RE: [tlug] [OT] US Civil War

[<burlingk@example.com>]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Behalf Of Daniel A. Ramaley
> Sent: Tuesday, August 21, 2007 1:38 AM
> 
> How is the Civil War taught in Southern schools? Growing up in a 
> Northern state, the spin that i remember being taught is that the war 
> was started because of a number of differences between North 
> and South, 
<snip>
> in the end. How is the Civil War taught in the South? I realize the 
> view i was taught is very biased and smacks of "the winners write the 
> history books", 
> 

Well, there are a couple of versions, depending on
which company's text books you are using.  Also, in
this modern day of propaganda, and political correctness,
they often seek scapegoats.

How they taught my brother about the war, was different
from what they taught me, and there was less than ten
years difference.  

I was taught that it started with the issue of taxation.
Things like tobacco, cotton, corn, and other grains were
starting to be heavily taxed.  The taxes tended to effect
the southern states more because of the sheer volume of
goods coming out of those areas.  They talk about wealthy
land owners, but the truly wealthy for the most part live
in the north.  They may have had holdings in the south,
but they lived in townhouses in the area of the original
colonies.

It got to the point where it cost less to do business
with Britain or France, than to do business with another
state.

Slavery did exist in the south.  I'm not going to say it
was right, or that it was kind in any way.  It was not good.
Slavery existed in the north as well though.  As for
treatment, there were slave owners that were cruel, but
there were also a surprising number of slaves that when the
time came that slavery was no longer legal, a surprising
number of former slaves chose to stay with their former
masters for what amounted to room and board, and a stipend.
In these cases though, they were often people whose family
had been with the land owners family for generations, and
were treated as members of the family (in some cases they
just were ^^;).

The southern states felt that things were the same as they
had been a short while before between Britain and the
colonies.  That is what led to the war.

When the war first started, Lincoln refused flat out to
bring up the issue of slavery.  Lincoln was anti-slavery
but, he didn't want to stress relations more than was
needed under the circumstances.  Slavery was not brought
into the war until four years later, when the south was
still not budging, and northern politicians pressured
Lincoln into addressing the issue.  By that time, the
war was already almost over.

The south took great losses.  The north practiced slash
and burn methods, and in some cases would even salt the
ground afterwards.  They were more brutal than they had
been years before with the British.  I suppose it was
because of how close they were geographically.  It felt
more personal than it had when the enemy leaders were
on the other side of the globe.

By the end of the war, we couldn't feed ourselves.  The
land that was left had been used for growing cotton and
tabacco, so wasn't very good yet for growing proper feed
crops.  Those areas that were good for it had been jacked
up by troop movements.  No northern state would dare sell
goods to a southern city or land owner, and help from the
outside was being blocked by naval blockades.

The war ended because we had to choose between fighting,
and feeding our children.  When it comes down to that kind
of choice, there really is no choice to be made.

History, as written by the victors, would paint a picture
of evil land barrons, with more wealth than you can imagine,
choosing to use slave labor rather than pay white workers.

That image is not 100% accurate.  It is filtered through
the eyes of those who a) felt betrayed by the south's 
attempt at secession, and b) wanted to rationalize the
brutal actions of brother against brother.  The civil
war was ugly, it was nasty, it was bloody.  Both sides
were right, and both sides were wrong.  There was no
winner, only the guy who had food left as winter started
to set in.  There was no victory in that war.  There were
simply those who managed to lose less.  They brought the
war to us.  It was faught on southern soil, and southern
cities were the ones burning.

It is a very sensetive subject for a lot of people.


-- 
Ken