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It Wasn't About Slavery: Exposing the Great Lie of the Civil War
The Great Lie of the Civil War
If you think the Civil War was fought to end slavery, you’ve been duped.
In fact, as distinguished military historian Samuel Mitcham argues in his provocative new book, It Wasn’t About Slavery , no political party advocated freeing the slaves in the presidential election of 1860. The Republican Party platform opposed the expansion of slavery to the western states, but it did not embrace abolition.
The real cause of the war was a dispute over money and self-determination.
Before the Civil War, the South financed most of the federal government—because the federal government was funded by tariffs, which were paid disproportionately by the agricultural South that imported manufactured goods.
Yet, most federal government spending and subsidies benefited the North. The South wanted a more limited federal government and lower tariffs—the ideals of Thomas Jefferson—and when the South could not get that, it opted for independence.
Lincoln was unprepared when the Southern states seceded, and force was the only way to bring them—and their tariff money—back. That was the real cause of the war.
A well-documented and compelling read by a master historian, It Wasn’t About Slavery will change the way you think about Abraham Lincoln, the Emancipation Proclamation, and the cause and legacy of America’s momentous Civil War.
If you think the Civil War was fought to end slavery, you’ve been duped.
In fact, as distinguished military historian Samuel Mitcham argues in his provocative new book, It Wasn’t About Slavery , no political party advocated freeing the slaves in the presidential election of 1860. The Republican Party platform opposed the expansion of slavery to the western states, but it did not embrace abolition.
The real cause of the war was a dispute over money and self-determination.
Before the Civil War, the South financed most of the federal government—because the federal government was funded by tariffs, which were paid disproportionately by the agricultural South that imported manufactured goods.
Yet, most federal government spending and subsidies benefited the North. The South wanted a more limited federal government and lower tariffs—the ideals of Thomas Jefferson—and when the South could not get that, it opted for independence.
Lincoln was unprepared when the Southern states seceded, and force was the only way to bring them—and their tariff money—back. That was the real cause of the war.
A well-documented and compelling read by a master historian, It Wasn’t About Slavery will change the way you think about Abraham Lincoln, the Emancipation Proclamation, and the cause and legacy of America’s momentous Civil War.
240 pages, Paperback
First published January 14, 2020
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272 people want to read
About the author
Samuel W. Mitcham
20 books9 followersMitcham was educated Northeast Louisiana University, North Carolina State, and received his doctorate at the University of Tennessee. He was a professor at Henderson State University, Georgia Southern University and the University of Louisiana at Monroe, and was a visiting professor at West Point. He lives in Monroe, Louisiana.
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February 19, 2021
(Following review originally posted at Amazon website, from which book has been removed.)
Dr. Samuel W. Mitcham, Jr, has written a number of books on history, primarily WWII military history (he has an entry in Wikipedia). “It Wasn’t About Slavery” is not a work of sober historical analysis, however; it is a polemic: Dr. Mitcham is angry—in fact, he is furious!—about a “Great Lie” which, he claims, has distorted the teaching of American History. This book is intended to drive a stake through the heart of that vampire, the “Great Lie.”
Dr. Mitcham presents the “Great Lie” in the Introduction to his book, in a sentence dripping with angry sarcasm: “The selfless and morally superior Union soldier, brilliantly directed by a prophet and saint, Abraham Lincoln, invaded the evil and decadent South with no other purpose than to liberate the oppressed and downtrodden ‘Negro’ from his cruel, sadistic masters.”
Wringing out the sarcasm, we have “President Lincoln ordered the Union armies into the South to liberate the Negro slaves.”
Does anyone today teach this gilded fantasy?—Does any historian actually BELIEVE it?
Lincoln himself never said any such thing. During his first Inaugural Address—presented after seven states had already seceded from the Union—he made it clear that he had no Constitutional authority to eliminate slavery in any state. He also made it clear that he believed that the Union was intended to be perpetual, and that no State had the right to leave it without permission from Congress: “It follows from these views that no State upon its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the Union; that resolves and ordinances to that effect are legally void, and that acts of violence within any State or States against the authority of the United States are insurrectionary or revolutionary, according to circumstances.”
His actions were therefore undertaken to crush the insurrection, and force the seceding states back into the Union, and he resisted attempts by abolitionists to combine their goals with his, most notably in his exasperated letter to Horace Greeley in 1862: “My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.”
This is the narrative with which all modern Civil War histories and essays begin: Lincoln fought to save the Union, not to free the slaves. Emancipation was a result, not a cause, of the war, and the Civil War was therefore about secession, not slavery.
Nevertheless, having created this “Great Lie” straw man, Dr. Mitcham proceeds to demolish it bit by bit, beginning with a historical review of Yankee hypocrisy and perfidy (Yankee slave traders brought the slaves to America in the first place, and profited immensely from the Triangle Trade; Northerners were even more racially bigoted than Southerners, etc.) and continuing—in Chapters I through X—to detail the conflicts between North and South over the institution of slavery.
Much of the ground covered in these chapters will be familiar to any reader with a background in American history. One of the events Mitcham includes here is the notorious Dred Scott decision, which effectively legalized slavery in every state of the Union, and Mitcham mocks the abolitionists for ignoring this ruling. Mitcham does not mention the logic behind Judge Taney’s decision: that the negro, as a “being of an inferior order, …had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.” In other words, that Negroes were not “men,” in the Jeffersonian sense of “all men are created equal,” and could therefore be enslaved for their own “benefit.”
Still, Mitcham informs us, the slaves were (mostly) happy, and that, after the War, the former slaves displayed no hatred toward their former white masters, when interviewed (presumably by white people).
Along the way we read find some interesting anecdotes, like the story of the slaver Capt. Canot (p. 3-4), and the revelation (p. 63) that abolitionists scattered “suggestive” images of biracial couples (at least, that’s how this reviewer interprets the phrase “amalgamation pictures”), wrapped in the blue paper traditionally used for chocolates, among decent Southerners. No wonder they hated abolitionists! Of these nuggets of information, the most interesting is the summary of expeditions (p. 142) planned by Lincoln to entrap the Confederacy into firing the first shot. The resupply mission to Fort Sumter was only one of these, albeit the successful one. One more Amazon star for this book!
It is not until we reach Chapter XI, “The Real Cause of the War,” that we get to the meat of Mitcham’s argument, which is that the war was really all about tariffs.
This chapter organization has a rather peculiar effect. It is as if a book about the assassination of President Kennedy, with the title “It Wasn’t Lee Harvey Oswald,” began by describing Oswald’s birth, schooling, military service, flight to Russia, marriage to a Russian woman, etc., etc., before presenting the evidence—based on a partial fingerprint found at the Dallas School Book Depository—that the assassin might have been someone on LBJ’s staff, and concluding with a description of Oswald’s murder by Jack Ruby in the basement of the Dallas Police HQ. Why present all that detail on Oswald if “It Wasn’t Lee Harvey Oswald?” Similarly, why present all that information on slavery if “It Wasn’t About Slavery?”
One might reasonably conclude that Mitcham has some doubts about the strength of his own argument, and feels compelled to defend slavery as an institution, just in case anyone still believes, after reading Chapter XI, that slavery was, in fact, what the war was all about. Sometimes this defensive approach undercuts his own argument, as when he quotes (p. 62) John C. Calhoun regarding abolitionist propaganda: “This agitation has produced one happy effect at least. Many in the South once believed that it [slavery] was a moral and political evil; that folly and delusion are gone; we see it now in its true light, and regard it as the most safe and stable basis for free institutions in the world.” Such a basis would be worth defending, even by military force, would it not?
But, to return to the meat of Mitcham’s argument: early in the book (p. 25) he notes that there was no income tax prior to the Civil War, so tariffs were the primary source of income for the Federal government. Most of this income went to development projects in Northern states, despite the fact that much, if not most, of the tariff money was collected in Southern ports. This disparity had almost led to secession in 1833 by South Carolina during the Nullification Crisis (under Pres. Andrew Jackson), ultimately resolved through a compromise and lower tariffs. Clearly, tariffs were a problem for the Southern states, so the reader would expect to see some accounts of growing Southern anger, desperate attempts to reduce or eliminate the tariffs, impact on the economies of the Southern states, tables of revenue and expenditures, etc. But Chapter XI presents only the bare statement that the South provided more than 83 percent of tariff revenue, citing a book by Leonard M. Scruggs as the source. (A diligent search of the Internet turned up only one attempt at supporting or refuting this number, in a satirical YouTube video by Atun-Shei Films, “TARIFFS and TAXES: The REAL Cause of the CIVIL WAR?!”—a video which captures the eye-glazing boredom induced by any discussion of economics in this context.) After that brief mention, Mitcham returns to the slavery issue, raising the possibility of compensated emancipation as a compromise that might have saved the Union.
The reader, expecting a mountain of evidence in Chapter XI to tip the scales in the direction of “tariffs” as the cause, is confronted by this “83 percent” molehill, opposite the immense dark mass of “slavery.” One begins to suspect that the evidence for tariffs, as the cause of secession and hence the Civil War, does not exist.
Those of us who do not find Chapter XI convincing are left with the question, “so, what WAS it about?”—and by “it,” we mean “secession.” We might begin by studying the Declarations of Secession by the various seceding states, published as a statement of their reasons for leaving the Union. These declarations are readily available on the Internet (browse on “declaration secession X,” where X = the state’s name). As an example, take Mississippi’s declaration, which includes the statement “Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery--the greatest material interest of the world.”
Dr. Mitcham does refer (p. 109) to “the secession ordnances,” but dismisses statements like the one above as just one argument for secession among many, and therefore not particularly significant. That one argument, however, concerns the institution that provided “the greatest material interest” to each of the slave states, and the basis—as Calhoun said—of their institutions.
Charles B. Dew, a Southern-raised historian who had heard from childhood that “it wasn’t about slavery,” set out to prove that it wasn’t by examining the speeches of the secession commissioners, sent out by those states that had already seceded to the states that had not, to encourage them to leave the Union. In “Apostles of Disunion: Southern Secession Commissioners and the Causes of the Civil War” (UVA Press, 2001, available from Amazon), Dew describes his shock at the discovery of Alabama commissioner Stephen Fowler Hale’s 1860 letter to the Governor of Kentucky. Since Hale and the other commissioners were presenting the most convincing arguments for secession possible, and in the most blunt and urgent language that they could use, their statements in Dew’s book should be the new starting point for any discussion of the “cause” question. Needless to say, these arguments were not about tariffs.
For those interested in statements of a more public nature, here’s a quotation from “Southern Punch,” a Richmond (Virginia) newspaper, in 1864:
*
“The people of the South,” says a contemporary, “are not fighting for slavery but for independence.”
Let us look into this matter. It is an easy task, we think, to show up this new-fangled heresy — a heresy calculated to do us no good, for it cannot deceive foreign statesmen nor peoples, nor mislead any one here nor in Yankeeland. . . .
Our doctrine is this: WE ARE FIGHTING FOR INDEPENDENCE THAT OUR GREAT AND NECESSARY DOMESTIC INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY SHALL BE PRESERVED, and for the preservation of other institutions of which slavery is the groundwork.
(From an essay, “The New Heresy,” in the September 19, 1864 issue of “Southern Punch,” available on the Internet: browse on “the new heresy southern punch”).
And, finally, it is well known that the Constitution of the Confederate States of America contained an article protecting slavery, but the exact wording of that article (Article IV, Section 3, clause 3) is not so well known. Here it is:
*
(3) The Confederate States may acquire new territory; and Congress shall have power to legislate and provide governments for the inhabitants of all territory belonging to the Confederate States, lying without the limits of the several States; and may permit them, at such times, and in such manner as it may by law provide, to form States to be admitted into the Confederacy. In all such territory the institution of negro slavery, as it now exists in the Confederate States, shall be recognized and protected by Congress and by the Territorial government; and the inhabitants of the several Confederate States and Territories shall have the right to take to such Territory any slaves lawfully held by them in any of the States or Territories of the Confederate States.
*
Not slavery, but a particular kind of slavery—NEGRO slavery—is to be constitutionally protected.
There is indeed a “Great Lie” at work in the story of America, but it’s much, much older than the Civil War or the Dred Scott decision. It has a birthdate prior to 1619 and the importation of the first African slaves into America, prior even to the discovery by Columbus of the New World in 1492. It’s the Lie that cancels the bold Jeffersonian claim that “all men are created equal” by adding the Orwellian corollary, “—but some are more equal than others.”
Dr. Samuel W. Mitcham, Jr, has written a number of books on history, primarily WWII military history (he has an entry in Wikipedia). “It Wasn’t About Slavery” is not a work of sober historical analysis, however; it is a polemic: Dr. Mitcham is angry—in fact, he is furious!—about a “Great Lie” which, he claims, has distorted the teaching of American History. This book is intended to drive a stake through the heart of that vampire, the “Great Lie.”
Dr. Mitcham presents the “Great Lie” in the Introduction to his book, in a sentence dripping with angry sarcasm: “The selfless and morally superior Union soldier, brilliantly directed by a prophet and saint, Abraham Lincoln, invaded the evil and decadent South with no other purpose than to liberate the oppressed and downtrodden ‘Negro’ from his cruel, sadistic masters.”
Wringing out the sarcasm, we have “President Lincoln ordered the Union armies into the South to liberate the Negro slaves.”
Does anyone today teach this gilded fantasy?—Does any historian actually BELIEVE it?
Lincoln himself never said any such thing. During his first Inaugural Address—presented after seven states had already seceded from the Union—he made it clear that he had no Constitutional authority to eliminate slavery in any state. He also made it clear that he believed that the Union was intended to be perpetual, and that no State had the right to leave it without permission from Congress: “It follows from these views that no State upon its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the Union; that resolves and ordinances to that effect are legally void, and that acts of violence within any State or States against the authority of the United States are insurrectionary or revolutionary, according to circumstances.”
His actions were therefore undertaken to crush the insurrection, and force the seceding states back into the Union, and he resisted attempts by abolitionists to combine their goals with his, most notably in his exasperated letter to Horace Greeley in 1862: “My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.”
This is the narrative with which all modern Civil War histories and essays begin: Lincoln fought to save the Union, not to free the slaves. Emancipation was a result, not a cause, of the war, and the Civil War was therefore about secession, not slavery.
Nevertheless, having created this “Great Lie” straw man, Dr. Mitcham proceeds to demolish it bit by bit, beginning with a historical review of Yankee hypocrisy and perfidy (Yankee slave traders brought the slaves to America in the first place, and profited immensely from the Triangle Trade; Northerners were even more racially bigoted than Southerners, etc.) and continuing—in Chapters I through X—to detail the conflicts between North and South over the institution of slavery.
Much of the ground covered in these chapters will be familiar to any reader with a background in American history. One of the events Mitcham includes here is the notorious Dred Scott decision, which effectively legalized slavery in every state of the Union, and Mitcham mocks the abolitionists for ignoring this ruling. Mitcham does not mention the logic behind Judge Taney’s decision: that the negro, as a “being of an inferior order, …had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.” In other words, that Negroes were not “men,” in the Jeffersonian sense of “all men are created equal,” and could therefore be enslaved for their own “benefit.”
Still, Mitcham informs us, the slaves were (mostly) happy, and that, after the War, the former slaves displayed no hatred toward their former white masters, when interviewed (presumably by white people).
Along the way we read find some interesting anecdotes, like the story of the slaver Capt. Canot (p. 3-4), and the revelation (p. 63) that abolitionists scattered “suggestive” images of biracial couples (at least, that’s how this reviewer interprets the phrase “amalgamation pictures”), wrapped in the blue paper traditionally used for chocolates, among decent Southerners. No wonder they hated abolitionists! Of these nuggets of information, the most interesting is the summary of expeditions (p. 142) planned by Lincoln to entrap the Confederacy into firing the first shot. The resupply mission to Fort Sumter was only one of these, albeit the successful one. One more Amazon star for this book!
It is not until we reach Chapter XI, “The Real Cause of the War,” that we get to the meat of Mitcham’s argument, which is that the war was really all about tariffs.
This chapter organization has a rather peculiar effect. It is as if a book about the assassination of President Kennedy, with the title “It Wasn’t Lee Harvey Oswald,” began by describing Oswald’s birth, schooling, military service, flight to Russia, marriage to a Russian woman, etc., etc., before presenting the evidence—based on a partial fingerprint found at the Dallas School Book Depository—that the assassin might have been someone on LBJ’s staff, and concluding with a description of Oswald’s murder by Jack Ruby in the basement of the Dallas Police HQ. Why present all that detail on Oswald if “It Wasn’t Lee Harvey Oswald?” Similarly, why present all that information on slavery if “It Wasn’t About Slavery?”
One might reasonably conclude that Mitcham has some doubts about the strength of his own argument, and feels compelled to defend slavery as an institution, just in case anyone still believes, after reading Chapter XI, that slavery was, in fact, what the war was all about. Sometimes this defensive approach undercuts his own argument, as when he quotes (p. 62) John C. Calhoun regarding abolitionist propaganda: “This agitation has produced one happy effect at least. Many in the South once believed that it [slavery] was a moral and political evil; that folly and delusion are gone; we see it now in its true light, and regard it as the most safe and stable basis for free institutions in the world.” Such a basis would be worth defending, even by military force, would it not?
But, to return to the meat of Mitcham’s argument: early in the book (p. 25) he notes that there was no income tax prior to the Civil War, so tariffs were the primary source of income for the Federal government. Most of this income went to development projects in Northern states, despite the fact that much, if not most, of the tariff money was collected in Southern ports. This disparity had almost led to secession in 1833 by South Carolina during the Nullification Crisis (under Pres. Andrew Jackson), ultimately resolved through a compromise and lower tariffs. Clearly, tariffs were a problem for the Southern states, so the reader would expect to see some accounts of growing Southern anger, desperate attempts to reduce or eliminate the tariffs, impact on the economies of the Southern states, tables of revenue and expenditures, etc. But Chapter XI presents only the bare statement that the South provided more than 83 percent of tariff revenue, citing a book by Leonard M. Scruggs as the source. (A diligent search of the Internet turned up only one attempt at supporting or refuting this number, in a satirical YouTube video by Atun-Shei Films, “TARIFFS and TAXES: The REAL Cause of the CIVIL WAR?!”—a video which captures the eye-glazing boredom induced by any discussion of economics in this context.) After that brief mention, Mitcham returns to the slavery issue, raising the possibility of compensated emancipation as a compromise that might have saved the Union.
The reader, expecting a mountain of evidence in Chapter XI to tip the scales in the direction of “tariffs” as the cause, is confronted by this “83 percent” molehill, opposite the immense dark mass of “slavery.” One begins to suspect that the evidence for tariffs, as the cause of secession and hence the Civil War, does not exist.
Those of us who do not find Chapter XI convincing are left with the question, “so, what WAS it about?”—and by “it,” we mean “secession.” We might begin by studying the Declarations of Secession by the various seceding states, published as a statement of their reasons for leaving the Union. These declarations are readily available on the Internet (browse on “declaration secession X,” where X = the state’s name). As an example, take Mississippi’s declaration, which includes the statement “Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery--the greatest material interest of the world.”
Dr. Mitcham does refer (p. 109) to “the secession ordnances,” but dismisses statements like the one above as just one argument for secession among many, and therefore not particularly significant. That one argument, however, concerns the institution that provided “the greatest material interest” to each of the slave states, and the basis—as Calhoun said—of their institutions.
Charles B. Dew, a Southern-raised historian who had heard from childhood that “it wasn’t about slavery,” set out to prove that it wasn’t by examining the speeches of the secession commissioners, sent out by those states that had already seceded to the states that had not, to encourage them to leave the Union. In “Apostles of Disunion: Southern Secession Commissioners and the Causes of the Civil War” (UVA Press, 2001, available from Amazon), Dew describes his shock at the discovery of Alabama commissioner Stephen Fowler Hale’s 1860 letter to the Governor of Kentucky. Since Hale and the other commissioners were presenting the most convincing arguments for secession possible, and in the most blunt and urgent language that they could use, their statements in Dew’s book should be the new starting point for any discussion of the “cause” question. Needless to say, these arguments were not about tariffs.
For those interested in statements of a more public nature, here’s a quotation from “Southern Punch,” a Richmond (Virginia) newspaper, in 1864:
*
“The people of the South,” says a contemporary, “are not fighting for slavery but for independence.”
Let us look into this matter. It is an easy task, we think, to show up this new-fangled heresy — a heresy calculated to do us no good, for it cannot deceive foreign statesmen nor peoples, nor mislead any one here nor in Yankeeland. . . .
Our doctrine is this: WE ARE FIGHTING FOR INDEPENDENCE THAT OUR GREAT AND NECESSARY DOMESTIC INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY SHALL BE PRESERVED, and for the preservation of other institutions of which slavery is the groundwork.
(From an essay, “The New Heresy,” in the September 19, 1864 issue of “Southern Punch,” available on the Internet: browse on “the new heresy southern punch”).
And, finally, it is well known that the Constitution of the Confederate States of America contained an article protecting slavery, but the exact wording of that article (Article IV, Section 3, clause 3) is not so well known. Here it is:
*
(3) The Confederate States may acquire new territory; and Congress shall have power to legislate and provide governments for the inhabitants of all territory belonging to the Confederate States, lying without the limits of the several States; and may permit them, at such times, and in such manner as it may by law provide, to form States to be admitted into the Confederacy. In all such territory the institution of negro slavery, as it now exists in the Confederate States, shall be recognized and protected by Congress and by the Territorial government; and the inhabitants of the several Confederate States and Territories shall have the right to take to such Territory any slaves lawfully held by them in any of the States or Territories of the Confederate States.
*
Not slavery, but a particular kind of slavery—NEGRO slavery—is to be constitutionally protected.
There is indeed a “Great Lie” at work in the story of America, but it’s much, much older than the Civil War or the Dred Scott decision. It has a birthdate prior to 1619 and the importation of the first African slaves into America, prior even to the discovery by Columbus of the New World in 1492. It’s the Lie that cancels the bold Jeffersonian claim that “all men are created equal” by adding the Orwellian corollary, “—but some are more equal than others.”
December 21, 2022
"At this point, the listener might ask 'If the Civil War wasn't about slavery, what was it about?' The answer is simple: money. Most wars were and are about money or wealth transfer, including territorial acquisition, in one form or another. What was slavery about? Money."
- Samuel W. Mitcham, It Wasn't About Slavery, Introduction
I bought this books during Audible's most recent 85% off everything sale, wherein I bought just about everything on my wishlist less than $5 because when else is there going to be a deal that good? It Wasn't About Slavery was wishlisted in the first place because it purported to be a stolid historical analysis and I wanted to give it a chance. I got through the introduction and first chapter before deciding that the summary lies: this is a polemic written by an apologist about a strawman argument that nobody actually makes - let alone teaches - in the real world.
According to the author, all teaching about the Civil War is that “the selfless and morally superior Union soldier, brilliantly directed by a prophet and saint, Abraham Lincoln, invaded the evil and decadent South with no other purpose than to liberate the oppressed and downtrodden ‘negro’ from his cruel, sadistic masters” (Mitcham, It Wasn't About Slavery, Introduction). This is so wrong as to be hilarious, especially for a military historian. When I was in middle school and we did a basic overview of the Civil War the unit was more nuanced than this. The above quote is not a statement that literally anyone - except, perhaps, Lost Causers who determinedly ignore anything that doesn't fit their worldview - actually teaches or believes happened.
He goes on to state that the Civil War wasn't actually a civil war (though he would graciously use that term for the sake of clarity *eyeroll*) because civil wars are when rival factions attempt each attempt total control of one government, a definition that strikes me as so reductive as to be false. I can see that as being one definition of a civil war, but not as something descriptive of all civil wars. That would be like saying 'all genocides are the Holocaust,' when in reality the definition of genocide - both the legal and academic versions - are far more complex and encompass many actions other than direct violence with the goal of killing everyone of a particular ethnic/religious group.
He leaves the introduction off by saying that no Confederates were actually charged with treason and that this somehow proves that their actions weren't treason at all, as if he were completely unaware (or, more likely, ignoring) Johnson's view and treatment of the secessionists after he ended up as President. Lack of formal legal follow-up, including treason charges, wasn't for lack of trying on the part of Republicans (mostly the radical faction), but because Johnson is well known to have made a point of restoring as many former secessionists as he could to their former positions - including in Congress! - as fast as he could, and over the objections of Republicans as well as the guidelines set by Congress.
So, I was severely unimpressed with this book and contemplated putting it down right there, but I figured it was short and why not listen to the whole thing? So, onto the first chapter, which he begins by saying that slavery is an ancient practice that still exists today despite modern laws (because there's nowhere in the world that slavery is legal, which I noticed he left out), which doesn't really go to a point. I guess it's supposed to imply that slavery is fine? He brings this up, talks about it at length, and just...doesn't go anywhere with it. I am - at best - confused.
Part and parcel with the 'there are modern slaves' bit is the point that there are, numerically, more (illegal) slaves in the world now than there were at any point in history and the author argues that no one has any problem with it. The first is irrelevant and the second is flatly wrong. First, the author brings up the number as if the fact that there are literally BILLIONS more people of all types/characteristics/descriptions/etcetera than there have been at any prior point and this would, obviously, affect raw numbers of anything. There are undoubtedly more blue-eyed redheads now that there ever have been at any history, and this 'proves' absolutely nothing. Second, there are lots of people and government and nongovernmental orgs (news outlets, nonprofits, etcetera) who have TONS to say modern slavery. There are multiple international nonprofits devoted to combating modern slavery (Anti Slavery International, End Modern Slavery Initiative Foundation), the UN and US State Department both have public declarations and information about modern slavery available online, and there is even an official day to focus on and call for the end of modern slavery (it's December 2nd, by the way). While I'd seen some of this in passing (PSAs on bathroom doors in major cities, news articles), all of the specific information (such as the date of December 2nd) was found with simple Google search. This more than anything else proved to me that this author had absolutely no interest in writing anything even remotely resembling historical analysis. Honestly, I almost couldn't believe that someone would put their own name on a pile of sentences that were so blatantly false.
And all this for what? To literally admit that his thesis is wrong in the very introduction! As quoted above, the author freely admits that the Civil War was about money, primarily as value held in enslaved people. It is well established that, at least on the side of the North, the Civil War wasn't about slavery at all and it is well known that Lincoln would kept all the slaves in bondage if it meant avoiding war. This doesn't mean that the Civil War wasn't about slavery at all, because references to slavery and slaveholding is all over the actual declarations of secession and newspaper that hyped secession fever, it just means that it wasn't about slavery to the North, though the Civil War was ALL about slavery to the South.
In the interest of full disclosure [September 27, 2022]: As a general rule, I don't review books I haven't completely read. I made an exception for this specific book because SO MUCH even just in the first two chapters was so blatantly wrong. I know I would have appreciated seeing a review like this one before wasting my time (though not my money, because the book will be returned) on it. With that in mind, other books about the Civil War that I did find informative and interesting were:
- The Field of Blood: Violence in Congress and the Road to Civil War by Joanne B. Freeman, for a greater understanding about the atmosphere and conflicts in Congress that lead up to the Civil War
- Madness Rules the Hour: Charleston, 1860 and the Mania for War by Paul Starobin, for a greater understanding about the secessionist movement in the South
- Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin, for a greater understanding about the Lincoln presidency and his views of slavery/the Civil War
- Seward: Lincoln's Indispensable Man by Walter Stahr, for a greater understanding about the Presidential Cabinet during the Civil War and various people's views of slavery/the Civil War
- The Impeachers: The Trial of Andrew Johnson and the Dream of a Just Nation by Brenda Wineapple, for a greater understanding of the Johnson Presidency and aftermath of the Civil War
- Samuel W. Mitcham, It Wasn't About Slavery, Introduction
I bought this books during Audible's most recent 85% off everything sale, wherein I bought just about everything on my wishlist less than $5 because when else is there going to be a deal that good? It Wasn't About Slavery was wishlisted in the first place because it purported to be a stolid historical analysis and I wanted to give it a chance. I got through the introduction and first chapter before deciding that the summary lies: this is a polemic written by an apologist about a strawman argument that nobody actually makes - let alone teaches - in the real world.
According to the author, all teaching about the Civil War is that “the selfless and morally superior Union soldier, brilliantly directed by a prophet and saint, Abraham Lincoln, invaded the evil and decadent South with no other purpose than to liberate the oppressed and downtrodden ‘negro’ from his cruel, sadistic masters” (Mitcham, It Wasn't About Slavery, Introduction). This is so wrong as to be hilarious, especially for a military historian. When I was in middle school and we did a basic overview of the Civil War the unit was more nuanced than this. The above quote is not a statement that literally anyone - except, perhaps, Lost Causers who determinedly ignore anything that doesn't fit their worldview - actually teaches or believes happened.
He goes on to state that the Civil War wasn't actually a civil war (though he would graciously use that term for the sake of clarity *eyeroll*) because civil wars are when rival factions attempt each attempt total control of one government, a definition that strikes me as so reductive as to be false. I can see that as being one definition of a civil war, but not as something descriptive of all civil wars. That would be like saying 'all genocides are the Holocaust,' when in reality the definition of genocide - both the legal and academic versions - are far more complex and encompass many actions other than direct violence with the goal of killing everyone of a particular ethnic/religious group.
He leaves the introduction off by saying that no Confederates were actually charged with treason and that this somehow proves that their actions weren't treason at all, as if he were completely unaware (or, more likely, ignoring) Johnson's view and treatment of the secessionists after he ended up as President. Lack of formal legal follow-up, including treason charges, wasn't for lack of trying on the part of Republicans (mostly the radical faction), but because Johnson is well known to have made a point of restoring as many former secessionists as he could to their former positions - including in Congress! - as fast as he could, and over the objections of Republicans as well as the guidelines set by Congress.
So, I was severely unimpressed with this book and contemplated putting it down right there, but I figured it was short and why not listen to the whole thing? So, onto the first chapter, which he begins by saying that slavery is an ancient practice that still exists today despite modern laws (because there's nowhere in the world that slavery is legal, which I noticed he left out), which doesn't really go to a point. I guess it's supposed to imply that slavery is fine? He brings this up, talks about it at length, and just...doesn't go anywhere with it. I am - at best - confused.
Part and parcel with the 'there are modern slaves' bit is the point that there are, numerically, more (illegal) slaves in the world now than there were at any point in history and the author argues that no one has any problem with it. The first is irrelevant and the second is flatly wrong. First, the author brings up the number as if the fact that there are literally BILLIONS more people of all types/characteristics/descriptions/etcetera than there have been at any prior point and this would, obviously, affect raw numbers of anything. There are undoubtedly more blue-eyed redheads now that there ever have been at any history, and this 'proves' absolutely nothing. Second, there are lots of people and government and nongovernmental orgs (news outlets, nonprofits, etcetera) who have TONS to say modern slavery. There are multiple international nonprofits devoted to combating modern slavery (Anti Slavery International, End Modern Slavery Initiative Foundation), the UN and US State Department both have public declarations and information about modern slavery available online, and there is even an official day to focus on and call for the end of modern slavery (it's December 2nd, by the way). While I'd seen some of this in passing (PSAs on bathroom doors in major cities, news articles), all of the specific information (such as the date of December 2nd) was found with simple Google search. This more than anything else proved to me that this author had absolutely no interest in writing anything even remotely resembling historical analysis. Honestly, I almost couldn't believe that someone would put their own name on a pile of sentences that were so blatantly false.
And all this for what? To literally admit that his thesis is wrong in the very introduction! As quoted above, the author freely admits that the Civil War was about money, primarily as value held in enslaved people. It is well established that, at least on the side of the North, the Civil War wasn't about slavery at all and it is well known that Lincoln would kept all the slaves in bondage if it meant avoiding war. This doesn't mean that the Civil War wasn't about slavery at all, because references to slavery and slaveholding is all over the actual declarations of secession and newspaper that hyped secession fever, it just means that it wasn't about slavery to the North, though the Civil War was ALL about slavery to the South.
In the interest of full disclosure [September 27, 2022]: As a general rule, I don't review books I haven't completely read. I made an exception for this specific book because SO MUCH even just in the first two chapters was so blatantly wrong. I know I would have appreciated seeing a review like this one before wasting my time (though not my money, because the book will be returned) on it. With that in mind, other books about the Civil War that I did find informative and interesting were:
- The Field of Blood: Violence in Congress and the Road to Civil War by Joanne B. Freeman, for a greater understanding about the atmosphere and conflicts in Congress that lead up to the Civil War
- Madness Rules the Hour: Charleston, 1860 and the Mania for War by Paul Starobin, for a greater understanding about the secessionist movement in the South
- Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin, for a greater understanding about the Lincoln presidency and his views of slavery/the Civil War
- Seward: Lincoln's Indispensable Man by Walter Stahr, for a greater understanding about the Presidential Cabinet during the Civil War and various people's views of slavery/the Civil War
- The Impeachers: The Trial of Andrew Johnson and the Dream of a Just Nation by Brenda Wineapple, for a greater understanding of the Johnson Presidency and aftermath of the Civil War
April 28, 2021
This book was an absolute atrocity . The author tried his best to reorient the historiographical discussion of American Civil War. However he failed to do so in my view. He as a professor predominantly in the southern US took on the role of a lost cause sympathizer akin to Shelby Foote wishing the confederacy had won the War. He did consult renowned historian James McPherson However in my estimation it’s likely that he cherry-picked ideas and manipulated them to fit the narrative he sought to tell. I can’t understand why this book has high reviews on here. This book has about as much merit as Holocaust denier David Irving does when writing about the Holocaust. This book started off as a thought provoking read as a way to entice new thought processes on the Civil War but quickly devolved into a love fest with the confederacy . All while trying to vilify Abraham Lincoln as a terrible human being. Any serious historian would be wise to avoid this book.
December 13, 2022
This is a terrific book if you only have a tenuous grip on history ... or reality for that fact. The author doesn't explore the subject; they start with an absurd premise and proceed to cherry-pick and/or deliberately misconstrue events to support the absurd premise.
Save your money and, more importantly, your time and give this a pass.
Save your money and, more importantly, your time and give this a pass.
June 16, 2023
An ahistorical insult to the idea of critical thought. Fails on every level of making a coherent argument. A waste of time and money.
May 27, 2020
If I were to deduct a star for this one, it would be due to my disappointment that there wasn't MORE. But the saying is, "Leave them wanting more." So,... success!
Of course, only "Civil War" history lovers would agree. And only those who understand why I put that in quotes will LOVE this one.
Find out some truth about "honest Abe" Lincoln. Gain a more balanced understanding of just how unnecessary and vile this war between the states was. Get background information on what lead up to the war that will also enable you to grasp the timeline that will prove that the claim that the so-called "Civil War" (War of Northern Aggression ) was fought over slavery is nothing but post-war propaganda. As Churchill is credited with saying, "The victors write the history books" (or something like that).
All that and more. I started this one at 9 AM and with several interruptions, was still finished by 5 PM the same day. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
Of course, only "Civil War" history lovers would agree. And only those who understand why I put that in quotes will LOVE this one.
Find out some truth about "honest Abe" Lincoln. Gain a more balanced understanding of just how unnecessary and vile this war between the states was. Get background information on what lead up to the war that will also enable you to grasp the timeline that will prove that the claim that the so-called "Civil War" (War of Northern Aggression ) was fought over slavery is nothing but post-war propaganda. As Churchill is credited with saying, "The victors write the history books" (or something like that).
All that and more. I started this one at 9 AM and with several interruptions, was still finished by 5 PM the same day. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
August 22, 2024
Total garbage. A waste of time and money.
August 23, 2022
The author argues that history is written by the victors, and the victors have falsely depicted the South as racist brutes. So it's ironic that he repeats the lie that the Germans of the 1930s considered Jews and Slavs to be subhuman. It doesn't occur to him that if mainstream history books lie about the American Civil war they might lie about WWII as well.
In this book there's a big focus on race, but strangely the author forgets to mention that the majory of slave traffickers and plantation owners in the South were Jews. In the Jewish Encyclopedia (Funk & Wagnalls), edition of 1901, under the entry "agriculture", page 266, it says that "cotton-plantations in many parts of the South were wholly in the hands of the Jews, and as a consequence slavery found its advocates among them". The author ignores this inconvenient fact and decides to mention the Jews only as victims (in a completely different conflict that was brought up for no reason).
Another problem with the book is that it doesn't explain exactly how the Nord's financial domination worked. It almost implies that the tariff were on exports, but we all know tariffs are on imports. So how is the South's export of cotton affected by a tariff on import? The book doesn't present a good argument for its main contention, which is that the South was going to be economically ruined by the tariff. It just says that the South exports a lot of cotton, but how is a tariff impacting that exactly? I had to put down the book and do some research on my own. The book leaves a lot to be desired.
In favor of the book I can however say that it makes a good argument that it was the North, and not the South, to start the war and this was done for economic reasons and not for the moral reasons. The argument is that the South had the right to secede (regardless of their reasons), and the North didn't have the right to bring them back in the Union with force. The argument is also that slavery would have been abolished in the South eventually even without the war. The death and devastation caused by the war was the greater of two evils.
In summary: the central message of the book is delivered and therefore this is a valuable book to read, in spite of the 2 problems I mentioned above.
In this book there's a big focus on race, but strangely the author forgets to mention that the majory of slave traffickers and plantation owners in the South were Jews. In the Jewish Encyclopedia (Funk & Wagnalls), edition of 1901, under the entry "agriculture", page 266, it says that "cotton-plantations in many parts of the South were wholly in the hands of the Jews, and as a consequence slavery found its advocates among them". The author ignores this inconvenient fact and decides to mention the Jews only as victims (in a completely different conflict that was brought up for no reason).
Another problem with the book is that it doesn't explain exactly how the Nord's financial domination worked. It almost implies that the tariff were on exports, but we all know tariffs are on imports. So how is the South's export of cotton affected by a tariff on import? The book doesn't present a good argument for its main contention, which is that the South was going to be economically ruined by the tariff. It just says that the South exports a lot of cotton, but how is a tariff impacting that exactly? I had to put down the book and do some research on my own. The book leaves a lot to be desired.
In favor of the book I can however say that it makes a good argument that it was the North, and not the South, to start the war and this was done for economic reasons and not for the moral reasons. The argument is that the South had the right to secede (regardless of their reasons), and the North didn't have the right to bring them back in the Union with force. The argument is also that slavery would have been abolished in the South eventually even without the war. The death and devastation caused by the war was the greater of two evils.
In summary: the central message of the book is delivered and therefore this is a valuable book to read, in spite of the 2 problems I mentioned above.
January 18, 2024
"...But like Robert E. Lee, Houston did not care to remain in a Union held together by bayonets..."
The traitors' so-called constitution purported to establish "a permanent federal government" and Robert E. Lee spent the early parts of The Slaveholders' Rebellion drawing his sword against future West Virginians in an attempt to prevent their efforts to secede. Oops.
"The new constitution followed the U.S. Constitution, except that it outlawed the slave trade and allowed for the admission of non-slaveholding states."
The U.S. Constitution outlawed the international slave trade after 1808. The traitors' so-called constitution explicitly allowed for "international" slave trading with "the slave-holding States or Territories of the United States of America". In 1861. And the U.S. Constitution obviously allowed for the admission of non-slaveholding states, as exemplified by Maine, California, the future states carved out of the territory covered by the Northwest Ordinance, etc.
"The issue of slavery was left to the individual states."
Except that the traitors' so-called constitution explicitly prohibited any state or future territory conquered by the frauds who later cried that they only wanted to be left alone (like Arizona) from preventing slave-holders from bringing the people they violently held in slavery into these states and territories. In other words, the traitors' "permanent federal government" stripped the individual states and territories of the right to decide whether or not slavery would be permitted within their borders, exactly the issue they later claimed triggered them into waging a treasonous war against the USA for years on end.
The quoted parts are just a couple sentences from this atrocity. It goes on like this, in the dumbest and most dishonest fashion imaginable. The punditry can't stop talking about the importance of steel-manning your opponents' arguments. So I tried that, by listening to the case presented by one of the grand wizards of the klavern ensconced at the Abbeville Institute. But this is just the same idiocy and shameless lying with which white supremacists insist on polluting the internet.
An embarrassment.
The traitors' so-called constitution purported to establish "a permanent federal government" and Robert E. Lee spent the early parts of The Slaveholders' Rebellion drawing his sword against future West Virginians in an attempt to prevent their efforts to secede. Oops.
"The new constitution followed the U.S. Constitution, except that it outlawed the slave trade and allowed for the admission of non-slaveholding states."
The U.S. Constitution outlawed the international slave trade after 1808. The traitors' so-called constitution explicitly allowed for "international" slave trading with "the slave-holding States or Territories of the United States of America". In 1861. And the U.S. Constitution obviously allowed for the admission of non-slaveholding states, as exemplified by Maine, California, the future states carved out of the territory covered by the Northwest Ordinance, etc.
"The issue of slavery was left to the individual states."
Except that the traitors' so-called constitution explicitly prohibited any state or future territory conquered by the frauds who later cried that they only wanted to be left alone (like Arizona) from preventing slave-holders from bringing the people they violently held in slavery into these states and territories. In other words, the traitors' "permanent federal government" stripped the individual states and territories of the right to decide whether or not slavery would be permitted within their borders, exactly the issue they later claimed triggered them into waging a treasonous war against the USA for years on end.
The quoted parts are just a couple sentences from this atrocity. It goes on like this, in the dumbest and most dishonest fashion imaginable. The punditry can't stop talking about the importance of steel-manning your opponents' arguments. So I tried that, by listening to the case presented by one of the grand wizards of the klavern ensconced at the Abbeville Institute. But this is just the same idiocy and shameless lying with which white supremacists insist on polluting the internet.
An embarrassment.
July 22, 2024
This is not a good book.
November 1, 2024
Nothing but Lost Cause propaganda. It was about slavery, read the secession documents, read journals of confederate soldiers and their motives, read about what they did when marching into Pennsylvania during Gettysburg, where they kidnapped, killed, or sold free African-Americans south into slavery. Again, nothing but Lost Cause propaganda!
September 14, 2025
6.20 hours on Audible. This book is bullshit. The author contends that the American Civil War (1861-1865) was really about money, not slavery. Mitchum trivializes slavery and largely ignores it in this volume, focusing instead on everything else like tariffs, money, Northern corruption in “the War of Northern Aggression.” Notably lacking is how the articles of secession of ALL seceding states mention slavery as the primary cause of their withdrawal from the Union, in addition to direct quotes at the time of the war, Iike the one from Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens, who declared the Confederacy was based on the noble truth that “the Negro is not equal to the white man” and how slavery was the Blacks’ natural condition. If you want to read a Neo-Confederate screed against everything wrong about the North and “the unscrupulous Lincoln” and how emancipation wasn’t even worth it, this piece of shit is your book.
June 21, 2024
This book on the Civil War had the potential to be really good, but the problem is it has an obvious bias towards the south. At times, the author is not even trying to be impartial or unbiased. While some of the content is accurate, the presentation is skewed and does not allow the reader to form their own opinions.
One positive aspect is the book’s thorough explanation of the North’s stance on slavery. It effectively explains that both the North and South initially supported different forms of emancipation, with many advocating for a gradual, compensated freeing of the slaves and a return of them to Africa—a view held by figures like Robert E. Lee and Abraham Lincoln. However, the rise of abolitionist movements eventually made this prospect impossible.
The book’s major flaw lies in its language and descriptions of the Northern and Southern states. The North is depicted as arrogant and condescending, while the South is romanticized as a peaceful land of tradition. This contrast is detracting from a balanced understanding of the reality of both sides.
I could say more, but in summary, although the book contains valuable information, its Southern bias diminishes its overall quality. While I do think that books these days favor the north too much, this book swings the pendulum the other way. It could have been really good. Unfortunately, this is not the case.
One positive aspect is the book’s thorough explanation of the North’s stance on slavery. It effectively explains that both the North and South initially supported different forms of emancipation, with many advocating for a gradual, compensated freeing of the slaves and a return of them to Africa—a view held by figures like Robert E. Lee and Abraham Lincoln. However, the rise of abolitionist movements eventually made this prospect impossible.
The book’s major flaw lies in its language and descriptions of the Northern and Southern states. The North is depicted as arrogant and condescending, while the South is romanticized as a peaceful land of tradition. This contrast is detracting from a balanced understanding of the reality of both sides.
I could say more, but in summary, although the book contains valuable information, its Southern bias diminishes its overall quality. While I do think that books these days favor the north too much, this book swings the pendulum the other way. It could have been really good. Unfortunately, this is not the case.
March 2, 2020
Best Yet!
I have read about 50 books relating to the WBTS, slavery, Lincoln, and reconstruction. This is the best overall book yet. It should be used to teach about the war in schools across the country.
I have read about 50 books relating to the WBTS, slavery, Lincoln, and reconstruction. This is the best overall book yet. It should be used to teach about the war in schools across the country.
December 9, 2023
Haven’t even read it and I know this is some neo confederate bullshit. Down with the south, reconstruction should have lasted a hundred and fifty years
October 25, 2024
Honest historians know the subject isn’t a retelling of facts, but an argument of events and their significance told from multiple perspectives. If the study doesn’t make you question what you know and even uncomfortable at times, you’re not really studying history. In that spirit, I chose this book whose premise is totally counter to my own belief in the cause of the war. The author’s “bust hell wide open,” which I recommend, convinced me to question my own opinions on a related subject, so I wondered if this would do the same.
(My counterpoints on the topics in parentheses)
It starts by justifiably arguing it shouldn’t even be called a civil war because the south wasn’t seeking control of the nation, but rather independence. The north painted the narrative as an insurrection or rebellion, but southerners aligned themselves with the founding fathers on states rights and independence. Emphasizing the thinking at the time that each state was seen by its people as their “country”, not the US, it was interesting to hear that a French diplomat involved with the Treaty of Paris ending the revolution needed to clarify if it was one treaty or thirteen.
It also reviews the history and culpability of the slave trade, considering how New England merchants made a lot of money off slaves and in the late 18th century, there were even northern states with more slaves than some southern ones.
(True statements, but holistically fails to consider that the north began to evolve in its thinking and states started abolishing slavery before the war)
The author addresses the view of secession as a state right existing before the 1860s, even in New England, and especially how the union was ok with WV secession because it sided with them, but not southern secession. It discusses the justification behind the idea of separating from the union, especially the vastly differing culture.
(Only a valid argument until you realize WV seceded in order to NOT secede from the union; VA forced their hand. The statements on culture make many generalizations which conveniently fit his thesis in a thin attempt to gain emotional support to the opinion)
In essence, this argues the same old story that the war was fought because of money; of taxes, tariffs, and the economy.
(True, but skewed. Money from the free enterprise of WHAT: the industry of and achieved through SLAVERY)
While interesting and informative, this cherry-picked, biased, one-sided argument has been repeatedly debunked, most efficiently in “battle cry of freedom” by McPherson. The individual confederate soldiers definitely had a variety of reasons for fighting, but the political reasoning behind the war was absolutely slavery no matter how you look at it.
Throughout the book, he uses somewhat crafty statements like noting how a handful of states said their reasoning for succession was northern states’ failure to extradite people involved in John Brown’s raid. But peeling the onion back further John Brown’s raid was about slavery. Worst of all, this makes egregious statements, like an attempt to defame Lincoln and claim him as one of the most overrated figures in American history. There are too many reasons to explain how and why that is such a false statement. Or even worse, comparing the attack on Fort Sumter to the fact that the first shots fired at Pearl Harbor were from US forces. At one point, he insinuates that freed slaves suffered because of their freedom and exposure to illnesses and things afterwards. He even attempts to paint a picture that the south was largely anti-slavery anyway, and the institution would have died out in an organic way if not forced to at the point of a bayonet; this is ridiculous to the point of irresponsible as a historian given the ensuing century of segregation and Jim Crow treatment of minorities in the south. These disgusting and disrespectful statements take the book from a respectable opinion of history into an arguably non-academic product.
(My counterpoints on the topics in parentheses)
It starts by justifiably arguing it shouldn’t even be called a civil war because the south wasn’t seeking control of the nation, but rather independence. The north painted the narrative as an insurrection or rebellion, but southerners aligned themselves with the founding fathers on states rights and independence. Emphasizing the thinking at the time that each state was seen by its people as their “country”, not the US, it was interesting to hear that a French diplomat involved with the Treaty of Paris ending the revolution needed to clarify if it was one treaty or thirteen.
It also reviews the history and culpability of the slave trade, considering how New England merchants made a lot of money off slaves and in the late 18th century, there were even northern states with more slaves than some southern ones.
(True statements, but holistically fails to consider that the north began to evolve in its thinking and states started abolishing slavery before the war)
The author addresses the view of secession as a state right existing before the 1860s, even in New England, and especially how the union was ok with WV secession because it sided with them, but not southern secession. It discusses the justification behind the idea of separating from the union, especially the vastly differing culture.
(Only a valid argument until you realize WV seceded in order to NOT secede from the union; VA forced their hand. The statements on culture make many generalizations which conveniently fit his thesis in a thin attempt to gain emotional support to the opinion)
In essence, this argues the same old story that the war was fought because of money; of taxes, tariffs, and the economy.
(True, but skewed. Money from the free enterprise of WHAT: the industry of and achieved through SLAVERY)
While interesting and informative, this cherry-picked, biased, one-sided argument has been repeatedly debunked, most efficiently in “battle cry of freedom” by McPherson. The individual confederate soldiers definitely had a variety of reasons for fighting, but the political reasoning behind the war was absolutely slavery no matter how you look at it.
Throughout the book, he uses somewhat crafty statements like noting how a handful of states said their reasoning for succession was northern states’ failure to extradite people involved in John Brown’s raid. But peeling the onion back further John Brown’s raid was about slavery. Worst of all, this makes egregious statements, like an attempt to defame Lincoln and claim him as one of the most overrated figures in American history. There are too many reasons to explain how and why that is such a false statement. Or even worse, comparing the attack on Fort Sumter to the fact that the first shots fired at Pearl Harbor were from US forces. At one point, he insinuates that freed slaves suffered because of their freedom and exposure to illnesses and things afterwards. He even attempts to paint a picture that the south was largely anti-slavery anyway, and the institution would have died out in an organic way if not forced to at the point of a bayonet; this is ridiculous to the point of irresponsible as a historian given the ensuing century of segregation and Jim Crow treatment of minorities in the south. These disgusting and disrespectful statements take the book from a respectable opinion of history into an arguably non-academic product.
November 12, 2025
This book will probably ruffle a lot of feathers among the black and liberal community, but the truth sometimes hurts. I grew up in the seat of the confederacy in South Carolina and was taught in school that the war was about states rights, not slavery. I was on the fence with this notion and read many books on the subject and have come to the conclusion that initially it wasn’t. The slavery issue came about later in the war and today Lincoln is romanticized as some sort of savior of the Union band the black race, when in reality he really didn’t give a damn about blacks, or Indians for that matter.
Lincoln was all about power and bringing in as much money as possible into the North and doing so on the backs of Southerners with very high tariffs. Anyone who got in his was arrested and jailed to the tune of about 40,000 people suspected of sympathizing with the Confederacy. Yes, habeous corpus meant nothing to Lincoln and people today complain about Trump not giving it to drug dealers and runners.
After the war Mitcham argues, perhaps incorrectly, that blacks had it better under slavery than during and after the war and he may have a point if you look at the numbers. Although upwards of 750,000 soldiers were killed on both sides, it is presumed that as many as one million black slaves died from starvation and disease. We will never know the real numbers since records were not kept, but suffice it to say that blacks did suffer greatly. After the war they were subjected to a difference kind of slavery, sharecropping.
And who is to blame for all this suffering and death? Liberals point to the Confederacy, but in the end slavery could have been halted if A., Wall Street stopped funding loans for slaves and B., if the North and England had simply boycotted southern cotton. But in the end this was all about keeping the textile mills running at considerable expense of young people in the North and England. Karl Marx can attest to that.
One thing that southerners can agree upon is that nobody insults a gentleman. They take insults very seriously, especially back then and South Carolina especially felt that Lincoln and the Northern abolitionists were really going overboard in their insults. They planted the seed that the Southerners were a bunch of ignorant, backwoods, inbred idiots when that couldn’t be further from the truth. Most southerners, especially in South Carolina, were highly educated and excellent planters, although the upper classes were slaveholders. Take, for example, a gentleman named Clemson or another named Poinsett. The former was educated in Europe and traveled the world and the latter was also highly educated diplomat, physician, botanist and physicist who introduced the poinsettia to the US. On the other hand, however, the overwhelming majority of southerners did not and could not afford slaves so essentially they were fighting for their liberties and southern pride.
Keep in mind that I do not condone slavery and neither does Mitcham, but some important points have to brought to light concerning the subject and the south and Lincoln. He makes a very convincing argument concerning Lincoln’s holier than though sainthood and it is worth taking into consideration.
Lincoln was all about power and bringing in as much money as possible into the North and doing so on the backs of Southerners with very high tariffs. Anyone who got in his was arrested and jailed to the tune of about 40,000 people suspected of sympathizing with the Confederacy. Yes, habeous corpus meant nothing to Lincoln and people today complain about Trump not giving it to drug dealers and runners.
After the war Mitcham argues, perhaps incorrectly, that blacks had it better under slavery than during and after the war and he may have a point if you look at the numbers. Although upwards of 750,000 soldiers were killed on both sides, it is presumed that as many as one million black slaves died from starvation and disease. We will never know the real numbers since records were not kept, but suffice it to say that blacks did suffer greatly. After the war they were subjected to a difference kind of slavery, sharecropping.
And who is to blame for all this suffering and death? Liberals point to the Confederacy, but in the end slavery could have been halted if A., Wall Street stopped funding loans for slaves and B., if the North and England had simply boycotted southern cotton. But in the end this was all about keeping the textile mills running at considerable expense of young people in the North and England. Karl Marx can attest to that.
One thing that southerners can agree upon is that nobody insults a gentleman. They take insults very seriously, especially back then and South Carolina especially felt that Lincoln and the Northern abolitionists were really going overboard in their insults. They planted the seed that the Southerners were a bunch of ignorant, backwoods, inbred idiots when that couldn’t be further from the truth. Most southerners, especially in South Carolina, were highly educated and excellent planters, although the upper classes were slaveholders. Take, for example, a gentleman named Clemson or another named Poinsett. The former was educated in Europe and traveled the world and the latter was also highly educated diplomat, physician, botanist and physicist who introduced the poinsettia to the US. On the other hand, however, the overwhelming majority of southerners did not and could not afford slaves so essentially they were fighting for their liberties and southern pride.
Keep in mind that I do not condone slavery and neither does Mitcham, but some important points have to brought to light concerning the subject and the south and Lincoln. He makes a very convincing argument concerning Lincoln’s holier than though sainthood and it is worth taking into consideration.
December 2, 2025
Well I only thought it fair to read something arguing that slavery was not the central issue of the Civil War. Mitch claims that money was the primary factor. I was, rather unsurprisingly, disappointed in the argumentation and am still convinced that slavery is the central reason the South seceded.
I don't think I have ever read another book that claimed to be a an academic work that was dripping with so much contempt. Mitcham is not a fan of "yankees" and his language was loaded with pejoratives toward Lincoln, abolitionists, Republicans, and whomever else he did not like all that much. Even if your argument is correct, that sort of blatant contempt is a sure way to not win over any opponents.
But the bigger issue is that the argumentation was flawed, fallacious, and misleading. From the get-go, Mitcham sets up the flawed history he is seeking to debunk: "The selfless and morally superior Union soldier, brilliantly directed by a prophet and saint, Abraham Lincoln, invaded the evil and decadent South with no other purpose than to liberate the oppressed and downtrodden 'Negro' from his cruel, sadistic masters." This presentation of history is indeed flawed. The problem? Mitcham simply set up a strawman to knock down. I am aware of no serious historian or student of the time period who believes anything remotely similar to Mitcham's caricature.
Mitcham's history is generally correct, though it is often presented without context, in a misleading fashion, lacking critical details, or, probably most often, as if he is revealing some forbidden truth. Some examples:
1) In his telling of the history of the slave trade, he goes to pains to show that New Englanders had slaves and benefited from the slave trade. My feeling was, "And?" I don't think anyone is actually arguing that New England is pure as the driven snow. His presentation seemed driven by his claim that white southerners get sneered at for inventing slavery, and this was his counterfactual to the supposed claim.
2) In the opening of Chapter 2, Mitcham asserts that by the year 1750, Connecticut had three times as many slaves as Georgia, and Massachusetts had four times as many. Zero context given for why this would be significant. He failed to mention that Georgia was only chartered as a colony in 1733 and that slavery was only officially allowed in the state beginning in 1751. It should not be surprising that there were fewer slaves in Georgia in 1750; there had not been time for their numbers to grow. Georgia is just a selectively chosen state intended to give a "startling" statistic.
3) He kept trying to show that Northern bans on slavery wasn't out of any abhorrence of slavery in particular but more out of a desire to protect white labor. This is pretty well-known and not shocking.
4) He often brought up how often Northern states wanted to secede. Again, something that is well-known and acknowledged, at least in serious histories. The Union was fragile from the very beginning, and threats of secession got bandied about quite often. Not really a shocking truth.
5) Showing how much Northerners didn't like black people was basically just engaging in the tu quoque fallacy. And it's pretty well-known that being antislavery did not mean pro-black or pro-equality of any sort.
6) His attempts to denigrate Lincoln as the "most overrated" man in American history fall flat, as he again revealed nothing new. Anyone who has read anything about Lincoln knows he was not an abolitionist, was not in favor of black equality, promoted emigration plans for relocating freed slaves, that he was not a Christian by any orthodox definition, and that he used what we would call racist language. Nor is it surprising that Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation was a war measure and was motivated more out of a desire to harm the war effort of the Confederacy than any altruistic motives.
7) Mitcham failed to address the very words of the Confederate states that plainly show that the preservation of slavery and its protection against perceived threats was pretty central in their thinking. Instead he dismissed those who refer to them with a wave of the hand because they also mentioned other grievances. This is a pretty glaring weakness in an argument that slavery was not central to the South's reason for secession, as I find it to be the strongest evidence in the argument that it was the central reason.
8) He berated Lincoln pretty strongly for suspending the writ of habeas corpus, but failed to note that the Confederacy also suspended it. He also highlighting how the rich could avoid the draft in the North by paying a fee, but failed to note that the rich in the South could also avoid military service by owning more than 20 slaves. Sad as it is, it is not unique to the North for rich men to avoid military service by virtue of having wealth.
Mitcham seems to have been operating under the assumption that if the North did not fight, at least initially, with the desire to abolish slavery, then slavery could not have been the central issue for the war. But slavery was most certainly the central reason that the South seceded and was the great "cornerstone" upon which the Confederacy was built. It is entirely possible for both sides to have different motivations for fighting; the North's motivations do not negate the South's. The South did indeed secede over the issue of "states' rights," but, generally speaking, the most important right they felt was being infringed upon was their right to hold slaves and expand that institution into the territories.
In closing, I think it is worth directly citing some of the words from the founding of the Confederacy, words that Mitcham ignored and swept aside:
"A geographical line has been drawn across the Union, and all the States north of that line have united in the election of a man to the high office of President of the United States, whose opinions and purposes are hostile to slavery. He is to be entrusted with the administration of the common Government, because he has declared that that 'Government cannot endure permanently half slave, half free,' and that the public mind must rest in the belief that slavery is in the course of ultimate extinction. …
On the 4th day of March next, this party [Republicans] will take possession of the Government. It has announced that the South shall be excluded from the common territory, that the judicial tribunals shall be made sectional, and that a war must be waged against slavery until it shall cease throughout the United States. The guaranties of the Constitution will then no longer exist; the equal rights of the States will be lost. The slaveholding States will no longer have the power of self-government, or self-protection, and the Federal Government will have become their enemy."
--- South Carolina's Declaration of Secession
"Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery—the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin."
--- Mississippi's Declaration of Secession
"In all the non-slave-holding States, in violation of that good faith and comity which should exist between entirely distinct nations, the people have formed themselves into a great sectional party, now strong enough in numbers to control the affairs of each of those States, based upon the unnatural feeling of hostility to these Southern States and their beneficent and patriarchal system of African slavery, proclaiming the debasing doctrine of the equality of all men, irrespective of race or color—a doctrine at war with nature, in opposition to the experience of mankind, and in violation of the plainest revelations of the Divine Law. They demand the abolition of negro slavery throughout the confederacy, the recognition of political equality between the white and the negro races, and avow their determination to press on their crusade against us, so long as a negro slave remains in these States."
--- Texas's Declaration of Secession
" The new constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution African slavery as it exists amongst us the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union would split." He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution, were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with, but the general opinion of the men of that day was that, somehow or other in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away. This idea, though not incorporated in the constitution, was the prevailing idea at that time. The constitution, it is true, secured every essential guarantee to the institution while it should last, and hence no argument can be justly urged against the constitutional guarantees thus secured, because of the common sentiment of the day. Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the government built upon it fell when the 'storm came and the wind blew.'
Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth."
--- Alexander H. Stephens, VP of the Confederacy, in his Cornerstone Speech
I don't think I have ever read another book that claimed to be a an academic work that was dripping with so much contempt. Mitcham is not a fan of "yankees" and his language was loaded with pejoratives toward Lincoln, abolitionists, Republicans, and whomever else he did not like all that much. Even if your argument is correct, that sort of blatant contempt is a sure way to not win over any opponents.
But the bigger issue is that the argumentation was flawed, fallacious, and misleading. From the get-go, Mitcham sets up the flawed history he is seeking to debunk: "The selfless and morally superior Union soldier, brilliantly directed by a prophet and saint, Abraham Lincoln, invaded the evil and decadent South with no other purpose than to liberate the oppressed and downtrodden 'Negro' from his cruel, sadistic masters." This presentation of history is indeed flawed. The problem? Mitcham simply set up a strawman to knock down. I am aware of no serious historian or student of the time period who believes anything remotely similar to Mitcham's caricature.
Mitcham's history is generally correct, though it is often presented without context, in a misleading fashion, lacking critical details, or, probably most often, as if he is revealing some forbidden truth. Some examples:
1) In his telling of the history of the slave trade, he goes to pains to show that New Englanders had slaves and benefited from the slave trade. My feeling was, "And?" I don't think anyone is actually arguing that New England is pure as the driven snow. His presentation seemed driven by his claim that white southerners get sneered at for inventing slavery, and this was his counterfactual to the supposed claim.
2) In the opening of Chapter 2, Mitcham asserts that by the year 1750, Connecticut had three times as many slaves as Georgia, and Massachusetts had four times as many. Zero context given for why this would be significant. He failed to mention that Georgia was only chartered as a colony in 1733 and that slavery was only officially allowed in the state beginning in 1751. It should not be surprising that there were fewer slaves in Georgia in 1750; there had not been time for their numbers to grow. Georgia is just a selectively chosen state intended to give a "startling" statistic.
3) He kept trying to show that Northern bans on slavery wasn't out of any abhorrence of slavery in particular but more out of a desire to protect white labor. This is pretty well-known and not shocking.
4) He often brought up how often Northern states wanted to secede. Again, something that is well-known and acknowledged, at least in serious histories. The Union was fragile from the very beginning, and threats of secession got bandied about quite often. Not really a shocking truth.
5) Showing how much Northerners didn't like black people was basically just engaging in the tu quoque fallacy. And it's pretty well-known that being antislavery did not mean pro-black or pro-equality of any sort.
6) His attempts to denigrate Lincoln as the "most overrated" man in American history fall flat, as he again revealed nothing new. Anyone who has read anything about Lincoln knows he was not an abolitionist, was not in favor of black equality, promoted emigration plans for relocating freed slaves, that he was not a Christian by any orthodox definition, and that he used what we would call racist language. Nor is it surprising that Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation was a war measure and was motivated more out of a desire to harm the war effort of the Confederacy than any altruistic motives.
7) Mitcham failed to address the very words of the Confederate states that plainly show that the preservation of slavery and its protection against perceived threats was pretty central in their thinking. Instead he dismissed those who refer to them with a wave of the hand because they also mentioned other grievances. This is a pretty glaring weakness in an argument that slavery was not central to the South's reason for secession, as I find it to be the strongest evidence in the argument that it was the central reason.
8) He berated Lincoln pretty strongly for suspending the writ of habeas corpus, but failed to note that the Confederacy also suspended it. He also highlighting how the rich could avoid the draft in the North by paying a fee, but failed to note that the rich in the South could also avoid military service by owning more than 20 slaves. Sad as it is, it is not unique to the North for rich men to avoid military service by virtue of having wealth.
Mitcham seems to have been operating under the assumption that if the North did not fight, at least initially, with the desire to abolish slavery, then slavery could not have been the central issue for the war. But slavery was most certainly the central reason that the South seceded and was the great "cornerstone" upon which the Confederacy was built. It is entirely possible for both sides to have different motivations for fighting; the North's motivations do not negate the South's. The South did indeed secede over the issue of "states' rights," but, generally speaking, the most important right they felt was being infringed upon was their right to hold slaves and expand that institution into the territories.
In closing, I think it is worth directly citing some of the words from the founding of the Confederacy, words that Mitcham ignored and swept aside:
"A geographical line has been drawn across the Union, and all the States north of that line have united in the election of a man to the high office of President of the United States, whose opinions and purposes are hostile to slavery. He is to be entrusted with the administration of the common Government, because he has declared that that 'Government cannot endure permanently half slave, half free,' and that the public mind must rest in the belief that slavery is in the course of ultimate extinction. …
On the 4th day of March next, this party [Republicans] will take possession of the Government. It has announced that the South shall be excluded from the common territory, that the judicial tribunals shall be made sectional, and that a war must be waged against slavery until it shall cease throughout the United States. The guaranties of the Constitution will then no longer exist; the equal rights of the States will be lost. The slaveholding States will no longer have the power of self-government, or self-protection, and the Federal Government will have become their enemy."
--- South Carolina's Declaration of Secession
"Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery—the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin."
--- Mississippi's Declaration of Secession
"In all the non-slave-holding States, in violation of that good faith and comity which should exist between entirely distinct nations, the people have formed themselves into a great sectional party, now strong enough in numbers to control the affairs of each of those States, based upon the unnatural feeling of hostility to these Southern States and their beneficent and patriarchal system of African slavery, proclaiming the debasing doctrine of the equality of all men, irrespective of race or color—a doctrine at war with nature, in opposition to the experience of mankind, and in violation of the plainest revelations of the Divine Law. They demand the abolition of negro slavery throughout the confederacy, the recognition of political equality between the white and the negro races, and avow their determination to press on their crusade against us, so long as a negro slave remains in these States."
--- Texas's Declaration of Secession
" The new constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution African slavery as it exists amongst us the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union would split." He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution, were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with, but the general opinion of the men of that day was that, somehow or other in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away. This idea, though not incorporated in the constitution, was the prevailing idea at that time. The constitution, it is true, secured every essential guarantee to the institution while it should last, and hence no argument can be justly urged against the constitutional guarantees thus secured, because of the common sentiment of the day. Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the government built upon it fell when the 'storm came and the wind blew.'
Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth."
--- Alexander H. Stephens, VP of the Confederacy, in his Cornerstone Speech
June 29, 2021
This is a work in progress because, at first I thumbed through it, then read excerpts, then, after readings reviews of this book on Amazon, which were all over the place, decided that it'd only be fair AFTER I read it the "old-fashioned way", i.e, painstakingly, cover-to-cover.
Thus far, the book has but reinforced my view that the Confederacy had a legal and moral right to secede from the Union, just as their grandfathers and great-grandfathers, some, but not all, had fought for the Continentals and/or their respective state militias for independence from Great Britain. Still, as with so many military and political affairs, that's a thing that had to be backed up with more than rhetoric. And already I'd known that "Yankee" attitudes towards blacks were every as bigoted as their Southern cousins were typified as; including "Dishonest Abe" himself. I already knew about Lincoln's 1862 letter to Horace Greeley, where he emphasized that his priority was to "preserve the Union" (much, as the author polemically points out, an abusive husband overpowers his wife when she's had enough of him and declares he intent to leave him, and after further egregious abuse, she relents, have been whipped into submission...), and whatever he did about slavery ("free all, free none, or free some and leave others in bondage") would be with that end in mind. I also knew of Lincoln's own "racist" views (at least by today's standards), and how he pushed for a post-slavery scenario of deportation from the USA, to the Caribbean, South America, and/or Africa, never mind that the resulting deprivations that would have likely resulted would have made the Cherokee "Trail of Tears" a picnic by comparison! Thus far, it's obvious that slavery, being more widely practiced in the South than north of the Mason-Dixon line, had already divided the nation, culturally and economically.
What's been "new" in the course of reading the book thus far is how slavery was still very much active in the so-called "free"states, and that the North had just as much economic interest in the "Peculiar Institution" as did the South! Right now I've just gotten through the nullification crisis of 1832, and amazing, it was a POTUS from a SOUTHERN state, Andrew Jackson, "Old Hickory" himself and still then a slaveholder, who was more than willing to wage war on the recalcitrant South Carolina in 1832, but cool heads prevailed in that matter and the driving issues...TARIFFS, was resolved, not entirely to the satisfaction of all parties, but at least enough to stave off what would appear to be an inevitable conflict. It seems to come down to an issue of supremacy...as John C. Calhoun had argued that a state could nullify whatever Federal laws it didn't agree with, and said nullification could be legally overcome only by a 3/4 majority of the other states (how would that have come forth...in the Senate?), he was arguing, in effect, that the states had agreed to JOIN the USA with the extant Constitution, but they'd not SURRENDERED to it. This, IMO, was the REAL issue at stake in the improperly-named "Civil" War (there wasn't anything "civil" about how the Confederacy was treated, Suh...), i.e. did the several states ultimately retain their sovereignty and could nullify and/or disregard whatever Federal laws they didn't care for, or even LEAVE altogether, or had they, in fact, "surrendered" when they were originally admitted, and any talk of leaving was tantamount to treason? Such would have been the argument during the Revolutionary War of the "Loyalists", as in 1775 most Americans still considered themselves to be British, and saw King George III as their sovereign. As the fictional James Wilkins, who later joins the loyalist militia and the fictional Colonel Tavington's Green Dragoons (Jason Issac's character being based on Banastre "Bloody Ban" Tarleton), puts it when some, in the 1776 discussion of the South Carolina Assembly at Charleston, move for a levy to fund and join the Continental Army, that there was no "American" nation, and to talk of same was TREASON. At least the American colonies had been established by England (and later the UK), there had been no prior status as an independent political entity. During that period where the states were under the Articles of Confederation, as the book points out, when a treaty was contemplated with France, the French ambassador remarked, "One treaty..or THIRTEEN?"
Thus far, the book has but reinforced my view that the Confederacy had a legal and moral right to secede from the Union, just as their grandfathers and great-grandfathers, some, but not all, had fought for the Continentals and/or their respective state militias for independence from Great Britain. Still, as with so many military and political affairs, that's a thing that had to be backed up with more than rhetoric. And already I'd known that "Yankee" attitudes towards blacks were every as bigoted as their Southern cousins were typified as; including "Dishonest Abe" himself. I already knew about Lincoln's 1862 letter to Horace Greeley, where he emphasized that his priority was to "preserve the Union" (much, as the author polemically points out, an abusive husband overpowers his wife when she's had enough of him and declares he intent to leave him, and after further egregious abuse, she relents, have been whipped into submission...), and whatever he did about slavery ("free all, free none, or free some and leave others in bondage") would be with that end in mind. I also knew of Lincoln's own "racist" views (at least by today's standards), and how he pushed for a post-slavery scenario of deportation from the USA, to the Caribbean, South America, and/or Africa, never mind that the resulting deprivations that would have likely resulted would have made the Cherokee "Trail of Tears" a picnic by comparison! Thus far, it's obvious that slavery, being more widely practiced in the South than north of the Mason-Dixon line, had already divided the nation, culturally and economically.
What's been "new" in the course of reading the book thus far is how slavery was still very much active in the so-called "free"states, and that the North had just as much economic interest in the "Peculiar Institution" as did the South! Right now I've just gotten through the nullification crisis of 1832, and amazing, it was a POTUS from a SOUTHERN state, Andrew Jackson, "Old Hickory" himself and still then a slaveholder, who was more than willing to wage war on the recalcitrant South Carolina in 1832, but cool heads prevailed in that matter and the driving issues...TARIFFS, was resolved, not entirely to the satisfaction of all parties, but at least enough to stave off what would appear to be an inevitable conflict. It seems to come down to an issue of supremacy...as John C. Calhoun had argued that a state could nullify whatever Federal laws it didn't agree with, and said nullification could be legally overcome only by a 3/4 majority of the other states (how would that have come forth...in the Senate?), he was arguing, in effect, that the states had agreed to JOIN the USA with the extant Constitution, but they'd not SURRENDERED to it. This, IMO, was the REAL issue at stake in the improperly-named "Civil" War (there wasn't anything "civil" about how the Confederacy was treated, Suh...), i.e. did the several states ultimately retain their sovereignty and could nullify and/or disregard whatever Federal laws they didn't care for, or even LEAVE altogether, or had they, in fact, "surrendered" when they were originally admitted, and any talk of leaving was tantamount to treason? Such would have been the argument during the Revolutionary War of the "Loyalists", as in 1775 most Americans still considered themselves to be British, and saw King George III as their sovereign. As the fictional James Wilkins, who later joins the loyalist militia and the fictional Colonel Tavington's Green Dragoons (Jason Issac's character being based on Banastre "Bloody Ban" Tarleton), puts it when some, in the 1776 discussion of the South Carolina Assembly at Charleston, move for a levy to fund and join the Continental Army, that there was no "American" nation, and to talk of same was TREASON. At least the American colonies had been established by England (and later the UK), there had been no prior status as an independent political entity. During that period where the states were under the Articles of Confederation, as the book points out, when a treaty was contemplated with France, the French ambassador remarked, "One treaty..or THIRTEEN?"
July 16, 2025
This is bound to be a controversial book since it challenges the causes of our nation's greatest tragedy. The war was not a one trick pony. Firstly, it shows the many factors leading to secession. The author readily admits that slavery was evil (it's only been around for 10,000 years), but he gets into the macro issues, global trade, tariffs (the only source of federal revenue before income tax), the arguments over our form of government, the industrial revolution, global trade, sectionalism, etc. I think many of his points are well taken. However, at times his rhetoric is extreme which is a bit of a turnoff. For example, he sees Lincoln as an extremely talented, if crude man, who falls far short of being god-like. I have no way of checking all his historical facts, but a few are obvious, 85% of US exports in 1860 were cotton. The cotton, as well as the slave trade, were financed by NY financiers. If you doubt this, where did the money come from to develop the million acres (the Atlantic Coast to TX) after Whitney invented the cotton gin in 1793? Cotton was the gasoline of the Industrial Revolution. Now, much of history is horrific. This period in our history is one of many. However, the evils of chattel slavery pale in comparison to the 100 million killed in 20th century wars. The readers who dismiss this book as offensive, "Neo-confederate", untrue, "a waste of time", know little of macro-history and it's reasons for getting us here. Oh, by the way, after the war 80% of the South was old growth forest, the greatest deciduous forest on earth, plus long leaf pines and cypress. By 1920, 98% had been clear cut. Who was responsible for this environmental degradation? Easy answer, massive timber companies based in the North.
September 25, 2021
This is a great book for beginning to understand the Civil War. Don't expect this book to completely shelve slavery as having any role in the war's conception, because that is simply impossible, but the author is extremely effective in illustrating the depravity, greed, and hypocrisy of the Yankees and what really motivated them. Touching on tariffs, the John Brown trial, abolitionist propaganda, and the struggle over majority representation in Washington, Mitcham drives home the point that the Civil War was hardly a righteous crusade to free the slaves and instead the same tired tale of power hungry elites setting aside scruples in favor of ambition.
If I were just learning about the Civil War, this would be a great first book for setting the stage and getting a broad understanding. For deeper knowledge and specifics, other works would be better.
If I were just learning about the Civil War, this would be a great first book for setting the stage and getting a broad understanding. For deeper knowledge and specifics, other works would be better.
September 17, 2025
You could laugh at the reasoning in this book if it didn't actually convince the feebleheaded to exclaim "Yeah!" on reading it. This is just Grade A balderdash. The American South was a slave society. Do I think that that branding is a little simple? Maybe. But it remains that if an economy is dependent on the existence of slavery for its success then it is a slave society. Greece, Rome, Brazil (rubber), Caribbean (sugar) and the CSA (cotton mostly).
You have slaves all over the world. You do not have classified slave societies.
Anyhow, the argument here is weak and silly and poorly relayed. A popular work like Erik Foner's "Reconstruction" is easy to read and meticulous in its research.
You have slaves all over the world. You do not have classified slave societies.
Anyhow, the argument here is weak and silly and poorly relayed. A popular work like Erik Foner's "Reconstruction" is easy to read and meticulous in its research.
May 18, 2023
Mitcham puts up a compelling case for why the South had all the right in the world to secede, and how it could have been prevented by the North not being so confrontative. I just wish he could have done it without trying to make the blacks the biggest victim of the war. He could have just shown how the Southern attitude towards blacks was the norm in America. There was no reason to go all in on how oppressed they actually were in the North as well, because that doesn't really matter. The title of the book is "It Wasn't About Slavery" not "It Wasn't About Racism".
December 13, 2021
Mitcham presented a deeply researched and extremely well documented case for why slavery was not the issue that started Lincoln's War. Anyone willing to dig deeper or wanting to challenge his facts has his deeply footnoted bibliography as a starting point. I have read numerous books about the causes of War and there was still plenty to glean from Mitcham's text. Mitcham doesn't shy away from pulling back the historical lies of the winners.
February 2, 2025
I thought about giving this two stars but some of Mitcham's prose really does zip. The issue is that the book is really uneven. REALLY uneven. I think it needed heavier editing and there are times when the narrative is completely devoid of any transition. There really were places where the book was good, particularly the John Brown raid.
July 1, 2025
Very interesting. Saw a recommendation from Phil Robertson and decided to read. Kind of clunky and random until about halfway through. There were a lot of citations to most of the ideas and facts presented, and then there was some that I thought were missing, which I will have to research those myself. Otherwise, good book that highlights the main purpose of the war, which was power and money.
January 10, 2021
Interesting reading, though not sure if it’s all about exposing a great lie. People who are interested in the Civil War and read from different and reliable sources understand the historical context of the Antebellum period. Nevertheless, easy reading and certainly a nice insight on the subject.
March 24, 2021
A great thorough historical examination pricing the point that slavery was a side issue in the way between the states. Anyone who states the Civil War was only about slavery after reading this book has to do a severe amount of metal gymnastics and ignore many facts. Wonderfully eye opening
August 27, 2025
This book presented a much different history of the Civil War & the end of slavery than is typically taught in US History classes today. I thought parts of it were very interesting, but other parts I zoned out on. It's hard to know what to believe when history is written by the victorious.
December 1, 2025
Eye opener.
I was simply suprised to have all of my preconceived notions about the war turned upside down. Everything from the reasons for the to the slave culture and about "Honest Abe".. I highly recommend this book
I was simply suprised to have all of my preconceived notions about the war turned upside down. Everything from the reasons for the to the slave culture and about "Honest Abe".. I highly recommend this book
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