Cotton was so insanely profitable for the southern economy that they basically put all their chips on that and slavery. It didnt matter that you personally didnt own slaves, your livelihood likely indirectly depended on slave labor. They didnt have a plan b for what would happen if they had to give up slavery. They fucked themselves with slavery and instead of owning up to that mistake and try to work their way out of it, they doubled down again and again until they were willing to go to war to keep the system they had
JacobJamesTrowbridge on
Most Confederate soldiers believed that emancipation would cause a race war in the south, and that African Americans would take violent retribution on white southerners for the centuries of enslavement. A lot of rebel soldiers owned slaves themselves, but a good portion of the Confederate army were non-slaveholders who thought that maintaining the antebellum social order was not only beneficial to them, but necessary for their safety.
MobsterDragon275 on
Plenty of Confederate soldiers would have fought for terrible reasons, but I highly doubt any of them thought they were going to end up with big personal plantations if they won.
biglyorbigleague on
“Slavery’s good for me even if I don’t own any because it keeps me from being on the same level as non-white people” — likely response
JayMack1981 on
Don’t waste your time, Billy! Johnny already dead.
KevanTheMan on
Billy Yank has a point
Overquartz on
Each Dixie boy must understand that he must mind his uncle Sam!!
Blade_Shot24 on
As well as trying to hold their Supramcacy over slaves
Useless_bum81 on
“They will still blame you for it though”
Ms_Apprehend on
Slave owners were wealthy. Just like today, they did not send their sons to battle; they paid poor whites to join in their names.
YSoMadTov on
One would argue that it’s not much different in modern time, considering that the southern States are the all Red.
17 Comments
One of the reasons the Confederacy had to resort to conscription (ran out of volunteers).
r/shermanposting
War has always been a racket
“…but that would have forced me to see blacks as humans.:
Could we please stop calling the U.S civil “war” a war and call it for what it was, a dispute among regarded farmers?
Atun-Shei’s ‘Checkmate Lincolnites’ summarized pretty well.
Cotton was so insanely profitable for the southern economy that they basically put all their chips on that and slavery. It didnt matter that you personally didnt own slaves, your livelihood likely indirectly depended on slave labor. They didnt have a plan b for what would happen if they had to give up slavery. They fucked themselves with slavery and instead of owning up to that mistake and try to work their way out of it, they doubled down again and again until they were willing to go to war to keep the system they had
Most Confederate soldiers believed that emancipation would cause a race war in the south, and that African Americans would take violent retribution on white southerners for the centuries of enslavement. A lot of rebel soldiers owned slaves themselves, but a good portion of the Confederate army were non-slaveholders who thought that maintaining the antebellum social order was not only beneficial to them, but necessary for their safety.
Plenty of Confederate soldiers would have fought for terrible reasons, but I highly doubt any of them thought they were going to end up with big personal plantations if they won.
“Slavery’s good for me even if I don’t own any because it keeps me from being on the same level as non-white people” — likely response
Don’t waste your time, Billy! Johnny already dead.
Billy Yank has a point
Each Dixie boy must understand that he must mind his uncle Sam!!
As well as trying to hold their Supramcacy over slaves
“They will still blame you for it though”
Slave owners were wealthy. Just like today, they did not send their sons to battle; they paid poor whites to join in their names.
One would argue that it’s not much different in modern time, considering that the southern States are the all Red.