# Texas in the Civil War **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 21, 2002, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927 "2002-09-21T03:31:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2002, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/1 "2002-09-21T03:31:50Z")
How and why did Texas side with the South? I apologize for being about to make what is probably an overgeneralization based in Northern ignorance, but somehow Texas doesn’t seem to have fit in with the rest of the antebellum South, either culturally or economically. The popular image of slave-worked cotton plantations doesn’t seem very Texan, to say the least. What was the extent of slavery in Texas? Was slavery a prominent feature of antebellum ranch life, or was it only in the eastern part of the state? Why did they secede. ---
**Author:** ![Sternvogel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc79bd/32.png) [@Sternvogel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sternvogel)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2002, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/2 "2002-09-21T03:59:02Z")
Here’s the Texas Ordinance of Secession. Among the reasons given are the USA Federal Government’s failure to protect Texas from “the Indian savages on our border, and more recently against the murderous forays of banditti from the neighboring territory of Mexico”. [http://www.lsjunction.com/docs/secesson.htm](http://www.lsjunction.com/docs/secesson.htm) Texas slavery was, as you indicated, primarily a phenomenon of the eastern two-fifths of the state. By 1860, over 30% of Texas residents were slaves. Because news traveled more slowly in those days, formal emancipation was not declared until June 19, 1865 (Lee had surrendered to Grant at Appomattox in April). Had the Confederacy won the war, slavery might have survived – and even expanded – within the borders of the Lone Star State. A good summary is available at [http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/view/SS/yps1.html](http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/view/SS/yps1.html) ---
**Author:** ![MEBuckner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mebuckner/32/2896_2.png) [@MEBuckner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MEBuckner)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2002, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/3 "2002-09-21T04:13:39Z")
From the [United States Historical Census Data Browser](http://fisher.lib.virginia.edu/census/), we find that in 1860 182,566 people out of a total population of 604,215 were slaves, or just over 30% of the people in the state. This is a lower percentage than Mississippi (55% of the population of the state enslaved), but slightly higher than Tennessee (nearly 25%), about the same as that of Virginia, and considerably higher than a Border State like Missouri (less than 10%). In fact, the economy of East Texas was very much part of the Cotton Belt, and pre-War Texas was considered not just a Southern state but a Deep South state. Texas was one of the first, pre-Sumter wave of seceding states–i.e., the really gung-ho ones who seceded before the outbreak of actual war forced their hand. See the [Declaration of the Causes which Impel the State of Texas to Secede from the Federal Union](http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/csa/texsec.htm) to see the reasons Texans gave for their secession. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2002, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/4 "2002-09-21T04:24:28Z")
Slavery actually prompted Texas to secede twice. Without minimizing the natural estrangement of language and culture between the immigrants to (Mexican) Texas from the U.S. and the Mexican government, one specific sticking point was that Mexico had outlawed slavery while the immigrants from the U.S. wanted to keep the slaves that they brought with them. ---
**Author:** ![t-keela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a3d4f5/32.png) [@t-keela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/t-keela)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2002, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/5 "2002-09-21T04:31:38Z")
It’s actually quite simple. Most of the people living in Texas at the time were from the South. Many still had relatives in the Old South and were not about to take arms against them. ---
**Author:** ![fatmac98](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3ec8ea/32.png) [@fatmac98](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fatmac98)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2002, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/6 "2002-09-21T05:30:08Z")
When Texas was still a posession of Spain, then Mexico, most of the settlers that came heer were from the South. It is a common mistake to think of Texas as a western or southwestern state, but make no mistake, it was, and in some ways still is a southern state. ---
**Author:** ![t-keela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a3d4f5/32.png) [@t-keela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/t-keela)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2002, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/7 "2002-09-21T05:47:33Z")
It depends on what part of Texas you are referring to. I live in the pineywoods of East Texas. But, I have lived in Houston, Dallas, Beaumont, Austin and San Antonio and have been practically everywhere in this State. It is quite diverse and yet strangely familiar or similar wherever you go. ---
**Author:** ![SoulFrost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f07891/32.png) [@SoulFrost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SoulFrost)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2002, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/8 "2002-09-21T07:29:13Z")
Oh no… you too, **t-keela**? My sympathies… In the late 1850’s the “[finest bale of cotton the world has ever seen](http://www.carthagetexas.com/commun.htm)” was produced in Panola County, TX. It is bound in silver cord and is on display in New York. Near 'bouts the only good that’s ever come from 'round heah. -David ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2002, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/9 "2002-09-22T01:31:54Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by javaman \* > \*\*I apologize for being about to make what is probably an overgeneralization based in Northern ignorance, but somehow Texas doesn’t seem to have fit in with the rest of the antebellum South, either culturally or economically. \*\* You’re picturing Texas as it is today, not as it was in 1860. The cattle boom, the oil boom, large-scale Mexican immigration, and urbanization all occurred after the Civil War. Much of central and western Texas wasn’t settled yet in 1860. The parts of the state which were settled were very much culturally and economically part of the deep South. ---
**Author:** ![aahala](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a88e4f/32.png) [@aahala](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aahala)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2002, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/10 "2002-09-22T03:32:24Z")
BTW, the Texas governor of the time was strongly opposed to Texas leaving the Union and was thrown out of office in early 1861 because of it. You may have heard of him, Sam Houston. ---
**Author:** ![syncrolecyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@syncrolecyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/syncrolecyne)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2002, 7:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/11 "2002-09-22T07:50:35Z")
This is just trivia, but for decades the largest city in Texas was not Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, or Austin, but Galveston. A hurricane in 1901 damaged Galveston’s prominence within the state. Also, while this is a point that is severly abused by some people, not all Confederates were primarily concerned with slaveholding. Some areas where there were few slaves, such as the Laredo area, had confederate supporters. In those parts of Texas, there were strong regional loyalties, as well as those who felt Texas lost too many rights when it became a state. Also in parts of Central Texas, many people were strongly pro-union. This is the best link I know of for all Texas related topics. [http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/index.new.html](http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/index.new.html) ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2002, 8:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/12 "2002-09-22T08:08:47Z")
My question is according to what I know Texas was the only state that could leave the union legally Was this concidered a moot point by the civil war? Taking the obivious view it seems like the U.S broke the treaty in which texas joined the union in ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2002, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/13 "2002-09-22T13:31:56Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by nightshadea \* > \*\*My question is according to what I know Texas was the only state that could leave the union legally > \*\* That’s not true. Nowhere in the documents making Texas a state is Texas granted any special right of secession. ---
**Author:** ![Yossarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/9de0a6/32.png) [@Yossarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yossarian)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2002, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/14 "2002-09-22T13:45:07Z")
I think the answer to most of the OP lies [here](http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/view/SS/mgs2.html). An excerpt: > [@](#): > > Indeed, the timing of the secession of Texas and the motivation behind it are of continued interest because they open up a series of questions about the nature of the Texas economy, the population, political parties, local needs, the role of such Unionists as Sam Houston,qv and the effects of public pressure to conform. Running through all of these questions is the role of slavery. > > Many Texans believed in the 1850s that slavery was vital to the Texas economy and to its future growth. Indeed, slavery had grown rapidly in Texas after annexationqv in 1845. By 1860 slaves constituted roughly 30 percent of the population. Limited means of transportation, however, concentrated plantations along the river valleys of eastern Texas and in the coastal counties just below Houston and Galveston. Only cotton grown in these places could easily reach a market. In other settled regions of Texas slavery was virtually absent, and the economy depended upon livestock, corn, or wheat and not on slavery and cotton. In 1860 Texas was divided between a region dependent on slavery region and a largely slave-free region. > > Most of those who lived in the slaveholding region in eastern and southeastern Texas had come to the state from the lower South. The population of the rest of the state had more diverse origins. Settlement extended little more than 100 miles west of Austin in 1860. Along the frontier were nonslaveholders from the upper South or from Germany. In north central Texas were wheat growers from the upper South. In the southwest and also on the Rio Grande were Mexicans and Germans, as well as British Americans. The major Texas cities, San Antonio, Houston, and Galveston, which all had populations just under 10,000, had significant German or Mexican populations. Population and economic characteristics greatly influenced secession. The diversity of the state slowed the secession process and helped to produce pockets of resistance to it. On the other hand, the recent immigration of many Texans from the lower South and their dependence on cotton and slavery influenced many to follow the lead of South Carolina and the rest of the lower South. Groups of Germans or upper Southerners who lived close to lower Southerners and in areas in which slavery and cotton were feasible were beginning to be assimilated into a lower South culture by 1860 and largely supported secession. Ties to political parties and ideology could in some cases determine attitudes toward secession. In general, Democrats were inclined to support the right of individuals to own slaves even at the expense of the Union. Whigs and other opposition groups were less inclined to sacrifice the Union for the sake of slavery. Regardless of their personal stake in slavery, groups were often influenced by party ties to support or oppose secession. Germans who did not hold slaves supported secession in Comal County out of loyalty to the Democratic party.qv Slaveholding former Whigs opposed secession in Galveston and Harrison counties. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2002, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/15 "2002-09-22T16:14:23Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by nightshadea \* > \*\*My question is according to what I know Texas was the only state that could leave the union legally > > Was this concidered a moot point by the civil war? > > Taking the obivious view it seems like the U.S broke the treaty in which texas joined the union in \*\* No, this isn’t correct. Texas didn’t join the Union by a treaty between sovereign states. It was annexed by the United States, with the consent of a Texas Convention, called to consider the annexation. There was a proposal to have Texas enter by treaty, but the U.S. Senate rejected the treaty: [A Treaty of Annexation, concluded between the United States of America and the Republic of Texas.](http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/texan05.htm) Then, the U.S. Congress proposed annexation of Texas, provided Texas consented: [Joint Resolution of the Congress of the United States, March 1, 1845](http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/texan01.htm). Texas summoned a Convention to consider annexation, on the terms of the Resolution. The Convention agreed to annexation: [Ordinance of the Convention of Texas, July 4, 1845](http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/texan03.htm). Final details having been worked out, Congress admitted Texas as a state: [Joint Resolution of the Congress of the United States, December 29,1845](http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/texan04.htm). Now, if you look at the terms Congress proposed for annexation, there is nothing giving Texas a special right to secede. In fact, the Resolution admitting Texas suggests the contrary, by saying: > [@](#): > > That the state of Texas shall be one, and is hereby declared to be one, of the United States of America, and admitted into the Union on an equal footing with the original states, in all respects whatever. Since Texas is on an equal footing with all the other states, it can’t have a special right to secede. Either all the states can secede, or none, but hard to see how Texas has a special right. And in fact, the Supreme Court held that once annexed, Texas had no right to secede, in the case of [State of Texas v. White](http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=case&court=us&vol=74&page=700), 74 U.S. 700 (1868). The key passage reads: > [@](#): > > The Constitution, in all its provisions, looks to an indestructible Union, composed of indestructible States. [74 U.S. 700, 726] When, therefore, Texas became one of the United States, she entered into an indissoluble relation. All the obligations of perpetual union, and all the guaranties of republican government in the Union, attached at once to the State. The act which consummated her admission into the Union was something more than a compact; it was the incorporation of a new member into the political body. And it was final. The union between Texas and the other States was as complete, as perpetual, and as indissoluble as the union between the original States. There was no place for reconsideration, or revocation, except through revolution, or through consent of the States. Finally, it’s true that the terms of annexation provide for the possible subdivision of Texas into smaller states, but that is not unique to Texas. [Article IV, section 3](http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.articleiv.html#section3) of the U.S. Constitution provides that any state can be subdivided, provided the state and Congress consents: > [@](#): > > Section 3. New states may be admitted by the Congress into this union; but no new states shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other state; nor any state be formed by the junction of two or more states, or parts of states, without the consent of the legislatures of the states concerned as well as of the Congress. The only difference is that the Resolution specifies that no more than four additional states may be created out of Texas. Dunno how they reached that number, but in principle, other states could be subdivided in a similar fashion. (State of Northern California, anyone?) ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2002, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/16 "2002-09-23T03:54:11Z")
Ahh I’m glad that historical ul is put to rest yhanks guys My wag: And as for northren ca leaving southren ca not while la county provides most of the tax money ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2002, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/17 "2002-09-23T03:55:18Z")
well la county orange county ect ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2002, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/texas-in-the-civil-war/128927/18 "2002-09-23T11:54:56Z")
> [@](#): > > I apologize for being about to make what is probably an overgeneralization based in Northern ignorance, but somehow Texas doesn’t seem to have fit in with the rest of the antebellum South, either culturally or economically. > [@](#): > > You’re picturing Texas as it is today, not as it was in 1860. The cattle boom, the oil boom, large-scale Mexican immigration, and urbanization all occurred after the Civil War. Much of central and western Texas wasn’t settled yet in 1860. The parts of the state which were settled were very much culturally and economically part of the deep South. Be that as it may, _javaman_ has a point. It was indeed somewhat closer to the deep south that, say, the North or the East South, but Texas is a part of the true Southwest. Additionally, its experiences and such dealing with its vast terrritory and different neighbors (Spanish Indians and previous Spanish settlers) did shape Texas differently. Your answer is also correct, _jklann_, but it doesn’t address the exact point where _javaman_ goes astray. I suspect Java’s thinking about the “Old South” plantantion society of “Gone with the Wind” and so forth. Well, that sort of thing didn’t exist in that form outside of the Atlantic states. Certainly there were plantations, and plantation owners were important, but not in the same cultural fashion as back east. Actually, the whole area from Texas to the Virginia border pretty much sucked, and not many poeple would choose to live there if it were not for the economic wonder of cotton in the Antebellum period. This may surprise you, but cotton was, in fact, only in heavy cultivation for about 50 years or so starting after the turn of the century. The “Old South” was a pretty young place. Pretty much everything to Texas had been settled because of cotton, prmarily because the whole region is hot as hell’s back door in the summertime.