Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Grainne who wrote (14174)	12/9/1997 4:09:00 PM
From: JF Quinnelly	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

Slavery was becoming a losing proposition by the time of the Civil War, and was continuing largely because of its own inertia. Keep in mind that slaves were the responsibility of their masters even when they were too old to work; maybe not the best of retirement plans, but certainly one of the earliest. If you check, you will find that all the other slave societies of the Western Hemisphere abandoned slavery in the mid to late 1800s, too. But all of the others managed the transition without a terrible war. It simply didn't make economic sense, and would surely have ended peacefully in America too, if not for the other sources of hostility between the sections in the U.S.

To: Grainne who wrote (14174)	12/9/1997 8:59:00 PM
From: James R. Barrett	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

Christine, did you see the Newsweek magazine with the cover story "Slavery In America"? I think it was two weeks ago. Anyway, one of the authors of the article stated that only 5% of the people in the South held slaves. I was taken aback at how low the number was. Now if this is true would you or anyone else know how 5% of the population (slave owners) could motivate the other 95% (non-slave owners) to fight a horribly bloody war with the Union Army for the primary purpose of allowing the 5% to keep their slaves? Something does'nt click here. What am I missing? Jim