THE BIG MESSY THREAD--Discussion of the Civil War and its relations to FIREFLY
POSTED BY: SouthernMerc
UPDATED: Sunday, October 26, 2003 20:41
VIEWED: 10919
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Greetings, all! This is a discussion that has been begging to be started for a bit now. Someone else may have come up with one, but it's not current enough for me to spot it in the list of threads.
Simply put, this thread will touch on the Civil War and Reconstruction Era, complete with icky feelings and subjects, and their relationship with Firefly.
First, a word on civility.
This is BOUND to be a touchy subject. Even 140 years after the Civil War/War Between the States/War of Northern Aggression, ppl STILL get hot discussing the issue's surrounding this point in history. While I can't actually police this thread to root out the trolls, be courteous to one another. No name calling, flaming or anything like that. I doubt I need to remind anyone, but it's best not to take chances.
Now a couple of simple rules.
Please limit posts to ACTUAL history, ie. verifiable by the history book. Speculation as to motives is fine (in fact, it's expected), but please leave out speculation as to actions taken. This may be difficult, as some things just aren't clear after a century in between then and now, but please try to limit it to a bare minimum. If you can quote a book and have it handy in front of you, state the title, please. I'd like to read it, and I'm sure others would be interested as well.
Second, remember this is how it relates to Firefly. While your post may not include it specifically, please mention how this could affect the FF 'verse. Not every post needs to be worded so, but it's neat to hear a new point of view on our favorite show.
Now that that's done, let's start the show.
I have three basic questions to get things going.
First: How much of an issue was slavery? Was it important, or merely an excuse? (ducks)
Second: How justified was Lincoln ordering Federal troops into Maryland? Did it set a dangerous precedent? (test your knowledge)
Third: How was the South treated after the war? Were the measures taken fair or excessive? (dig out your legal notes) BTW, this one has alot of relevance to FF.
Ok, that's good to get the juices flowing. Opinions are fine, just not insults. (You can tell I'm worried about children in the audience.)
Get crackin'!
Jayne: "How big a room?"
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I'm so much like a moth is to a flame, it's not even funny.
How important slavery was to the Civil War depended on where you stood. The French and British made it abundantly clear that they would not help a country that supported slavery. When the Emancipation Proclamation took effect January 1, 1863, it effectively ended the South's dreams of foreign intervention. Gen. Lee hoped that by winning a victory on Northern soil, France and England would (at least) petition the Union to cease hostilities, but England and France had completely left the South in the lurch after the Emancipation Proclamation was made public. The Battle of Gettysburg (July 1-3, 1863) would not have resulted in a southern independence, even if Gen Lee did win the battle.
The South seceded for a great number of reasons, but they will never tell you that slavery was one of them. Actually, the Confederate constitution was a carbon copy of the Union constitution. The only difference is one or two sentences that guarantee the right to own slaves. That's not to say that EVERYONE in the South was fighting for slavery. Only 1/4 of the population owned slaves and 1/5 of that number owned more than two (McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom(?)). But it does show that the top 5% of the population, the law makers and the newspaper publishers, owned slaves, and it is usually poor people who fight a rich man's war.
The North was complete torn over slavery. Abolitionist newspaper headquarters were burnt to the ground and people were rioting over the Emancipation Proclamation. It wasn't as clear cut as Aboltion against Slavery. Lincoln was elected not on the abolition ticket, he was only elected to keep slavery out of the territories. North and South, there were Civil Wars raging inside Civil Wars.
There is nothing to suggest that the Civil War in Firefly was slavery driven or not. There is slavery in the 'verse. But we can't even be sure that it is condoned by the Alliance or Independence or neither. Does anyone have anymore info on Firefly's slavery?
There is so much more that I could say on the subject, but this is a post, not a thesis, and I am at work! 
C'mon, Veteren! Where are you? 
Viva Firefly!
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The question whether the Civil War (for purposes of simplicity, I will use that term, although a strong case can be made that it is an inaccurate one) was “fought over slavery” is often a very misleading one. It leads one into a fallacious “either-or” scenario; either the War was fought over slavery, or it was not. While slavery was, of course, an issue, it has become the over-riding one in the grammar- and high-school educations most Americans have received. The total causes of the Civil War are much too numerous and involved to really go into here in much depth.
As JohnnyReb mentioned, the vast majority of those who actually did the fighting were not fighting over slavery, while some -- not all -- of the politicians were more concerned over it. As sad and reprehensible as it may be -- and I’m actually about to bring this around to Firefly here -- the majority of the white population at the time simply did not care one way or the other about the slaves. Now, before I get flamed here, yes, there were many who did care very passionately, one way or the other, but most people had their own problems to deal with. This seems to be the way the Alliance looks at “indenturing,” they just don’t care.
I will restrain my natural, Unreconstructed ire regarding Reconstruction, but it bears mentioning. Yes, the Southern states were treated abysmally during that period. Many of the measures were unfair, excessive, and plain illegal -- such as the proscription against any Confederate soldier who was even accused of being a guerilla fighter was proscribed from even owning property. Many of the other excesses were not done by the government per se, but were at least tacitly approved of. The “State Police Force” in Texas during Reconstruction springs to mind. There is some evidence to show that, had Lincoln not been assassinated, Reconstruction would have taken a different form, but I’m not wholly convinced. It does not seem that the Alliance treats the former Independents quite this badly, but I’m not sure. Mal clearly has forged paperwork regarding Serenity, although it is unclear whether he is unable -- for whatever reason -- to legally own the ship, or if it is just to make his not-quite-legal shipping easier.
Just a few thoughts off the top of my head, likely someone or other here can point out any errors I might have made -- I think much faster than I type -- or, at the very least, have some other views. Always willing to discuss the Civil War when it can be done in a civil manner... ;’)
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Southernmerc, OutlawTexan, JohnnyReb? he he he When are we going to hear from Lincoln347?
Viva Firefly!
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As an Iowa boy, I'd just like to throw out the observation of a 'Northerner'. In school, slavery was what was mostly focused on during discussions of the Civil War, though I do recall something about economics also playing a major part. I'd love to hear about some of the other causes of the war (whatever you want to call it) as I think they might better pertain to FireFly than slavery, which is all we ever really hear about in High School up here.
All about the history!
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Quote:
Originally posted by JOHNNYREB:
There is nothing to suggest that the Civil War in Firefly was slavery driven or not. There is slavery in the 'verse. But we can't even be sure that it is condoned by the Alliance or Independence or neither. Does anyone have anymore info on Firefly's slavery?
The only mention of slaves I can recall is in the beginning of Shindig ( http://firefly.shriftweb.org/scripts/106.shtml):
MAL
Still, might ought to clear out before too much
longer. Seems there's a thief about.
INARA
A thief?
MAL
Took this right off him.
(Mal hands Inara a wad of cash.)
Now they earned that with the sweat of their
slave-trading brows.
As to the question of the historical causes of the war and what we learn in school, all I remember is that in my high school (in CA) my teacher said that he would bite the head off of any student that said the Civil War was fought over slavery, but saying it was fought over the expansion of slavery into the territories was OK (an oversimplification but much closer to the truth -- there was a power struggle between the industrializing north and the agricultural south, and the latter needed to ensure they wouldn't get outvoted in congress and have their labor supply taken away from them, so they needed to at least maintain parity with the north, and wanted some of the new territories that were to become states to allow/protect the slave practice.)
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I hail from the North, too (Massachusetts). My high school teacher told us that the Civil War was fought for states rights, but never expanded on what "states rights" meant. (He purposefully ignored my questions about the Civil War, I think. The Civil War was my undisputed forte.)
When we say the South was agricultural and the North was industrial, we kinda shrug and think that goes without saying. Consider though, that New York had more miles of railroad than the entire Confederacy put together; that one street in Lowell, Massachusetts had more wool and cotton spinners than the entire Confederacy; that Cotton was THE export of the South with negligible exceptions, and it starts to all come into focus. Their economies were as different as two economies could be. Here's were states' rights comes into it...
Whenever anything came to congress for legislation, neither the North nor the South could agree that law was fair. If the North wanted tariffs on foreign manufactured goods to boost its economy, the South thought it was unfair because that would mean they were chained to a northern controlled monopoly. If the South wanted laws passed to make export of cotton easier for English factories, the North cried unfair because they would have to compete with Europe's prices. If the South wanted to expand slavery into the territories, the North cried unfair because that meant that there could possibly more Southern senators in congress calling the shots. If the North tried to keep the South from bringing slaves into the territories, the South shouted unfair because, many times before, the South was promised popular sovereignty, territories below Misourri, etc. and each time the North renegged on the compromise THEY offered. States rights meant that each state had the right to tend to each state's business without congressional interference. Later it came to mean each state's right to secede from the Union. If they volunteered to be part of the Union, why couldn't they un-volunteer? That is what was meany by states' rights.
Unrelated, there is a scene in "Serenity" where Badger checks a woman's teeth like she was a horse before he motions her away and tells Mal he won't pay him. If Badger is dealing slaves, it may or may not be legal in the 'verse.
Viva Firefly!
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First a comment to a seemingly forgotten bit of history that has some impact and importance.
Eli Whitney.
The cotton gin made slavery economically less viable, therefore adding to the pressure to end the practice.
But ironically, the more important invention of Whitney was standardised armament, which gave a significant logistics edge to the Union.
Two facts that for political reasons, don't seem to be in the history books any more - and might be useful in further discussion.
Oh, yeah, and there was also the Agro vs Industry/Economy factors that lead up to war - can't forget that.
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Now this is a bit of crackpot pyschology, and by no means a professional analysis, but understanding the mindset at work here seems to be critical in discussing this, so forgive me this bit, ok ?
And if you can do better than this Taxi-pusher ?
PLEASE do... I am a cabbie, not a shrink.
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As a farmer/rancher from Shadow, Mal was in the same situation many folk in the south felt they were, war came to him unwanted, unbidden, and he quickly went from fighting for something he kinda believed in, to fighting for his very survival.
His beliefs against the Alliance aren't rooted in faith in his own side of things, so much as a bitter grudge against being caught in such a position and then mistreated by one if not both sides.
In a war, only a small percentage of folks really want violence, the greater part of them just want the shooting to stop so they can go home and harvest before the crops go bad, but over time, in that situation, a person comes to "blame" the other side for their troubles, and while they maybe have a point, that's usually when things get pretty ugly, because a man with nothing to lose and a heavy grudge is a pretty dangerous fellow.
-frem
diefuxdie
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Quote:
Eli Whitney.
The cotton gin made slavery economically less viable, therefore adding to the pressure to end the practice.
Actually, the cotton gin made the slave economy more viable. Until the cotton gin was available, removing seeds from the cotton was the most labor intensive part of producing cotton. Here's an excerpt from a from a civil war website http://www.swcivilwar.com/index.htm
Quote:
The invention of the cotton gin made the cultivation of cotton on large plantations using slave labor a profitable enterprise in the deep South. The slave became an ever more important element of the southern economy, and so the debate about slavery, for the southerner, gradually evolved into an economically based question of money and power, and ceased to be a theoretical or ideological issue at all.
I beleive that the differentiation of northern and southern based on the industrialization of the north is exaggerated. I've seen Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps of Brooklyn, New York that show most of Second Avenue occuppied by a Dairy Farm as late as 1895. That's thirty years after the Civil War ended.
The North did not need the south as a breadbasket, it had plenty of farms. The difference was that northern farms primarily produced food, southern plantations produced cotton, food, and sugar. Sugar and Cotton were cash crops. The North did not have a cash crop, it depended on industry for cash. The problem with industry is that in needs markets. The North needed the South as a Market for finished goods. The South needed finished goods, but Europe produced them more cheaply than the North.
Here's the rub, the Southern economy was propped up by (subsidized by the free labor of)slavery. The North had no such advantage (not to say that factory workers were well paid), so Northern political representatives resorted to Tariffs to level the playing field between Norhtern and European factories.
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Good posts all. No hateful comments, no snide remarks. I'd say that worry was unfounded (course now we will get about a hundred flame posts, gotta learn to stop jinxing my own thread).
My take on the slavery bit, since I am quite sure someone is wondering. Slavery as an issue wasn't thought of as ideology, but economy. Some people did have very strong ideological views on the subject, but they were not in the majority. I simply have a hard time believing the all white government suddenly started caring about slavery. Money, on the other hand, they would care about. It wasn't until much later in the war that it was used politically to remove support from the South. Of course, this doesn't change the fact that emancipation was the best thing to come out of those dark times. Quick side question, was the proclamation legal (was it passed through congress)?
On the subject of slavery in the 'verse: Badger does inspect that one girl's teeth, and a reference is made to "indenturing". Indenturing sounds somewhat legal to me though, as though there is an official procedure or stance on it. Can someone with the episodes take a look and post a comment on that? As for Badger's inspection, slavery is still going on today. It is quite illegal, but there is still slave trade happening around the world, even in the USA (How's that for a fun thought?). So Badger could be into the illegal form of slavery, or he could just be checking out a new girl for prostitution (lookee, another fun thought).
First day of thread down, and it's looking good. I'm learning some interesting things here while talking about my favorite show. Let's keep those posts coming!
Jayne: "How big a room?"
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