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WHAT DID THEY FIGHT OVER?
WAR FOR SOUTHERN INDEPENDENCE (1861-1865)

PAGE 1 EVENTS AND DATES Last Revision: 4 Feb 2005

1787 Constitutional Convention George Mason is a major contributor but objects to ratification in the end. 1860 20 Dec: South Carolina secedes JF Epperson web site presents many documents supporting the argument that the south seceded over slavery 25 Dec: Address of South Carolina to Slaveholding States This document supports the argument that the tariff was the basis for secession 1861 9 Jan - 26 Jan: Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, and Louisiana secede 1 Feb: Texas convention approves secession pending statewide referendum 4 Feb - 28 Feb: Virginia, Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee, and North Carolina reject secession 18 Feb: Confederate President Jefferson Davis inaugural address . States free trade is policy but does not mention slavery 23 Feb: Texas referendum votes 46,153 to 14,747 for secession Texas handbook article 27 Feb: letter from J Davis to Lincoln 2 Mar: Congress approves this amendment to the constitution: "No amendment shall be made to the Constitution which will authorize or give to Congress the power to abolish or interfere, within any State, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State" Don't believe it? See the U. S. House of Representatives web site at house.gov/house/Constitution/Amendnotrat.html The north�s willingness to pass this amendment demolishes the argument that the war was fought over slavery even if that was the cause of southern secession 2 Mar: Morrill tariff passed by Senate. More evidence that war was fought over tariff.	George Mason's Objections include this "By requiring only a majority to make all commercial and navigation laws, the five Southern States, whose produce and circumstances are totally different from that of the eight Northern and Eastern States, may be ruined..." WHY NOT CALL IT CIVIL WAR? Civil War would apply if both sides had fought to control Washington. The south's war aim was its independence and the north's aim was to deny the south its independence. Hence the accurate term is War for Southern Independence. There are few, I believe, in this enlightened age, who will not acknowledge that slavery as an institution is a moral and political evil. --Robert E. Lee 1856 WALTER E. WILLIAMS See what this black columnist and economics professor says about the war. Williams home page Why the Civil War -- 18 Nov 1998 Black Confederates -- 21 Jan 2000 Secession or Nullification -- 8 Apr 2002 The Real Lincoln -- 1 Apr 2002 Non Politically Correct Thinking -- 21 Oct 2002 Parting Company is an Option -- 24 Dec 2003 CONFEDERATE MEMORIAL The Confederate Memorial, designed by Moses Ezekiel, a confederate veteran, is located at Arlington National Cemetery. One of the uniformed confederate soldier figures on the memorial is a black man; the first representation of a black soldier on a monument in Washington D.C. LONDON TIMES 13 September 1862 If Northerners ... had peaceably allowed the seceders to depart ... the result might fairly have been quoted as illustrating the advantages of Democracy; but when Republicans put empire above liberty, and resorted to political oppression and war rather than suffer any abatement of national power, it was clear that nature at Washington was precisely the same as nature at St. Petersburg ... Democracy broke down, not when the Union ceased to be agreeable to all its constituent States, but when it was upheld, like any other Empire, by force of arms.
4 Mar: Lincoln inauguration. Supports amendment protecting slavery, states has no intention of interfering with slavery, but threatens invasion "to collect the duties and imposts." 11 Mar: confederate constitution adopted. Prohibits protective tariffs. 16 Mar: President Lincoln offered troops to assist Texas Governor Sam Houston who opposed secession. Houston rejected the offer. Texas handbook article 4 Apr: Lincoln orders Gustavus Vasa Fox to relieve Fort Sumter	page 2 - more on Lincoln's first inaugural address page 3 - the Lincoln tariff war Many history accounts mention that the war started with the confederate attack on Fort Sumter. Most accounts neglect to mention Lincoln's actions which led to the attack. page 4 - what led to the attack on Fort Sumter
7 Apr: P. G. T. Beauregard cuts off supplies from Charleston to Sumter 11 Apr: Beauregard demands evacuation, Anderson answers will evacuate 15 Apr if not resupplied 12 Apr: Fox expedition arrives and remains outside harbor and B attacks sumter 13 Apr: Sumter surrenders 15 Apr: Lincoln proclamation calling for the states to provide 75,000 militia for three months to put down the "rebellion"	Lincoln offered command of the invasion force to Robert E. Lee who declined. Four states (Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia) had already rejected secession, but reversed their decisions and joined the confederacy as a result of the invasion order. Four slave states remained in the union. Lee was from Virginia and resigned from the U.S. Army. He wrote: "With all my devotion to the Union, and the feeling of loyalty and duty of an American citizen, I have not been able to make up my mind to raise my hand against my relative, my children, my home. I have therefore, resigned my commission in the Army, and save in defense of my native state (with the sincere hope that my poor services may never be needed) I hope I may never be called upon to draw my sword."
27 Apr: Lincoln suspends habeas corpus MORE Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Roger B. Taney issued an opinion that only Congress had the authority to suspend habeas corpus. Lincoln ordered the arrest of Taney but the arrest warrant was never served.	page 5 - atrocities
6 May - 20 May: Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina these seceded as a direct result of Lincoln�s decision to invade the first seven that had seceded See "Reluctant confederates" 1862 14 Feb - 16 Feb: Capture of Fort Donelson -- first major victory by north and many in the north believed it would lead to a quick collapse of the south	Click here for a highly recommended site with lots of info about the causes angelfire.com/pa/sergeman/defenders/civilwar/main.html H. L. MENCKEN "The Gettysburg speech was at once the shortest and the most famous oration in American history...the highest emotion reduced to a few poetical phrases. Lincoln himself never even remotely approached it. It is genuinely stupendous. But let us not forget that it is poetry, not logic; beauty, not sense. Think of the argument in it. Put it into the cold words of everyday. The doctrine is simply this: that the Union soldiers who died at Gettysburg sacrificed their lives to the cause of self-determination -- that government of the people, by the people, for the people, should not perish from the earth. It is difficult to imagine anything more untrue. The Union soldiers in the battle actually fought against self-determination; it was the Confederates who fought for the right of their people to govern themselves."
6 Apr - 7 Apr: Battle at Shiloh -- north realized how long and difficult the war would be. Thus began the northern policy of destruction of crops, livestock and property. Grant called it "complete conquest" I call it atrocities	page 5 - atrocities
22 Sep: Lincoln declares Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation gave the seceding states until 1 Jan 1863 to give up fighting and rejoin the union. 1863 1 Jan: Emancipation proclamation declares free all the slaves in confederate states (except Tennessee, southern Louisiana, and parts of Virginia)	page 6 - abolition and emancipation
1864 2 Jan: Confederate General Patrick Cleburne proposes enlisting slaves, in exchange for freedom, in the confederate army. 13 Jan: Jefferson Davis rejects Cleburne's proposal. 8 Apr: U. S. Senate approves constitutional amendment abolishing slavery 15 June: U. S. House of Representatives fails to approve constitutional amendment abolishing slavery 1865 31 Jan: U. S. House of Representatives approves constitutional amendment abolishing slavery, sending it to the states for ratification 3 Feb: Hampton Road Peace Conference. Seward (in the presence of Lincoln) declared that if the South abandoned the struggle, the amendment probably would fail to receive the necessary approval of three-fourths of the states for ratification. Seward inferred, according to Stephens's account of the conference, that if the Southern states quickly rejoined the Union, they could assist in voting down the amendment.	Introductory of " No Treason No. I" (1867) by abolitionist Lysander Spooner ( obituary ) The question of treason is distinct from that of slavery; and is the same that it would have been, if free States, instead of slave States, had seceded. On the part of the North, the war was carried on, not to liberate slaves, but by a government that had always perverted and violated the Constitution, to keep the slaves in bondage; and was still willing to do so, if the slaveholders could be thereby induced to stay in the Union. The principle, on which the war was waged by the North, was simply this: That men may rightfully be compelled to submit to, and support, a government that they do not want; and that resistance, on their part, makes them traitors and criminals. No principle, that is possible to be named, can be more self-evidently false than this; or more self-evidently fatal to all political freedom. Yet it triumphed in the field, and is now assumed to be established. If it really be established, the number of slaves, instead of having been diminished by the war, has been greatly increased; for a man, thus subjected to a government that he does not want, is a slave. And there is no difference, in principle --- but only in degree --- between political and chattel slavery. The former, no less than the latter, denies a man's ownership of himself and the products of his labor; and [*iv] asserts that other men may own him, and dispose of him and his property, for their uses, and at their pleasure. Previous to the war, there were some grounds for saying that --- in theory, at least, if not in practice --- our government was a free one; that it rested on consent. But nothing of that kind can be said now, if the principle on which the war was carried on by the North, is irrevocably established. If that principle be not the principle of the Constitution, the fact should be known. If it be the principle of the Constitution, the Constitution itself should be at once overthrown.

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