At a New Hampshire town hall, long-shot GOP Presidential wannabe Nikki Haley was asked what she believed caused the Civil War. She answered,
“I think the cause of the Civil War was basically how government was going to run. The freedoms and what people could and couldn’t do….I think it always comes down to the role of government and what the rights of the people are. And I will always stand by the fact that I think government was intended to secure the rights and freedoms of the people. It was never meant to be all things to all people. Government doesn’t need to tell you how to live your life. They don’t need to tell you what you can and can’t do. They don’t need to be a part of your life. They need to make sure that you have freedom. We need to have capitalism. We need to have economic freedom. We need to make sure that we do all things so that individuals have the liberties so that they can have freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom to do or be anything they want to be without government getting in the way.”
When the questioner said it was “astonishing” that she didn’t mention slavery, Haley replied: “What do you want me to say about slavery?” and called for the next question.
Nothing so far has demonstrated quite so vividly the dearth of competent, trustworthy alternatives to Donald Trump in the Republican Party, at least among those willing to oppose him. Haley has become the default favorite of the NeverTrumpers in the party. All she has to do is hang on to that support and be a viable candidate in the unlikely scenario that the Supreme Court rules that Trump is disqualified from office. How could she botch that softball question so completely? As I read it, her answer seems to take the South’s side in the Civil War. It’s a states’ rights analysis. One can make a persuasive historical, political and economic argument that slavery wasn’t the sole reason for the Civil War, but not mentioning it at all in a public forum defies belief.
Whatever scholarly debates on the subject may be, the fact is that most of the public believes that the war was caused by the South’s insistence that its states should have the right to persist in their “peculiar institution.” Surely Haley knows this. What was she thinking? Was she thinking? That she doubled down after the questioner called attention to her omission is particularly perplexing.
After the strange answer to the question caused an uproar in the news media and on social media, Haley tried to blame her gaffe on the questioner while giving a different answer. “Well, two things on this track. I mean, of course, the Civil War was about slavery. We know that, that’s the easy part of it,” she told The Pulse of NH News Talk Radio Network. “What I was saying was, what does it mean to us today? What it means to us today is about freedom. That’s what that was all about. It was about individual freedom. It was about economic freedom. It was about individual rights. Our goal is to make sure, no, we never go back to the stain of slavery.”
Then Haley said, “It was definitely a Democrat plant. That’s why I said, what does it mean to you? And if you notice, he didn’t answer anything. The same reason he didn’t tell the reporters what his name was.”
Lame and lamer. “What was the cause of the Civil War?” doesn’t mean “What does the Civil War mean to us today?” If the Civil War was “of course” about slavery, why wasn’t “Of course the Civil War was about slavery” the first thing out of her mouth? Did she think being forced to say that the Civil War was about slavery was some kind of a trap? Was Haley afraid of alienating the Confederates among her supporters? My goodness, Abraham Lincoln provided the perfect answer to the question in his Gettysburg Address: has Haley never read it?
The Civil War query was a hanging curve over the middle of the plate, and Haley fouled it into her own face.
And what does it matter whether the questioner was a “Democrat plant”? It wasn’t, or shouldn’t have been, a “gotcha!” question.
No wonder Chris Christie is hanging around the race.
Ethics Alarms 
A simple “..and isn’t slavery the ultimate lack of freedom?” would have settled it.
Well, at least it would have been a lot better than what she said.
This is part of the reason I loathe primaries- They’re riddled with questions meant to divide up the base and create divisions among the party without any real material impact on the reality of American Policy and give incumbents the benefit of having their opponents get smashed before the actual race. Argue against that, if you’d like: Can anyone justify asking a candidate what the cause of the Civil War was during a presidential primary in 2023? What elucidation were we looking for?
Reality is that there’s a portion of Republicans, it’s not so small as can be ignored safely, that is on a spectrum between being straight up racist and being so sick and tired of the American race discussion that a reference to slavery in even the most milquetoast of ways will turn them off. Haley’s answer, while twisted up into a pretzel and ultimately wrong, was probably an attempt to politick away from that.
But taking aside that her answer was bad, the better question is what policy in 2023 does a states rights v slavery debate clarify? How about: Who benefits from that question being asked? And here’s where we get to the meat of it… The only people who benefit from a question like that are people who want Republicans to lose, or people looking to capitalize on the poor race relations in America and the former and common part of the Venn Diagram there are Democrats, and the latter exclusive part of the Venn diagram are populist Republicans like Trump or Ramaswamy.
Exactly.
Dumb answer to an irrelevant question.
Yes, and that is why I think it was a Gotcha! Question.
The cause of the Civil War is not relevant to this election. It is almost a litmus test. You have to say slavery. But, you can’t JUST say slavery, you have to ONLY say slavery.
If you stray beyond that narrow area, they can accuse you of re-writing history.
They don’t want an explanation of the complexities in the society at the time.
And, explaining those complexities would only serve to demonstrate what an asinine question that is in a primary debate in 2023.
-Jut
She could have said one issue was democrats’ insistence on keeping black people ignorant, impoverished, dependent, and under their control.
If she had half the wit some of our presidents have had, she could have done it. Unfortunately, she can’t even provide a fun sound bite.
I would have wanted her to point out the absurdity of asking such a stupid question of a candidate by quipping, “Oh, wow! I love historical trivia! I am so glad you asked that. They told me that everyone here hated me and would ask tough combative questions!”
And then answer the question correctly, following it up with asking him who the Vice-President was under James Monroe.
South Carolina the first state to secede from the union did so on December 20, 1860. The rationale for secession was the fear that the institution of slavery was being threatened by the federal government. There was no blood spilled until the decision to preserve the union was made a year later.
According to Historytoday.com, “The American Civil War was fought to preserve the Union. There had long been tensions between the rights of the states under the constitution and those of the federal government, so much so that South Carolina and the administration in Washington almost came to blows over the issue of tariffs in the 1830s. It was slavery, however, that brought matters to breaking point.”
The Civil war began in April of 1861 when Abraham Lincoln ordered that Fort Sumter, under the command of U.S. Major Robert Anderson who occupied the still under construction fort during the approximate 15 month standoff between Union forces and the South Carolina militia, be resupplied with fresh troops and “humanitarian aid”. Naturally this was seen as an encroachment by U.S. troops on sovereign ground by the South Carolina Governor. Nonetheless, Lincoln sent the ship called the Star of the West with 200 troops and supplies to resupply the fort. When it arrived in Charleston harbor it was driven back to sea by the militia.
Militia commander P.G.T. Beauregard demanded that Major Anderson surrender the fort, but Anderson refused. Beauregard began firing on Fort Sumter in the early morning of April 12, 1861.
While the north claims that the Civil war was fought over slavery, Lincoln’s decisions had little to do with the slavery issue. This is evident when the Emancipation Proclamation did not affect the indenture of slaves in non-secessionist states. Had the war been fought to end slavery, all slaves in both the confederate states and the northern states would have been freed. The reason they were not was to prevent Maryland from seceding which would put the District squarely in Confederate territory.
We teach our children that the sole reason for the Civil war was to end slavery. That is pure BS. The slavery issue was a significant issue that led to a schism between the industrialized northern states who had the luxury of massive numbers of cheap labor immigrants to fuel the economic engine of the industrialized northern states but not the only issue. One might wonder if the war would have been fought had the North not had a steady influx of immigrant labor fleeing starvation in Europe. The Irish made good canon fodder.
You have to ask the question if slavery was the reason over 700,000 Americans died why did it take over 15 months after secession did Lincoln make the decision to reclaim South Carolina?
We should consider this possibility. What will some states do if the EPA mandates that fossil fuels are no longer permitted or if they are allowed they incur a huge punitive tax. If the federal government decides at some point that large parts of America are not “thinkin’ straight” (Cool Hand Luke reference) and that they need to impose punishments or restrictions because of that “bad thinkin” what could we expect to occur. The cause of the Civil war was that a large part of America believed (rightly so) that the federal government was about to eliminate their ability to earn profits and incomes.
If we only learn that the Civil war was to end slavery we will miss the important lessons of what happens when economic livelihoods are threatened by federal legislation that affects only certain states because different states with different comparative economic advantages do not consider the losses other citizens will incur because the legislation has no impact on them. Today we see college kids demanding someone else pay the tab for the debts they voluntarily made; we have millions of people demanding that ever increasing subsidies to be paid by others, and we keep demanding others pay their fair share.
Niky Haley made a blunder answering that question because the American people have been told since 1865 that the civil war was fought to end slavery. She needs to be aware that most Americans can only swim in the shallow end of the pool of knowledge when it comes to History.
Exactly. It’s called “reading the room.” Successful candidates have to know how to do that. It was not time to give a nuanced discourse on the myriad factors that led to the war. But only mentioning slavery is one thing—not mentioning it at all is absurd.
I suppose what she should have asked was from whose perspective was the war fought; Lincoln’s or the confederates. That would have confounded them.
I still believe that we should be teaching the nuanced version of the origins of the war so we can learn the lessons from the past. There is little value learning that x was bad and A defeated B to eliminate the bad. That is why we have so many buying into the latest scientific fad that purports to be the way to salvation.
Chris,
You almost had it there. In the 1830’s, South Carolina almost pushed the issue over tariffs.
They seceded in 1860 because they thought slavery would be threatened and slavery had been part of the Constitutional bargain amongst the states.
South Carolina demanded that the feds leave state land. That included Fort Sumter. Lincoln refused. Why? My understanding is that Lincoln still intended to collect tariffs on goods coming into Charleston. He could give up the South, but not the tariffs.
As I believe Thomas Sowell observed, a large percentage of federal revenues (80+%?) came from tariffs on goods coming into the South. He could not give up that revenue.
So, if the South fought the Civil War for slavery, the North fought it for taxes (or money).
-Jut
I’m gratified that Haley is getting exactly the criticism she deserves for her terrible answer, and for her excuses afterwards. And several articles have pointed out that while some of the states seceded for economic reason, there was never any question that slavery was the #1 issue for South Carolina, and Haley was governor of that state.
And survival! Lincoln realized that a North without the South would be an infinitely weaker and more unstable nation.
Very thoughtful response, but I have to correct your timeline.
South Carolina seceded in December, 1860, about a month after the election. Fort Sumter was fired upon in April, 1861 — this was about a month after Lincoln was inaugurated and about 4 months after South Carolina seceded.
I don’t know exactly how long the South Carolina militia were demanding the surrender of Fort Sumter, but it wasn’t 15 months — at most 4 months. Lincoln took action on Fort Sumter almost immediately after he took office, March 4, 1861.
The first major battle of the war was First Bull Run in July, 1861 — roughly 8 months after SC seceded but only about 3 months after Fort Sumter, which was followed by Virginia and the rest of the states in the CSA seceding.
Lincoln always said that the war was about preserving the Union. That doesn’t mean slavery wasn’t the major cause, just that the North’s main war aim was to restore the Union. Emancipation was more of a tool to solidify support for the war and perhaps a recognition that the war had become a revolutionary movement.
I wish Haley had given a better answer to this question. Perhaps something like “The South seceded to preserve their institutions, primarily including slavery. The North fought to restore the Union.” Something like that would be about as nuanced as one might expect in a political campaign.
Now if this were 1860, and the question were asked, one might reasonably expect a half hour speech.
Diego You are absolutely correct my error. Notwithstanding the error it was because of Lincoln’s election that the committee to secede met on December 17 with great fanfare. The flyers about secession speak directly to the institution of slavery. However, had Lincoln not moved to reinforce Sumpter the war may have been delayed or avoided. We cannot determine what if’s. What we do know is that Lincoln used military forces to preserve the Union when it sent the Star of the West with 200 troops and supplies into Charleston. Until that time, the secession was peaceful.
You said;
“Lincoln always said that the war was about preserving the Union. That doesn’t mean slavery wasn’t the major cause, just that the North’s main war aim was to restore the Union.”
Before I go on DO NOT INTERPRET ANY STATEMENT AS A JUSTIFICATION FOR SLAVERY.
Slavery was one of many precipitating issues for secession not the war and it was the last significant straw that broke the camel’s back. Had the slave states not seceded would there have been a civil war? I would say no. So was the war caused by slavery or secession? That was the question posed. The secession decision was a culmination of multiple political disagreements and Lincoln’s stated position against slavery pushed the South Carolina legislature to decide to secede out of fear of some federal mandate that would threaten their economic prosperity. I would also submit, had they not seceded it would have been far harder to pass the thirteenth amendment abolishing slavery. Thus, the slavery issue caused secession and the secession caused the war. I submit slavery would have died out on its own by 1900 due to technological progress.
You could compare the abolitionist movement in the North to what we are currently seeing with climate change proponents and DEI proponents. There is no moral equivalency between then and now despite all the talk from activists today. The abolitionists were not just signaling virtue like what we see today yet we should realize that should some government or Supreme court body decide that what was once a right is no longer a right their will be significant social consequences and even the potential of another civil war. The Dobbs decision did not even take away a right and the abortion advocates are screaming.
We should take heed of the lessons from the past. I wonder if the abolitionists of the day would applaud the removal of the reconciliation monument from Arlington. I certainly hope not.
I know the difference between “their” and “there”. I am finding that even when I type “there” it is changed to “their.” Unfortunately I do not always catch the change.
The grammarian that programmed this AI must be the same one that uses “less” when “fewer” is appropriate or “lay” when “lie” is the correct word
How does it handle “insure/assure/ensure”?
One last comment on this issue. From what I’ve read in the past few years, the ‘fire brands’ in the Deep South states were determined to have a showdown over slavery and secession. What they chose to do in furtherance of this goal was to sabotage the Democratic convention in Charleston early in 1860. They walked out (seceded from?) the convention, thus preventing it from nominating Douglas.
Ultimately this split the Democrats, with them essentially fielding a Northern and Southern candidate in different states. The election was a 3-4 man election in the various states (almost no one had the courage to print ballots for Lincoln in the South).
What if these men had not split the Democratic party and Douglas was their only candidate? Would there have been a Constitutional Union party with John Bell?
I believe that, even if it had been a two man race, Lincoln would have won — and fairly decisively in the Electoral College. If you look at the state by state vote, he won actual majorities in states totaling 169 electoral votes (152 needed to win).
I’d say it would be fairly obvious that the fire brands were not happy with the ultimate results of their actions — but I would also assume that they calculated if they did not act, slavery would be doomed anyway.
Excellent color commentary, DG, it’s going into my archives; thanks!
PWS
I can’t imagine any honest motive for asking such a simplistic question about the American Civil War at a New Hampshire town hall forum. It is sad that Haley didn’t see the question for what it was, and then she even flubbed the opportunity to spout a politically acceptable answer.
Jack is correct in saying that there is “…a persuasive historical, political and economic argument that slavery wasn’t the sole reason for the Civil War…” but most people today aren’t even willing to listen to such an argument, much less make it. Too many activist historians have already muddied those waters beyond recovery. Natural ignorance and anti-southern bias take care the rest. Better to keep dredging up old grievances, perpetuate victimhood and facilitate revenge reparations.
Of course, this matter comes on the heels of the government’s removal of the Reconciliation Monument at Arlington, further validating the woke and communist agenda to erase history, divide America and destroy citizens’ appreciation of and connection to a vital part of their redemptive history. Certainly, it puts an exclamation point on the years-long demonstration that the Democrats and the federal government are declaring an end to reconciliation. Sometimes, you get exactly that for which you ask.
Haley’s answer is better than the theory I once heard that involved Lincoln forcing the South to start the Civil War so he could permanently expand the federal powers, install himself as a dictator, and wipe out as many pesky southerners as possible.
Like many bizarre theories, that one contains some truth. Lincoln and the Radical Republicans did have ambitions of drastically expanding federal power. The pesky states-rights Southerners stood in the way of those ambitions.
I view Lincoln as an unlikely dictator, but he intended to have his way in the conflict. Both sides abandoned the key to settling political disputes: compromise. Both sides vastly underestimated the length and severity of the war. I will always regard the Civil War as our great national tragedy. It need not have happened.
I’d put it a bit differently. Lincoln had (correctly) concluded that the nation couldn’t and wouldn’t survive in the loose individual state sovereignty system that was in place, and alluded to that problem in various ways during the debates with Douglas. Again, the Gettysburg Address articulates his vision. Compromise was not going to work with slavery: Henry Clay’s Missouri Compromise and the Compromise of 1850 made things worse, not better. Like all of the great Presidents, Lincoln knew when to stretch the Constitution into new wildernesses for the good of the nation: Constitutionally, he was on weak ground opposing secession. In practical terms, he was right, and acted, under his power as President, to preserve the nation.
I see no possible way the war could have been averted. The only alternative would have been a war at a different time, with a less able and courageous President. If the South had seceded under Pierce or Buchanan, the Confederacy would have been established by 1860.
Nikole Hannah-Jones is now declaring on X that the Civil War wasn’t fought over slavery and that this is ‘basic history.” What sophistry. The North was fighting to preserve the Union, and everyone knew that would mean the eventual elimination of slavery—which is why the Confederacy seceded. This woman is a tenured professor and engages in this kind of double-talk. The first thing the US did when the Civil War was ending was to ban slavery.
I believe there alternatives. We were the only western nation to fight a war (ultimately) to end slavery. Northern states had ended slavery, but very few of their slaves were emancipated, they were just taken to slave states and sold. Thus their economic loss was compensated, an opportunity never afforded the southern states in 1860.
My own slave-owning ancestors were pro-Union; they thought their best chance for keeping their property was to remain in the Union. My state voted against secession, then voted for it after Lincoln began to strong arm them to raise troops to invade their neighboring states. For them, waging war on Northern invaders was preferable to waging war on their neighbors and families.
If that war was truly inevitable, then I fear a second round is just around the corner.
Sounds like an Axis theory that Trump got a hold of a time machine,went back to the 19th Century, grew a beard and executed a plot…Trump started the Civil War!
Don’t blame Nikki Haley for how she, a daughter of immigrants, was taught by the schools of the south who believe the civil war was “Northern Aggression” Rather, we need to confront how we have allowed these lies to fester as a result of the nazi rat lines of the cold war which masquerade as “libertarian”.