alt.education

"Bob LeChevalier" wrote in message
news:i01ir3l9qrnbocofugvqm5bbuuvkbg236o@4ax.com...
> "Joe Irvin" wrote:
>>"Bob LeChevalier" wrote in message
>>news:6dgfr358sd40947nfpunn95213cpuiccqi@4ax.com...
>>> "Joe Irvin" wrote:
>>>>> What do you mean by "valid"? It can be done, as is evidenced by
>>>>> history. It was considered "moral" then, and at the time of the Civil
>>>>> War, Southerners justified slavery on Biblical terms. So much for
>>>>> absolute morality ...
>>>>
>>>>That is was done is what I meant by 'valid'. IMO, I don't think, even
>>>>most
>>>>Southerners, that owned slaves believed it was moral.
>>>
>>> On the contrary.
>>>
>>>>T Jefferson, a slave holder believed it was wrong.
>>>
>>> Jefferson was a rather exceptional person.
>>
>>New Orleans had a large ex slave population
>
> New Orleans was part of France at the time. Those ex-slaves dated
> from before it became American.

Slaves that were given there freedom headed for places like New Oreleans
because it was more wide open and slaves could get jobs there. They also
migrated to northern cities.

>>... G Washington willed that his slaves were to set free after he died.
>
> Again, exceptions.

These were exceptional men and knew from the get go that slavery was
immoral. Its hard for someone to give up there lively hood because someone
says its immoral ... slavery by the time of the war was really on the way
out ... it was becoming less and less economical. This is not to say they
weren't slaveholders who didn't want to keep the institution.

>>There were slaves that owned land and worked their farms.
>
> Cite please. I think you will find that they were ex-slaves, or that
> their master owned the land and let them use it.

Don't have the exact cite, but I think I read it in a book: "Fame and the
Founding Fathers", by Douglass Adair. It talked of a vacation TJ took to, I
think it was Vermont, where he saw an exslave who was farming and I don't
think there was slavery in Vermont.
>
>>I think most slave holders knew that slavery was immoral,
>
> Your thoughts and historical reality have nothing in common.

I gave two examples, and you blew them off as being exceptional ... George
Mason was another that denounced slavery ... "[J]udging from reference to
them [the slaves] as "of the family" and from James Madison's life long
abhorrence of the institution of slavery, it seems likely that at Montpelier
they received attention in the best rather than the worst tradition of the
colonial South. (Ketcham, 1990, page 12.)" ... the US Constitution was
written in a way that slavery could be abolished, but in order to get a
Constitution compromises had to be made, putting off the decision on slavery
to a later date ... unforturately it casued a war. as a block Southerns were
against doing away with slavery. What I said was reality.

> One typical argument:
> http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=1124
> > < condemnation of tyranny and oppression seem logically to involve, as
> < a result, the condemnation of slavery; yet, if slavery is afterwards
> < expressly mentioned and treated as a lawful relation, it obviously
> < follows, unless Scripture is to be interpreted as inconsistent with
> < itself, that slavery is, by necessary implication, excepted.
>
> Here is another essay on the subject. They were clearly NOT arguing
> economic self-interest.

Just because your cite didn't argue economic self interest doesn't mean it
wasn't so. Slaves were a very large capital investment. Freeing them meant
financial ruin ... take generators from a utility, aircraft from an airline
and then tell both to continue doing business ... bankruptcy probably ...
exactly what happened to the South ... it took decades for the South to
recovery. I agree that there were other reasons.
> http://www.southernslavery.com/articles/golden_rule_slavery.htm
>
> To many southerners, the northern practice was even more immoral.
> They called it "wage slavery".

Yes, they did. Did the Northern ship owers who brought slaves to sell think
it was an immoral practice?
>
>
>>>>It was economically profitable, at least at
>>>>first, so they justified slavery ... using the Bible as you stated.
>>>
>>> Some justified it because it was profitable. But even those who did
>>> not own slaves in the South supported slavery, and in the civil war
>>> gave their lives to preserve it, and they weren't doing it for profit.
>>
>>I don't know if they supported slavery
>
> Historians can tell the difference.
>
> They supported slavery, in the areas where slavery was the norm. In
> those areas, a person might be lynched for publically opposing
> slavery, and it wasn't the wealthy slaveowners who did the lynching.

This is true, but it doesn't take away from the fact that they didn't think
the Fed govt had the power to meddel in their states domestic affairs.. One
doesn't have to agree with ever issue in a State ... they can go to war in
support of their State.
>
>>The regular farmer/landowner had no personal interest in supporing the
>>slave holders.
>
> Correct. But he did, anyway.
>
>>Many in western No Carolina and eastern Tenn. supported the North.
>
> Correct. There were areas of the South that opposed slavery,
> generally places where cotton wasn't grown.
>
>>> The only way to prevent that situation is if their authority is
>>> exactly balanced by some other authority so that they cannot
>>> necessarily back their version of "right" with "might".
>>>
>>> A God who can punish the disobedient is ruling by might-makes-right.
>>
>>Might makes right, but you have a choice to obey or disobey.
>
> So does a slave.
>
>>In the end God holds those who don't accountable.
>
> So does a slavedriver.
>
>>>>> By definition. Anything else isn't morality.
>>>>
>>>>True morality isn't negotiable.
>>>
>>> You are assuming your conclusion. There is no "true morality". There
>>> is only what we agree is morality. If we agree that something else is
>>> moral, then it is.
>>
>>You are talking about morality by poll? There is right and wrong/good and
>>evil and its not poll driven.
>
> It is if we say it is.

I disagree ... was the lynching of slaves moral? The poll of the lynchers
seem to say it was, so was it moral or immoral ... you can't have it both
ways that "It is if we say it is", and then say lynching is immoral. By
your reasoning lynching was moral. Poll morality isn't morality at all.

>>>>There is right/wrong, good/evil.
>>>
>>> Only because we think so.
>>
>>No, because there is good and evil even if there are people who don't
>>think
>>so. Man is not the decider
>
> George Bush is. At least he says so. %^)
>
>>There is morality and immorality.
>
> Your belief.

Not my belief, a transcendent Gods, by his teaching. If you believe
morality is poll driven you have no argument against Hitler, Pol Pot, Stalin
etc. As long as you believe man is the final arbitrator, as above, you
cannot have a very strong argument against what happens.

>>>>> Of course. And sure enough, slavery has existed, which supports the
>>>>> argument. And it was claimed to be good by those who supported it.
>>>>
>>>>What they claimed doesn't mean that slavery was moral.
>>>
>>> They obviously disagreed.
>>
>>No, they knew it was immoral and enslaved anyway for economic reasons.
>
> No. They most of them "knew" it was moral.

The ones on the side of morality.
>
>>>>They could claim it was for economic reasons and not believe it.
>>>
>>> But that is not in fact what they did. They did believe it, and they
>>> believed that those trying to end slavery were evil.
>>
>>I'm not trying to get into anyones mind, I cannot. But I do know that
>>they
>>were Southerners who held slaves knowing it was wrong, but held them
>>anyway
>
> So? "Southern" wasn't a religion.

I know, my point is they most likely knew slavery was wrong/immoral.
>
> Southern Baptists, on the other hand, split off from the other
> Baptists specifically over that question. They believed Southern
> slavery was moral, and believed it strongly enough to schism a church
> over it. And the preachers who made the decision to split mostly
> weren't plantation owners trying to preserve their wealth.

Politics getting into religion ... I do believe that some did think slavery
was moral. At least a case, using the Bible can be made for slavery ... see
Philemon.
>
> lojbab