Fighting Sioux 23
New member
Again, the personal attacks. Sigh...
Kepler said:
To start, you are using the wrong terminology. At the time of the Constitutional Convention, it was not the "South" (or at least, not as we use the term now). It was slave state vs free state. Assuming you mean "South" to mean the slave states, then you are not including slave states such as New York and New Jersey, which did not abolish slavery until about a decade after the Constitutional Convention, and had slave owners/slavery proponents at the Constitutional Convention. So, if there had been a firm ground taken on slavery at the Constitutional Convention (which again, if you had read my posts, I agree that such a position should have been taken--so I won't address your straw man arguments), and the states had formed separate countries, you would have had 2 (or, as Handy stated, and with which I agreed with, likely more than 2) countries: the slave states (New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia (as well as modern day West Virginia and Kentucky), North Carolina (as well as modern day Tennessee), South Carolina, and Georgia (as well as most of modern day Alabama and Mississippi)) and the free states.
I think we are all in agreement that slavery was not going to end in 1787. I also believe that we are in agreement that slavery should have been addressed at the Constitutional Convention. However, the issue is that by avoiding the slavery question, did the Constitution create a strong enough government that could effectively end slavery (as it did, via the Civil War)? It is an argument that is commonly discussed amongst historians. Some of the common questions revolving around the hypothetical event of the Constitution not existing that are often discussed are: would slavery had ended sooner or later; would the AoC fallen apart, and, if as almost universally agreed upon, what would the makeup of the country/countries had been; and would we have been "better off" by the Constitution (and/or the current iteration of the United States) not existing? My point in my post was to further this discussion, which it did.
As I stated previously, I agree that slavery should have been addressed at the Constitutional Convention. However, I do believe that there is a significant (if not likely) chance that slavery would have lasted longer given that the slave state economy was so heavily dependent and tied to slavery. Further, given that slavery existed in other countries following the Civil War (and indeed, still exists in various forms today), and the United States continued to trade with such countries, there is a strong argument that the free state country would not have put pressure on the slave state country to end slavery prior to the 1860s (and perhaps not even prior to the Twentieth Century). My issue with your post was that I did not believe you were really considering this issue, but were focusing too much on the modern political implications.
Kepler said:
Possible path: maybe. Probable path: unlikely.
The slave states like New York and New Jersey probably follow this path; however, the economies of New York and New Jersey were not based upon slave labor, such as the rest of the slave states. The rise of cotton in the remaining slave states by the end of the Eighteenth Century, coupled with the world's growing desire for cotton, would likely have meant the rest of the slave states would not have had to develop/rely upon an industrial/commercial economy for much longer than the free states (which were never terribly reliant upon slavery for their economies). Of course, had countries refused to do business with the rest of the slave states until they eliminated slavery, this possibly could alter this take; however, as discussed above, I believe such pressure would not have mounted for a long time (likely into the Twentieth Century). In any event, to assume slavery would have ended upon the development of an industrial/commercial economy is also unlikely. Given that slavery was engrained into the slave state business model, it would be natural to assume that slaves would have been "repurposed" for the other hard manual labor positions within the industrial/commercial economy.
Kepler said:
Again, hypothetically possible, and perhaps more probable than your 2a. scenario. Although, it likely would have taken some sort of military pressure to effectively fragment the slave states. Again, the slave state economies were largely self-sufficient (which was the source of some of the big disagreements between Jefferson's and Hamilton's economic ideals and willingness to take on debt). They largely would have only needed central government for protection. I would concede that had the free state country (or another country) invaded one or more of the slave states, it could have caused such a government to fragment. I just don't believe such an invasion (presumably for the purpose of eradicating slavery) would have occurred prior to the 1860s.
Kepler said:
Sigh...more personal attacks. You do realize that these types of arguments are the lowest of the low in terms of debate, correct? In any event, if you knew me, you would know your statement is about as 180 degrees from the truth as possible.
Now, if we can just agree that we both hope the Islanders are able to win the Cup in glorious fashion, while the Rangers fail historically, then I think we might be able to make some ground on other issues.
