General Sir James Marshall-Cornwall, in the first chapter in his book Grant as a Military Commander, noted that the real issue between the North and South was political and economic. He described the economic pressure on the North to protect its industrial expansion with high tariffs, whereas Southern agriculture needed free trade. Thus the animosity between the two sections were based upon different cultures with conflicting economic systems.
Senator William Grayson, one of Virginia's first United States Senators, expressed concern that the South would eventually become the "milch cow" of the Union! Shortly after the American Revolution, the Northern states decided to transfer all state war debts to the federal government. This meant that the federal government would obtain the monies to pay the debt by raising tariffs. the result was that the Southern states were required to pay a disproportionate share of the debt. For example, the export of cotton alone from the South in 1859 was valued at $161,434,923. The total export of ALL Northern goods in 1859 was valued at $78,217,202. This differential was in place at the beginning of our political union and continued up to the establishment of an independent South.
In 1828, Senator Thomas H Benton declared:
"Before the Revolution [the South] was the seat of wealth, as well as hospitality....Wealth has fled from the South, and settled in regions north of the Potomac: and this is in the face of the fact, that the South, in four staples alone, has exported produce, since the Revolution, to the value of eight hundred millions of dollars; and the North has exported comparitively nothing....Under federal legislation, the exports of the South have been the basis of the federal revenue....Virginia, the two Carolinas, and Geortgia, may be said to defray 3/4th, of the annual expense of supporting the federal government....nothing or next to nothing is returned to them, in the shape of Government expenditures. That expenditure flows back northwardly, in one uniform, uninterrupted, and perennial stream. Federal legislation does all of this!"
Abolitionists claimed that slavery was the cause of the loss of wealth in the South. Professor Jonathan Elliot, a teacher of science at Harvard University, discounted this theory and stated that it was federal legislation in regard to the Tariff Acts that was the culprit.
A Northern member of Congress was asked what was the real reason that Northerners were encouraging abolitionist petitions. the Congressman replied, "The real reason is that the South will not let us have a tariff, and we touch them where they will feel it."
In 1833 there was a surplus revenue of many millions in the public treasury which by an act of legislation unparalleled in the history of nations was distributed among the Northern states (New england) to be used in local public improvements, as noted by George Lunt, author of Origins of the Late War.
President James Buchanan's message to Congress declared, "The South has not had her share of money from the public treasury, and unjust discrimination has been made against her...."
When President Lincoln was asked why the North should not let the South go, his reply was, "Let the South go? Let the South go! where then shall we get our revenues?"
Patrick Henry warned the South about placing her faith in the good will of the North when he spoke out about the proposed Constitution: "But I am sure that the dangers of this system [the Federal Constitution] are real, when those who have no similar interest with the people of this country [the South] are to legislate for us - when our dearest rights are to be left, in the hands of those, whose advantage it will be to infringe them."
It is revealing to read the Northern newspaper accounts that document the change in the mood of the North in the first few months after the South seceded. at first there appears to be a mood to allow the South to exercise its right to self-determination. then we begin to see predictions of economic loss if the North allows the 10% tariff established by the Southern Confederacy to remain in place and to compete with the North's higher tariff. Some predicted that grass wouyld grow in the streets of New York while New Orleans prospered.
The Northern Colonies, from the earliest part of the history of the United States, had a great fear of losing their trade in the Western Territories. In 1786, John Jay started an uproar in Congress among the Southern delegates with his attempts to give up rights to the Mississippi River to Spain in exchange for commercial advantages in Spanish ports. The great fear of the commercial North was that all or a great part of the commerce west of the Appalachian Mountains would go through New Orleans and leave the Eastern ports with very little commerce. The North made many efforts in early in American history to give control of the land and great rivers in the Mississippi Valley to the Spain. This, they believed, would keep American commerce in the Northern ports
This fear of losing its commercial advantages to the states along the Mississippi River was a prime factor in the North's invasion of the South. Just weeks before the first shots were fired, The New York Times ran story after story about how the commerce of the North would be lost to New Orleans and to the rest of the South because of the low Southern tariffs. Many Northerners admitted that their reasons for fighting the South were not the result of differences of principles of constitutional law but only because their profits might be lost if the South was successful in its move for independence.
So, according to newspapers and speeches of the time before the war show that SLAVERY was NOT the cause of the war,. It was over commerce and transportation money! Sounds a lot like the Mafia from more modern times....
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