Community Organizer Elected President of the United States

originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
Hard to know what would have happened if the South had not seceded.
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Actually, it's very easy to know, and you said as much: The practice of slavery would be 'quarantined' into the ten states dependent on it, and, eventually, it would fade away (either tattered by federal regulation or made irrelevant by newer agricultural practices).

Instead, those states squandered the lives of their men, their economies, their dignities, and a century of emotional energy on a cause that was rotten in its core (no matter how nobly they argued its fine points).
 
Not precisely the same, but there has been a lot written speculating on what would have happened if the South had won the Civil War. Google it, and the list is long.
 
originally posted by Claude Kolm:
Not precisely the same, but there has been a lot written speculating on what would have happened if the South had won the Civil War. Google it, and the list is long.
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funny movie about said subject:

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www.csathemovie.com
 
originally posted by Claude Kolm:
Not precisely the same, but there has been a lot written speculating on what would have happened if the South had won the Civil War. Google it, and the list is long.
Click to expand...

I really don't want to be on that NSA list.
 
originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
Lincoln wasn't a Republican because he was a moderate, he was a moderate among Republicans, which was an anti-slavery party. A nit, I recognize, but a meaningful one given the reality of radical Republicans.
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Did I say something to make you think that I wasn't clear on that idea? My point was that Lincoln was chosen by the Republican party to be their Presidential candidate because he was perceived to be in the moderate wing of that party regarding its anti-slavery stance, a vain attempt to keep the Southern states from seceding. Lincoln's primary concern, insofar as I've read in his correspondence, was the preservation of the Union. His desire to end slavery, as heartfelt and sincere as it was, took a back seat to that concern.

I think that we actually agree about most of the particulars.

Mark Lipton
 
For anyone who has not yet read it, Team of Rivals is a fantastic book that gives the much more complicated tale of how Lincoln ended up as the Republican nominee (among other fascinating tales).
 
originally posted by Jeff Grossman:
originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
Hard to know what would have happened if the South had not seceded.
Click to expand...
Actually, it's very easy to know, and you said as much: The practice of slavery would be 'quarantined' into the ten states dependent on it, and, eventually, it would fade away (either tattered by federal regulation or made irrelevant by newer agricultural practices).

Instead, those states squandered the lives of their men, their economies, their dignities, and a century of emotional energy on a cause that was rotten in its core (no matter how nobly they argued its fine points).
Click to expand...

Mark asked would the North have declared war, not what would have ultimately happened. You and I and everyone else agree about the larger question. The smaller question is less clear. I think it doubtful the North would ever have declared war. Alas abolition was never strong enough to support that. And the direction of things was clear with the election of Lincoln. I also think it doubtful that the South would not have fought a war of secession sooner or later rather than suffer the pains of changing an economic system that, based on oppression and theft of labor, was nevertheless for the moment profitable.
 
The South also saw their control of the national political system slipping away. No new slave states meant only one thing in the end.
 
I often wonder at the lack of African Americans in the nyc wine trade (there are notable exceptions, of course).

I won't think of wine as really going mainstream for most Americans until there are more bald headed, glasses wearing black sommeliers, instead of just the bald headed, glasses wearing white guys who dominate the trade.

I remember the answer that Mariah Carey gave to the question "How do you sell 3 million records?"

A: You sell to both black and white audiences.
 
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