To: JDN who wrote (347669 ) 1/25/2003 6:09:23 PM From: Johannes Pilch Read Replies (3) | Respond to This is all wrong, JDN, including why Lincoln didn't free slaves. Undoubtedly economic sectionalism did influence the war, but it was certainly not the chief and immediate cause of the war. Slavery was. Southern whites wished to protect slavery both because the southern economy was based upon slavery, but also because, as Jeff Davis himself said, slavery afforded even the poorest white southerner a social platform upon which he could stand as an "equal" to other whites. In other words, white society could stand upon the backs of slaves as a way of life whether whites physically owned slaves or not. Southern leader after southern leader whipped up poor southern anger for the war by claiming that southerners had to fight otherwise whites would "be forced to live with niggers."
