The Fool wrote:

>
> Then there's this:
> 
> http://www.ka.net/randy/conspiracies/shadow/html/shadow.html
> 

I don't have time right now to read the whole thing, but when I get 
to a quote like this I'm not sure I want to anyway:

"Lincoln was caught in the middle between the Northern 
industrialists and the Southern agriculturists, who both wanted to 
dominate Western expansion because of the wealth it offered. The 
industrialists knew that the agriculturists depended on slavery 
because cotton, upon which Southern wealth was based, was very labor 
intensive and required the inexpensive labor that slavery provided. 
They knew that if the Western lands were declared "free states" then 
the Southern agriculturists would be unable to compete, and would be 
forced to leave Western expansion, and its potential profits, to the 
Northern industrialists."


Slavery was never an efficient source of labor.  The Civil war was 
about maintaining an Aristocracy, first and foremost.  The Southern 
system of agriculture was extremely inefficient according to just 
about everything I've read on the subject.  Slavery is inherently 
inefficient, and slaves were not inexpensive.

One of the primary reasons the South wanted to expand into the west 
(and into Mexico and the Caribbean) was that they knew that if they 
did not maintain the balance of power in the U.S. Government, their 
way of life was doomed.  Thus we see the South demanding a Slave 
state be admitted to the Union for every free state until just 
before the war.


-- 
Doug

email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.zo.com/~brighto

"Imagine all the people,
Living for Today"

John Lennon

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