The Causes of Secession 150 Years Ago

One hundred and fifty years ago, Abraham Lincoln had been President of the United States for 22 days. Jefferson Davis has been President of the Confederate States of America for about a month more than that.

April would hardly prove to be the cruelest month, but it would be the most cruelly portentous. On April 12^th, 1861, the attack on Fort Sumter would kick off the Civil War. Five days later Virginia would kick off the second wave of secession, which would bring the Confederacy to a total of eleven states.

The Washington Post has a fun "Five Myths" series going on. The latest installment is Five Myths about Why the South Seceded, by James W. Loewen. It's good. I'll summarize and add my two cents. The South didn't secede over state's rights (Myth #1). There was only issue of the time that involved a Federal intervention into state affairs and that was the fugitive slave issue. The South was in favor of intervention. Indeed, the central argument for secession was that the Federal Government had broken the original compact by not enforcing the Fugitive Slave Clause.

Tariffs and taxes were not the issue (#2). I would add that no other economic issue cleaved the nation. Most Southerners weren't slave owners but that doesn't mean they weren't pro-slavery (#3). A lot of them hoped to be, and those who didn't didn't want to lose their superior status to the slave population.

Lincoln didn't go to war to free the slaves (#4). No, he went to war to save the Union. But slavery was the root cause of the Union's peril, and that was the theme of Lincoln's Senate and Presidential campaigns.

Finally, there is no reason to believe that the South could not have long maintained slavery if it had managed to achieve independence (#5).

I would add the following: the immediate cause of the first wave of secession was the election of Abraham Lincoln. The Deep South participated in an election and then pulled out when they didn't like the result. That doesn't bolster their record as gentlemen.

The ultimate cause of the Civil War was the South's attachment to slavery and the North's refusal to allow the extension of that peculiar institution. What really destabilized the nation was the 1850 census. The South realized how much faster the rest of the country was growing. Southerners came to believe what Abraham Lincoln believed: that if the South was permanently hemmed in, slavery was indeed on a course to ultimate extinction. The mini-civil war in Kansas proved that even Judge Douglas' popular sovereignty couldn't save them. The only way to preserve slavery was to escape the Union.

The Civil War still sings in our blood and marrow. It is good to think about it.

Comments

[larry kurtz]

Sounds like you don't believe Loewen either, Ken: "The only way to preserve slavery was to escape the Union."

I would just add:

"During the period of 1861 to 1865, Native Americans all over the continent were struggling for autonomy, as peoples with their own organization, culture, and life-style. Some tribes, like the Cherokees, were directly involved in the war. Other Native Americans living in the war-torn areas of the East made individual decisions as to whether they wished to have anything to do with the situation. Still others, living in the mountains, prairies, and deserts of the rest of the country, suddenly realized they had a chance to take back some of their own land, as they saw fewer and fewer U.S. Army soldiers assigned to forts in their tribal areas. Statistics show that just under 3,600 Native Americans served in the Union Army during the war."

http://www.civilwarhome.com/nativeamericans.htm

[donCoyote]

I find it more than ironic that James Loewen who made his reputation in historical circles with his book "Lies My Teacher Told Me" engages in a lie of omission by totally ignoring the debate surrounding, the campaigning done by Lincoln in favor of and the ultimate passage of the Morrill Tariff of 1861. While not the sole reason for the Civil War, neither was slavery and it is too important to totally ignore as Loewen does. All in all a pretty disappointing article by Loewen. I'd give it no more than a C.

[Jon S.]

donCoyote,

It is worth noting that the Morrill Tariff became law two days BEFORE Lincoln was inaugurated. That doesn't mean that Lincoln did not support a higher tariff (he did), but the passage of that law had nothing to do with Lincoln's support. Seven states had already seceded by the time the tariff law was passed. The loss of anti-tariff members from seceded states guaranteed its passage. Ken is certainly right that it was slavery and the perceived threat Lincoln posed to slavery that caused secession.

[Ken Blanchard]

Larry: Loewen was arguing that slavery was economically viable. The view that it was not is a load-bearing strut in the "unnecessary war" thesis. I am arguing that slavery was not politically viable in the long run if the slave-holding states had remained peaceably within the Union, or at least that that is what theS Southerners believed. There is no contradiction between Loewen's point and mine.

[larry kurtz]

Ok. Rationale for a white guy fleeing Arkansas for whiter pastures works for me.

[Jamey]

Ok, IF South was fighting for slavery, what was north fighting for? Union? Is that how you yanks think "union" is kept? Do you also beat your wives into submission to hold together your "union?" If Lincoln has not sent out for invasion force to invade lower South, upper South would not have seceded. Virginia actaully voted AGAINST secession in early April - only changing AFTER Lincolbs call for invasion! As did NC, AR, tc, etc - alvery is not mentioned in their secession documents!

[Ken Blanchard]

Jamey: I was born and bred in Jonesboro, Arkansas, so I am no damn Yank. But yes, the Union was in fact kept the way you say. After the extinction of slavery, the threat to Union disappeared. And yes, some slave states did not mention slavery in their documents and some slave states did not secede. But only slave states seceded.