Quote:
Originally Posted by Opossum
All Confederate statues need to be destroyed.
Anyone who hasn't destroyed their Confederate flag should be shunned from everyone.
White people who say "all lives matter" in response to "black lives matter" is an insensitive idiot.
The Eyes of Texas should not be the school song of The University of Texas.
Please share what we can do to help.
Thank you.
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A little education in American history is suggested.
The following are facts, not opinions:
After the Revolution between the American States and England the peace treaty specifically stated that the various states were considered to be separate and independent Nations. They got together and drew up an agreement that assigned certain functions to a central group of leaders, but the states were still in charge, and they could leave the group if they so desired.
That had some problems, so several years later, the United States was born by another agreement. Look at the US constitution. The individual states were still considered to be independent, and could leave.
Mexico's war of independence pushed out Spain in 1821. Texas became a country, called the Republic of Texas, from 1836 until it agreed to join the United States in 1845. Sixteen years later, it seceded along with 10 other states to form the Confederacy.
When the southern states desired to leave and form a different country, the main reason was because of economic mistreatment by the Industrial Northern States. Slavery was not the only difference between the North and the South. But it is now said to be so because of propaganda that ignores the actual history. The winner of a war usually gets to write the history about the war.
The fact is that economics was the major driving factor for the war. (by the way I wrote a long paper (much longer than this) for college that was titled: "The Economic causes of the Civil War".
The North had completed the Erie Canal built between 1817 and 1825, the original Erie Canal traversed 363 miles from Albany to Buffalo. It was the longest artificial waterway and the greatest public works project in North America. The canal put New York on the map as the Empire State. The leader in population, industry, and economic strength was now connected by ships west to Chicago by the inner ocean called the Great Lakes.
The completion in 1825 of the Erie Canal, connecting Lake Erie with the Hudson River, was an event of major importance in Michigan history because it greatly facilitated the transportation of passengers and freight between the eastern seaboard and Michigan ports. There were with other connections to bring iron ore and turn it into steel. Portions of the Erie Canal are still operable for tourism, the main source of boat traffic along the Erie Canal. Commercial and shipping traffic declined abruptly after the completion of the St. Lawrence Seaway in 1959.
With the northern output of steel, railroad construction began in earnest in the North but not the South. The South was left with very few miles of track when the Civil War started. That fact alone meant that they never had a chance to compete with the industrial North. Once President Lincoln said that they could not become a separate nation, they never had a chance because they were a geographical area that grew cotton, tobacco and sugar; all very labor intensive.
Before the Civil War, the southern states has developed a trading partnership with England by sending their cotton to England to be turned into clothing at the English mills. Hatred of the North for the South resulted in charging expensive railroad freight rates from the South to the North for cotton and cheap railroad freight rates from the North to the South for industrial goods. The South could, and did, send their cotton by ships to England cheaper than sending it North to the mills in New England. That really pissed the Northern people off. How dare the South trade with England and not them, after they built the railroad lines south to get their cotton: you do understand that the North didn't give a tinker's damn about the slaves that picked the cotton.
In 1794 Eli Whitney (1765-1825) patented the cotton gin, a machine that revolutionized the production of cotton by greatly speeding up the process of removing seeds from cotton fiber. The demand for cotton went up, and the black families were caught by the worldwide economic demands. By the mid-19th century, cotton had become America’s leading export. His invention offered Southern planters a way to produce more cotton with less labor as a a growing number of Americans, including Southern Americans, supported the abolition of slavery. More than a few history scholars have made the point that slavery would have ended within a short time if the cotton Gin had been invented only a few years earlier because there would no longer be a need for it. Interesting point, and it is a long study and a longer discussion. What if?
There was a problem with expanding cotton production to the West: the South had very few miles of rail that would transport the cotton from the West to the sea ports in the East: The North would not invest in Railroads for use by only the South that would have helped to developed to Southern states. When the North blockaded the sea ports, that cut off the supply of money from England for the Cotten it wanted and needed the was almost over.
Just follow the money, the trail of money explains a lot.
At the beginning of the war, very few people even considered the slaves; except John Brown who attacked Harper's Ferry with the hope of giving the slaves an opportunity to rise up and rebel: none did, and they knew they could have. He was hanged: "John brown's body lies a mouldering in the grave".
The South, to this day, understands the discrimination of the North against it. Slaves were common long before and during the 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 and into the 1800s. Not all slaves were black and in some parts of the world they exist today. The drive for money does tell us something.
Today, in America, farming is not as labor intensive, and there is no need for slaves to do the work: I wish that these changes could have been brought sooner.
We can not change the past: it is what it is. We should learn from history, and honor our past success as well as our past mistakes. Pulling down statues and confederate flags will not change anything. It does limit our understanding and substitute emotion for thoughts. We need those reminder of who and what we were.
The real problem today: the Democrat party still tries to hold the black man back. They intentionally limit the education of black young people in the inner city schools to an inadequate education. The wasted time on sports in our schools prevents the serious training of our students in math and science. Forget the watered down play time classes and the fake social study courses. Let's get serious about what needs to be done now to train the black students. Without an education, the chances for a better income and life is severely limited.
The Democrat party was the party of the South before and after the Civil war. It was the party of the KKK, and it has NEVER wanted the Negro to develop socially and economically. Look at the large cities controlled by the Democrat party, there has been almost nothing done to raise up the black family. Trump has tried, and been viciously attacked. The democrats want the jobs to go the the immigrant workers who cross our borders and take the jobs from the black people. Today's Wall Street Journal had a feature article about how President Trump has now closed some of the programs that allow foreign workers to come into our country for work. Those jobs should go to Americans. The training programs that draw foreign workers should go to Americans, and our black neighbors need those training programs more than any of us. The Democrats object: what the hell is this? They object? The Corona Virus has hurt the black families more than any other part of our society. This is just another attempt, by the Democrats, to keep the black people in our society down.
There is a chance with the next election to really make a difference in America. But many blacks do not understand that the only way to make any real changes is to help Trump "drain the swamp". If we don't re-elect Trump, I believe that the threat of the Democrat Party to pull the black man back into perpetual slavery is real.
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