So my assistant’s boyfriend here in South Carolina is claiming to be very resentful that his state (I’m not native) is still paying debts incurred during the civil war. I know a bit about the civil war and I don’t think I’ve ever heard that particular bit.
The argument came about when my assistant - who’s from Califnornia - argued with him that South Carolina is very closed to change and he argued the opposite side (he’s intelligent but argumentative…he’d fit in well here).
Still, anyone know what he’s talking about? Is it real debt? Or is it the sort of ‘well, the economy isn’t what it could have been without the war and therefore we’re not as wealthy as we could have been’ sort of argument?
He’s also arguing that the south was progressive in how it handled slaves and was open to gradual emancipation but the way it was done was terrible and happened because the federal government just freed them all straightaway without preparing them for freedom.
Section 4 of the 14th Amendment invalidated all debts incurred by seceding governments. I suppose the state might still be paying off bonds that were issued to pay off bonds that were issued to pay off bonds that were issued to pay off soldiers’ pensions.
This goes beyond rose colored glasses into outright denial of the facts.
A True Believer is unlikely to be swayed, but the CSA Constitution itself is rather instructive. Rather than protecting states rights or allowing each state to make its own determinations, the CSA constitution explicitly protected the institution of slavery and did not allow each state (or any new states that may have been formed or joined) to make a determination on slavery for itself.
I suppose you could always make the argument that the South would eventually have amended its own Constitution and gradually made these sorts of changes internally, but, if so, it’s own laws made it harder to do so than just sticking with a US style set of laws.
As for state debt, that’s just not true. It’s akin to the idea that the US is still paying off debts from the Revolutionary war.
It’s debt load wasn’t more than a few million dollars in the post war period. Debts incurred by states and nations aren’t open ended. Perhaps new debt is incurred to help pay for things, but old debt gets paid off. I guess you could stretch this to mean that the old debt is being paid off by new debt, therefore it’s still the same debt, but that stretches the notion beyond any rational measure and means that EVERY state is still paying off Civil War debt.
South Carolina, like other states (and conspicuously unlike the federal government), has a balanced budget requirement. In spite of this, the state does have some debt outstanding, about $7.47 billion as of 6/30/2012, of which $3.89 billion was long-term liabilities. However, these tend to be very specific things, such as capital improvement bonds, highway bonds, and the like. You can examine these in more detail in the state’s annual report at http://www.cg.sc.gov/publications/Documents/CAFR/Sections/FY2012/CompleteCAFRFY12-accessible.pdf.
OK, now what about his position that the south rebelled because, in talks prior to secession, the plans laid out for emancipation would have been ruinous to the southern economy?
Also, were there any such talks? I’m unaware of such.
No, Lincoln didn’t really want to free existing slaves, though it was what the South feared prior to the election.
I suppose he is correct that the South greatly feared such a plan would come to pass, but there is absolutely zero evidence any such plan actually existed. Certainly no formal talks occurred to promote an emancipation plan.
Your assistant’s boyfriend is pretty much right in conspiracy theory territory. Lots of verifiably bogus claims and alternate history. Again, he doesn’t strike me as the sort who would accept any evidence that contradicted his beliefs, but it’s still good to know he doesn’t have even a toe to stand on.
Actually, South Carolina’s debt spiraled out of control after the Civil War. Reconstruction didn’t exactly go very smoothly in that state and the debt went from about $5 million just after the war to about $20 million by the mid 1870s. There were some fairly drastic political changes after that and by the mid 1880s they had the debt back down to roughly $5 million or so again. That was the big pay-down of the Civil War debt.
There weren’t any talks of emancipation prior to the war. There were debates about various slavery-related issues (for example, what should happen to a runaway slave who was captured in a free State, or whether new States admitted to the US should be free or slave States, and what logic dictates that.) Those issues along were enough to cause secession.
But there was no serious discussion about emancipation of slave States until long after the war started.
The silly thing about the point in the OP was the South Carolina was rabidly pro-slavery and proud of it. They seceded first and justified it by saying the Federal government was not enforcing the fugitive slave laws in states that declared any slave within their borders was automatically granted freedom. In other words, they were against states’ rights where slavery was concerned; all states had to recognize slavery.
South Carolina’s economy was based more on slavery than just about any other state. This was not due to cotton but rather indigo; the raising and processing of which was brutal work. South Carolinians thought their economy would collapse without slaves and were not going to give it up, even if reimbursed, because they were afraid they’d never be able to pay people enough to work in the indigo plantations.
I have no idea if this is true, I strongly doubt if it is. But I remember John Chancellor on the NBC nightly news in the mid 1970s noting there were still 19 women collecting pensions from their late husband’s
civil war military service. Apparently it was not uncommon for aging Confederate soldiers in the 1920s and 1930s to marry young women so there would be someone to get monthly survivor benefits. Could there be some SC woman who was born in 1915, married in 1933, widowed in 1935 getting his pension?
Billy Sherman's troops treated South Carolina harsher than they treated the other states they marched through bringing the jubilee. They were determined to punish the state where treason was hatched. It could be that given the long term poverty and sloth, that some infrastructure wasn't replaced until recently and they are still paying off the bonds.
