[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
orion wrote:
That makes no sense-
The South could have kept slavery easily in the form of an amendment that would have prevented the federal government from abolishing it without their consent.
Also, by leaving the union they gave up any chance of influencing territories that wanted to join the union.
If what you claimed was correct the south would have had to stay in the union in order to have further influence in the unions decision making process.
It simply does not compute.
The South wasn’t interested in “keeping” slavery, they wanted expansion. The amendment kept slavery where it was - legislation was forthcoming to keep it our of the Federal Territories. That is what the election of 1860 was about. The Slave Power split the Democratic Convention because the national party would not commit to anything more than “popular sovereignty” in the new Federal Territories in opposition to the Republicans’ plank of “no expansion of slavery”.
And, they knew that they couldn’t “influence territories” because the election result gave them information to the contrary - that the Republicans’ plan was going to win the day. That is precisely why the Slave Power wanted out - if they stayed in the Union, the legislative math meant that they were losers.
The Slave Power couldn’t influence the “Union’s decision making process” - they already tried and failed.
And, the Confederacy was already licking its chops at the possibilities of westward expansion - the Confederacy was thinking empire, and weren’t about to let anything stand in their way.
Everything computes just fine, if you have any facts at your disposal. You are like a slow-motion trainwreck. Bow out while you still can.[/quote]
This guy has clearly never actually read anything on the issue. Orion, if you picked up a book, or better yet primary sources from the era, it would compute.