I Have a Few Questions

[Rob Wick]

If you remember, Laurie, it was the North in the Northwest Ordinance that prohibited slavery from existing in that region. Slavery existed in the North but it was not the economic basis for the region, as it was for the South and it was allowed to die a natural death.

No one is saying that one side is blameless and the other is horrible. No serious historian believes or teaches that. However, we are talking about two very different things here. Racism and slavery.

Racism was, and still is, prevalent in all aspects of society. Northerners were as unashamedly racist as were Southerners as were Westerners, etc. However, it was only Southerners who clung to the system of slavery until the war forced it out of existence. It was Southerners who were willing to disband the Union due to their irrational fear that Lincoln was going to try to end it's existence, even though he said so many times that he had no constitutional power to do so.

Every secession document at the time pointed to Southern fear that the North planned to eradicate slavery. It was only after losing the war that Alexander Stephens and Jefferson Davis (and later Jubal Early) tried to take slavery out of the equation.

I'm through discussing this topic. I will change no one's mind and no one will change mine. I've got work to do.

Best
Rob