What mainly caused the Civil War?

[Associate Justice PiT]

Not that the Confederate states were right, but it was most definitely about states rights.

     Tell me, how much of an issue do you think states' rights would have been if it had not been for slavery?

[Associate Justice PiT]

Not that the Confederate states were right, but it was most definitely about states rights.

     Tell me, how much of an issue do you think states' rights would have been if it had not been for slavery?

Quite a lot!

First, there were the Kentucky and Virginia resolutions, where those states sought to nullify federal legislation having nothing to do with slavery.

Second, a number of New England states were contemplating nullification with respect to the War of 1812.

Third, South Carolina (while Jackson was President) sought to nullify a tax scheme injurious to the south.

And those are just actions before the war between the states.

Not that the Confederate states were right, but it was most definitely about states rights.

Tell me, how much of an issue do you think states' rights would have been if it had not been for slavery?

If not slavery than tariffs.  The South depended on slavery for their economy, they were mad that the Union was trying to mess with their economy through tariffs, slavery, and other things.  The war was fought because the South felt the North was trying to screw it over, that arouse from many things, one of which happened to be slavery.

     I see. Let me put it this way though. If neither slavery nor tariffs existed, would the South still have been angered enough by the North to secede? This is an honest question; I don't know a great deal about the antebellum South.

[Associate Justice PiT]

If the war really was all about slavery, then how come the South's general, Robert E. Lee, opposed slavery?

     I agree that it wasn't all about slavery, but I'll answer your question anyway. He led the Confederate Army because he wanted to defend his homestate of Virginia.

     President Lincoln in fact asked him to lead the Union Army, but Lee refused since he couldn't bring himself to lead an army against Virginia.

     As an aside, Thoreau would have considered Lee a wuss. As Thoreau said in his essay "Civil Disobedience," if you find a law to be unjust, you have to fight it, not go along with it. Thoreau in fact went to jail once for refusing to pay a poll tax that might have helped fund slaveowners.

[Associate Justice PiT]

Why (and how) exactly is this thread still going?

     Necroposting, it would seem.

[Associate Justice PiT]

I have the answer!


Secession



/argument

     Oh yeah!? I have a better answer!


People.



     Beat that!

[Associate Justice PiT]

After considering it very carefully, and reading a few propaganda books, it may very well have been a Jewish conspiracy

I hope you're joking. TO my knowledge, Judah Benjamin was the highest ranking Jew of the war.

Obviously I'm joking, but its about as much of a main cause as slavery is, which is 0%

     Eh, I'd give slavery 5% credit. Just because Frederick Douglass is that awesome.

     Not to mention it was one item on a veritable laundry list of things that the South didn't like. Not significant, but not a non-factor. Excuse me if that made no sense.