- 21 Aug 2012 15:09
#14037426
Okay, you got me on my first de Tocqueville quote. It has been years since I read it. It was actually one of the first serious books that I ever read. Before that, I consumed trashy conspiracy theories, such as those expounded in The Creature from Jekyll Island, by some kook named G. Edward Griffin.
I did not use my de Tocqueville quote accurately, and now I can see that your reading is better. I was just grabbing something real quick off the net, and I did not look it over in enough detail.
In the spirit of honest debate, I would like to repeat the contested quote (this way, you will see that my retraction is sincere).
I was looking for something else. I thought there was a part where de Tocqueville describes the attitude of ordinary Americans, who could already anticipate a horrible war on the horizon, because of Southern slavery. Instead, I latched onto the first quote that contained the phrase "civil war." You know, I thought there was something wrong with the phrasing--I am glad you pointed this out. I can see that it is not a complete waste of time to argue with you. Well done.
I have to revisit this masterpiece it seems, and soon. I think you should also, however.
Perhaps that was indeed his view. He seems like someone who was optimistic about the continued progress of mankind. All decent people can hope that progress will be brought about without unnecessary pain. And the tension had not reached an intense enough pitch to make war seem inevitable at this point, I suppose. That is what deeper reflection tells me, anyhow. In the section following the one I quoted above, I find comments that are also relevant to our sub-argument on the Civil War. It is titled "What Are The Chances In Favor Of The Duration Of The American Union, And What Dangers Threaten It." (Part VI of "The Present And Probable Future Condition Of The Three Races Which Inhabit The Territory Of The United States." I had previously quoted from part V.)
De Tocqueville does not see such a war as likely, and if it occurs anytime soon, he predicts that the Union will lose. The editors have added a few notes preceding this chapter, to draw attention to the facts that make de Tocqueville's opinions here less than authoritative (I quote the version that wikipedia links to).
You have clarified my error, with your polite and accurate criticisms. I was letting historical hindsight creep back into my memory of de Tocqueville's original evaluations. Obviously, he could not have foreseen such a war, in any of its specific details.
Nobody could have predicted such a war over 20 years in advance, I guess. We are talking about something that had never happened in the history of the world, to my knowledge. There had been wars over slavery, of course. The Spartacus uprising jumps to mind. But that was a revolt of the slaves themselves. Never before had there been a war caused by slavery, in which the combatants themselves were not slaves. There had been slave uprisings, of course. There had been legal abolition of slavery by kings and government. But not one other example (as far as I know) where neither side in the conflict was a party of revolting slaves (there was some marginal contribution by former slaves in the Union forces, but not at high enough levels to be significant to my current argument).
It is not surprising that de Tocqueville's vision fails at this point. We are talking about something unique and unprecedented, something that could only be barely glimpsed with the most penetrating insight. Don't get me wrong: de Tocqueville had such insight. But, even the most penetrating intellect can be expected to fail at certain points. All humans, even the most talented, suffer from limitations.
Which brings me back to the original point: de Tocqueville's failure to completely grasp the nature of the coming Civil War. The individual states were too powerful at this point, and the Union was too weak. It was hard to imagine how such an inherently weak Federal authority could muster the energy and resources to combat a confederation of seceding states. He also failed to anticipate the ascendancy of a strong anti-slave party in the North.
Regardless of his inevitable intellectual failures (inevitable, because no matter how inspired, he was still human), it is still impressive to see how much his vision did encompass. He doesn't seem to think that slavery would peacefully melt away, like ice in the sun, without effort or pain, as you suggest it would have.
It is quite obvious that he sees only two real possibilities: a legal abolition of slavery, or a violent uprising of the slaves themselves. That White people who didn't own slaves would bear arms for this cause is hard to imagine in 1831. He didn't think the Union could levy sufficient troops for any cause, let alone for this one. Blacks fighting Whites over slavery was imaginable; Whites fighting Whites over such an issue only really became conceivable in 1861. But, in any case, he knew that this progress would be accompanied by "great calamities"
More importantly, he also managed to express the fact that Southerners were not amenable to reason on this issue. I understand that you "found de Tocqueville's sentiments to be supportive of [your] position," but I have provided evidence to the contradictory. I know how easy it is to experience errors in one's memory, when you are quoting from a book that you haven't read in a long time. Once again, here is the quote I wanted you to reflect on:
Your assertion that slavery in America would just peacefully disappear, because the Southerners would gradually come to accept that it was inefficient, is contradicted by these other statements (which you also failed to address directly):
These were Southern attitudes in '31. In thirty years, these attitudes had only hardened. Perhaps that was because anti-Slavery attitudes had solidified in the North. In any case, I think that if de Tocqueville's observations are correct, it is unlikely that the South would have changed their slave-mongering ways under the mere force of reason. What history shows us is that it required the force of arms.
Hindsight being 20/20, yes, these efforts were doomed. What doomed them was the military victory of Union forces. We can speculate about alternative scenarios, in which slavery was peacefully wiped out by "advances in industrialisation and automation... increasing international pressure" and so on, but these speculations have precisely the same authority as any science fiction novel.
It was also the belief of de Tocqueville that "slavery... cannot survive." But, he was not naive enough to imagine that this would happen in a peaceful way. I find your faith in the smooth and painless progress of mankind to be touching--you obviously have a lot of faith in your fellow man. History shows us that progress is always accompanied by violence and/or coercion, however. A social injustice does not just go away when people first begin to recognize it. Many examples could be cited to show that the people who benefit from these injustices always fight back with coercive methods, in order to secure their position of privilege. In order to overcome these defenses, coercive countermeasures must be deployed.
The slavery issue is a perfect example. Progress on this question was quite retarded in America. It was recognized by many enlightened people, even in the South, to be a great injustice. All enlightened parties acknowledged this, in the abstract, but no concrete measures were ever enacted (in the South). There was no political will to solve the problem, in 1831, even if Southern slavery made us an object of international disdain and embarrassment. The secondary problems that would inevitably arise seemed insurmountable; de Tocqueville does a good job of enumerating them. For example, anti-slavery measures in the North, preceding 1831, were also accompanied by the most virulent racism (much worse than in the South, in its way). Other forms of discrimination, primarily on the non-legal social plane, drove the recently freed slaves to emigrate to other places--mainly the South. If legal forms of discrimination were abolished in the South, de Tocqueville expected a corresponding rise in social discrimination. The Northern Blacks at this time could make their exodus to the South, but the Southern Blacks had no such line of retreat. Stuck where they are, with the tension continually rising in their neighborhood, something bad was bound to happen. A war of extermination, perhaps. Maybe the forceable deportation of former slaves to other nations. In 1831, he could not imagine free Blacks and Whites living together on an equal footing.
So, sure, de Tocqueville anticipated an end to slavery in the South. It was only going to take the forceable removal of almost all the Blacks, or their outright extermination. That sounds even worse than what actually did happen. A Civil War against the South sounds like a humane alternative, compared to the solution that de Tocqueville envisioned. In any case, the change would be accompanied by "great calamities."
Look, I am sure that you can indeed find support for your own positions in de Tocqueville. He is a complex thinker, and not a rigid ideologue, so I am sure that modern ideologues of all sorts can find supporting material for their own point of view in his seminal masterpiece. I certainly find such support, despite the fact that my first use of him in this debate was incorrect, because I didn't familiarize with the necessary context (I hope you can excuse this mistake, which was made in good faith, because I was in a rush... I certainly didn't consciously intend to distort de Tocqueville's position).
To further demonstrate my good faith, I will quote a passage that does seem to support your position.
In other words, if a confederation of Southern states were to secede, the Union could tolerate this, without any significant threat to the material prosperity of the whole. In fact, he speculates that this would even enhance the naval power.
It seems to me that you hold to these exact same opinions. Here's the catch, he wrote these things in reference to the world of 1831. We now have three decades of historical development to look at, which de Tocqueville did not have access to. Even if his evaluations were valid in 1831, they may not hold in 1861.
And so what has changed? Here is my estimation (certainly not the most authoritative... I haven't even gotten around to the second reading of Democracy In America yet!):
1) The ascendancy of Union power. The central power was more consolidated in '61 than in '31. De Tocqueville thought civil war unlikely, but even if it broke out, he seems to think that Union efforts would be anemic and easily repelled. This had changed completely in the 30 intervening years. History shows us, that by the time the war actually broke out, the Union was now able to hold its own against even a powerful Confederacy under competent command.
2) The growth of industrial manufacturing in the North. He is aware that there is already a disparity with the South, but it was only to grow after that. In '31, the South still received her manufactured goods predominantly from Britain. By '61, as we already know from a previous chapter in this debate, the North had appropriated this trade to herself. In '31, if the South had seceded, then Britain would not have had such a strong motive to launch aggression against the North, using a newly established toehold in an independent South. She would not have wanted to disrupt her lucrative trade to the South. However, in '61, her manufactured goods were in more direct competition with those of the North. Now there was an incentive for aggression. In other words, an independent Confederacy of Southern states, in 1861, backed by the power of Britain's navy, would have been a significant threat to the rest of the continent.
3) The rise of a strong anti-slavery party in the North. This was something that de Tocqueville failed to anticipate completely. Who could have seen this coming, in 1831? He tells us how racist they were, up in the North. They were quite willing to abolish slavery from their own states, but not because of any high minded ideals, and they were confident that racist discrimination on the social plane would drive the newly freed Blacks into other territories. They cared nothing about the injustice of slavery, and were only interested in the practical side of the question. By 1861, this had changed. Now there was strong agitation in the North against Southern slavery, not for vulgar reasons of sheer expediency, but more as a matter of principle. Another way to put this: before, in '31, there were political motives that went against this, but now, in '61, there was an ideological motive. This ideology crystallized around Lincoln in the 1860 campaign, and it drove the South into an absolute panic.
4) The consolidation of pro-slavery sentiment in the South. De Tocqueville describes an attitude in 1831 that is already almost completely intransigent: "they hold their life upon no other tenure." This attitude had only hardened by 1861. In all likelihood, this was in response to the abolitionist movement in the North, which was steadily growing in power. Then again, maybe the Northern sentiment for abolition crystallized in response to an escalation of pro-slavery sentiment in the South.
It is clear to me that I should read more about the origins of the Civil War, but even with my limited knowledge, I can see that the crisis was driven by the South's intransigence on the issue of slavery. Beginning the narrative (somewhat arbitrarily) in the year of de Tocqueville's visit to America, all of the economic and social forces that you think would have destroyed Southern slavery by 1870, without a war, or apparently without any real pain or effort at all, all of these forces were already active at this time, in 1831. Three decades went by, and still these forces had not brought the South to reason. They refused to be coerced by these "soft" methods. This made the force of arms necessary, I think.
We can speculate about what the South would have done about slavery, if they had won the war, if the Union had capitulated to their secession, or according to the dictates of any number of "alternative history" scenarios from science fiction novels. I myself can envision a scenario in which the South, now free from Union pressure, suddenly and dramatically abolishes slavery, almost out of spite, to show the North and the rest of the world that it was not slavery that made them rebellious, and now that they were not being directly forced to it, they were willing do the right thing, under their own volition. This scenario does not seem likely to me, however. More likely, inspired with confidence by their victory over the North, they would have clung to their "way of life" even more. The victor in any military contest always feels, whether it is true or not, that his victory came about through some kind of moral superiority. If the Union has just capitulated without a war, this was would have inspired an even greater feeling in the South for the moral superiority of their "venerable traditions." For all you know, a successful rebellion of the South might have secured the existence of state-sponsored slavery in the western hemisphere well into the 20th century.
Now, none of these science fiction scenarios are very relevant, because we should focus on what actually did happen, instead of what your ideology says should or could have happened. But you still seem resistant to the established facts of history.
By all means, set it aside! This is not an open topic of debate, among the minimally literate. They almost immediately seceded upon Lincoln's election, which is in itself an act of aggression. They knew full well that this would trigger a war; they showed no willingness to avoid the catastrophe. Lincoln might have been willing to capitulate on certain issues; we will never know, however, because of the South's eagerness to fight. On top of this political aggression, they were the ones who initiated military aggression, at Fort Sumter. The South picks a fight, and then you blame the North for accommodating them!
You would like to equate my justifications for the Union to the excuses that are made by propagandists for Israel. It seems to me that that is precisely what you are doing: making excuses for a bunch of murderous slave-mongers.
What aggression? I know what you mean, of course. You mean the Union should have just ignored all military and political aggression from the South, like a bunch of weaklings--just capitulate to every demand, like a wimp. I have been upset by a lot of recent elections in my country. What if I begin conspiring with a group of like-minded neighbors, and then start shelling the police station down the road? After all, if I "perceive" this station to be an aggressive military outpost, then my actions are justified, by your reasoning. When the violent counter-reaction inevitably comes, I will complain incessantly about the "unjust aggression" of "invading" forces. According to your libertarian logic, anyone who is dissatisfied with a presidential election can initiate violence against police, military personnel, or anyone at all that is "perceived" to be a threat.
If the aggression of the Confederacy at Sumter is to be justified, then you ought to show that it was in response to aggression from the Union. But in early 1861, there was no such aggression. It isn't good enough to demonstrate that they expected this aggression at some unknown point in the future. I expect a lot of things to happen, but that doesn't mean I can preemptively shoot at anyone I feel like, does it? Here is the "aggression" that you think justified so much violence: Lincoln's election. In other words, they were angry at the North because they freely cast their vote for a candidate that the South disliked.
I have already made the following point, but it bears repeating. All war boils down to defense and offence. One side is defending themselves, and the other is on the attack. The defenders should not automatically receive a normative justification, for the simple fact that they are defending themselves. But I should correct myself here. On a certain level, they do receive an automatic justification. The principle of self-defense is the central feature of all normative justifications for war. But, this principle is complex in its applications. For example, I am sure that you will admit that an offensive attack can be justified, if it is sincerely intended to defend against an imminent threat. That is your excuse for the South's violence, in fact. They anticipated an invasion, and so they acted preemptively.
But the principle of self-defense also covers the case of Union "aggression" against the Confederacy. After all, a secession by the Confederacy would have destroyed the Union as it currently existed. How can you claim the right of self-defense for the Confederacy, but not extend this to the Union as well? The Union had as much right to exist as the Confederacy.
But there is another principle we should consider as well: All wars have a political objective. Beyond the simple fact of who is attacking, who is defending, in order to evaluate whether or not a war is just, we have to ask, what were the political objectives? I have already pointed out that Germany was defending her own national territories in the second phase of WWII. Does that mean these defensive efforts were just? On a certain simplistic level, yes, everyone is allowed to defend themselves, if it is a case of national survival. But, two facts allow us to reach a more adult judgment. One, they started the war--the invasion of Germany was launched in response to their earlier aggression. And two, their political objectives were wrong--a totalitarian empire covering all of Europe and Russia. You don't get to start a war under these motivations, and then claim self-defense when you begin to lose.
This is not an exact analogy. The aggression of Germany was a great threat to all of Europe, and even the world; the Confederacy's aggression was not quite so threatening to the security of North America. I have already drawn your attention to the potential threat posed by an independent Confederacy, allied with Britain, and supported by her naval power. This was serious, but not nearly as serious as the threat posed by the Nazis. On this scale of comparison, the danger posed by an independent Confederacy ranks more as an annoyance.
But, that is not the point of the analogy. The point is, even when a nation is defending their own territory, they should not receive a blanket justification. Especially if, one, they started the aggression in the first place, and, two, their political objectives were unjust. The Confederacy did in fact initiate the violence (stop trying to hallucinate it away!), and part of their motivation was to preserve slavery. Therefore, their cause was unjust.
I know that it sounds childish to talk about "who started it," but you are the one who is trying to press a normative justification for the Confederacy. If we are trying to determine if a war is just or not, we have to ask this question. You may not like the answer, but it is a matter of fact: the South started the war.
* * *
I've got to break it off at some point. I told you I would become captivated by the subject of the Civil War, and leave the original thread behind. I find this war to be deeply interesting--so many things changed in this era. One thing that did not change was the subjugation of Southern Blacks. The Southern Whites, despite the outcome of the war, continued to force the Blacks into a quasi-feudal state of abject dependency. I believe that the North went along with this, for reasons of political expediency, and it created a serious problem for future generations.
As you point out, all other races emigrating to America managed to assimilate. The Irish were subject to all kinds of discrimination early on, but after a while, they found their "nitch," and began to enjoy the rights and privileges of full citizens. The Italians experienced difficulties, the Jews, but all eventually assimilated. The Blacks, however, continued to be oppressed well into the 20th century, making us an international embarrassment. It took truly strenuous efforts to correct this situation.
In fact, it took the heroic contributions of a true political genius, Martin Luther King. He campaigned hard for the Civil Rights Act, and one of his central goals, the main purpose of all those marches and demonstrations, was to solicit positive action from the Federal government. I find it frankly appalling that politicians and other talking-heads who follow the libertarian ideology try to claim King as one of their symbolic mascots. His methodology was completely at variance with their own. To claim King as a "libertarian" hero is to violate the facts of history. It is Orwellian.
Do us both a favor, in your future post, and distract me from the subject of the Civil War. Please expound on the "practical harm caused by Title II." I will admit that I don't see it.
I did not use my de Tocqueville quote accurately, and now I can see that your reading is better. I was just grabbing something real quick off the net, and I did not look it over in enough detail.
In the spirit of honest debate, I would like to repeat the contested quote (this way, you will see that my retraction is sincere).
de Tocqueville wrote:When I contemplate the condition of the South, I can only discover two alternatives which may be adopted by the white inhabitants of those States; viz., either to emancipate the negroes, and to intermingle with them; or, remaining isolated from them, to keep them in a state of slavery as long as possible. All intermediate measures seem to me likely to terminate, and that shortly, in the most horrible of civil wars...
I was looking for something else. I thought there was a part where de Tocqueville describes the attitude of ordinary Americans, who could already anticipate a horrible war on the horizon, because of Southern slavery. Instead, I latched onto the first quote that contained the phrase "civil war." You know, I thought there was something wrong with the phrasing--I am glad you pointed this out. I can see that it is not a complete waste of time to argue with you. Well done.
I have to revisit this masterpiece it seems, and soon. I think you should also, however.
Eran wrote:I actually found de Tocqueville's sentiments to be supportive of my position. The fact that slavery was inefficient marked its end.
Perhaps that was indeed his view. He seems like someone who was optimistic about the continued progress of mankind. All decent people can hope that progress will be brought about without unnecessary pain. And the tension had not reached an intense enough pitch to make war seem inevitable at this point, I suppose. That is what deeper reflection tells me, anyhow. In the section following the one I quoted above, I find comments that are also relevant to our sub-argument on the Civil War. It is titled "What Are The Chances In Favor Of The Duration Of The American Union, And What Dangers Threaten It." (Part VI of "The Present And Probable Future Condition Of The Three Races Which Inhabit The Territory Of The United States." I had previously quoted from part V.)
De Tocqueville does not see such a war as likely, and if it occurs anytime soon, he predicts that the Union will lose. The editors have added a few notes preceding this chapter, to draw attention to the facts that make de Tocqueville's opinions here less than authoritative (I quote the version that wikipedia links to).
The author(s) of note 269, affixed to the introduction of part VI of chapter 18 of the first book (whoever they are), wrote:In 1831, when [de Tocqueville] visited America, the anti-slavery agitation had scarcely begun; and the fact of Southern slavery was accepted by men of all parties, even in the States where there were no slaves: and that was unquestionably the view taken by all the States and by all American statesmen at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, in 1789.
You have clarified my error, with your polite and accurate criticisms. I was letting historical hindsight creep back into my memory of de Tocqueville's original evaluations. Obviously, he could not have foreseen such a war, in any of its specific details.
Nobody could have predicted such a war over 20 years in advance, I guess. We are talking about something that had never happened in the history of the world, to my knowledge. There had been wars over slavery, of course. The Spartacus uprising jumps to mind. But that was a revolt of the slaves themselves. Never before had there been a war caused by slavery, in which the combatants themselves were not slaves. There had been slave uprisings, of course. There had been legal abolition of slavery by kings and government. But not one other example (as far as I know) where neither side in the conflict was a party of revolting slaves (there was some marginal contribution by former slaves in the Union forces, but not at high enough levels to be significant to my current argument).
It is not surprising that de Tocqueville's vision fails at this point. We are talking about something unique and unprecedented, something that could only be barely glimpsed with the most penetrating insight. Don't get me wrong: de Tocqueville had such insight. But, even the most penetrating intellect can be expected to fail at certain points. All humans, even the most talented, suffer from limitations.
Which brings me back to the original point: de Tocqueville's failure to completely grasp the nature of the coming Civil War. The individual states were too powerful at this point, and the Union was too weak. It was hard to imagine how such an inherently weak Federal authority could muster the energy and resources to combat a confederation of seceding states. He also failed to anticipate the ascendancy of a strong anti-slave party in the North.
Regardless of his inevitable intellectual failures (inevitable, because no matter how inspired, he was still human), it is still impressive to see how much his vision did encompass. He doesn't seem to think that slavery would peacefully melt away, like ice in the sun, without effort or pain, as you suggest it would have.
De Tocqueville, in part V of the above mentioned chapter on the three races, wrote:Slavery... cannot survive. By the choice of the master, or by the will of the slave, it will cease; and in either case great calamities may be expected to ensue.
It is quite obvious that he sees only two real possibilities: a legal abolition of slavery, or a violent uprising of the slaves themselves. That White people who didn't own slaves would bear arms for this cause is hard to imagine in 1831. He didn't think the Union could levy sufficient troops for any cause, let alone for this one. Blacks fighting Whites over slavery was imaginable; Whites fighting Whites over such an issue only really became conceivable in 1861. But, in any case, he knew that this progress would be accompanied by "great calamities"
More importantly, he also managed to express the fact that Southerners were not amenable to reason on this issue. I understand that you "found de Tocqueville's sentiments to be supportive of [your] position," but I have provided evidence to the contradictory. I know how easy it is to experience errors in one's memory, when you are quoting from a book that you haven't read in a long time. Once again, here is the quote I wanted you to reflect on:
De Tocqueville, in part V, chapter 18, book one, wrote:...they hold their lives upon no other tenure.
Your assertion that slavery in America would just peacefully disappear, because the Southerners would gradually come to accept that it was inefficient, is contradicted by these other statements (which you also failed to address directly):
De Tocqueville (V, 18, one) wrote:The instruction which is now diffused in the South has convinced the inhabitants that slavery is injurious to the slave-owner, but it has also shown them, more clearly than before, that no means exist of getting rid of its bad consequences.
De Tocqueville (V, 18, one) wrote:...whilst the principle of servitude is gradually abolished in the North, that self-same principle gives rise to more and more rigorous consequences in the South.
These were Southern attitudes in '31. In thirty years, these attitudes had only hardened. Perhaps that was because anti-Slavery attitudes had solidified in the North. In any case, I think that if de Tocqueville's observations are correct, it is unlikely that the South would have changed their slave-mongering ways under the mere force of reason. What history shows us is that it required the force of arms.
Eran wrote:Sure, whites held on to it to preserve their way of life (and the narrow interests of elite plantation owners). But I do believe such efforts were doomed.
Hindsight being 20/20, yes, these efforts were doomed. What doomed them was the military victory of Union forces. We can speculate about alternative scenarios, in which slavery was peacefully wiped out by "advances in industrialisation and automation... increasing international pressure" and so on, but these speculations have precisely the same authority as any science fiction novel.
It was also the belief of de Tocqueville that "slavery... cannot survive." But, he was not naive enough to imagine that this would happen in a peaceful way. I find your faith in the smooth and painless progress of mankind to be touching--you obviously have a lot of faith in your fellow man. History shows us that progress is always accompanied by violence and/or coercion, however. A social injustice does not just go away when people first begin to recognize it. Many examples could be cited to show that the people who benefit from these injustices always fight back with coercive methods, in order to secure their position of privilege. In order to overcome these defenses, coercive countermeasures must be deployed.
The slavery issue is a perfect example. Progress on this question was quite retarded in America. It was recognized by many enlightened people, even in the South, to be a great injustice. All enlightened parties acknowledged this, in the abstract, but no concrete measures were ever enacted (in the South). There was no political will to solve the problem, in 1831, even if Southern slavery made us an object of international disdain and embarrassment. The secondary problems that would inevitably arise seemed insurmountable; de Tocqueville does a good job of enumerating them. For example, anti-slavery measures in the North, preceding 1831, were also accompanied by the most virulent racism (much worse than in the South, in its way). Other forms of discrimination, primarily on the non-legal social plane, drove the recently freed slaves to emigrate to other places--mainly the South. If legal forms of discrimination were abolished in the South, de Tocqueville expected a corresponding rise in social discrimination. The Northern Blacks at this time could make their exodus to the South, but the Southern Blacks had no such line of retreat. Stuck where they are, with the tension continually rising in their neighborhood, something bad was bound to happen. A war of extermination, perhaps. Maybe the forceable deportation of former slaves to other nations. In 1831, he could not imagine free Blacks and Whites living together on an equal footing.
So, sure, de Tocqueville anticipated an end to slavery in the South. It was only going to take the forceable removal of almost all the Blacks, or their outright extermination. That sounds even worse than what actually did happen. A Civil War against the South sounds like a humane alternative, compared to the solution that de Tocqueville envisioned. In any case, the change would be accompanied by "great calamities."
Look, I am sure that you can indeed find support for your own positions in de Tocqueville. He is a complex thinker, and not a rigid ideologue, so I am sure that modern ideologues of all sorts can find supporting material for their own point of view in his seminal masterpiece. I certainly find such support, despite the fact that my first use of him in this debate was incorrect, because I didn't familiarize with the necessary context (I hope you can excuse this mistake, which was made in good faith, because I was in a rush... I certainly didn't consciously intend to distort de Tocqueville's position).
To further demonstrate my good faith, I will quote a passage that does seem to support your position.
De Tocqueville (part X, chapeter 18, book one) wrote:If the Union were to be dissolved, the commerce of the States which now compose it would undoubtedly be checked for a time; but this consequence would be less perceptible than is generally supposed... Even if the South of the Union were to become independent of the North, it would still require the services of those States. I have already observed that the South is not a commercial country, and nothing intimates that it is likely to become so. The Americans of the South of the United States will therefore be obliged, for a long time to come, to have recourse to strangers to export their produce, and to supply them with the commodities which are requisite to satisfy their wants. But the Northern States are undoubtedly able to act as their intermediate agents cheaper than any other merchants. They will therefore retain that employment, for cheapness is the sovereign law of commerce. National claims and national prejudices cannot resist the influence of cheapness.
In other words, if a confederation of Southern states were to secede, the Union could tolerate this, without any significant threat to the material prosperity of the whole. In fact, he speculates that this would even enhance the naval power.
De Tocqueville (part X, chapeter 18, book one) wrote:I am convinced that the dismemberment of the Union would not have the effect of diminishing the naval power of the Americans, but that it would powerfully contribute to increase it. At the present time the commercial States are connected with others which have not the same interests, and which frequently yield an unwilling consent to the increase of a maritime power by which they are only indirectly benefited. If, on the contrary, the commercial States of the Union formed one independent nation, commerce would become the foremost of their national interests; they would consequently be willing to make very great sacrifices to protect their shipping, and nothing would prevent them from pursuing their designs upon this point.
It seems to me that you hold to these exact same opinions. Here's the catch, he wrote these things in reference to the world of 1831. We now have three decades of historical development to look at, which de Tocqueville did not have access to. Even if his evaluations were valid in 1831, they may not hold in 1861.
And so what has changed? Here is my estimation (certainly not the most authoritative... I haven't even gotten around to the second reading of Democracy In America yet!):
1) The ascendancy of Union power. The central power was more consolidated in '61 than in '31. De Tocqueville thought civil war unlikely, but even if it broke out, he seems to think that Union efforts would be anemic and easily repelled. This had changed completely in the 30 intervening years. History shows us, that by the time the war actually broke out, the Union was now able to hold its own against even a powerful Confederacy under competent command.
2) The growth of industrial manufacturing in the North. He is aware that there is already a disparity with the South, but it was only to grow after that. In '31, the South still received her manufactured goods predominantly from Britain. By '61, as we already know from a previous chapter in this debate, the North had appropriated this trade to herself. In '31, if the South had seceded, then Britain would not have had such a strong motive to launch aggression against the North, using a newly established toehold in an independent South. She would not have wanted to disrupt her lucrative trade to the South. However, in '61, her manufactured goods were in more direct competition with those of the North. Now there was an incentive for aggression. In other words, an independent Confederacy of Southern states, in 1861, backed by the power of Britain's navy, would have been a significant threat to the rest of the continent.
3) The rise of a strong anti-slavery party in the North. This was something that de Tocqueville failed to anticipate completely. Who could have seen this coming, in 1831? He tells us how racist they were, up in the North. They were quite willing to abolish slavery from their own states, but not because of any high minded ideals, and they were confident that racist discrimination on the social plane would drive the newly freed Blacks into other territories. They cared nothing about the injustice of slavery, and were only interested in the practical side of the question. By 1861, this had changed. Now there was strong agitation in the North against Southern slavery, not for vulgar reasons of sheer expediency, but more as a matter of principle. Another way to put this: before, in '31, there were political motives that went against this, but now, in '61, there was an ideological motive. This ideology crystallized around Lincoln in the 1860 campaign, and it drove the South into an absolute panic.
4) The consolidation of pro-slavery sentiment in the South. De Tocqueville describes an attitude in 1831 that is already almost completely intransigent: "they hold their life upon no other tenure." This attitude had only hardened by 1861. In all likelihood, this was in response to the abolitionist movement in the North, which was steadily growing in power. Then again, maybe the Northern sentiment for abolition crystallized in response to an escalation of pro-slavery sentiment in the South.
It is clear to me that I should read more about the origins of the Civil War, but even with my limited knowledge, I can see that the crisis was driven by the South's intransigence on the issue of slavery. Beginning the narrative (somewhat arbitrarily) in the year of de Tocqueville's visit to America, all of the economic and social forces that you think would have destroyed Southern slavery by 1870, without a war, or apparently without any real pain or effort at all, all of these forces were already active at this time, in 1831. Three decades went by, and still these forces had not brought the South to reason. They refused to be coerced by these "soft" methods. This made the force of arms necessary, I think.
We can speculate about what the South would have done about slavery, if they had won the war, if the Union had capitulated to their secession, or according to the dictates of any number of "alternative history" scenarios from science fiction novels. I myself can envision a scenario in which the South, now free from Union pressure, suddenly and dramatically abolishes slavery, almost out of spite, to show the North and the rest of the world that it was not slavery that made them rebellious, and now that they were not being directly forced to it, they were willing do the right thing, under their own volition. This scenario does not seem likely to me, however. More likely, inspired with confidence by their victory over the North, they would have clung to their "way of life" even more. The victor in any military contest always feels, whether it is true or not, that his victory came about through some kind of moral superiority. If the Union has just capitulated without a war, this was would have inspired an even greater feeling in the South for the moral superiority of their "venerable traditions." For all you know, a successful rebellion of the South might have secured the existence of state-sponsored slavery in the western hemisphere well into the 20th century.
Now, none of these science fiction scenarios are very relevant, because we should focus on what actually did happen, instead of what your ideology says should or could have happened. But you still seem resistant to the established facts of history.
Eran wrote:Setting aside whether they can legitimately be blamed at starting a war...
By all means, set it aside! This is not an open topic of debate, among the minimally literate. They almost immediately seceded upon Lincoln's election, which is in itself an act of aggression. They knew full well that this would trigger a war; they showed no willingness to avoid the catastrophe. Lincoln might have been willing to capitulate on certain issues; we will never know, however, because of the South's eagerness to fight. On top of this political aggression, they were the ones who initiated military aggression, at Fort Sumter. The South picks a fight, and then you blame the North for accommodating them!
You would like to equate my justifications for the Union to the excuses that are made by propagandists for Israel. It seems to me that that is precisely what you are doing: making excuses for a bunch of murderous slave-mongers.
...I believe the Northern aggression, especially given their initial motivation, was wholly unjustified.
What aggression? I know what you mean, of course. You mean the Union should have just ignored all military and political aggression from the South, like a bunch of weaklings--just capitulate to every demand, like a wimp. I have been upset by a lot of recent elections in my country. What if I begin conspiring with a group of like-minded neighbors, and then start shelling the police station down the road? After all, if I "perceive" this station to be an aggressive military outpost, then my actions are justified, by your reasoning. When the violent counter-reaction inevitably comes, I will complain incessantly about the "unjust aggression" of "invading" forces. According to your libertarian logic, anyone who is dissatisfied with a presidential election can initiate violence against police, military personnel, or anyone at all that is "perceived" to be a threat.
If the aggression of the Confederacy at Sumter is to be justified, then you ought to show that it was in response to aggression from the Union. But in early 1861, there was no such aggression. It isn't good enough to demonstrate that they expected this aggression at some unknown point in the future. I expect a lot of things to happen, but that doesn't mean I can preemptively shoot at anyone I feel like, does it? Here is the "aggression" that you think justified so much violence: Lincoln's election. In other words, they were angry at the North because they freely cast their vote for a candidate that the South disliked.
...this was a war of defence by the South, and a war of aggression by the North.
I have already made the following point, but it bears repeating. All war boils down to defense and offence. One side is defending themselves, and the other is on the attack. The defenders should not automatically receive a normative justification, for the simple fact that they are defending themselves. But I should correct myself here. On a certain level, they do receive an automatic justification. The principle of self-defense is the central feature of all normative justifications for war. But, this principle is complex in its applications. For example, I am sure that you will admit that an offensive attack can be justified, if it is sincerely intended to defend against an imminent threat. That is your excuse for the South's violence, in fact. They anticipated an invasion, and so they acted preemptively.
But the principle of self-defense also covers the case of Union "aggression" against the Confederacy. After all, a secession by the Confederacy would have destroyed the Union as it currently existed. How can you claim the right of self-defense for the Confederacy, but not extend this to the Union as well? The Union had as much right to exist as the Confederacy.
But there is another principle we should consider as well: All wars have a political objective. Beyond the simple fact of who is attacking, who is defending, in order to evaluate whether or not a war is just, we have to ask, what were the political objectives? I have already pointed out that Germany was defending her own national territories in the second phase of WWII. Does that mean these defensive efforts were just? On a certain simplistic level, yes, everyone is allowed to defend themselves, if it is a case of national survival. But, two facts allow us to reach a more adult judgment. One, they started the war--the invasion of Germany was launched in response to their earlier aggression. And two, their political objectives were wrong--a totalitarian empire covering all of Europe and Russia. You don't get to start a war under these motivations, and then claim self-defense when you begin to lose.
This is not an exact analogy. The aggression of Germany was a great threat to all of Europe, and even the world; the Confederacy's aggression was not quite so threatening to the security of North America. I have already drawn your attention to the potential threat posed by an independent Confederacy, allied with Britain, and supported by her naval power. This was serious, but not nearly as serious as the threat posed by the Nazis. On this scale of comparison, the danger posed by an independent Confederacy ranks more as an annoyance.
But, that is not the point of the analogy. The point is, even when a nation is defending their own territory, they should not receive a blanket justification. Especially if, one, they started the aggression in the first place, and, two, their political objectives were unjust. The Confederacy did in fact initiate the violence (stop trying to hallucinate it away!), and part of their motivation was to preserve slavery. Therefore, their cause was unjust.
I know that it sounds childish to talk about "who started it," but you are the one who is trying to press a normative justification for the Confederacy. If we are trying to determine if a war is just or not, we have to ask this question. You may not like the answer, but it is a matter of fact: the South started the war.
* * *
I've got to break it off at some point. I told you I would become captivated by the subject of the Civil War, and leave the original thread behind. I find this war to be deeply interesting--so many things changed in this era. One thing that did not change was the subjugation of Southern Blacks. The Southern Whites, despite the outcome of the war, continued to force the Blacks into a quasi-feudal state of abject dependency. I believe that the North went along with this, for reasons of political expediency, and it created a serious problem for future generations.
As you point out, all other races emigrating to America managed to assimilate. The Irish were subject to all kinds of discrimination early on, but after a while, they found their "nitch," and began to enjoy the rights and privileges of full citizens. The Italians experienced difficulties, the Jews, but all eventually assimilated. The Blacks, however, continued to be oppressed well into the 20th century, making us an international embarrassment. It took truly strenuous efforts to correct this situation.
In fact, it took the heroic contributions of a true political genius, Martin Luther King. He campaigned hard for the Civil Rights Act, and one of his central goals, the main purpose of all those marches and demonstrations, was to solicit positive action from the Federal government. I find it frankly appalling that politicians and other talking-heads who follow the libertarian ideology try to claim King as one of their symbolic mascots. His methodology was completely at variance with their own. To claim King as a "libertarian" hero is to violate the facts of history. It is Orwellian.
Do us both a favor, in your future post, and distract me from the subject of the Civil War. Please expound on the "practical harm caused by Title II." I will admit that I don't see it.