Reparations for slavery: pro or con?

[thorough9]

Originally Posted by john_galt

thorough I stop reading because you are a waste of time especially when you make stupid claims. I do not cut and paste. Never have and never will. This is what I study so shove it.

They only teach GED classes at Home School Compound Community College. LOL, and You don't study anything except FOX news and talk radio. You're a parrot. You're not capable of independent thought, just chirps and whistles that mimic the thoughts of the people who make them. You're not forming your own opinions that, through similarity, are in agreement with theirs. You're just an echo - a hollow reverberation of someone else's voice. You have deteriorated into a "waste of time" and "shove it" and "you're stupid" because you have no answer for anything - an indication of your lack of independent thought capability. Next you're gonna run into the house and tell Mommy. LOL. or "take your ball and go home". Don't worry. When you do decide to venture off of the porch again, I'll be waiting. See you then. LMAO!!!!!

[BobsAlias]

hmmm...sounds a little like my kids...they both like to sing songs in the car...each trying to sing louder than the other. I think the little one sometimes sings the wrong verse just to get a rise out of the older one.

when I can't sleep, I come here & read some of these long novel-like posts

seriously

to the victor goes the spoils...not PC...but that's how it's always been since the dawn of time. people conquer other people...enslave them, kill them, rape them, etc. not a nice thought, but it is what it is

how about we calculate reparations for any group who has been conquered by any other group throughout all of time. I'm curious to see who the ultimate winner is...meaning who has conquered the most & therefore would have to pay the most or who would get the most reparations paid to them & from whom? Do I get reparations from Viking descendants whose ancestors raped/pillaged the village of my European ancestors? Sweet! Can I have Pat & Kevin Williams from the MN Vikings? I'll give them a good home on the Chiefs roster. or would it I have to pay reparations 'cause their Black? well crap. ok...I'll just take Jared Allen ;-)

[Enchanterlingum]

Originally Posted by kcbigpapa

So you are advocating a 100% estate tax? Seems a little harsh.

Sure, why not?

I walked away from an inheritance because I wouldn't debase myself to fight for it, and I doubt I'll have a crack at another in my lifetime, so again, why not?

If you really want your kids to have something, give it to them.

[kcbigpapa]

Originally Posted by Enchanterlingum

If you really want your kids to have something, give it to them.

Didn't this just go back full circle to the giving of money someone didn't earn, even if it is an heir? I am not saying you are right or wrong, just a little bit of devil's advocate here.

[Enchanterlingum]

Originally Posted by kcbigpapa

Didn't this just go back full circle to the giving of money someone didn't earn, even if it is an heir? I am not saying you are right or wrong, just a little bit of devil's advocate here.

Money stolen at gunpoint, which is what the government does, hardly equates to inheritance or a gift to your children. That's just moral equivalency bullshit.

Bottom line, tax dollars shouldn't go to anybody whose sole purpose is to maintain respiration and a heartbeat. Oh and vote for the right color or party, can't dare forget that.

[JRLawrence]

Originally Posted by john_galt

So now it is time to separate the folks with common sense from those...

.... Under which authority did the slavery occur? The first slaves into English controlled territory came in 1637 at Jamestown, VA. Prior to that there were many indentured servants (slaves with an expiration date). The Spanish had taken hundreds of thousands of slaves from the indigenous population since the early 16th century. (note the person of color comment now). Let's narrow our focus to the just the territory called the United States. From 1637 English law and English authority ran the country until 1776. The United States was not formed until 1781 and our constitution did not authorize slavery or recognize slavery other than the 3/5s rule about SLAVES, not freemen. Many states in the north did not recognize slavery though it was not codified legally. The only government organ to recognize slavery was the Confederacy from 1861 to 1865 (it was in their constitution). More on people of color; the Chinese immigrants were in many cases treated worse than slave because at least slaves had value whereas a "free" man or woman from China had no value except to themselves....

Ok John G.

All of the above are good comments. But I also love history (recognized in High School that I would never make a lot of money from it, it is fun anyway.) So, one area of my studies is Economics; lucky me I had a professor that had us do a paper on Economic History and I picked the topic of "The Economic History of the Civil War". I read a bunch of books for the study. The study was a real eye opener. We have often heard it said that Slavery was not the cause of the civil war, and most people dismiss the idea because of the propaganda that the North has put forward to justify a war that they won because of other motivations. The following statements are germane to the understanding of the History of the Civil War.

1. The South was discriminated against economically by the North prior to, and after the war. e.g. it cost a lot more to ship Southern Goods, including cotton to the North than to ship Northern manufactured goods to the South. In fact it was cheaper for the South to ship their cotton to the mills in England than it was to ship the same cotton to the Northern Mills, many in New England.

2. The steel manufactured goods were much more expensive in the South; thus, limiting the development of a manufacturing base in the South.

3. The North was becoming an economic powerhouse with the opening of the cannel system and the waterways on the Great Lakes that extended trade all the way to Chicago from New York. The steel production was booming, but the South got none of it due to the discrimination of the Northern Industrialists. The were not about to allow what was viewed as a competing area to develop a better industrial base.

4. The North also had developed an extensive Railroad System with several thousand miles of rail compared to a few hundred miles of laid rails in the South.

5. The South was also lagging in the Agriculture area because of the resisted ability to modernize the methods of producing and harvesting better crops. But in just a very few years the Cotton Gin would arrive, making slavery an unneeded institution. It has been estimated by several historians that without the Civil War slavery would not have lasted another 20 years. It had already been banned in England from which the institution has originated (The English also made slaves out of the Irish, and even traded them in the Northern Africa countries bordering the Mediterranean. But the slave/cotton/rum/sugar etc. trade in the American/England/Caribbean/& back to American route was a money maker for English shipping.

6. The South had a limited amount of gun powder (I remember only one producing mill - you can google it an check me out) and they had very few methods of producing arms, or the ability to trade with Europe after the first part of the war.

7. The South was trading their cotton with England, but the English also did not want the South to be able to establish an industrial economy because it was in their interest to receive the farm goods and resell the finished goods back to the South. It was the same plan they used in India to bring the wealth back to England by using another country to only produce the raw materials. The finished goods, and the largest profit was reserved for England.

8. The Northern States knew of the English plan and did a good job of adopting it for themselves.

9. The South got the first real hit on the North with the first battle of Bull Run. The war could have been over at that moment as the South pushed the retreating Northern Army on several fronts. The flanking attach that would have sealed the retreating Northing Army and possibly finishing the war as it started was stopped because of newly acquired brass cannon. The cannon used allowed the Northern Army to escape without the aid of any supporting troops; just the few guns (two or three -I don't remember the exact count just now) that could keep repeating fire that iron cannon could not.

Brass was new (Bronze is old) because zinc is needed for brass. Zinc has only been recognized and produced as a new metal for a short time. Full production of zinc did not take place until the early 1900 (I think it was 1911) with the establishment of an electrical process.

Anyway the new brass cannon was a "Napoleon" that had been recently developed after the first production of Zinc (yes the alchemist has a zinc ore for trial in brass production, but the results were not consistent because the ore was not consistent) Anyway Napoleon was so taken with the new metal that he even had the buttons on the uniforms of the French Army made out of zinc (read the book Napoleon's Buttons). Zinc has a problem in the cold, and the Russian winter was cold enough to affect the zinc buttons holding the clothing on the French troops. When the Buttons turned to a powder, the French froze to death when their clothes fell off.

10. After the First Battle of Bull Run, the Northern Army immediately placed orders for more and better cannon. This time with the riffled barrel. The new units were taken to mouth of the Savanna River for an attack on the fort that protected the harbor and allowed trade, and support, to continue with England. There was a small island some distance from the Fort, and Robert E. Lee made the observation that it was so far away that "there is not a gun in the world that can reach that far". The Parriot (sp?) riffled cannon quickly took the fort down, and trade with England stopped; the supply of needed war material was thus very limited.

In short: as with any discussion, follow the money if you want to understand almost anything in life. The money was not on Slavery, it was an institution past it's useful life and would have shortly died without the Civil War. But the Civil War kept the south submissive to the North for many more years. Many in the South talked about States' Rights, alas that was only about politics and the desire to have a voice. But, without being able to match the North in economics and manufacturing the South never had a second chance to win the Civil War. The first chance was lost when the brass cannon opened fire at the Southern Army. Those few brass cannon (the only ones in the Northern Army) protected a beaten Northern Army and allowed to North to gather its forces for the longer war.

Well I banged this out about as fast as I can type. If I had the time, I could pull the details up for a better discussion. But then, I am not getting paid for this article; so the fast work will have to do for now.

JR

[CuteOldGuy]

Interesting. Thanks, JR.

[Guest121212]

JR's post has got me thinking - oh shit, that can be dangerous . . .

IMO, Certainly the direct cause of the Civil War was slavery, but behind that was the agrarian South and their almost absolute determination to maintain a very pretentious and "elegant" lifestyle.

I believe the War was caused by slavery but it was not a necessary conflict. Slavery was rapidly becoming obsolete. I believe that in 1861 that no one would have dreamed of using slaves for propulsion of boats as the Romans did in ancient times - there were steam engines for that! As has been mentioned, machinery was constantly evolving to do repetitive manual labor on the farm. Unfortunately, there was no machine at the time invented to actually pick cotton, or things may have been much different . . . however, absent the War, I doubt seriously that slavery would have continued to be widespread in the fields and in great numbers for more than twenty or thirty years more given the technological advances of the time. Now, for waiting on table and performing mundane household chores, certainly the South loved to put on airs, putting them on every chance they were afforded - and there may have been some slaves that were continued to be kept, but as wealth would have increased exponentially in the South absent the war and given the current rate of technological change, the social stigma attached to slave ownership from both the North and more and more in the South would have eliminated the practice all together - why own what you can rent, and rent very, very inexpensively, especially if there was status attached to having paid household help for that most "elegant" South. Not owning a slave may have become actually fashionable in a generation or two.

The fact is that most all the reasons for the War are intertwined deeply in one way or another - clearly, there were some Southerners that that acknowledged the inherent wrongs in keeping slaves. Interestingly, most all that had this view, owned slaves. There was also widespread anger in the South at what was viewed as the great Northern hypocrisy. In the mid-1800's there were many that criticized northern factories where most workers were ill-treated and poorly paid - some treated worse than a slave . . . in most instances a slave would be cared for in a better manner than a worker in the North - to protect the investment - employers in the North simply found the next set of hands to bleed and tear the flesh from bone in their factories. Ultimately, however, the difference was that the worker in the North could walk away, he was not the property of another person.

Americans are fond of violence and violent solutions to social problems. The War may have been unnecessary, but quite unavoidable given the political climate. had there been more political tolerance, I think it may have burned itself out (slavery) with social change and shifting attitudes and with increased wealth from mechanization.

Well boys, that ends my playing in the Sandbox seriously for a while, y'all can beat my post to shreds now . . .

Kisses,

- Jackie

[CuteOldGuy]

I'm not going to rip your post to shreds, Jackie, I'm going to kiss your ass. Someday soon in person, I hope.

[JRLawrence]

Originally Posted by jackie@sintropolis

Certainly the direct cause of the Civil War was slavery, but behind that was the agrarian South and their determination to maintain a pretentious and "elegant" lifestyle.

Kisses,

- Jackie

Slavery and the propaganda of the North certainly drove the emotions of both sides before during and after the civil war. Much like the modern football cheerleaders carry the crowd spirit, but have nothing to do with the technical aspects of the game.

Many students of economics view money and the discrimination of the South as the primary underlying cause of the Civil War. The pretentious and "elegant" lifestyle is, for the most part, a fictionist presentation of what was really happening in the South. I had a professor in one of my early 1960's economics history classes (Ph.D. - note the proper abbreviation- from India, which was then equivalent to a little college in the US) who made the same argument. By the time the class was over his argument was destroyed. Just as there are a few really elegant cars, the vast number are not. There were a good number of pretentious and "elegant" lifestyle in the South, but most were not. At that point in history, it was just hard work to get the crops in. When there was a "main house" it was also the farm office/headquarters/supply center etc.

The South, for the most part, was not a society where a few owned a lot of slaves. It was a place where those who had slaves, only had a few; it was expensive to own a slave. It was so expensive that the argument has been made that the Irish in the North had a worse existence than the slaves in the South. This is not a good emotionally charged point, but the economics prove this out in many cases. But I would caution against any general overall statement, there were many variables. The reason for this position is that the slave had to be taken care of from birth to death with food, housing, clothing and medical care. In the North the mill worker was only paid a tiny amount, and if he got sick he was fired. Abuse of workers in the North may have exceeded the abuse of the slave in the South, including the abuse of female workers in the North. (If you don't want your kids to starve: you will_____ .) We don't have to approve of any of this, that has no part in a discussion. The question is about what really happened.

It is not polite to call another person or region backward, but compared to the industrial Northern powerhouse, the agrarian South was backward and poor. Better ways of farming were being discovered, and of course the rural poor looked up the few people who had obtained "a pretentious and "elegant" lifestyle" much as we do today.

What drove the huge difference between the two regions was the Great Lakes that provided an inland ocean for the transportation of goods and the establishment of industry. It was difficult for the South to even get their goods out of the backcountry and to the ports for shipment to England. The investments of the New York bankers did not go to the South, it went into their own area for industrial development.

In the final analysis, it was the unbalanced distribution of money and control that drove the South to withdraw from the Union. The entire region had a long history of not being treated fairly.

However, right or wrong, it was the slavery issue that was used to justify the attack upon the South. There was not a lot of popular support by the general population (remember the draft riots in New York City - see the movie "Gangs of New York" where it showed the US Navy ship cannon to fire on the city, and yes that happened). Without popular support A. Lincoln would not be able to win the war, and he almost lost the whole thing at the First Battle of Bull Run. But for the few (i think 2 or 3) Napoleon cannons constructed of the new alloy brass the Union Army would certainly have been captured at that beginning point of the Civil War. Support for the war had not yet been gathered; it is almost certain that the South would have been split from the Union. The point to remember, if the South had won this battle; slavery would have still ended in about 20 years due to the invention of the cotton gin.

Emotions, and mass appeal, drive a lot of things. But behind the curtain of modern propaganda there is always the dual motivation of money and control.

No matter how much we may hate the abuse of others, the larger question concerns what factors that drive the question. That is usually money, and it is the art of propaganda that conceals the real reasons for a government action, or lack of action.

JR

[thorough9]

Yeah, you're right. The Civil War was the "War of Northern Agression". They were picking on the poor little ole' south....... BUT...... The U.S. was a sovereign nation. The south seceeeded. AND The south fired the first shot of the was at Fort Sumner.

Again, you're also right. Slavery really wasn't that bad. Slaves were treated fabulously - that's why they were running away - it's hard for someone to stomach such incredible benevolence. Workers in the North had the option of choice. They could leave the conditions of the factory should they choose to. Slaves were property and didn't have the luxury of choices. I find this "slaves didn't have it so bad" position especially, ironically, humorous considering how quickly, some on this board, condemn things like forced sexual slavery and the trafficking of underage girls. Exactly what do you think slavery amounted to? Slaves belonged to someone. They, their children, their children's children - generations of hopelessness and psychologically debilitating bondage - no future prospects and no other foseeable options. You say that slavery wasn't so bad or that the workers or the Chinese had it just as bad? I say that you're incredibly misinformed or that you are yourselves a victim, of the propaganda of the defeated south, who in hindsight, tried to re-write the struggle to keep an entire race of people subjugated, for their own economic gain, into a something noble. There is as much nobility in keeping slaves, then, as there is in keeping sex-slaves, now. To endorse one is to endorse the other. To divide one into "degrees of difficulty" then, is to do the same now. To make excuses for, and reasons why, then is to do the same now. To make excuses for the slave-holder, is to make excuses for the pimp and the trafficker....

It is irrelevant how long slavery would have lasted with the increase of agrarian technology. The south went to war to preserve slavery and the financial rewards reaped from free labor. If you really want to define or examine the true intentions of the south, all you have to do is examine what the south did, concerning the slave and his descendents, following the Civil War, after all of this agrarian technology was made available - just truth and facts - no interpretations needed.

[JRLawrence]

Well you are right on one thing: The January 26, 1861 edition of Harper's Weekly described the First Shot of the Civil War: "The first shot was fired on January 10, 1861. It was fired by the South Carolinians on Morris Island. They fired on the Union Ship "Star of the West" as it attempted to reinforce Major Anderson at Fort Sumter."

The rest of your sarcasm is purely emotional.

At no point did I, or anyone else, strive to justify slavery. My point, which you have reinforced, is: the question of slavery drove the emotional causes of the civil war. As bad as slavery was, it was not supported by the larger public opinion of the North at the start of the civil war. Slavery was am issue to many people, John Brown & the Kansas Issue which hinged on the restriction or expansion of slavery into new territory that would eventually become the state of Kansas. However, this group of people, however right or wrong their position, did not reflect the primary concerns of the wast number of men who would have to take up arms during the Civil War; those people were concerned with the day to day hardships of making a living for their families. Thus, the poor Irish did not want to fight in the Civil War when they had just left the hardships of Ireland where the English had held them in perpetual servitude for generations. They could not own land, they were not free, they were treated like slaves, and they were starving. To their minds, they were worse off than the slaves of the South. (Note: I said to their minds because here I am talking about their emotional view point.)

The primary cause, not the only cause, of the Civil War was MONEY and CONTROL. In much the same way the primary cause of WWI and WWII which was an extension of WWI was money. At the start of WWI Germany had the chemical production of fertilizer making it the bread basket of Europe, which other nations wanted. The Indian Wars in the US was also about MONEY and CONTROL; the white man wanted the land.

Go back and read my comments again. It is sad that much of our history is taught to our children with the victor's propaganda that simplifies history: showing how great the victor was and by implication still is.

The cause of the Civil War was much more complicated than the single issue of slavery. For anyone to pick a single issue as the only cause neglects to think deeply upon the subject.

"A little learning is a dangerous thing;
drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
and drinking largely sobers us again." Alexander Pope (1688 -1744)

Alexander Pope may not have sold as many books, but he has been cited as the second most frequently quoted writer in the English language, after William Shakespeare.

and also

"A little knowledge is apt to puff up, and make men giddy, but a greater share of it will set them right, and bring them to low and humble thoughts of themselves." Francis Bacon

JR

[thorough9]

Ok. So remove emotion form the equation. The south's economy was based upon agriculture, which was a slave based economy. Slavery was very profitable. By your own admission, the Civil War was about money, power, and control. How did the south make money: slavery. Lincoln didn't initially want to free the slaves, he freed the slaves as a means of removing the south's labor force, and consequently, its source of wealth. If the south never seceeded, who's to say how long slavery would have remained, but I will continue to point to the south's behavior concerning blacks, following the Civil War, as an indicator of their intentions.

There is very little about the south that can be romanticized. The southern aristocrats were both slaveholders and masterful manipulators. The south was full of poor Scots-Irish immigrants who had initially settled the south and the "backwoods" of continental America since the days of the whiskey rebellions. The Scots-Irish had been on the lowest rung of the English social caste system - their status was close to being slaves. So the Scots-Irish came to this country and were immediately elevated, at least one step above the slaves. The poor southerner did not own slaves, but the poor southerner fought and died by the thousands for the southern cause: A rich man's war, but a poor man's fight. Very few poor southerners could vote at all - due to property requirements, so what was their motivation for fighting? You could say that they were reacting to the "invasion" of the North, but that's a hard case to make considering that the South was the aggressor.

No matter what or how the North bullied the south, the southern states were a part of the Union, and they were a powerful participant in Congress. The south refused to bend to the inevitability of the end of slavery, which would have taken away their labor source/wealth/influence. They could have remained in the union and worked to achieve their goals, diplomatically, but they chose to break and fight. Lincoln, and the North, fought to preserve the Union. So, the reason the North fought was preservation of the Union, and the reason - the underlying, base reason - that the south fought was to preserve their way of life - which was forced servitude for profit - slavery.

[john_galt]

Okay, the topic has strayed from reparations to slavery itself. Word to the crowd, NOBODY defends slavery so quit acting like they do. As for the orginal topic, reparations, the point I was trying to make was the slippery slope of activism. Some of you figured that point out quickly. If reparations "for slavery" are to become law then other groups who feel, sometimes rightfully, that they were abused and taken advantage of as a people will also move forward on their own reparation lawsuits. Where will that end? Few people in this country can claim to being pure stock. My point was how do you possible determine as a class who is responsible for the actions of 200 years ago. I maintain that it is impossible to do it cleanly and the process would be abused by the lawyers and the greedy.

Slavery and the Civil War or as someone called it the War of Northern Aggression. I prefer the War Between the States. When the U.S. Constitution was ratified the only mention of slavery was in Article 1, Section 2 which talked of representation. Representatives were to represent the population of the country and the South wanted the advantage of counting their slaves as individuals which would have given the South more representatives in Congress. Don't take this to mean votes as voting "rights" were far different then than now. Look closely at Section 2; only slaves without regard to race counted as 3/5th of a person.
" which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons."
Freedmen, Indians, and the indentured were counted as whole persons. It is plain that this section does not endorse slave but only acknowledges the circumstances.

Did slavery have something to do with the start of the War Between the States? The obvious answer has to be YES. The proof is in the CSA Constitution.
(4) No bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves shall be passed. Article 1, Section 9, para. 4.
Slavery was present in the Northern states except for those who had expressly forbidden the practice like Pennsylvania. As the region the South insisted on the continuation of slavery to support their primarily agrarian economy. Besides slavery a large part the push for secession was politics. When the nation was established the South was firmly in control of the Congress and the presidency having the benefit of more population. Nine of the first 13 presidents hailed from the South. It was understood that pro-slavery and pro-free states would be brought into the union equally to maintain parity. One slave state, Tennessee, one free state, Ohio. The cracks started forming with the Missouri Compromise in 1820. The law passed through both houses, the Senate, and signed into law used the Southern border of the new state as a boundary of sorts. Any state below the line would be assumed slave and any state above the line would be free. This agreement was hammered out by Calhoun, Webster, and Clay. The assumption was that the line extended to the Pacific Ocean and this came under attack with the petition of California for statehood. The Southern representatives insisted that the Southern half of California should be slave under the Missouri compromise but the representatives of California wanted no slavery in their state. The Supreme Court decided that no territory could be forced to be a slave state against their will. California came in as a free state followed by Kansas. The Southern states petitioned for more territory to the South meaning Mexico and Cuba but their efforts were blocked by the federal government. Southern activists had pushed for the purchase of Cuba and if that failed, invasion. The president Pierce made a poor attempt which was rebuffed by the Spanish crown. The handwriting was on the wall for the South. Their power was waning and there was no turning back. The only thing needed was a spark.

Who fired the first shot of the war? Some can make a very strong argument that the first shot was in Kansas and not South Carolina. Massachusetts abolitionists came to Kansas armed with the premier weapon of the day, the Sharps rifle, and founded Lawrence, Kansas. This action was against federal law and Kansas territorial law but still... Factions began crossing the border, both ways, to attack settlements and individuals that they considered the enemy. A referendum in Kansas to decide their stand on slavery was tainted by thousands of Missourians who crossed the border and lived in tents in order to be "residents". We all know of the murders committed by John Brown but that didn't start the war...yet.

Lincoln was one of four viable candidates for president in 1860. The new Republican party was established out the Whig party for the purpose of abolitioning slavery. Though Lincoln only recieved 40% of the popular vote he received a majority of the electoral vote and won the election. Lincoln carried no Southern states and lost Maryland as well. This was the last straw for the South and South Carolina announced their secession after a state convention. The US Congress had met in December with the intent to guarantee Southern rights but failed to reach an agreement. Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia, and Texas followed. Lincoln would not become president until three months later.
Fort Sumter was one of a chain of forts established following the War of 1812 to protect the harbors of the United States from Britain and stood in the channel of Charleston harbor. The fort was unfinished and held a small contingent of US troops. President Buchanan resupplied the fort by ship and this was allowed by the South Carolina state militia. In fact, members of the fort routinely went into Charleston to shop for goods and were well recieved by the locals. This changed after Lincoln assumed office. Lincoln sent an unarmed ship with supplies and more troops to Fort Sumter. There were only 80 soldiers in the fort prior to this. The Charleston commander was ordered not to allow this. General Beauregard ordered the surrender of the fort from Major Anderson. The troops under his command would be allowed safe passage from Sout Carolina with their weapons in order to preserve honor. Anderson refused and the siege began. The unarmed ship had earlier come under fire and had retreated over the horizon but was not struck. No union soldiers were killed during the one day siege when Anderson surrendered his command. One soldier was killed when a cannon burst firing a salute to the Southern victors. Was this war then?

There has been some discussion among historians that Lincoln forced the issue in order to get the South to react. That would place the North as the aggrieved party and would only be acting in self defense. Lincoln called for 75,000 volunteers for a short term enlistment to quell the uprising. Lincoln never acknowledged the secession in any of his speeches. The prospect of an foriegn army marching through the countries of Virginia and North Carolina (they commonly thought of themselves as countries) forced those two states to secede. The stage was set. Could things have been stopped?

Lincoln could have asked what the South wanted to rejoin the Union but that would have probably overturned the results of an election and would have only postponed the final confrontation between the South and abolitionists. Probably nothing Lincoln could have done would have stopped the war by this time. Could the war have been shorter? Yes. If the South had pushed forward after the victory at Bull Run they had a very good chance of taking Washington DC or at least besieging the capital. The Maryland legislature had to be forced not to secede by federal troops. Maryland would have seceded and the capital of the United States would have found itself deep inside a hostile nation. The war would have probably been over and the South would have gone on as the second American nation on the North American continent. Cuba would have been purchased or taken by the CSA as well as parts of Northern Mexico. Some writers even think it would be likely that the CSA would acquire land all the way to the Pacific Ocean.

To conclude:
Reparations--unworkable
Slavery caused the war--yes
Could the war have been prevented--no
Could the are have been shorter and less costly--yes, with a Southern victory.

[thorough9]

Again with the could'a would'a should'a..... Oh well, they lost.