Henry Lewis Benning Quotes


It is apparent, horribly apparent, that the slavery question rides insolently over every other everywhere -- in fact that is the only question which in the least affects the results of the elections


Citations

Henry Lewis Benning, *-1875, Georgia Politician and Confederate General, Letter to Howell Cobb, 1849

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This moral statement from a New jersey Quaker abolitionist is not particularly noteworthy, However what makes this quote important is that Woolman traveled throughout the South preaching this as his main theme. At that time — before the American Revolution — he did so and was not attacked or intimidated; he was mostly ignored by the Southern authorities. At the time, the South was very confident of its ability to continue slavery. Years later, when the abolition movement grew larger and stronger, a Northern Quaker Preacher doing this not not escape with his life.


While England was strongly opposed to slavery, the English textile industry benefited from importing American Southern cotton. So many in England were supportive of the Confederacy.


The issue of slavery which had been suppressed in Congress for the first decades of the nation broke out when Missouri statehood was considered. By previous agreement, slavery was not even discussed in Congress but the time period elapsed. Tallmadge not only proposed that no more slaves could come into Missouri {613176} but most shocking to the Southerners was that every person born in the new state would be free at the age of 25. In a generation, there would be no more slavery in Missouri and there would be no economic compensation for slave owners at all. The House of Representatives accepted the amendment, but it failed in the Senate. At that time, Senators were not elected by voters but were appointed by the state legislators and the Southern slave states had a disproportionate share of the senate from a population point of view. But what this quotation shows clearly that a majority of the country in 1819 were opposed to slavery and were willing to end it without compensation.


This quotation, one of William Lloyd Garrison’s favorite quotations illustrating the intellectual degeneration brought about by slavery. In historical perspective, Lumpkin, later, was one of the three justices of the Georgia Supreme Court, and with this kind of intellectual and legal corruption the Courts of the South were major forces protecting the institution of slavery.


When the first Southern States seceded, each appointed a whose job it was to persuade the other Southern States to also secede. In this case Hale was marketing secession to Kentucky which with Maryland were the only two Southern States to reject what they regarded as treason and rebellion. The importance of the quotation however is in his argument which was all based on enmity to racial equality and abolition. Later Southern apologists would argue that the Civil War was fought, not about slavery and racism butt about different philosophies of government. See {623715} .


Buchanan us considered by most historians to have been the worst or one of the worst Presidents of the United States. At this point, he was a lame duck president with Abraham Lincoln, the President Elect soon to take office. This speech, just encouraged the South more than ever and helped to bring about the Civil War. His vacillation and lack of any leadership on the slavery question exacerbated the polarization that was tearing the nation apart.


The reason for secession was the threat to slavery, which was a great threat to the slave-owners of the South. However, the non slave-owners had a very strong vested interest in maintaining slavery in that most Southerners had been brought up with such a negative view of Blacks that they were paranoid of Black equality or even worse some Blacks in positions of authority over whites. At the time, it was the Republican Party that was the advocate for minority equality and the Democratic Party embraced the racists. The parties would flip flop after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 ending legal segregation was passed by a Democratic President and a Democratic Majority Congress.


The Confederates were very clear that slavery was the cause of the war. Revisionists later tried to add other motives to the Southern cause, but Grant and all the contemporaries on both sides knew slavery was the crux of the matter. So the Confederate cause was the right to brutalize, torture, and even kill an unwilling labor force that was unpaid. No war in history had ever been fought for such a lowly cause and the Confederate leadership skills were amazing in keeping up morale without a decent cause to fight for.


In the original Constitution the apportionment of members of the House of Representatives was based on the white population plus After his Presidency, Adams served in the House of Representatives for many years and was thus active in politics.


Henry Lewis Benning
Henry Lewis Benning
  • Born: April 2, 1814
  • Died: July 10, 1875
  • Nationality:
  • Profession:

Henry Lewis Benning was a general in the Confederate States Army. He also was a lawyer, legislator, and judge on the Georgia Supreme Court. He commanded "Benning's Brigade" during the American Civil War. Following the Confederacy's defeat at the end of the war, he returned to his native Georgia, where he lived out the rest of his life. Fort Benning is named after him.