• carl_dungeon@lemmy.world
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    8 months ago

    You can always follow up when someone says “states rights” with “to do what?”… because the answer was “have slaves”.

    • Waluigis_Talking_Buttplug@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      Another interesting note I bring into the states rights argument is that the south wanted to force the north to send back escaped people and were actually sending people into the north to kidnap black people, many of whom were never born slaves.

      So yeah the north wanted the right to gives rights to the people in it, and the south thought that didn’t apply to black people.

      • TranscendentalEmpire@lemm.ee
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        8 months ago

        So yeah the north wanted the right to gives rights to the people in it, and the south thought that didn’t apply to black people.

        I think that gives a bit too much credit to the vast majority of Union citizens. Yes there were some groups of Quakers who actually believed in freeing slaves and protecting their rights, but that was a minority opinion .

        The majority of people in the union disagreed with slavery for economic and political reasons that were unattached to the morality of slavery. Even progressive politicians like Abe Lincoln who wanted to free slaves, also wanted them to be shipped to the Dominican Republic or Africa afterwards.

      • Veraxus@kbin.social
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        8 months ago

        That’s an easy one.

        It means “disassemble all checks and balances, strip the people of all power and authority, and concentrate the power and authority into the hands of a chosen party-aligned dictator or oligarchy.”

        Small government doesn’t get any smaller than a totalitarian dictatorship.