Conversation

It's Black History Month so I'm reading the Declaration of Causes of Seceding States (which, admittedly, is a lot of White history but you see the point). You ever read all 8,000 words of this thing? How long exactly do you think it takes them to get to slavery? A lot of people argue to this day that the Civil War wasn't primarily about slavery. And since this document is pretty long, I bet it takes a while to get to slavery, right? Well anyway, in the first sentence they say "okay, we're going to present the causes of the Civil War!" and then in the second sentence, spoiler alert, it's slavery baby!

"The people of Georgia having dissolved their political connection with the Government of the United States of America, present to their confederates and the world the causes which have led to the separation. For the last ten years we have had numerous and serious causes of complaint against our non-slave-holding confederate States with reference to the subject of African slavery."

I know that I'm probably preaching to the choir on Mastodon but I bet even most of the choir hasn't tried to read this thing. It's not just kind of about slavery. They don't mention slavery as one thing among many other grievances. It's slavery all the way down. https://web.archive.org/web/19980128034930/http://sunsite.utk.edu/civil-war/reasons.html

It's also honestly one of the dumber historical documents I've ever read. Here's Mississippi's declaration which also waits all the way until sentence number two to explicitly state the cause: "In the momentous step which our State has taken of dissolving its connection with the government of which we so long formed a part, it is but just that we should declare the prominent reasons which have induced our course. Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. "

I grew up in New York City and I still remember a teacher who tried to argue that the war was about "state's rights." Imagine growing up in a place where the text books and political zeitgeist tries to pass that off as fact. Something to think about for the disinformation researchers out there.