----- Original Message ----- From: "Julia Thompson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Killer Bs Discussion" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Sunday, February 29, 2004 5:52 PM Subject: Re: L3 Bitter Mellons, Gin and Tonic, and a an Un- reasonable view.
> > Some of those doing the fighting were fighting for states' rights, so > arguably it was *fought* over that. > > A lot of those in the South put their state above the nation. Lee > wouldn't fight for the Union because his Virginia was part of the > Confederacy. And this putting the state before the nation was probably > one of the major factors that lost the war for the South. I think the question you raised is an interesting one, but I don't think it is quite that easily resolved. In particular, people like Lee would lose their whole way of life if the North won the Civil war. Gautam beat me to the consequences for poorer whites. What I was going to say is that the bottom white knew he was better than a good fraction of the population: almost half in the Deep South, about 1/3rd in the upper South. Second, it wasn't just a few who owned slaves: in Mississippi and Georgia, almost half of the white population were slave owners, in Alabama and Florida over a third, in Louisiana, Texas, North Carolina, Virginia, and Tennessee, between a quarter and a third. So, I would argue that if one had to choose between a principled stand against the Federal Government having too much power, period, and preserving a way of life; the fight was to preserve a way of life. Without slavery, the life of most whites, slaveowners and non-slaveowners, would have been quite different. Dan M. _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
