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Author: William W. Freehling Publisher: Oxford University Press ISBN: 0198024126 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 192
Book Description
The critical northern antebellum debate matched the rhetorical skills of Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas in an historic argument over the future of slavery in a westward-expanding America. Two years later, an equally historic oratorical showdown between secessionists and Unionists in Georgia generated as much popular interest south of the Mason-Dixon line, and perhaps had an even more profound immediate effect on the future of the United States. With Abraham Lincoln's "Black Republican" triumph in the presidential election of 1860 came ardent secessionist sentiment in the South. But Unionists were equally zealous and while South Carolina--a bastion of Disunionism since 1832--seemed certain to secede; the other fourteen slave states were far from decided. In the deep South, the road to disunion depended much on the actions of Georgia, a veritable microcosm of the divided South and geographically in the middle of the Cotton South. If Georgia went for the Union, secessionist South Carolina could be isolated. So in November of 1860 all the eyes of Dixie turned to tiny Milledgeville, pre-war capital of Georgia, for a legislative confrontation that would help chart the course toward civil war. In Secession Debated, William W. Freehling and Craig M. Simpson have for the first time collected the seven surviving speeches and public letters of this greatest of southern debates over disunion, providing today's reader with a unique window into a moment of American crisis. Introducing the debate and debaters in compelling fashion, the editors help bring to life a sleepy Southern town suddenly alive with importance as a divided legislature met to decide the fate of Georgia, and by extension, that of the nation. We hear myriad voices, among them the energetic and self-righteous governor Joseph E. Brown who, while a slaveholder and secessionist, was somewhat suspect as a native North Georgian; Alexander H. Stephens, the eloquent Unionist whose "calm dispassionate approach" ultimately backfired; and fiery secessionist Robert Toombs who, impatient with Brown's indecisiveness and the caution of the Unionists, shouted to legislators: "Give me the sword! but if you do not place it in my hands, before God! I will take it." The secessionists' Henry Benning and Thomas R.R. Cobb as well as the Unionists Benjamin Hill and Herschel Johnson also speak to us across the years, most with eloquence, all with the patriotic, passionate conviction that defined an era. In the end, the legislature adopted a convention bill which decreed a popular vote on the issue in early January, 1861. The election results were close, mirroring the intense debate of two months before: 51% of Georgians favored immediate secession, a slim margin which the propaganda-conscious Brown later inflated to 58%. On January 19th the Georgia Convention sanctioned secession in a 166-130 vote, and the imminent Confederacy had its Southern hinge. Secession Debated is a colorful and gripping tale told in the words of the actual participants, one which sheds new light on one of the great and hitherto neglected verbal showdowns in American history. It is essential to a full understanding of the origins of the war between the states.
Author: William W. Freehling Publisher: Oxford University Press ISBN: 0198024126 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 192
Book Description
The critical northern antebellum debate matched the rhetorical skills of Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas in an historic argument over the future of slavery in a westward-expanding America. Two years later, an equally historic oratorical showdown between secessionists and Unionists in Georgia generated as much popular interest south of the Mason-Dixon line, and perhaps had an even more profound immediate effect on the future of the United States. With Abraham Lincoln's "Black Republican" triumph in the presidential election of 1860 came ardent secessionist sentiment in the South. But Unionists were equally zealous and while South Carolina--a bastion of Disunionism since 1832--seemed certain to secede; the other fourteen slave states were far from decided. In the deep South, the road to disunion depended much on the actions of Georgia, a veritable microcosm of the divided South and geographically in the middle of the Cotton South. If Georgia went for the Union, secessionist South Carolina could be isolated. So in November of 1860 all the eyes of Dixie turned to tiny Milledgeville, pre-war capital of Georgia, for a legislative confrontation that would help chart the course toward civil war. In Secession Debated, William W. Freehling and Craig M. Simpson have for the first time collected the seven surviving speeches and public letters of this greatest of southern debates over disunion, providing today's reader with a unique window into a moment of American crisis. Introducing the debate and debaters in compelling fashion, the editors help bring to life a sleepy Southern town suddenly alive with importance as a divided legislature met to decide the fate of Georgia, and by extension, that of the nation. We hear myriad voices, among them the energetic and self-righteous governor Joseph E. Brown who, while a slaveholder and secessionist, was somewhat suspect as a native North Georgian; Alexander H. Stephens, the eloquent Unionist whose "calm dispassionate approach" ultimately backfired; and fiery secessionist Robert Toombs who, impatient with Brown's indecisiveness and the caution of the Unionists, shouted to legislators: "Give me the sword! but if you do not place it in my hands, before God! I will take it." The secessionists' Henry Benning and Thomas R.R. Cobb as well as the Unionists Benjamin Hill and Herschel Johnson also speak to us across the years, most with eloquence, all with the patriotic, passionate conviction that defined an era. In the end, the legislature adopted a convention bill which decreed a popular vote on the issue in early January, 1861. The election results were close, mirroring the intense debate of two months before: 51% of Georgians favored immediate secession, a slim margin which the propaganda-conscious Brown later inflated to 58%. On January 19th the Georgia Convention sanctioned secession in a 166-130 vote, and the imminent Confederacy had its Southern hinge. Secession Debated is a colorful and gripping tale told in the words of the actual participants, one which sheds new light on one of the great and hitherto neglected verbal showdowns in American history. It is essential to a full understanding of the origins of the war between the states.
Author: J. William Harris Publisher: LSU Press ISBN: 9780807122655 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 316
Book Description
In this exciting study of the communities on both sides of the Savannah River in Georgia and South Carolina, J. William Harris explores two great ironies of American history—the South’s commitment to a liberty supported by slavery and its attempt to maintain the status quo with a war that undermined southern society. Relying on strong research in quantifiable data as well as manuscript records, Harris examines why white southerners—most of whom did not own slaves—united in a long, bloody war to preserve the institution. He argues that slaveowners relied on an ideology of liberty, a potential for social mobility, and a web of personal relationships between classes to contain white class divisions and ensure control over the black population. The strains of war, Harris shows, dissolved these bonds of community and made Confederate victory impossible, forever changing southern society.
Author: Michael P. Johnson Publisher: LSU Press ISBN: 9780807124291 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 276
Book Description
Traditionally, the secession of the states in the lower South has been viewed as an irrational response to Lincoln's election or as a rational response to the genuine threat a Republican president posed to the geographical expansion of slavery. Both views emphasize the fundamental importance of relations between the federal government and the southern states, but overlook the degree to which secession was a response to a crisis within the South.Johnson argues that secession was a double revolution -- for home rule and for those who ruled at home -- brought about by an internal crisis in southern society. He portrays secession as the culmination of the long-developing tension between slavery on one side and the institutional and ideological consequences of the American Revolution on the other. This tension was masked during the antebellum years by the conflicting social, political, sectional, and national loyalties of many southerners. Lincoln's election forced southerners to choose among their loyalties, and their choice revealed a South that was divided along lines coinciding roughly with an interest in slavery and the established order.Starting with a thorough analysis of election data and integrating quantitative with more traditional literary sources, Johnson goes beyond the act of secession itself to examine what the secessionists said and did after they left the Union. Although this book is a close study of secession in Georgia, it has implications for the rest of the lower South. The result is a new thesis that presents secession as the response to a more complex set of motivations than has been recognized.
Author: Spencer Bidwell King Publisher: University of Georgia Press ISBN: 0820335401 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 380
Book Description
Published in 1966, this documentary history examines the history of Georgia from the first appearance of Spanish explorers to the hardships of the Civil War and Reconstruction. Through the accounts of those who experienced the events firsthand, Spencer Bidwell King Jr. allows the reader to experience colonialism, Revolution, and statehood. Within these distinctive eras, King discusses society, education, religion, literature, and the economic and cultural pursuits of the people. He combines extensive quotes from primary sources with historical information to create a continuous narrative. By using the voices of Georgians, King reveals the state's unique character and individuality.
Author: E. Merton Coulter Publisher: LSU Press ISBN: 9780807100073 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 696
Book Description
This book is the trade edition of Volume VII of A History of the South, a ten-volume series designed to present a thoroughly balanced history of all the complex aspects of the South's culture from 1607 to the present. Like its companion volumes, The Confederate States of America is written by an outstanding student of Southern history, E. Merton Coulter, who is also one of the editors of the series and the author of Volume VIII.The drama of war has led most historians to deal with the years 1861 to 1865 in terms of campaigns and generals. In this volume, however, Mr. Coulter treats the war in its perspective as an aspect of the life of a people.The attempt to build a nation strong enough to win independence naturally drew Southerners' attention to such problems as morale, money, bonds, taxes, diplomacy, manufacturing, transportation, communication, publishing, armaments, religion, labor, prices, profits, race problems, and political policy. Mr. Coulter balances these phases of the struggle in their relation to war itself, and the whole is dealt with as a period in the history of a people.And finally, Mr. Coulter deals with the ever-recurring questions: Did secession necessarily mean war? Was the South from the very beginning engaged in a hopeless struggle? And, if not, why did it lose?
Author: Harold Holzer Publisher: Simon and Schuster ISBN: 141659440X Category : History Languages : en Pages : 643
Book Description
One of our most eminent Lincoln scholars, winner of a Lincoln Prize for his Lincoln at Cooper Union, examines the four months between Lincoln's election and inauguration, when the president-elect made the most important decision of his coming presidency—there would be no compromise on slavery or secession of the slaveholding states, even at the cost of civil war. Abraham Lincoln first demonstrated his determination and leadership in the Great Secession Winter—the four months between his election in November 1860 and his inauguration in March 1861—when he rejected compromises urged on him by Republicans and Democrats, Northerners and Southerners, that might have preserved the Union a little longer but would have enshrined slavery for generations. Though Lincoln has been criticized by many historians for failing to appreciate the severity of the secession crisis that greeted his victory, Harold Holzer shows that the presidentelect waged a shrewd and complex campaign to prevent the expansion of slavery while vainly trying to limit secession to a few Deep South states. During this most dangerous White House transition in American history, the country had two presidents: one powerless (the president-elect, possessing no constitutional authority), the other paralyzed (the incumbent who refused to act). Through limited, brilliantly timed and crafted public statements, determined private letters, tough political pressure, and personal persuasion, Lincoln guaranteed the integrity of the American political process of majority rule, sounded the death knell of slavery, and transformed not only his own image but that of the presidency, even while making inevitable the war that would be necessary to make these achievements permanent. Lincoln President-Elect is the first book to concentrate on Lincoln's public stance and private agony during these months and on the momentous consequences when he first demonstrated his determination and leadership. Holzer recasts Lincoln from an isolated prairie politician yet to establish his greatness, to a skillful shaper of men and opinion and an immovable friend of freedom at a decisive moment when allegiance to the founding credo "all men are created equal" might well have been sacrificed.
Author: William W. Freehling
Author: William W. Freehling
Author: Frank Moore
Author: J. William Harris
Author: Michael P. Johnson
Author: Spencer Bidwell King
Author: Andrew Johnson
Author: 
Author: E. Merton Coulter
Author: Frank Moore
Author: Harold Holzer