _cause_ their impoverishment or _result_ from it. Barring
>the continuing survival and profitability, they were doomed to become
>drastically poorer whether Yankee armies invaded or not.>
>- Gary Charbonneau
Andrew Stooksbury had asked whether destruction by Southerners exceeded
that caused by Sherman's troops. Somehow, Mr. Charbonneau has turned this
into a discussion of slavery -- an old abolitionist trick. Mr. Stooksbury
was discussing the value of the crops, livestock, homes, barns and other
property stolen or destroyed by the vandal horde. Now comes Mr. Charboneau
to say that because of emancipation, "White Southerners ... were doomed to
become drastically poorer whether Yankee armies invaded or not."
This is a non sequitur. Most white families in the South did not own
slaves and didn't lose a dime because of emancipation. But the value of
lost labor (75 percent of Southern soldiers were from non-slaveholding
families) by those men who left their farms to fight for their country for
four years was immense, while those who were killed and died of illness
represented a permanent loss to their country. And the destruction wrought
by Sherman's forces was visited upon slaveholder and non-slaveholder
alike.
Yet we see once again the old Yankee trick: When in doubt, demagogue the
issue by castigating the South for slavery, as if nothing else mattered
about the war except the region's system of labor. And the context within
which Mr. Charbonneau resorts to this trick is quite enlightening. A
family lost its home to arsonists? Its sons were slain on the
battlefields, its daughters raped by Yankee stragglers? Its livestock were
stolen or slaughtered? Crops stolen or burnt? Everything that wasn't
nailed down was taken from these defenseless civilians?
Oh, reasons Mr. Charbonneau, this is not a war crime, but social justice,
since the family was "doomed to become drastically poorer." These people
had committed the sin of being white Southerners and were therefore
deserving of whatever fate befell them. Never mind the slippery morality
involved in the process of saying that the end justifies the means. Never
mind the dehumanization of the foe. So have the forces of imperial
conquest and tyranny always reasoned. Pizarro and De Soto were quite
similar in their reasoning, with "God, gold and glory" being their version
of the Union's "John Brown's body."
Thinking of the reaction we Southerners get when we defend the Confederacy
from calumny, let me say to our Northern neighbors:
"You won the war; get over it!"
Robert Stacy McCain
Rome, Third Military District, Occupied CSA
RStacy2229
In article <31d7554f...@nntp.netcruiser>, and...@ix.netcom.com (A.
Chilton Lannen) writes:
>You don't shatter a peoples' will to fight
>by slapping them on the wrist.
>
Thanks. We'll keep that in mind. (Note to General Lee: Confederate
Wrist-Slapping Battalions seem to be ineffective. Yours, Jeff. D.)
RStacy2229
>>I would like someone to explain to me how Sherman's treatment of the
>>largely female workforce at the New Manchester and Roswell mills served
>>any logical military purpose.
> Did the mills continue to operate? If not, then the military
>purpose was served.
Yes, but having captured the territory on which the mill stood and
deported the work force to Kentucky, to:
a. BURN the mill; and
b. to BURN the surrounding homes of the mill workers, destroying the
entire village
seems a tad excessive, don't you think?
A textile mill west of the Chattahoochee River was of little use to the
Confederate government if Johnston's army were held east of the
Chattahoochee, as Sherman had both the wherewithal and determination to
do. The destruction of New Manchester and the deportation of its residents
(same is true at Roswell) makes sense only as an act of retribution, and I
believe the fellow who "died to make us holy," as the song said, would
have disapproved of a policy of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
RSMC
RStacy2229
>To break
>an entire population's will to fight you have to devastate them.
>I'm not saying it's wrong or right, just an aspect of wars.
>
So you're saying that if Lee's army had burned and looted its way into
Pennsylvania, that would have improved Southern chances of victory?
And are you thereby justifying "Operation Linebacker" and the
carpet-bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong? The German bombing of London and the
firebombing of Dresden? What about the devastation of Poland under Nazi
rule? Are you saying that this was just part of breaking their will to
fight?
Perhaps if Sherman had herded Southern civilians onto railcars and shipped
them to concentration camps, then starved, shot or gassed them to death,
maybe THAT would have done the trick, huh?
RSMC
RStacy2229
In article <4r8mnu$a...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>,
mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes:
>Not only is that hyperbole, but it doesn't even address the Confederate
>scorched earth policy
I have no knowledge of such a policy and presume that you will refer me to
a nice history of this policy, however ....
If Sherman had not been engaged in a war designed to conquer and subjugate
the South by a policy of invasion, arson and larceny, such a "Confederate
... policy" would have been unnecessary.
RSMC
Mark T Pitcavage
In article <4re3ap$3...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>,
RStacy2229 <rstac...@aol.com> wrote:
>In article <4r8o1k$g...@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>,
>char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) writes:
>
Forgive me for not weeping overmuch. I think there were a lot of blacks who
just wanted to be left alone, too. Sometimes you don't get what you want, but
you get what you need.
Mark T Pitcavage
In article <4re3d1$3...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>,
RStacy2229 <rstac...@aol.com> wrote:
>In article <31d7554f...@nntp.netcruiser>, and...@ix.netcom.com (A.
>Chilton Lannen) writes:
>
Gosh, you mean there were EXCESSES in WARTIME? Heaven forfend. I guess I
could get all righteous and note things like the great Texas unionist massacre
or Shelton Laurel or Saltville or all the rest of the long litany of
Confederate atrocities, but I won't. These things happen in war, and both
sides were equally culpable of murder, destruction, rapine and pillage.
Mark T Pitcavage
In article <4re3dc$3...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>,
RStacy2229 <rstac...@aol.com> wrote:
>In article <31d7554f...@nntp.netcruiser>, and...@ix.netcom.com (A.
>Chilton Lannen) writes:
>
>>an entire population's will to fight you have to devastate them.
>>I'm not saying it's wrong or right, just an aspect of wars.
>>
>So you're saying that if Lee's army had burned and looted its way into
>Pennsylvania, that would have improved Southern chances of victory?
>And are you thereby justifying "Operation Linebacker" and the
>carpet-bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong? The German bombing of London and the
>firebombing of Dresden? What about the devastation of Poland under Nazi
>rule? Are you saying that this was just part of breaking their will to
>fight?
>Perhaps if Sherman had herded Southern civilians onto railcars and shipped
>them to concentration camps, then starved, shot or gassed them to death,
>maybe THAT would have done the trick, huh?
Maybe he should have just enslaved them and put them to work on the
plantations, huh? That would have been a rather more poetic justice.
Mark T Pitcavage
Brian Blakistone
char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) wrote:
>Suppose that the Union armies had not invaded the Confederacy.
>Would Southerners then willingly have freed their slaves, thus subjecting
>themselves to the economic equivalent of twenty or thirty Marches to the Sea?
>Unthinkable. They would only have freed their slaves if and when slavery
>became unprofitable. But if slavery had become unprofitable, the
>result would have been a catastrophic fall in slave prices as slaves
>ceased to be an asset and became a liability, essentially wiping out
>two to three billion dollars of capital investment (not including the
>fall in land values which would probably have occurred at the same time).
I'm not so sure, if the planters could lever themselves up to their
eyeballs with slaves as collatoral, you would have two powerful groups
that needed a bailout, the government might just have compensated
them, spreading the cost to the entire nation. Another way might have
been a very gradual phase out, so that all children born are free,
since the dollars the children would earn would be far in the future
and uncertain, it would be a far less costly way for the planters to
eliminate the institution.
Brian
gary charbonneau
In article <4re3bh$3...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>,
RStacy2229 <rstac...@aol.com> wrote:
>Why is it that the amount of hostility exhibited toward the South is, in
>most cases, directly proportional to the likelihood of the person posting
>from an "edu" address?
Mr. Stacy, the hostility I feel toward the South is not due to the fact
that I post from an "edu" address, but because the South is too darn
hot and humid for my tastes (I feel hostile toward Indiana,
from which this post emanates, for precisely the same reason). I have
no reason for hostility toward any of the people of the South, and feel
none. I hope that you have no hostility toward me, and especially
hope that you have no hostility toward me because of my e-mail address.
- Gary Charbonneau
gary charbonneau
In article <4re3c1$3...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>,
RStacy2229 <rstac...@aol.com> wrote:
>In article <4r8o1k$g...@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>,
>char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) writes:
>
>>either _cause_ their impoverishment or _result_ from it. Barring
>>the continuing survival and profitability, they were doomed to become
>>drastically poorer whether Yankee armies invaded or not.>
>>- Gary Charbonneau
>
>Andrew Stooksbury had asked whether destruction by Southerners exceeded
>that caused by Sherman's troops.
Fair enough. I am quite sure that we both agree that the destruction caused
by Sherman exceeded that caused by Southern troops. It may even have
exceeded it by a whole order of magnitude. Since I have never seen
any figure quoted on the value of the destruction caused by Southern troops,
I certainly can't say.
>Somehow, Mr. Charbonneau has turned this
>into a discussion of slavery -- an old abolitionist trick. Mr. Stooksbury
>was discussing the value of the crops, livestock, homes, barns and other
>property stolen or destroyed by the vandal horde. Now comes Mr. Charboneau
>to say that because of emancipation, "White Southerners ... were doomed to
>become drastically poorer whether Yankee armies invaded or not."
>
>This is a non sequitur. Most white families in the South did not own
>slaves and didn't lose a dime because of emancipation.
Hardly a non-sequitur. White Southerners, as a statistical category,
most definitely and demonstrably did become poorer as a result of
emancipation -- since that statistical category includes both slaveholders
and non-slaveholders, and the slaveholders owned most of the wealth. But
I accept the criticism and suggest that the start of the sentence be
amended to read, "Slaveholding white southerners ...."
>But the value of
>lost labor (75 percent of Southern soldiers were from non-slaveholding
>families)
That parenthetical statement may be true, but at the same time very
misleading. Perhaps "75 percent of Southern soldiers were from
non-slaveholding families," but that would include Southern soldiers
(black as well as white) who fought for the Union as well as those
who fought for the Confederacy. We know that 75 percent of Southern white
families owned no slaves, but I don't think we know that the distribution
of _Confederate_ soldiers mirrored the distribution of Southern white
families. If anyone has any statistics on that, I would be most
interested in seeing them.
>by those men who left their farms to fight for their country for
>four years was immense, while those who were killed and died of illness
>represented a permanent loss to their country. And the destruction wrought
>by Sherman's forces was visited upon slaveholder and non-slaveholder
>alike.
>
>Yet we see once again the old Yankee trick: When in doubt, demagogue the
>issue by castigating the South for slavery, as if nothing else mattered
>about the war except the region's system of labor. And the context within
>which Mr. Charbonneau resorts to this trick is quite enlightening. A
>family lost its home to arsonists? Its sons were slain on the
>battlefields, its daughters raped by Yankee stragglers? Its livestock were
>stolen or slaughtered? Crops stolen or burnt? Everything that wasn't
>nailed down was taken from these defenseless civilians?
>
>Oh, reasons Mr. Charbonneau, this is not a war crime, but social justice,
>since the family was "doomed to become drastically poorer."
I have not reasoned that these were not war crimes. I was addressing a quite
separate issue, which is whether these acts were primarily responsible for any
real or suggested impoverishment of the South as a region. That they
were responsible for some level of impoverishment is unquestionable.
However, they pale into insignificance compared with the effects of
emancipation.
>These people
>had committed the sin of being white Southerners and were therefore
>deserving of whatever fate befell them. Never mind the slippery morality
>involved in the process of saying that the end justifies the means.
John Dewey, for one, pointed out that the dichotomy between means and
ends is false. We always choose a package that consists of both ends
and the means to achieve them. When Southerners seceded, for example,
they had no choice but to leave almost half of the Southern population
in a state of slavery, to work the farms and plantations while the
white men went off to war. Even if they had had any inclination
whatsoever to free the slaves (they did not), they could not have done so with
any realistic prospect of achieving independence. Did the end (independence)
justify the means (continued slavery)? If not, was slavery
a war crime? Was the value of the package (independence with continued
slavery) worth the moral cost of the package? Must the answer depend on
whose ox got gored?
>Never
>mind the dehumanization of the foe. So have the forces of imperial
>conquest and tyranny always reasoned. Pizarro and De Soto were quite
>similar in their reasoning, with "God, gold and glory" being their version
>of the Union's "John Brown's body."
>
>Thinking of the reaction we Southerners get when we defend the Confederacy
>from calumny, let me say to our Northern neighbors:
>"You won the war; get over it!"
I did not win the war. I was not in the war. I do not refer to the
North ca. 1861-1865 as "we".
- Gary Charbonneau
gary charbonneau
In article <4re7o3$b...@optional.cts.com>,
If by "the government", you mean, "the Confederate government",
probably not. If slavery had ever been legally abolished in an
independent Confederacy, it is highly probable that it would have
been abolished by the individual state governments, as required by
the theory of states rights and, basically, by the Confederate
constitution. I believe that this would likely have occurred
by means of that "other way" that you suggest, but this
would still almost certainly have been accompanied by the
loss of all the capital invested in slaves, and, quite probably,
followed upon the emancipation of most of the slaves by their individual
owners, leaving only a minority to be freed. The slaveholders would,
however, have had every economic incentive to do what they could to maintain
the profitability of slavery by any means possible, to perpetuate the
institution for as long as possible.
- Gary Charbonneau
efr...@cc.memphis.edu
RS McCain asks:
> Why is it that the amount of hostility exhibited toward the South is, in
> most cases, directly proportional to the likelihood of the person posting
> from an "edu" address?
Why is that a literate person can go through this
ng and find "hostility...toward the South" when
what is usually displayed is informed criticism
of aspects of *Confederate* history and politics?
Hostility toward "The South" (tm) has indeed been
exhibited from time to time, but such people as
Tony D. were not welcomed by the likes of the
list below.
> Think about it: Pitcavage, Simpson, Epperson, Schmidt. Except for Mike at
> Clemson, I don't think the Southrons have a single "edu" poster.
"Edu" Frank
Stephen Schmidt
rstac...@aol.com (RStacy2229) writes:
>Why is it that the amount of hostility exhibited toward the South is, in
>most cases, directly proportional to the likelihood of the person posting
>from an "edu" address?
>Clemson, I don't think the Southrons have a single "edu" poster.
Steve Wall has a .edu account, I think. Maury used to have
a .edu account but doesn't anymore.
Some of it is just statistical flukes. There are more
Group members than diehard Southrons. Out of the ten or
twelve Group members, it is quite likely that at least
some would be from .edu sites. There are really only
about four or so Southrons (Reb, RSM, Linda, Mike, have
I missed anyone?) and the odds of not having a .edu in
such a small sample are respectable.
The four you named are educators. We posses a desire to inform
those who need informing. I think the hostility is all on
the other end. It's hard to teach those who don't want to
be taught, preferring comfortable falsehoods, but some of
us make the effort anyway. Sometimes it's more for the
benefit of the lurkers than the Southrons, though.
Steve
--
Stephen Schmidt Department of Economics
210A Social Sciences Union College
(518) 388-6078 Schenectady NY 12308
Stephen Schmidt
rstac...@aol.com (RStacy2229) writes:
>So you're saying that if Lee's army had burned and looted its way into
>Pennsylvania, that would have improved Southern chances of victory?
>And are you thereby justifying "Operation Linebacker" and the
>carpet-bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong? The German bombing of London and the
>firebombing of Dresden? What about the devastation of Poland under Nazi
>rule? Are you saying that this was just part of breaking their will to
>fight?
None of those materially affected the outcome of the wars in
question, except possibly the Poland case. If you want to make
a more reasonable comparison (which I guess you don't, but bear
with me) you might compare it to the Phoenix program during the
Vietnam War, which was actually pretty effective as a weapon
against the Vietcong.
>Perhaps if Sherman had herded Southern civilians onto railcars and shipped
>them to concentration camps, then starved, shot or gassed them to death,
>maybe THAT would have done the trick, huh?
Ah, nothing like a little pious hypocrisy. It's been what, ten
days since RStacy was last outraged because someone raised the
Nazis? Maybe twelve?
James F. Epperson
On 3 Jul 1996, RStacy2229 wrote:
> In article <4r8o1k$g...@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>,
> char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) writes:
>
> >char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu
>
> Why is it that the amount of hostility exhibited toward the South is, in
> most cases, directly proportional to the likelihood of the person posting
> from an "edu" address?
>
> Think about it: Pitcavage, Simpson, Epperson, Schmidt. Except for Mike at
> Clemson, I don't think the Southrons have a single "edu" poster.
This is a red-herring claim on two counts. First, Linda Teasley is an
English professor at the University of South Florida (she just doesn't use
a school account for this newsgroup), Steve Wall is in the Philosophy
Department at the same school, Chuck Pinnegar (who seems to be dormant
right now) posted from an account at a Canadian university, and there have
been several transient members of the newsgroup who advocated the
Confederate viewpoint from university addresses.
Second, I am not "hostile" to the South. I am hostile to attempts to
present myth as history, however.
Jim Epperson | I would like to see truthful
Department of Mathematical Sciences | history written -- US Grant
University of Alabama in Huntsville +-------------------------------------
eppe...@math.uah.edu URL: http://www.math.uah.edu/~epperson
URL: http://members.aol.com/jfepperson
gary charbonneau
By any theory which is not logically equivalent to anarchy. More
specifically, by the theory which holds that, in the absence of
demonstrable and irremediable oppression by the government, people owe
loyalty to the government and have no right to take up arms against it,
and that the right of self-determination is limited to a considerable extent
by the principle of majority rule.
That the Confederates also subscribed to this theory is demonstrated
by their actions against the Unionists of eastern Tennessee and
northern Alabama. They merely subscribed to a particular version of the theory
which held that the government of the United States was a special
case, not entitled to the loyalty of the people of the United
States if and when that loyalty conflicted with loyalty to a
particular state.
- Gary Charbonneau
efr...@cc.memphis.edu
Robert Stacy "Victim from a long line of victims"
McCain writes, in response to Gary Charbonneau:
> Oh, reasons Mr. Charbonneau, this is not a war crime, but social justice,
> since the family was "doomed to become drastically poorer." These people
> had committed the sin of being white Southerners and were therefore
> deserving of whatever fate befell them. Never mind the slippery morality
> involved in the process of saying that the end justifies the means. Never
> mind the dehumanization of the foe. So have the forces of imperial
> conquest and tyranny always reasoned. Pizarro and De Soto were quite
> similar in their reasoning, with "God, gold and glory" being their version
> of the Union's "John Brown's body."
> Robert Stacy McCain
> Rome, Third Military District, Occupied CSA
Well, RS, we'll all start weeping for you and yours
when you deed your property back to the Creeks.
Ed "now it's all clear to me" Frank
Brooks Simpson
rstac...@aol.com (RStacy2229) wrote:
>Why is it that the amount of hostility exhibited toward the South is, in
>most cases, directly proportional to the likelihood of the person posting
>from an "edu" address?
>
>Think about it: Pitcavage, Simpson, Epperson, Schmidt. Except for Mike at
>Clemson, I don't think the Southrons have a single "edu" poster.
Well, this would be an ignorant comment from some people, but, then, I've
come to expect that from this one.
Apparently Mr. McCain forgets that many of the posters he lists above
have never expressed hostility to a group of people who were in the
South--enslaved blacks. Rather, their hostility, as far as I can
understand it, is to the fact of their enslavement.
But then perhaps Mr. McCain doesn't recognize blacks as Southerners, only
whites. Where this leaves mixed-race offspring is for others to debate.
I do think Mr. McCain is in a fair way to take the prize as flame-baiting
Reb of the year, replacing one long-time holder of the award and a few
folks from early this year.
Brooks Simpson
A. Chilton Lannen
rstac...@aol.com (RStacy2229) wrote:
>In article <31d7554f...@nntp.netcruiser>, and...@ix.netcom.com (A.
>Chilton Lannen) writes:
>
>>To break
>>an entire population's will to fight you have to devastate them.
>>I'm not saying it's wrong or right, just an aspect of wars.
>>
>So you're saying that if Lee's army had burned and looted its way into
>Pennsylvania, that would have improved Southern chances of victory?
First, he could not have done so, as his army was neither large
enough nor free of opposition. But if he had, say, managed to wipe
out several manufacturing sites, then, yes, the chances of a Southern
victory would improve.
>And are you thereby justifying "Operation Linebacker" and the
>carpet-bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong?
It worked quite well in hurting the capacity of the North
Vietnamese to wage effective war (excluding terrorist attacks and
guerilla actions). That it did not fulfill the completely unrealistic
expectations some had does not diminish the fact that it did have an
effect.
> The German bombing of London and the
>firebombing of Dresden?
Both important production centers of both people and products.
The German bombing of London might well have caused the British to
capitulate if Hitler had properly funded the Luftwaffe (and if the
Luftwaffe had better strategic commanders). The loss of Dresden's
production hurt Germany and probably contributed to ending the war
sooner.
> What about the devastation of Poland under Nazi
>rule? Are you saying that this was just part of breaking their will to
>fight?
This example doesn't fit. The Polish had already surrendered to
the Germans. War won, morale broken. Continuing to wage war on the
populace after it has capitulated is murder.
>Perhaps if Sherman had herded Southern civilians onto railcars and shipped
>them to concentration camps, then starved, shot or gassed them to death,
>maybe THAT would have done the trick, huh?
So because I believe that what Sherman did had a real military
purpose, I somehow support the Holocaust?? Hitler's maniacal
destruction of European Jews had nothing to do with military policy.
Indeed, it hurt the war effort because Nazi soldiers were gassing
helpless citizens who had already surrendered rather than shooting at
the Soviets, who were far from helpless and had not surrendered.
--Andrew
-------
and...@ix.netcom.com
"God cannot alter the past; that is why he is obliged to connive
at the existence of historians." -- Samuel Butler
Maury
~<4re3bh$3...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, rstac...@aol.com says...
>In article <4r8o1k$g...@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>,
>char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) writes:
>
>>char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu
>
>Why is it that the amount of hostility exhibited toward the South is, in
>most cases, directly proportional to the likelihood of the person posting
>from an "edu" address?
>
>Think about it: Pitcavage, Simpson, Epperson, Schmidt. Except for Mike at
>Clemson, I don't think the Southrons have a single "edu" poster.
>
>RSMC
--------------------------------
They're slow. I graduated! B-)
Formerly, w...@itc.virginia.edu
W...@ITC.VIRGINIA.EDU
That address is still on my images I uploaded to
West Virginia's "Byrd" military site that I posted
on recently.
Kind Regards,
w...@cstone.net
Maury, in Virginia
Dave Smith
rstac...@aol.com (RStacy2229) wrote:
>Why is it that the amount of hostility exhibited toward the South is, in
>most cases, directly proportional to the likelihood of the person posting
>from an "edu" address?
>Think about it: Pitcavage, Simpson, Epperson, Schmidt. Except for Mike at
>Clemson, I don't think the Southrons have a single "edu" poster.
That's one of the more ridiculous things I've seen posted in
quite a while.
Dave "non edu, and sometimes viewed as a member of the Group" Smith
------------------------------------------------------------
Dave Smith "Always Store Beer in a Dark Place"
Villa Hills, Ky --- Lazarus Long
http://users.aol.com/dmsmith001/
The Cincinnati CWRT http://users.aol.com/CintiCWRT/
------------------------------------------------------------
Ted Waltrip
In <4reqk9$g...@news.asu.edu> Brooks Simpson <brooks....@asu.edu>
writes:
>rstac...@aol.com (RStacy2229) wrote:
>
>>Why is it that the amount of hostility exhibited toward the South is,
in
>>most cases, directly proportional to the likelihood of the person
posting
>>from an "edu" address?
>>
>>Think about it: Pitcavage, Simpson, Epperson, Schmidt. Except for
Mike at
>>Clemson, I don't think the Southrons have a single "edu" poster.
>
I've
>come to expect that from this one.
>
>Apparently Mr. McCain forgets that many of the posters he lists above
>have never expressed hostility to a group of people who were in the
>South--enslaved blacks. Rather, their hostility, as far as I can
>understand it, is to the fact of their enslavement.
>
>But then perhaps Mr. McCain doesn't recognize blacks as Southerners,
only
>whites. Where this leaves mixed-race offspring is for others to
debate.
>
>I do think Mr. McCain is in a fair way to take the prize as
flame-baiting
>Reb of the year, replacing one long-time holder of the award and a few
>folks from early this year.
>
>Brooks Simpson
>
Same old whining claptrap! For christ's sake learn a new tune!! Ted
Waltrip
Ted Waltrip
In <1996Jul3.1...@unvax.union.edu> schm...@unvax.union.edu
(Stephen Schmidt) writes:
>
> There are more
>Group members than diehard Southrons. Out of the ten or
>twelve Group members, it is quite likely that at least
>some would be from .edu sites. There are really only
>about four or so Southrons (Reb, RSM, Linda, Mike, have
>I missed anyone?)
Stevey old buddy!! I'm still here watching you!!! Ted Waltrip
TRuger4279
True, but then they would have had to do the same to some of their own
troops
that still owned slaves in the beginning. Let us not forget that
Northerners still
owned, although a much smaller percentage, slaves.
Curt
A. Chilton Lannen
schm...@unvax.union.edu (Stephen Schmidt) wrote:
>rstac...@aol.com (RStacy2229) writes:
>>Why is it that the amount of hostility exhibited toward the South is, in
>>most cases, directly proportional to the likelihood of the person posting
>>from an "edu" address?
>>Think about it: Pitcavage, Simpson, Epperson, Schmidt. Except for Mike at
>>Clemson, I don't think the Southrons have a single "edu" poster.
>
>Steve Wall has a .edu account, I think. Maury used to have
>a .edu account but doesn't anymore.
>
>Some of it is just statistical flukes. There are more
>Group members than diehard Southrons. Out of the ten or
>twelve Group members, it is quite likely that at least
>some would be from .edu sites. There are really only
>about four or so Southrons (Reb, RSM, Linda, Mike, have
>I missed anyone?) and the odds of not having a .edu in
>such a small sample are respectable.
But wait! Maybe he is actually on to something here. I had a
an .edu address last year and will have another .edu address starting
again in August. ;-)
Or maybe he is not onto something.
--Andrew
If you are a fan of wacko theories, you should hear the "The Beatles
were Communist spies and they left clues in their music and names"
theory. I thought that one up amongst some historically minded
friends in a bar at 3 AM. We couldn't find a publisher for the
planned book, tho. What a shame . . .
Ted Waltrip
In <Pine.SUN.3.91.960703125945.10050G-100000@zonker> "James F.
Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
>
>O
>Second, I am not "hostile" to the South. I am hostile to attempts to
>present myth as history, however.
>
>Jim Epperson
But in our Southern opinion Jimmy that's exactly what you "victors"
have been doing for 130 years. Ted Waltrip
Lynn Berkowitz
On Thu, 04 Jul 1996 05:59:15 GMT, and...@ix.netcom.com (A. Chilton
Lannen) wrote:
:If you are a fan of wacko theories, you should hear the "The Beatles
:were Communist spies and they left clues in their music and names"
:theory. I thought that one up amongst some historically minded
:friends in a bar at 3 AM. We couldn't find a publisher for the
:planned book, tho. What a shame . . .
:
No, no, no, no!! That was to cover up Paul McCartney's death at the
hands of, of, uh, wait a minute...well, some terrorist group that
doesn't really exist. Emmett Jordan would probably know. :)
A co-worker of mine was in that same bar, at about the same time,
talking to a bunch of conspiracy-minded whacko gun nuts. He basically
agreed with everything they told him (there were about six of them)
and he let them on to a little secret: the Trilateral Commission, New
World Order, The Group and Elders of Zion have left secret codes in
the newspapers, magazines, advertisements, etc. You know, all those
codes that begin with http://www.
ObCivilWar:
On this day in Vicksburg, 133 years ago, the "Bowels of the
Confederacy" received a mighty enema, allowing the Father of Waters to
once again flow unconstipated to the sea. This was due to another
conspiracy plot of Yankee devil Pemberton, who planned to turn over
the city on the 4th of July, having been urged to do so during a
seance in which the ghost of Benjamin Franklin urged him to return to
Pennsylvania.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Lynn Berkowitz lynn...@ix.netcom.com
James F. Epperson
On 3 Jul 1996, RStacy2229 wrote:
> And why? Tell me. Why? As Jefferson Davis had said, the South asked
> nothing but to be let alone. This war of conquest and subjugation was
> necessary under what theory of government?
There is a terrible reality to warfare which says that it almost always
expands uncontrollably. Politicians who have embarked casually into wars
never seem to learn this, but it is true. They always say that they can
control things, but they almost never can. Japan did not think she would
get her cities fire-bombed and nuked when she embarked on the policies
that led to Pearl Harbor, but it happened that way. Japan also only
wanted to be "let alone," to pursue her own interests in China. She
miscalculated, got into a position where she had to fight in order to
preserve what she perceived as her national honor, and ended getting
smacked pretty hard in the resulting war.
I see a lot of similarity between the actions of the Southern politicians
and the Japanese leaders. Both were very much driven by rather extreme
notions of honor; both claimed that they really did not start the war, but
were forced into it by the actions of the US government; both just wanted
to be let alone to pursue their own destinies, not acknowledging that
there might be legitimate interests of the US government in conflict with
those destinies; both were badly beat up in the war that resulted; both
still have adherants who fail to see that by initiating the events that
led to war, they (i.e., Japanese government or secessionist politicians)
bear a heavy responsibility for what happened to their people.
(Caveat and disclaimer: By no means do I intend to compare the CSA to
those parts of the Japanese war effort such as the Bataan Death March or
other atrocities. My point is to make a limited comparison between the
political decisions that led to the start of the two wars, =ONLY=.)
Brian Blakistone
char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) wrote:
>Brian Blakistone <cbla...@sdcc13.ucsd.edu> wrote:
>>char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) wrote:
>>>Would Southerners then willingly have freed their slaves, thus subjecting
>>>themselves to the economic equivalent of twenty or thirty Marches to the Sea?
[I suggest a government bailout or a very gradual emancipation]
>If by "the government", you mean, "the Confederate government",
>probably not. If slavery had ever been legally abolished in an
>independent Confederacy, it is highly probable that it would have
>been abolished by the individual state governments, as required by
>the theory of states rights and, basically, by the Confederate
>constitution.
I was actually thinking in terms of the States remaining in the Union,
but even if not there would be no reason the Confederate gov't. could
not offer a carrot to entice states to get rid of the institution.
Also since States could rejoin the Union could on a fifty percent
vote, it could have been offered by the Union as an enticement to
Unionists like Holden of NC to return to the fold permenantly.
> I believe that this would likely have occurred
>by means of that "other way" that you suggest, but this
>would still almost certainly have been accompanied by the
>loss of all the capital invested in slaves, and, quite probably,
>followed upon the emancipation of most of the slaves by their individual
>owners, leaving only a minority to be freed.
I'm not sure I follow this, they would retain the rights to their
current capital in the slaves, it would only be the children that they
would lose out on. Assume a company owns an unsafe factory that
cannot be refitted, it was very cheap to make. The government allows
them to use it for its useful life, but requires it be replaced with a
more expensive version when its life is done. You haven't really lost
capital, you miss some profits far in the future, but the present
value of those dollars is very small.
>The slaveholders would,
>however, have had every economic incentive to do what they could to maintain
>the profitability of slavery by any means possible, to perpetuate the
>institution for as long as possible.
This is certainly true, I just don't think a total loss of the capital
invested was inevitable, likely perhaps. There is another difference
between the destruction of Sherman and the emancipation of the slaves.
Emancipation was a huge transfer of wealth from the planters to the
freedmen, the South as a whole was not harmed, indeed it was
undoubtedly a net gain in the long term. The destruction of houses,
farms, livestock and infrastructure actually destroyed resources, as
opposed to transferring title.
Brian
efr...@cc.memphis.edu
In article <4rfnbb$o...@dfw-ixnews9.ix.netcom.com>, ted...@ix.netcom.com(Ted Waltrip ) writes:
> In <1996Jul3.1...@unvax.union.edu> schm...@unvax.union.edu
> (Stephen Schmidt) writes:
>>
>>Group members than diehard Southrons. Out of the ten or
>>twelve Group members, it is quite likely that at least
>>some would be from .edu sites. There are really only
>>about four or so Southrons (Reb, RSM, Linda, Mike, have
>>I missed anyone?)
>
Strange thing for a grownup to devote himself too.
Ted, when you are ready to do something other than
make one-line sniping attacks we all might be more
interested in what you have to say.
Ed "speaking for many, I daresay" Frank
REB 4 LIFE
In article <Pine.SUN.3.91.960703125945.10050G-100000@zonker>, "James F.
Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
<snippage of pro-South census>
>Second, I am not "hostile" to the South. I am hostile to attempts to
>present myth as history, however.
Yeah, me too. That claptrap about how "Lincoln freed the slaves"
ticks me off every time I see it.
R4L
REB 4 LIFE
In article <1996Jul3.1...@unvax.union.edu>,
schm...@unvax.union.edu (Stephen Schmidt) writes:
>Some of it is just statistical flukes. There are more
>Group members than diehard Southrons. Out of the ten or
>twelve Group members, it is quite likely that at least
>some would be from .edu sites.
Ten or twelve. What happend to the Gang of Four. Seems
like ye be on the run, if you feel the need for so many call-ups
from the minor leagues.
>There are really only
>about four or so Southrons (Reb, RSM, Linda, Mike, have
>I missed anyone?)
You left out Kathie Fraser and the Rev. Dr. Maggard. I would
include Phil Leigh, Michael Polizzi, and Mike Behrent in our
number as well. Also, you will be glad to hear that the Messrs.
Gaelic Reb, Celtic Reb, the Missouri Rebel, and Larry Beane
are still with us. However, they have been heavily involved in
some internal "housekeeping" here in the Confederacy and have
had limited time for pointless discourse with yankees and
scalawags. Expect most, if not all of them, to return here later
in the summer.
<snip>
>The four you named are educators. We posses a desire to inform
>those who need informing.
I prefer the word indoctrinate over inform when relative to the "four".
>I think the hostility is all on
>the other end.
No no no. It's hard to be hostile when you spend so much time
laughing.
>It's hard to teach those who don't want to
>be taught, preferring comfortable falsehoods, but some of
>us make the effort anyway.
Comfortable falsehoods? Lemme see here... oh yeah! Such as
Lincoln freed the slaves. Such as Sherman's destruction of Georgia
was a legitimate tool of war. Such as secession was illegal and those
who supported it were traitors. Such as Lincoln was justified in
"bending" the Constitution with regards to habeus corpus,
censorship of the press, etc...
>Sometimes it's more for the
>benefit of the lurkers than the Southrons, though.
Lurkers Beware!
R4L
REB 4 LIFE
In article <Pine.SUN.3.91.960703133525.10391B-100000@zonker>, "James F.
Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
<snips fore and aft>
>I see a lot of similarity between the actions of the Southern politicians
>and the Japanese leaders. Both were very much driven by rather extreme
>notions of honor; both claimed that they really did not start the war,
but
>were forced into it by the actions of the US government; both just wanted
>to be let alone to pursue their own destinies,
What a totally amazing and completely bizarre notion. The Japanese
wanted to be "left alone" to pursue their territorial conquests in China
and SE Asia. They aggressively sought to conquer other soveriegn
nations. The Confederacy sought to be "left alone" so its citizens could
lead THEIR OWN LIVES on THEIR OWN SOIL. In case you haven't
noticed on your own, allow me to point out that these goals ARE NOT THE
SAME.
Geez Louise, put your brain in gear next time...
R4L
Dave Gorski
In article <00003213...@msn.com>, Wolly...@msn.com (Andrew
Stooksbury) wrote:
> So, what you are saying is that it was the Southern troops and not
> Sherman and his March to the sea that destroyed Georgia. I guess it
> was not Sheridan in the Valley either. I guess the Northern scorched
> earth policy had nothing to do with it.
>
> David S.
If I understand correctly from the E-mail I've received and the
posts I read here the answer to my questions about hostility in 1996
would be about the same as if I had asked the question in 1866.
The basis of the hostility is the war itself, the loss of life, the
destruction of property and land (regardless of who caused the damage)
and the "subjugation " of the Southern people.
Media stereotypes, and Northern insensitivity towards (white)
southern culture perpetuate the hostility.
But what about (white) Southern sensitivity towards Blacks? or
White American's sensitivity towards Native Americans, Germans towards
Jews, men towards women, and the list goes on and on and on.....
The South is not the first "cultural" group to have lost a war. Even
though there are those who will deny that it was lost. Doesn't there
come a time when you must force yourself to accept what has undeniably
happened as a part of history, a part of your culture, and move on ??
Was the South as resistant to physical and financial reconstruction
as it seems to be to a psychological reunion to the United States ?
Thanks for the many good points made,
Dave Gorski
James F. Epperson
No comparison is perfect, but this one is better than you might think.
For one thing, the original post that I was responding to decried the
extent of destruction in the American South during the ACW, and in that
regard the comparison is very valid. Neither the Japanese nor the
secessionists considered that their actions might lead to significant
harm being visited on their home lands, and ever since there have been
those who were unwilling to face up to their (Japanese or secessionist)
responsibility for that.
But, to go farther, your defense of the Confederates ignores, yet again,
the fact that they wanted to be left alone in order to continue to reap
the benefits of slavery. Is this less of an evil that wanting to conquer
other nations? At least the Chinese could fight back . . .
Steven F. Miller
cbla...@sdcc13.ucsd.edu (Brian Blakistone) wrote:
[interesteing hypothetical discussion of possibility of gradual
emancipation snipped]
>There is another difference
>between the destruction of Sherman and the emancipation of the slaves.
>Emancipation was a huge transfer of wealth from the planters to the
>freedmen, the South as a whole was not harmed, indeed it was
>undoubtedly a net gain in the long term. The destruction of houses,
>farms, livestock and infrastructure actually destroyed resources, as
>opposed to transferring title.
I don't see the logic in saying that emancipation was a transfer of
*wealth* to the freedpeople. It was an uncompensated liquidation of
assets held by the slaveowners. The ex-slaves' "title" to themselves
was metaphorical. The wealth they had represented was gone, period.
After slavery their persons had no market value at all: they couldn't
sell themselves or present themselves as collateral for a loan, for
example, as their former owners could do with them when they were
slaves.
(Come to think of it, Reconstruction might have looked considerably
different if every freedman and freedwoman emerged from slavery with
actual capital equivalent to their value as slaves.)
My point, of course, is not to downplay the significance of freedom
to the freedpeople themselves or to the Southern economy in the long
term, but rather to underscore the devastating effects of emancipation
on the Southern economy immediately after the war.
Cordially,
Steven F. Miller
Cordially,
Steven F. Miller
System Janitor
Brooks Simpson <brooks....@asu.edu> writes:
>rstac...@aol.com (RStacy2229) wrote:
>Apparently Mr. McCain forgets that many of the posters he lists above
>have never expressed hostility to a group of people who were in the
>South--enslaved blacks. Rather, their hostility, as far as I can
>understand it, is to the fact of their enslavement.
I don't remember *anyone* on this list ever expressing hostility
towards enslaved blacks Brooks.
Maybe the hostility Mr. McCain is refering to is embodied in the
focus on the South's enslavement of blacks verses the apparent
indifference towards the North's desire not to have any blacks at all,
free or slave. From Lincoln's Ottawa speech (which Mr. McCain
asked for the other day), ``There is a physical difference between the two
[races] which, in my judgment, will probably forbid their ever living
together upon the footing of perfect equality...'', to Indiana's
laws forbiding blacks to become residents of the state, to
the Yankee government's stated desire to send all blacks to
South America (37th Congress, 2d session, Report No. 148,
Emancipation and Colonization, 1862), it is not clear that the
Yankees would have dealt with having four million blacks in their
midst even as well as the Southerners did.
>But then perhaps Mr. McCain doesn't recognize blacks as Southerners, only
>whites. Where this leaves mixed-race offspring is for others to debate.
I think this is unfair, and that Mr. McCain's use of ``Southerner''
is similar to mine, and probably excludes more whites (scalawags,
or whites who supported the Union) than it does blacks. Southerner:
person from the South who support(ed/s) the Confederacy. I don't
expect you to use the word as I do. I know plenty of people who
don't support the Confederacy who consider themselves Southerners...
I defer to each of them.
>I do think Mr. McCain is in a fair way to take the prize as flame-baiting
>Reb of the year, replacing one long-time holder of the award and a few
>folks from early this year.
And I think Mr. Pitcavage can keep the prize as flame-baiting Yank for
another year. Did you notice the rash of
rude-one-liners-following-full-page-inclusions that came streaming out
of his keyboard right after his coup taking post about the forgotten
documents? I likened them to ``smoking a cigarette afterwards''...
-Mike
A. Chilton Lannen
reb4...@aol.com (REB 4 LIFE) wrote:
>In article <1996Jul3.1...@unvax.union.edu>,
>schm...@unvax.union.edu (Stephen Schmidt) writes:
<<snip discussion of The Group (tm)>>
>>It's hard to teach those who don't want to
>>be taught, preferring comfortable falsehoods, but some of
>>us make the effort anyway.
>
>Comfortable falsehoods? Lemme see here... oh yeah! Such as
>Lincoln freed the slaves.
He *did* lay the groundwork for such with the Emancipation
Proclaimation (which admittedly did not free any slaves at the time it
was issued), but did not do it out of a sense of moral outrage. It
was a tool of war.
> Such as Sherman's destruction of Georgia
>was a legitimate tool of war.
We could debate that until the end of time. It depends on your
outlook on war. Some of us think it was militarily necessary, others
think that he should have just politely asked the rebels to stop
supplying the Confederate armies.
> Such as secession was illegal and those
>who supported it were traitors.
Since you invoke the Constitution later in this post, I assume
that you think it had some legal validity. Therefore, here are the
relevant passages for those who do not have a copy handy.
Secession was indeed illegal by the tenants of the Constitution,
and _engaging in war_ against the United States was considered treason
in the same document.
Article 6: This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which
shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which
shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the
supreme law of the land; and the judges in every State shall be bound
thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the
contrary notwithstanding."
The seceding states refused to obey the Constitution and laws of
the United States. That is a legal violation.
Article 3, Section 3: "Treason against the United States shall
consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their
enemies, giving them aid and comfort."
The seceding states levyed war against the United States by South
Carolina firing on Fort Sumter and the other states joining in.
> Such as Lincoln was justified in
>"bending" the Constitution with regards to habeus corpus,
>censorship of the press, etc...
Article 1, Section 9: "The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus
shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion
the public safety may require it."
I'd say that there was a rebellion going on.
Amendment 1: "Congress shall make no law . . ."
Drat it. This only applies to Congress. Oh well, guess the
President can issue executive orders adbridging these rights in times
of crisis.
>>Sometimes it's more for the
>>benefit of the lurkers than the Southrons, though.
>
>Lurkers Beware!
>
>R4L
--Andrew
A. Chilton Lannen
lynn...@ix.netcom.com (Lynn Berkowitz) wrote:
>On Thu, 04 Jul 1996 05:59:15 GMT, and...@ix.netcom.com (A. Chilton
>Lannen) wrote:
>
>:If you are a fan of wacko theories, you should hear the "The Beatles
>:were Communist spies and they left clues in their music and names"
>:theory. I thought that one up amongst some historically minded
>:friends in a bar at 3 AM. We couldn't find a publisher for the
>:planned book, tho. What a shame . . .
>:
>No, no, no, no!! That was to cover up Paul McCartney's death at the
>hands of, of, uh, wait a minute...well, some terrorist group that
>doesn't really exist. Emmett Jordan would probably know. :)
There are clues that point to McCartney's death above and beyond
the Abbey Road album cover. This commie agent posing as a musician
knew he was going to be assassinated by the KGB and replaced with an
exact physical duplicate. He secretly applied for aid from those who
knew his plight in the West by writing the song "Help". He needed
help from "not just anybody", but from the CIA. Unfortunately he
failed and was killed. This would explain why his music is so awful
now -- the KGB couldn't find a replacement with adequate musical
talent.
Like a Sherlock Holmes mystery, the commies left clues -- in the band
members' names:
Paul: An obvious reference to Paul of Tarsus, hated by commies.
McCartney: A subtle twist of the name "McCarthy": the commie hunter.
--Since Paul was a goof, the Soviets were implying these men were
too.
John: An obvious reference to John the Baptist. The commies had John
become a druggie to imply that Mr. Baptist only saw illusions from
some bad opium.
Lennon: An obligatory tribute to "Lenin."
Ringo: "Ring" implies communist rule _around_ the entire world, and
"o" is the visual symbol of this effect.
Starr: A reference to the "Red Star" used extensively in communist
China.
George: A reference to George Washington, a hero of communist Ho Chi
Minh since the early 50s.
Harrison: Um, this is where we ran out of steam. Can anyone help
out? We'll give you a co-author status. ;-)
>A co-worker of mine was in that same bar, at about the same time,
>talking to a bunch of conspiracy-minded whacko gun nuts. He basically
>agreed with everything they told him (there were about six of them)
>and he let them on to a little secret: the Trilateral Commission, New
>World Order, The Group and Elders of Zion have left secret codes in
>the newspapers, magazines, advertisements, etc. You know, all those
>codes that begin with http://www.
That's a fascinating new conspiracy. I'll have to ponder that
one a little more . . .
--Andrew
Who is recalling another of his theories from that fateful night. I
noticed that there were more booths than chairs in the pub, which
struck me as funny. Commies are slowly doing away with independant,
individual, free-standing chairs and replacing them with "communal"
booths in an attempt to subtly influence the psyches of Americans.
And have you noticed that if you keep checking the same classroom in
any school exactly one year apart, evey year an addtional right-handed
desk is replaced by a left-handed desk? Obviously, commies are
trying to teach our children to be "leftists". Damn, those commies
are subtle.
Ted Waltrip
In <1996Jul...@admin2.memphis.edu> efr...@cc.memphis.edu writes:
>
>In article <4rfnbb$o...@dfw-ixnews9.ix.netcom.com>,
ted...@ix.netcom.com(Ted Waltrip ) writes:
>> In <1996Jul3.1...@unvax.union.edu> schm...@unvax.union.edu
>> (Stephen Schmidt) writes:
>>>
>>>Group members than diehard Southrons. Out of the ten or
>>>twelve Group members, it is quite likely that at least
>>>about four or so Southrons (Reb, RSM, Linda, Mike, have
>>>I missed anyone?)
>>
>
>Strange thing for a grownup to devote himself too.
>
>Ted, when you are ready to do something other than
>make one-line sniping attacks we all might be more
>interested in what you have to say.
>
>Ed "speaking for many, I daresay" Frank
>
>
yankee attention. And speak for yourself you arrogant (whatever)
Ted Waltrip
In <Pine.SUN.3.91.960704192741.11068B-100000@zonker> "James F.
Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
>
>But, to go farther, your defense of the Confederates ignores, yet
again,
>the fact that they wanted to be left alone in order to continue to
reap
>the benefits of slavery. Is this less of an evil that wanting to
conquer
>other nations? At least the Chinese could fight back . . .
>
>Jim Epperson
Ha Ha! Fight back! With what? sharpened bamboo spears? TW
|
efr...@cc.memphis.edu
Terd Watlip wrote:
>>> Stevey old buddy!! I'm still here watching you!!! Ted Waltrip
>>
>>Strange thing for a grownup to devote himself to.
>>
>>Ted, when you are ready to do something other than
>>make one-line sniping attacks we all might be more
>>interested in what you have to say.
>>
>>Ed "speaking for many, I daresay" Frank
>>
>>
> Frankly Ed old buddy I don't give a damn if I ever get your glorious
> yankee attention. And speak for yourself you arrogant (whatever)
Dumb racist, maybe? That makes three mistakes--
you're going to be in Wacko's league if you keep
this up.
Ed "everyone should have a goal" Frank
Brooks Simpson
ted...@ix.netcom.com(Ted Waltrip ) wrote:
>Same old whining claptrap! For christ's sake learn a new tune!! Ted
>Waltrip
Same old, same old . . . sigh. Ted's just a bit cranky.
But I wish he won't write such things about Mr. McCain.
BDS
Brooks Simpson
ted...@ix.netcom.com(Ted Waltrip ) decided to share with us the following
response to Jim's remark,
At least the Chinese could fight back . . .
>>
>>Jim Epperson
>
>Ha Ha! Fight back! With what? sharpened bamboo spears? TW
We will forgive Ted's knowledge of Chinese history. In light of his
awareness of the history of his own country, we surely can't expect much.
But even sharpened bamboo spears would be a far more potent weapon that
Ted's own retorts.
BDS
|
Brian Blakistone
sfmi...@wam.umd.edu (Steven F. Miller) wrote:
>cbla...@sdcc13.ucsd.edu (Brian Blakistone) wrote:
>>There is another difference
>>between the destruction of Sherman and the emancipation of the slaves.
>>Emancipation was a huge transfer of wealth from the planters to the
>>freedmen, the South as a whole was not harmed, indeed it was
>>undoubtedly a net gain in the long term. The destruction of houses,
>>farms, livestock and infrastructure actually destroyed resources, as
>>opposed to transferring title.
>I don't see the logic in saying that emancipation was a transfer of
>*wealth* to the freedpeople. It was an uncompensated liquidation of
>assets held by the slaveowners. The ex-slaves' "title" to themselves
>was metaphorical. The wealth they had represented was gone, period.
The value of a slave was really the future labor he could provide
above what his room and board would cost. Now the freedmen were free
to sell that labor at market prices in the form of wages. If you
accept that argument, then unless the slave is killed or moves from
the south in the post war, that value has not been destroyed, it has
been transferred from the slaveowner to the freedmen.
>After slavery their persons had no market value at all: they couldn't
>sell themselves or present themselves as collateral for a loan, for
>example, as their former owners could do with them when they were
>slaves.
But they could put their labor up as collateral to borrow land, and
then split the profits with the landowner.
>(Come to think of it, Reconstruction might have looked considerably
>different if every freedman and freedwoman emerged from slavery with
>actual capital equivalent to their value as slaves.)
Undoubtedly, but the attempts to give even unoccupied government owned
lands to the freedmen floundered in Congress.
>My point, of course, is not to downplay the significance of freedom
>to the freedpeople themselves or to the Southern economy in the long
>term, but rather to underscore the devastating effects of emancipation
>on the Southern economy immediately after the war.
I may be out in left field here but poke holes in this scenario:
Somehow you are able to free all the slaves and avoid the war. The
next day the South can produce the same basket of goodies that it did
the day before, but the planters now have to pay the freedmen. The
planters have been damaged materially, but the economic assets of the
South as a whole has not changed a bit, which is unlike the
destruction of the war, which did materially alter the ability of the
South to produce goods and services. There are also now more people
sharing the pie, so obviously the pieces get smaller.
Now I have drastically oversimplified the process, the reality is that
there were tremendous social and economic frictions in moving from a
slave based economy to a free labor one. Blacks did not want to work
in the same manner that they used to, and, as you point out, the
ability to raise capital was much more difficult, women and children
were much less likely to work, extreme working conditions would no
longer be tolerated, but I would argue many of those things have
value as well. What I am thinking is that emancipation was less
devastating to the economy of the South than the destruction, death
and chaos of the war.
Brian
efr...@cc.memphis.edu
>>> At least the Chinese could fight back . . .
>>>Jim Epperson
>>Ha Ha! Fight back! With what? sharpened bamboo spears? TW
>
> We will forgive Ted's knowledge of Chinese history. In light of his
> awareness of the history of his own country, we surely can't expect much.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
He has two, so it's a lot to keep up with.
> But even sharpened bamboo spears would be a far more potent weapon that
> Ted's own retorts.
Hey, you gotta admit, he's learning to use the spell-checker.
Ed "welcoming progress, even in tiny steps" Frank
James F. Epperson
On 6 Jul 1996, REB 4 LIFE wrote:
> In article <Pine.SUN.3.91.960704192741.11068B-100000@zonker>, "James F.
> Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
>
> > Is this less of an evil that wanting to conquer
> >other nations? At least the Chinese could fight back . . .
>
> I won't take this bait. Here's a question for you:
>
> The United States puposely set out to conquer another nation-
> The Confederate States. How is that less evil than Japan purposely
> setting out to conquer China? Didn't Japan view China as rightfully
> theirs? What's the difference? Not much, if any.
Oh, there is quite a bit of difference. China had never been part of
Japan, so there was no basis for even disputing its right to be a separate
nation. OTOH, there was quite a strong basis for disputing the legitimacy
of secession. Hence, from the point of view of the Federal government
(and RE Lee, for that matter), the so-called Confederacy was not a nation
but an illegal government erected on top of states owing allegience to the
United States government. Hence, there was no conquest of another nation
going on, but the suppression of an illegal rebellion.
Now, sometimes rebellion is a good thing, and sometimes it is not.
Accordingly, sometimes it is a bad thing (i.e., "evil") to suppress a
rebellion, and sometimes it is not. It will come as no surprise that I
think it was quite a good thing to suppress the rebellion of 1861-65. We
are all better off for it.
James F. Epperson
On 6 Jul 1996, REB 4 LIFE wrote:
> In article <31dc62cf...@nntp.netcruiser>, and...@ix.netcom.com (A.
> Chilton Lannen) writes:
>
> >>>It's hard to teach those who don't want to
> >>>be taught, preferring comfortable falsehoods, but some of
> >>>us make the effort anyway.
> >>
> >>Comfortable falsehoods? Lemme see here... oh yeah! Such as
> >>Lincoln freed the slaves.
> >
> > He *did* lay the groundwork for such with the Emancipation
> >Proclaimation (which admittedly did not free any slaves at the time it
> >was issued), but did not do it out of a sense of moral outrage. It
> >was a tool of war.
>
> You are equivocating here. Did "Lincoln free the slaves", or did
> he not? The answer is that he did not.
The answer is that he did. In DRAWN WITH THE SWORD, McPherson devotes an
entire essay to this issue; his essential point is that at several points
during his tenure of office (and even before his inauguration), Lincoln
made policy decisions that nudged the nation toward emancipation. A
brief summary:
(1) The central theme of Lincoln's political speeches from his re-entry
into politics in 1854 until his view of slavery as a "monstrous
injustice" which did evil to black and white, free and slave. His main
charge against Stephen Douglas was Douglas's "declared indifference" to
the moral wrong of slavery, and that Douglas did not look to a time when
slavery would be at an end. Lincoln's tone marked him as a man who was
opposed to slavery on moral grounds and thus served to precipitate
secession in response to his election.
(2) Lincoln might have accepted the Crittenden Compromise and averted
secession and the resulting war, but he would not give in on the issue of
restricting the future expansion of slavery.
(3) By being cautious and slow on the emancipation issue Lincoln was
able to forge a strong enough political coalition to win the war --
lose the war, and slavery is strengthened, perhaps immeasurably; win the
war, and slavery is weakened, perhaps doomed.
(4) Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation at a time when the mood
of the country would barely tolerate it and suffered politically as a
result, but the document was issued, and enforced as the Union armies
occupied more and more Southern territory.
(5) Lincoln came under enormous pressure in 1864 to give up emancipation
as a war aim in order to obtain peace with re-union. He refused to do
so. Re-union =and= emancipation were both essential pre-conditions for
any peace settlement.
In all of these five points it is =Lincoln= that makes the decision and
the decision is always in the direction that favors emancipation. Left
out of this discussion is his role in the passage of the 13th Amendment
and his support for state abolition measures in Maryland, Missouri, and
West Virginia, all of which occurred during the war.
All of this indicates that Lincoln wanted to free the slaves and it
further indicates that it was through his agency that the slaves were
freed. The Emancipation Proclamation may well have been symbolic in large
part, but it nonetheless had enormous concrete impact on the status of
slavery in the South, and thus on the nation as a whole. Yes, the EP
exempted slavery in the loyal states and the occupied areas of the South,
but the policy of emancipation that it initiated led to the demise of the
institution everywhere. And it was Lincoln's doing.
JFE
Maury
<-------------Snippity-Do-Dah------------->
>> secret codes in
>>the newspapers, magazines, advertisements, etc. You know, all those
>>codes that begin with http://www.
============================
That code was cracked.
Netscape 3.0b {"Atlas"} doesn't require the use of it. -- Maury
Maury
~<4rhu1g$k...@dfw-ixnews2.ix.netcom.com>, ted...@ix.netcom.co wrote:..
><Pine.SUN.3.91.960704192741.11068B-100000@zonker>
>"James F.>Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
>>But, to go farther, your defense of the Confederates ignores, yet
>again,
>>the fact that they wanted to be left alone in order to continue to
>reap
>>the benefits of slavery.
The North of that error, uh- era, benefited from owning slaves,
later selling them down south; benefited from the products of
the slavery in the south; made war and conquered with it's 21
million people vs 4 1/4 million white Southerners and after that
war, the North benefited from both black and white economic
destitution (a form of slavery) as it stole Southern properties;
and furthered benefited from killing off the Native Americans,
stealing their lands and placing them on reservations and POW Camps.
-- Maury
====================
>Is this less of an evil that wanting to
>conquer >>other nations?
It conquered the people within it's own boundries first
and expanded more later. No, it is more of an evil
as opposed to a lesser one. -- Maury
==========================
At least the Chinese could fight back . . .
>>
>>Jim Epperson
Not on the opium the British supplied them with they couldn't.
-- Maury
=======================================
REB 4 LIFE
In article <Pine.SUN.3.91.960704192741.11068B-100000@zonker>, "James F.
Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
<Snips>
>But, to go farther, your defense of the Confederates ignores, yet again,
>the fact that they wanted to be left alone in order to continue to reap
>the benefits of slavery.
I repeat for you Sir, that they wished to lead THEIR OWN LIVES
on THEIR OWN LAND. That you may not approve of some facets
of HOW they led their lives is absolutely 100% IRRELEVANT.
PERIOD.
> Is this less of an evil that wanting to conquer
>other nations? At least the Chinese could fight back . . .
I won't take this bait. Here's a question for you:
The United States puposely set out to conquer another nation-
The Confederate States. How is that less evil than Japan purposely
setting out to conquer China? Didn't Japan view China as rightfully
theirs? What's the difference? Not much, if any.
R4L
REB 4 LIFE
>>>It's hard to teach those who don't want to
>>>be taught, preferring comfortable falsehoods, but some of
>>>us make the effort anyway.
>>
>>Comfortable falsehoods? Lemme see here... oh yeah! Such as
>>Lincoln freed the slaves.
>
> He *did* lay the groundwork for such with the Emancipation
>Proclaimation (which admittedly did not free any slaves at the time it
>was issued), but did not do it out of a sense of moral outrage. It
>was a tool of war.
You are equivocating here. Did "Lincoln free the slaves", or did
he not? The answer is that he did not.
>> Such as Sherman's destruction of Georgia
>>was a legitimate tool of war.
>
> We could debate that until the end of time. It depends on your
>outlook on war.
No, it depends on your outlook on THIS war, and in that context
the theft and destruction of property not of military significance,
and the abuse of non-combatants was and is inexcusable.
> Some of us think it was militarily necessary, others
>think that he should have just politely asked the rebels to stop
>supplying the Confederate armies.
Real cute. Let's boil this down to a personal level, Andrew. Suppose
I want *you* to submit to some demand of mine, and in order to
accomplish your submission I hold a gun to your Mother's head. How
would that make you feel? I feel that my purpose is legitimate, and
my methods justified. Somehow, I doubt you'd feel the same.
>> Such as secession was illegal and those
>>who supported it were traitors.
>
> Since you invoke the Constitution later in this post, I assume
>that you think it had some legal validity. Therefore, here are the
>relevant passages for those who do not have a copy handy.
>
> Secession was indeed illegal by the tenants of the Constitution,
Point out the specific lanquage that precludes secession. If you can.
>and _engaging in war_ against the United States was considered treason
>in the same document.
Only if you are subject to the Constitution. The Confederacy had removed
itself from jurisdiction.
>Article 6: This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which
>shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which
>shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the
>supreme law of the land; and the judges in every State shall be bound
>thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the
>contrary notwithstanding."
>
> The seceding states refused to obey the Constitution and laws of
>the United States. That is a legal violation.
In your mind. Suppose I defy a provision of the Constitution of Canada?
So what? I am not a Canadian citizen, and I am not subject to their
laws when I am outside that country. The Confederacy and it's citizens
were no longer a part of the United States, and not subject to the
jurisdiction of their Constitution.
>Article 3, Section 3: "Treason against the United States shall
>consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their
>enemies, giving them aid and comfort."
> The seceding states levyed war against the United States by South
>Carolina firing on Fort Sumter and the other states joining in.
This is not true. They were no longer "seceding states", they were
another country. Sure, the Confederacy levyed war upon the United
States. In self defense.
>> Such as Lincoln was justified in
>>"bending" the Constitution with regards to habeus corpus,
>>censorship of the press, etc...
>
> Article 1, Section 9: "The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus
>shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion
>the public safety may require it."
>
> I'd say that there was a rebellion going on.
There was a war going on, not a rebellion.
> Amendment 1: "Congress shall make no law . . ."
>
> Drat it. This only applies to Congress. Oh well, guess the
>President can issue executive orders adbridging these rights in times
>of crisis.
I guess he did.
In a part of your post not included here, you suggest that by invoking
the US Constitution I acknowledge its authority (or something of that
nature). Of course, that's true. But, the authority of the Constitution
only extended to those states and citizens remaining a part of the
United States. My point was that Southrons are quite aware of the
irony involved. Lincoln swore to preserve, protect and defend the
Constitution, and by instigating the subjugation of the Confederacy I
am sure he felt that he was doing just that. But in the process he
stomped on, tiptoed around, or downright ignored some parts of the
same document. And he pulled it off, too. Not many get to have their
cake and eat it, too, but Lincoln sure did. And the country is the
worse for it.
R4L
Maury
In article <4rhbpv$9...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, reb4...@aol.com says...>>Some of it is just statistical flukes. There are more
>>Group members than diehard Southrons. Out of the ten or
>>twelve Group members, it is quite likely that at least
>>some would be from .edu sites.
"The latest version of The Group (tm)" is a misnomer.
The (tm) should be (mt) for "me too" because that's what
they do. If the people in that listing would discuss and/or
debate what they knew with one another openly this area would
have a lot more information and less silly chatter.
But they don't and the reason is shown in the idea of *needing*
a "group". A group is composed of several people who are cowardly
in doing something on their own and totally by himself.
The North of today is typically filled today with "gangs" and
"groups" while Southerners, like their ancestors, are typically
highly independant, seeking that "individualism" and being true
unto themselves. They are not so cowardly as to form a "Group"
because of that long Honored sense of "individualism". -- Maury
====================
>You left out Kathie Fraser and the Rev. Dr. Maggard. I would
>include Phil Leigh, Michael Polizzi, and Mike Behrent in our
>number as well. Also, you will be glad to hear that the Messrs.
>Gaelic Reb, Celtic Reb, the Missouri Rebel, and Larry Beane
>are still with us.
I'm still here and I have been here longer than any of those
you've listed who rarely write anything and moreso who rarely
debate pro-Northern ideas here. They've become "friends" with
their opponents regarding debating issues and now they cannot debate.
They have lost that "individualism" and more.
Here we take a stand, whether pro North or pro South.
In the days of our ancestry, those you listed would have
been shot or hung as traitors. Now they are totally useless
as "Southerners" or "United Daughters of the Confederacy"
in debating pro-Northern statements due to making 'friends"
with definate opponents of the old and modern South.
It takes far more courage and strength to stand your ground
as an individual and defend the South both of the past as
well as of the present against the odds that are ever present.
I remain,
Maury, in Virginia
Sons of Confederate Veterans,
19th Virginia, 5th Brigade
Deo Vindice!
>R4L
A. Chilton Lannen
reb4...@aol.com (REB 4 LIFE) wrote:
>In article <31dc62cf...@nntp.netcruiser>, and...@ix.netcom.com (A.
>Chilton Lannen) writes:
>
>>>Comfortable falsehoods? Lemme see here... oh yeah! Such as
>>>Lincoln freed the slaves.
>>
>> He *did* lay the groundwork for such with the Emancipation
>>Proclaimation (which admittedly did not free any slaves at the time it
>>was issued), but did not do it out of a sense of moral outrage. It
>>was a tool of war.
>
>You are equivocating here. Did "Lincoln free the slaves", or did
>he not? The answer is that he did not.
No, Lincoln did not pass the Constitutional Amendment freeing the
slaves. Only the state legislatures could do that. Lincoln, however,
pushed the states in that direction.
>>> Such as Sherman's destruction of Georgia
>>>was a legitimate tool of war.
>>
>> We could debate that until the end of time. It depends on your
>>outlook on war.
>
>No, it depends on your outlook on THIS war, and in that context
>the theft and destruction of property not of military significance,
>and the abuse of non-combatants was and is inexcusable.
Every aspect of the economy of an enemy at war with you is of
military significance. Cloth keeps enemy soldiers warm, crops give
them strength, iron gives them weapons, wealth gives them hope. All
economic activity in the South contributed to the war effort.
>> Some of us think it was militarily necessary, others
>>think that he should have just politely asked the rebels to stop
>>supplying the Confederate armies.
>
>Real cute. Let's boil this down to a personal level, Andrew. Suppose
>I want *you* to submit to some demand of mine, and in order to
>accomplish your submission I hold a gun to your Mother's head. How
>would that make you feel? I feel that my purpose is legitimate, and
>my methods justified. Somehow, I doubt you'd feel the same.
I think it is silly to take it down to this level, but to
demonstrate that I do believe what I say, I'll go along.
First, is my mother engaged in activities that support efforts to
kill you, as did "non-combatant" suppliers of the Confederacy were vis
a vis the Federal soldiers? If so, then you would be justified in
putting a gun to my mother's head, or sister's, or father's if they
are contributing to the effort to kill you. Would I hate you for
doing so? Yes. Would I say that you had no cause or that it wasn't
militarily useful? No.
>>> Such as secession was illegal and those
>>>who supported it were traitors.
>>
>> Since you invoke the Constitution later in this post, I assume
>>that you think it had some legal validity. Therefore, here are the
>>relevant passages for those who do not have a copy handy.
>>
>> Secession was indeed illegal by the tenants of the Constitution,
>
>Point out the specific lanquage that precludes secession. If you can.
I am going to snip the rest of the individual arguments and boil
this down to our essential philosophical disagreement (my original
item by item reply ran upwards of 200 lines). Please let me know if
I misrepresent your view.
Your view: The Confederate States broke away from the U.S.A. and
established their own separate, independent nation. By so doing,
they were no longer bound by the authority or strictures of the United
States Constitution. Therefore, the definitions and illegalities
outlined in the U.S. Constitution cannot be properly attributed to the
new nation and its inhabitants.
I have a fundamental and unchangeable philosophical objection to
this line of reasoning. I am a follower of Thomas Hobbes version of
the establishment of governmental authority. Hobbes wrote that, in
order to have a single, supreme source of authority, each individual
or group of individuals gives up some of its power and acknowledges
the supremacy of the newly constituted authority. This is what the
States did when they agreed to the Constitution. According to
section 6 of that document:
Article 6: This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which
shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which
shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the
supreme law of the land; and the judges in every State shall be bound
thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the
contrary notwithstanding."
I think that we can both agree that this was an acknowledgement
of the superior authority of federal laws over state laws and
constitutions. So far so good.
Where we differ is in the ability of the parties to then *take
back* that ceded authority. I believe, as Hobbes did, that once you
give it up, you can never get it back *unless* the supreme body once
again grants it to you. This can be an explicit return of the power:
"You are now freed from the authority of this government and all
rights that derive from such." Or it take be an implicit return of
the power: If the supreme authority ceases attempts to assert its
authority (usually because of defeat in combat). To take it back to
the Civil War, my philosophical outlook leads me to conclude that the
states had surrendered their authority *permanently*, and had no right
to take it back without the acknowledgement of the Federal government.
Without that acknowledgement, I do not consider the CSA a nation, and
at no time were the Confederate States or their inhabitants not under
the authority of the Federal Government. Now if the Confederates had
*won* the war, then they would have forced the Government to *give
them back* the authority and autonomy they had given up.
The CSA saying that it was a nation in 1861 did not make it so
any more than the USA doing so in 1776, nor the Montana Freemen in
1996. Only the United States was successful in *re-acquiring* the
power that they had given up to the British sovereign, and therefore
the USA was an independent nation as of 1783. The CSA and the
Freemen (and, lest you think I'm associating the CSA with bad company,
Hungary in 1969, India in 1777, Tibet still today) failed and were,
therefore, never independent as they claimed.
We agree to disagree. We have differing philosophies, and I
have yet to see a philosopher convert to his opponents' camp.
--Andrew
GAELIC REB
In article <4rhbpv$9...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, reb4...@aol.com (REB 4
LIFE) writes:
>You left out Kathie Fraser and the Rev. Dr. Maggard. I would
>include Phil Leigh, Michael Polizzi, and Mike Behrent in our
>number as well. Also, you will be glad to hear that the Messrs.
>Gaelic Reb, Celtic Reb, the Missouri Rebel, and Larry Beane
>are still with us. However, they have been heavily involved in
>some internal "housekeeping" here in the Confederacy and have
>had limited time for pointless discourse with yankees and
>scalawags. Expect most, if not all of them, to return here later
>in the summer.
>
>
Personally, I've just not had the time to reply to the ng, though I still
have a chance to read through from time to time. This has certainly been
an interesting thread, though a bit boring with Pitcavage's typical
one-liners as half of the posts. I would respond to the original poster
that (A) there are Southerners who wish the South had won, and (B) we'd
like to try secession again. I further suggest that the reason that some
of us feel hostile is because of remarks like Pitcavage's, in which he
suggests that the word white must be inserted before the word Southerner.
Pitcavage claims to be a Southerner, but I believe that his African
heritage sways him too much. He simply can't comprehend the fact that
local government is an option still preferred by many; he sees this as a
white conservative position directly in contrast with the "big government"
federalism (socialism) which he loves. I believe that people should help
themselves, and not rely on government to do it for them. The right to
self-government and autonomy were the reasons my ancestors defended their
homes, and I do take strong issue with those who wish it were otherwise,
i.e., the yankee mythmakers.
I have been busy with several things. The 175th birthday of N.B. Forrest
is the 13th of July, and we are planning several things in regard to that
date. His hometown of Chapel Hill, Tennessee has accepted the donation of
a 10' bas-relief plaque to be placed on their city hall lawn. (Mark
Pitcavage should insert his one-liner here) That should be a great event,
and one with more important consequences than Epperson's opinion on Foner.
James "Gaelic Reb" Turner
Justin M Sanders
REB 4 LIFE (reb4...@aol.com) wrote:
> In article <31dc62cf...@nntp.netcruiser>, and...@ix.netcom.com (A.
> Chilton Lannen) writes:
> > He *did* lay the groundwork for such with the Emancipation
> >Proclaimation (which admittedly did not free any slaves at the time it
> >was issued), but did not do it out of a sense of moral outrage. It
> >was a tool of war.
> You are equivocating here. Did "Lincoln free the slaves", or did
> he not? The answer is that he did not.
Obviously Lincoln never personally freed a slave. He did, as president,
enunciate a policy which his agents, the Union Army, were ordered to
carry out. They freed the slaves, wherever they could, as ordered by the
President.
To claim that Lincoln had nothing to do with liberating slaves prior to
the 13th Amendment is rather like saying that Jefferson didn't buy the
Louisiana Purchase simply because he, personally, didn't hand the $15
million over to Napoleon.
--
Justin M. Sanders "I shot an arrow into the air. It fell
Dept. of Physics to earth I know not where." --Henry
Univ. of South Alabama Wadsworth Longfellow confessing
jsan...@jaguar1.usouthal.edu to a sad ignorance of ballistics.
REB 4 LIFE
In article <Pine.SUN.3.91.960705230358.11746A-100000@zonker>, "James F.
Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
<snips>
> It will come as no surprise that I
>think it was quite a good thing to suppress the rebellion of 1861-65. We
>are all better off for it.
Pardon me for yawning. It is quite obvious that you have a
different value system at work here than do I. As an American,
I value the right of self-determination to be superior to any other.
My Confederate ancestors did as well, and they acted upon their
principles. Call it a rebellion, or call it illegal, the fact remains
that they were exercising their rights as free men to choose how
they would be governed, and by whom. The generation of 1776
did the same, as did their ancestors who first came to these shores.
R4L
Mark T Pitcavage
In article <4rhep1$b...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>,
REB 4 LIFE <reb4...@aol.com> wrote:
>In article <Pine.SUN.3.91.960703133525.10391B-100000@zonker>, "James F.
>Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
>
> <snips fore and aft>
>
>>I see a lot of similarity between the actions of the Southern politicians
>>and the Japanese leaders. Both were very much driven by rather extreme
>>notions of honor; both claimed that they really did not start the war,
>but
>>were forced into it by the actions of the US government; both just wanted
>>to be let alone to pursue their own destinies,
>
>What a totally amazing and completely bizarre notion. The Japanese
>wanted to be "left alone" to pursue their territorial conquests in China
>and SE Asia. They aggressively sought to conquer other soveriegn
>nations. The Confederacy sought to be "left alone" so its citizens could
>lead THEIR OWN LIVES on THEIR OWN SOIL. In case you haven't
>noticed on your own, allow me to point out that these goals ARE NOT THE
>SAME.
>
Isn't it interesting how their own soil included Kansas, Nebraska, California,
New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, etc., etc., etc.?
Mark T Pitcavage
In article <4rkpej$f...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>,
>on THEIR OWN LAND. That you may not approve of some facets
>of HOW they led their lives is absolutely 100% IRRELEVANT.
>PERIOD.
This is one of the strangest, and in some ways saddest, posts I have seen on
alt.war.civil.usa.
paul oman
Would it be reasonable to suggest that the south, being in a defensive
position, and a smaller 'country' should have realized that their
success would have come from political actions instead of purely
military events (certainly the military would have been a political
tool, however)?
If so, the south was at a very big disadvantage by having a military
type as President and its primary hero, Lee, a soldier.
Would not the southern cause have been better served if Lee or Davis
dashed off to Europe during the South's best times (Jan-Feb 63?) and
personally pleaded the southern message to england and france?
Along the same vein, shouldn't the south have done more to shape the
outcome of the north's 1894 election to their liking?
respectfully,
paul oman
RStacy2229
In article <4rlfb8$m...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, gael...@aol.com (GAELIC
REB) writes:
> The 175th birthday of N.B. Forrest
>is the 13th of July, and we are planning several things in regard to that
>date.
And on the 12th of July, we'll have the famed and beloved Nelson Winbush
speaking here in Rome to Nathan Bedford Forrest Camp 469 SCV. Gosh, it
sure would be nice if Pitcavage could come down and denounce Mr. Winbush
as a racist, don't you old boys agree?
Robert Stacy "radically seditious" McCain
RStacy2229
In article <4re69n$4...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>,
mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes on the fate
of the women workers at Georgia's Roswell and New Manchester Mills:
>Forgive me for not weeping overmuch.>
Forgiven. Were this the Imperial German Army, I would leave a pistol on
the desk and leave the room, expecting you to do the honorable thing,
having so wantonly shown your hard-hearted hypocrisy toward the suffering
of innocent people. I suppose what you mean to imply is that there WERE no
innocent white Southerners, and that all of us -- all of us except such
odious scalawags as you, that is -- deserve contempt merely for being who
we are. That sounds suspiciously like ethnic bias.
>I think there were a lot of blacks who just wanted to be left alone,
too.>
Allow me to quote you this, Mark:
"One may get the idea, from what I have said, that there was bitter
feeling toward the white people on the part of my race, because of the
fact that most of the white population was away fighting in a war which
would result in keeping the Negro in slavery if the South was successful.
In the case of the slaves on our place this was not true, and it was not
true of any large portion of the slave population in the South where the
Negro was treated with anything like decency. ... In order to defend and
protect the women and children who were left on the plantations when the
white males went to war, the slaves would have laid down their lives. ...
I have long since ceased to cherish any spirt of bitterness against the
Southern white people on account of the enslavement of my race. No one
section of our country was wholly responsible for its introduction, and,
besides, it was recognized and protected for years by the General
Government. Having once got its tentacles fastened on to the economic and
social life of the Republic, it was no easy matter for the country to
relieve itself of the institution."
--- Booker T. Washington, "Up From Slavery"
This is the same Mr. Washington who probably did more for the advancement
of African-Americans in the late 19th and early 20th century than any man
of the era. And the elisions from this passage contain materials which
would warm the cockles of any Confederate heart, yet which are so
politically incorrect by modern standards that I wished to leave them out.
I urge you to read them, and indeed urge you to read this entirely
sensible book, which offers inspiration to all humanity.
You can have the blind, poisonous hatred of Mssrs. Baldwin, Haley and
Farrakhan, or you can have the deep wisdom of Mr. Washington. You cannot
have both.
> Sometimes you don't get what you want, but you get what you need.
>:
And the end, of course, always justifies the means, and having once
stepped onto that slippery slope, you can abandon any claim to morality.
That someone could be so thoroughly indoctrinated into this mindset is
amazing to me. Thank goodness I didn't bother sucking up to my teachers
and professors, and as an undergraduate was more interested in swilling
beer and chasing tail than in constructing an academic reputation. There,
but for a case of Bud, go I.
Robert Stacy McCain
RStacy2229
In article <4re6g0$4...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>,
mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes:
>Maybe {SHERMAN} should have just enslaved them and put them to work on
the
>plantations, huh? That would have been a rather more poetic justice.
>
Quite Shakespearean, actually, seeing as how Sherman had been a
slave-owner and was no part of the color-blind egalitarian. By the way,
what do you say of O.O. Howard's remarks about the vicious racism of Brig.
Gen. J.C. Davis? And these, just to name two. Does it not strike you as
odd that so many racists would be involved in "liberation" of a race they
detested?
Robert Stacy McCain
RStacy2229
In article <4re6hn$4...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>,
mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes:
>Tell that to Edmund Ruffin.
Thank you for calling to the attention of the Southerners on this list the
honorable Mr. Ruffin. Perhaps they will investigate his end and look up
his final words (try http://www.dixienet.org ) and draw from them some
inspiration.
Again, I call upon you, Mr. Pitcavage, to emulate Mr. Ruffin in the manner
of his passing, and that at the soonest possible opportunity.
RSMc
RStacy2229
In article <4re9sl$f...@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>,
char...@nickel.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) writes:
> especially
>hope that you have no hostility toward me because of my e-mail address.>
"[T]o compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation
of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical..."
--- Thomas Jefferson, Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, 1786
RStacy2229
In article <Pine.SUN.3.91.960703125945.10050G-100000@zonker>, "James F.
Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
>Second, I am not "hostile" to the South. I am hostile to attempts to
>present myth as history, however.
Then denounce Alex Haley.
RStacy2229
Schmidt writes:
>The four you named are educators. We posses a desire to inform
>those who need informing.
The four I named are propagandists. They possess a desire to indoctrinate
those whom they feel need indoctrination.
>I think the hostility is all on the other end.>
Hostility toward propaganda, yes.
>It's hard to teach those who don't want to be taught, preferring
comfortable >falsehoods, but some of us make the effort anyway.>
Well, I try, but you just keep clinging to your comfortable falsehoods. I
prefer the obvious truth: The "free soil" movement was essentially a
"white soil" movement, a racist campaign intended to prevent blacks from
settling in the Western territories, where a policy of genocide against
Native Americans was under way. As for abolition, I agree with the fellow
who said of Thad Stevens, that he was more motivated by hatred for the
master than by love for the slave. Further, I agree with Churchill, who
spotted Harriet Beecher Stowe as nothing less than a master propagandist.
The obvious purpose of the modern PC campaign to portray the Confederacy
as the moral equivalent of the Third Reich is to create anti-white --
anti-Southern white -- resentment among African-Americans, although why
anyone would care to do such a thing is beyond me. You guys are modern-day
Reconstructionists, as far as I can see, attempting to assuage some
deep-seated guilt or envy which I cannot fathom.
>Sometimes it's more for the
>benefit of the lurkers than the Southrons, though.
WELL, DUH! Why do you think I do this? Do I expect Pitcavage or Brooks or
Epperson to suddenly repent, join their local SCV chapter and start
reading Dabney and Calhoun and Davis? No, I fully expect them to continue
in their current opposition to Western civilization and the
Judeo-Christian tradition, feeding the wolf and hoping to be eaten last.
Robert Stacy McCain
Rome GA
gd...@america.net
rstac...@aol.com (RStacy2229) wrote:
>... as an undergraduate (I) was more interested in swilling
>beer and chasing tail...
Is that any way for a gentleman to talk? Please, sir, there are ladies
present...
Regards,
Chris Welch-Hutchings
Alpharetta, GA
James F. Epperson
I will gladly do so if the veracity of his book as history ever becomes
an issue in the discussion here.
James F. Epperson
On 6 Jul 1996, RStacy2229 wrote:
> In article <4re6g0$4...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>,
> mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes:
>
> >Maybe {SHERMAN} should have just enslaved them and put them to work on
> the
> >plantations, huh? That would have been a rather more poetic justice.
> >
> Quite Shakespearean, actually, seeing as how Sherman had been a
> slave-owner and was no part of the color-blind egalitarian.
The only place I have ever heard of Sherman as a slave owner was in Sen.
Davidson's unfortunate speech. It is not included in any of the
biographies of Sherman that I have read, so I am rather inclined to
dismiss this allegation as another of Mr. McCain's many fantasies, but
will refrain from doing so until more definitive information can be
posted.
If it can be shown that Sherman did own slaves then I will post the
appropriate retraction. Will Mr. McCain promise to do the same if he is
proven wrong? (And will he have the integrity to follow through?)
James F. Epperson
On 6 Jul 1996, RStacy2229 wrote:
McCain's inability to distinguish between the context of a statute
forbidding a state-supported religion on the one hand, and the exercise
of freedom of speech by state employees on the other, speaks volumes. By
the "logic" advocated here, it is sinful and tyrannical for me to be
taxed to pay the salary of the Governor of Alabama and that of one of our
Senators, and as many as 50% of the state employees, probably more.
Andrew James Llwellyn Cary
Maury wrote:
>
> ~<4rm9o7$1...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, rstac...@aol.com says...
>
> >In article <Pine.SUN.3.91.960703125945.10050G-100000@zonker>, "James F.
> >Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
> >
> >>Second, I am not "hostile" to the South. I am hostile to attempts to
> >>present myth as history, however.
>
> >Then denounce Alex Haley.
>
> (Posted openly with CC: E-Mail)
>
> Why?
>
> Although I never viewed the film as the norm, it was
> a slice of history and I think it was a slice that did
> exist with some oversears. What specifically should be
> denounced about Haley's works (He also wrote "Queen").
> I liked the both of them. I didn't "cotten to" some of
> the scenes, but those things did happen (whipping), and
> I also know that it happened to "whites" and when at
> Sea, the men's wounds were "tended to" by a bucket of
> salt water, which burned even more. There has always been
> brutal people in ever generation and more than several.
> It is they that seem to be remembered and focused upon.
> The USNavy and the British Navy were excessinly cruel to
> the sailors -- one of the reasons why the 13 colonies
> went to war against the British (impressment & consequences
> thereof). -- Maury, in Virginia
The War of 1812 had a cause celeb of the impressment of American Seamen
by the British Navy, this is one of the reasons Jefferson closed the
ports of the US.
The British navy did not distinquish between American and English
merchantmen prior to the revolution and impressed men where ever it
could get them from the English merchant fleet, after the revolution the
Royal Navy continued to try and impress American Citizens as actually
being British Citizens even when on USA vessels.
As point of fact the British Navy outlogged flogging and many other
brutal punishments shortly after the end of the Napoleonic Wars. The
American Navy retained them quite a bit longer, only after books like
Dana's _Two Years Before the Mast_ and Melville's _Whitejacket_
publicized the conditions of merchant and naval seamen did conditions
change.
By the way, the flogging wounds were washed in saltwater because
experience had shown the wounds healed quicker. The traditional Army
treatment after a flogging was a 'half-and-half' half a pint of rum
was drunk for the inner man and half a pint of rum was poured on the
wound for the outer man.
Both the British and American Armies flogges after the navies gave it
up.
--
Andrew J. L. Cary | I Reckon that the Opinions
Senior Curmudgeon | expressed here DO represent
Cary Consulting Services, Newark, CA | those of the management of
ajl...@ix.netcom.com | Cary Consulting Services
Maury
Mark T Pitcavage
In article <4rm8pf$1...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>,
RStacy2229 <rstac...@aol.com> wrote:
>In article <4re6g0$4...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>,
>mpit...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Mark T Pitcavage) writes:
>
>>Maybe {SHERMAN} should have just enslaved them and put them to work on
>the
>>plantations, huh? That would have been a rather more poetic justice.
>>
>Quite Shakespearean, actually, seeing as how Sherman had been a
>what do you say of O.O. Howard's remarks about the vicious racism of Brig.
>Gen. J.C. Davis? And these, just to name two. Does it not strike you as
>odd that so many racists would be involved in "liberation" of a race they
>detested?
I don't recall Howard's remarks, but it doesn't matter; JC Davis was
responsible for a horrible action. But as to your last question, no, it
doesn't. There were anti-semites in the armies that destroyed Hitler's
Germany, too.
A. Chilton Lannen
w...@cstone.net (Maury) wrote:
>
>~<4rm9o7$1...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, rstac...@aol.com says...
>
>>In article <Pine.SUN.3.91.960703125945.10050G-100000@zonker>, "James F.
>>Epperson" <eppe...@math.uah.edu> writes:
>>
>>>Second, I am not "hostile" to the South. I am hostile to attempts to
>>>present myth as history, however.
>
>
>>Then denounce Alex Haley.
> =========================
>
> (Posted openly with CC: E-Mail)
>
>
>Why?
>
>Although I never viewed the film as the norm, it was
>a slice of history and I think it was a slice that did
>exist with some oversears. What specifically should be
>denounced about Haley's works (He also wrote "Queen").
I think it has to do with the fact that Haley claimed that Roots
was a work of accurate history about a specific ancestor of his and
that ancestors environment. After his death, his papers were donated
to a University (Tennessee), and those papers quite plainly showed
that he made up almost everything in the book from his imaginaton. No
documentation, no confirming sources. Yet he received the Pulitzer
Prize for *History* for Roots.
>I liked the both of them. I didn't "cotten to" some of
>the scenes, but those things did happen (whipping), and
>I also know that it happened to "whites" and when at
>Sea, the men's wounds were "tended to" by a bucket of
>salt water, which burned even more. There has always been
>brutal people in ever generation and more than several.
>It is they that seem to be remembered and focused upon.
>The USNavy and the British Navy were excessinly cruel to
>the sailors -- one of the reasons why the 13 colonies
>went to war against the British (impressment & consequences
>thereof). -- Maury, in Virginia
I thought they were fairly well done as well -- so long as they are
taken as fiction.