Reply to DCUM Vote: Greatest American of All Time

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Lincoln gets way too much credit.  He happened to be the President at a time when inevitable change was happening.  He arguably caused the war itself, or made it more costly.  The emancipation proclamation was a military tactic.  Slavery was going to end regardless.

Harriet Tubman is the better answer here.[/quote]

There's always someone who wants to make this argument but it's hard to justify. If you spend enough time reading Lincoln's speeches, the run up to the Civil War, the aftermath, it's hard to see another person at the time who could have done what Lincoln did. The war was horrendous but it was not started by Lincoln, it was started by Lincoln's staunch no more spread of slavery position that caused the South to abandon all pretenses at principals along with irrational paranoia. The argument that slavery was going to die out anyway is laughable to anyone aware of the mood and beliefs of 1860, which followed several decades of widespread spread of slavery and the slave based cotton economy. Slavery in 1860 would have seemed more permanent than in 1810. The moral values espoused by Lincoln were at the heart of what America was supposed to mean, more than just a political state. His argument won, and the US we have today is because of it.

Lincoln also showed a remarkable growth during the war years in his attitude towards not just slavery but racial issues. His deep conviction in the core promise of the Declaration of Independence that all men are created equally, no exceptions, no carve outs, is what triumphed, and that is why he remains the greatest American. [/quote]

It's a tangent but industrialization would have greatly reduced the number of slaves needed for relatively un- or low-skilled field work. At that point, chattel slavery would likely have evolved into migrant workers or share croppers. [/quote]

why?? the share cropping system evolved to maintain slavery... of slavery had never been abolished there was absolutely no reason for it to go away--- it is very profitable, hence we have more enslaved people NOW than we did then despite it being very difficult to hold humans in bondage today but the profits make it worth it.  [/quote]

The PP's claim about industrialization ending slavery also ignores that previous industrial leaps like the cotton gin accelerated and entrenched slavery (despite Eli Whitney's hope that it would mitigate it).  The existing evidence we have is the exact opposite.

Societies that were similarly economically dependent on slavery (Rome) or forced labor never had slavery end peacefully, slavery was disrupted by the end of the civilization or extreme shocks like the plague killing half of everyone.[/quote]

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