Was the American Civil War inevitible?

[Valmy]

His greatest victory, Chancellorsvile, certainly featured uncomfortably high casualties for the South.  Joe Johnston knew how the South needed to fight.  Ah well.

[Razgovory]

Or these deep divisions could be allow to break on fault lines and create an amicable division.

Except the whole basis for the break was deep suspicion and rampant conspiracy theories.  The entire basis was conflict and hatred, how amicability could come from that I do not know.  You think good Northern Men were going to stand aside while the Slave Power Cabal destroyed the US to protect their un-American feudal privileges?

After John Brown it was coming.  Both sides were too entranched.  The notion that the South would have freed their slaves, gradually or otherwise, anytime soon was even more wishful thinking in 1860 than it had been in 1800.

I don't know.  I think most in the North were pro-Union, I'm not sure they wanted to fight over it until Southern belligerence forced the issue.  That said, if the Confederacy was allowed to live, there would never be a real peace with the Union.  No peace could exist between two states if the largest single investment of one of the countries is constantly running over the border to another one.

[Lettow77]

 For all that the Union cause is underlined in the rhetoric that we are all countrymen and any separation is a villainous sundering of one coherent entity by a slave power conspiracy, the way so many yankees here and elsewhere go on about Southerners befits the sort of cant you see with Balkantards and their unbecoming ethnic feuds.

[Valmy]

For all that the Union cause is underlined in the rhetoric that we are all countrymen and any separation is a villainous sundering of one coherent entity by a slave power conspiracy, the way so many yankees here and elsewhere go on about Southerners befits the sort of cant you see with Balkantards and their unbecoming ethnic feuds.

Man this is nothing.  Seeing the Republicans and Democrats going at it on the internet these days you would think we were days away from another Civil War.

[viper37]

The South had the people, the North had the economy.

Uhm, no, actually the north had both.

yes, but the North was industrialized while the South relied mostly on agriculture, with slave workers.

In the North, they could afford to densifiy a little more before expanding, so long as they could by agricultural products from elsewhere to complement their own production.

In the South, with an economy model revolving around plantations, ran by a few whites and lots of black slaves, if a family has more than a couple of children, the elder one gets the plantation while the other boys need to find something else, and that something else is either a plantation with no heir or new lands to expand to, for whatever production they wish.

So, I think the South had more imperatives to race west the North at that time.  And the North needed a lot of workers in the post-civil war era.  I don't know if the losses of the Civil War caused that, though, or if it was simply increased economic activity due to reconstruction era.

[viper37]

I wonder...if the South decided to stay in, but use the threat of secession more as a bargaining chip than a real threat...how much in concessions to their way of life/state's rights could they have squeezed out?   They'd certainly have been better off and much stronger than under Reconstruction, and still a very powerful political bloc inside the U.S.

But nope, they had to go all honey badger on everybody.

Well, the moment Lincoln decided to prevent slavery in the new territories, the South would never accept that.  Lincoln would have had to allow slavery to be decided on a State by State basis for the South to consider remaining in the Union, imho.

But yeah, they would have been better to embrace change, but lot's of people don't see it that way.

[Valmy]

would have had to allow slavery to be decided on a State by State basis for the South to consider remaining in the Union, imho.

That was Stephen Douglas' idea and the South stormed out of the 1860 Democratic convetion to protest it.  They wanted complete rights to their property as guaranteed by the US Constitution and that included the ability to take them anywhere in the territories.

[viper37]

would have had to allow slavery to be decided on a State by State basis for the South to consider remaining in the Union, imho.

That was Stephen Douglas' idea and the South stormed out of the 1860 Democratic convetion to protest it.  They wanted complete rights to their property as guaranteed by the US Constitution and that included the ability to take them anywhere in the territories.

Ah, I was mistaken then

Well, not much chance of a happy reunion by 1860 then.

[Valmy]

Ah, I was mistaken then

Well, not much chance of a happy reunion by 1860 then.

Yep every reasonable compromise had pretty much been tried by 1860. 

[jimmy olsen]

The South had the people, the North had the economy.

Uhm, no, actually the north had both.

yes, but the North was industrialized while the South relied mostly on agriculture, with slave workers.

In the North, they could afford to densifiy a little more before expanding, so long as they could by agricultural products from elsewhere to complement their own production.

In the South, with an economy model revolving around plantations, ran by a few whites and lots of black slaves, if a family has more than a couple of children, the elder one gets the plantation while the other boys need to find something else, and that something else is either a plantation with no heir or new lands to expand to, for whatever production they wish.

So, I think the South had more imperatives to race west the North at that time.  And the North needed a lot of workers in the post-civil war era.  I don't know if the losses of the Civil War caused that, though, or if it was simply increased economic activity due to reconstruction era.

That's not really how it worked out. The population in the North grew more and expanded faster even before immigrants started arriving in big waves in the late 1840s.

[derspiess]

Not unlike Grant, I think?

I think Peedy is being ironic.

No, Lee had a far higher casualty % than Grant.  He was overly offensive when he didn't need to be.  Iirc, he had about 1/3 more casualties in overall numbers than Grant - and that was with smaller armies that could ill afford it.  Lee was a butcher.

Grant was a butcher (but followed the surest strategy for winning).  Lee suffered high casualties in some battles, but most of the time he had no choice.

[Valmy]

Grant was a butcher (but followed the surest strategy for winning).

The butchers were the ones who let the war continue year after year.

[derspiess]

Grant was a butcher (but followed the surest strategy for winning).

The butchers were the ones who let the war continue year after year.

Are you letting Grant off the hook, then?

[CountDeMoney]

Are you letting Grant off the hook, then?

There's no hook to let him off of.

[derspiess]

Are you letting Grant off the hook, then?

There's no hook to let him off of.

Cold Harbor was a pretty ginormous hook.  He even said so himself.