The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #67936   Message #1143474
Posted By: Strick
22-Mar-04 - 10:20 PM
Thread Name: BS: slavery, poverty and culture
Subject: RE: BS: slavery, poverty and culture
It's a waste of time, but let me clarify some points that you refer to.

"The Test Oath ...wasn't a test of a willingness to be loyal to the Union ... it was a test to determine who to punish for supporting secession. The result was that the majority of white Texans were disenfranchised causing no little discontent."

Two points. First, nature of the oath is misrepresented in more recent histories both to hide that punishment was being inflicted and to imply that Southerners deserved whatever mild misfortunes they suffered (just like some of you comments) since they were unwilling to take a simple step to become loyals citizens again. That simply wasn't true, it was a catch-22. Second, the imposition of the oath not only disenfranchised men who had been able to vote in elections immediately after the war, it was the first signal that the North intended reverse the conciliatory policy Lincoln put forward and actively punish the South. Say what you will, it was no way to make them love the North.

"Jim Crow had nothing to do with the North's thirst for vengence against the South."

The Jim Crow laws came after the war and the Reconstruction. How could they be the cause of the North's treatment of the South before they were enacted? Were you thinking the North's resentment over the slavery issue itself? Really? For the first couple of years of the war the North insisted the war was not fought over slavery, only to maintain the Union. This was the period of draft riots and Copperheads. Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation electrified the nation, but that was well into the war, was meant more to prevent Britain entering the war on the South's side and, as I'm sure you knew only affected slaves in the Southern states, not the Union states that were slavery was still legal. Most of the war, the war had nothing to do with slavery -- unless you say Lincoln is a liar.

"Of course, there wasn't any [hard currency] since most if not all of the specie in the state had gone into the war [snip]... The economy collapsed."

No, the North was only responsible for intentionally imposing policy that they knew would have harsh economic consequences and allow the legal looting of the property of those of the defeated. Coming as it did, as a form of punishment, again you can't expect the Southerners to love the North.

Say what you will about the non-existant "Klan" in Texas, they started to try to control the lawless element the Army did little or nothing to put down. If you're surprised that once the North openly started punishing the South for the war, retaliated against anyone they could reach who symbolized what the North was doing, well, you don't understand what's happening in Palestine or happened in Northern Ireland. They considered themselves freedom fighters, too. Yes, I know there's more to it than that, but that's how they saw themselves.