From the archives: Obama’s hatred for southern heritage sparks debate over the true cause of the Civil War

By Thomas Madison

Following the liberal playbook, which instructs never allowing a crisis go to waste, Barack Hussein expertly executed a perfect 2015 Dive Left yesterday, taking full advantage of the Charleston tragedy to attack southerners and the Confederate flag again.

According to Hussein spokesman, Eric Shultz, “the president has said before he believes the Confederate flag belongs in a museum, and that is still his position,” sparking yet another round of controversy and conflict over the beleaguered symbol of southern heritage, and prompting a spirited discussion in the facebook group, US Tea Party Political Activists National Assembly, of which I am a proud member, as to the true cause of the Civil War. Contrary to nearly universal opinion, the Civil War was not fought over slavery. The Civil War was fought over money.

Always follow the money. Specifically, the Civil War was fought over unfair taxation of the southern states and the Morrill Tariff of 1861, passed the day before Lincoln was inaugurated, which more than tripled the tariff rate from 15% to 48%, and became the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Lincoln “promised that any state that would not pay the taxes would be invaded and the taxes would be taken by force with bloodshed if necessary. In that same address Lincoln said he supported the Corwin Amendment and declared that if the southern states rejoined the Union that the Corwin Amendment would pass and be ratified. The Corwin Amendment would have kept slavery legal in the south forever under the US Constitution. Lincoln never had any intention of freeing a single slave and in fact said the opposite when taking office. So, the south clearly did not secede over the threat of losing the right to keep slaves.”

In those days the federal government funded its operation through tariffs, as the nightmare (or liberal’s dream) of income tax was 52 years from being foisted upon the American people. The majority of that tariff revenue (80%) came from the agrarian south, even though the South represented only 25% of the population.

Tobacco and cotton were king. The problem was that the north dominated Congress, which was taxing the south to death, and used most (80%) of the money to build infrastructure in the northern industrial states. There had been growing resentment for many years on the part of southerners over this disparity, the south providing nearly all of the revenue, while the north received nearly all of the benefit. Thus, South Carolina seceded, and the rest of the southern states followed.

Lincoln could not simply allow the southern states to walk away. The north would have become a wasteland without the south’s tariff money. Thus, he was compelled to FORCE the south to remain in the union and continue to pay the north’s way. It was clearly a case of unfair taxation.

In his 1860 presidential campaign, to garner southern votes and support, Lincoln promised that he would not touch slavery in the states in which it already existed. There were also many slaveholders in the north.

As the Civil War progressed from 1861 to 1863, the north was losing the war badly. Morale and support for the war amongst Mom and Pop Yankee was diminishing, recruiting troops was becoming much more difficult, and it looked as though the north was indeed going to lose the war.

Searching for a mechanism to increase morale and support for the war amongst northerners while also increasing troop recruitment, Lincoln happened upon the idea of making slavery the new cause celebre for war. He couldn’t admit that the real reason for war was to continue to screw the south out of its money and give it to the north. So, he fired up the abolitionists and broke his campaign promise with the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing slaves in southern states only, leaving slavery alive and well in the northern states. Thus, Lincoln’s straw man (faux) cause for war became the theretofore uncontested issue of slavery, ordering the institution be abolished, but only in the south.

It worked. Northern morale and support spiked, troop recruitment increased dramatically, Lincoln found Grant, and the rest is revisionist history. Our founding fathers, rebels and secessionists themselves, would clearly have supported the south’s right to self-government and resistance to tyranny.

Slavery was not the true cause of the Civil War! The victor may write the history, but that does not make it the truth.