The Civil War that wasn't

It is exciting at 30 years old to have the opportunity to learn new things about subjects we were "taught" in grade school. Up north, we thought that we were being taught the right things about subjects like the "Civil" War. We were not.

We were taught that those evil Southerners wanted to have slaves, and they were all slave owners, and they would fight to the death to keep their slaves. Then we were taught that Abe Lincoln was such a wonderful guy that he was able to "convince" the Southerners that Blacks are people too, and they deserved to be free. Right? Uh...no.

When this country was formed, it was formed as a republic, where each state was governed by its people. That's what made us great. If you didn't like how your state was doing things, you could take it up with the state. The federal government had very little role in lawmaking, save for the Constitution, which is all the federal government needs as far as law goes.

Then the Feds decided to start making more "federal laws" by which each state had no choice but to abide. Certain states realized that this presented a grand departure from what the framers had intended. They saw their hard-earned money going to D.C. by way of federal taxes, and not returning. They saw their state power going to D.C. without any benefit.

So they decided to secede. They united as a Confederacy and formed their own government, run by their states, using the principles that they held dear.

The Federal Government did not like that one bit! Those southern states had stopped paying taxes to Washington since they had formed their own government.

Deciding that they could not survive without the South's tax money, the Feds decided to go punish the South. Abe Lincoln waged a war with the newly independent Confederacy (for nothing more than money and power), and eventually won. In the process of "uniting" our country, Lincoln turned families against each other, made brothers kill each other, and eventually killed 600,000 Americans.

Don't be fooled by your textbook. The War between the States was not about slavery. It was about power. The Feds wanted more power and so they took it.

And another thing. The term "Civil War" applies only when two opposing forces are in competition for control of the SAME government. This was not the case with our War of Secession. It is not literally accurate to call it a Civil War.