The northern states were just as prejudiced as the south

Not KKK, but rather reconstituted KKK. The original KKK (associated with Bedford Forrest, who deconstituted it after it became racist) was racially integrated and was founded to protect Southern women of all colors from rape. Bedford Forrest has become widely vilified as racist, yet he was an early advocate of civil rights, especially voting and employment rights. Many Northern propagandists want to deny the historical facts.

 

Many see Klu Klux Klan and see that Nathan Bedford Forrest was the first Grand Dragon and they immediately think about the Klan of the 1960s that oppressed blacks and denied them their rights. Wikipedia has his last public speech and that doesn't fit in with what popular opinion believes, yet the facts are the facts.

 

Um, no one is disputing the grotesque racism in the North. This is well documented throughout American history. Racism is all across the globe and as it relates to the Civil War, I think people focus on the fact that slavery was a legal institution in southern states. It was a thriving industry, one that help gave riches to this part of American society and the country as a whole.

 

Gen. Forrest has no relation to the organizations that have used names similar to the original Klan. When it was shut down, it was deconstituted so that it could not be re-activated. Thus the group called the Reconstituted Klan. Bedford Forrest had nothing to do with it and was an outspoken proponent of full employment of former slaves and voting rights. He ordered the "colored" troops to not tolerate unequal treatment, and he ordered all troops that there was to be no discrimination. He advocated for allowing slaves and other "colored" Southerners to enlist in the Confederate Army. They already served in the militia or National Guard troops, as they had in the Revolutionary war.

 

This is totally true. The horrid Klan as we know it didn't get active until Forrest had been dead for... more than 30 years, I do believe.

That aside, however, we can't really praise him for being a misunderstood sweetheart of a guy when a number of his quotes stated things like (and I do quote) "I am not an enemy of the negro, we want him here among us; he is the only laboring class we have." Unquote.

Do you think that some of what appears to have been his *helping* of African Americans could have been because of statements like that, and he wanted his "workers" to remain the "laboring class" without uprising?

 

I ain't saying Nate Forrest was an angel, far from it. It is that there is stereotypical, revisionist attitudes that blur the ability to accurately view the past. Sometimes those that desire to lead folks in a contrary direction will play upon these misrepresentations, voila, we are fooled again into heading into unnecessary armed conflict.

 

I know you didn't say that. My comments were in response to the post I quoted by Thomas Pendrake. Oh, and the revisionist attitudes and trying to rewrite history with facts that are sometimes downright silly... yeah, I've sure seen a lot of that around!

 

There were racists everywhere, just like there still are. Social issues like this were just different at the time, it wasn't the same debate and people felt differently about every day life like that. A lot of issues with the war had nothing to do with racism. People kept slaves because they were profitable and upkept the south's economy. They would have been fighting the war whether their slaves were white, black, or asian.

 

After "Reconstruction" Southern African Americans were having trouble getting any but the most menial work. Forrest advocated allowing "colored" people to work in jobs and professions that they were qualified to work in. That included professional jobs. Don't forget, prior to the war there were many wealthy "colored" Southerners, including educated and professional people. General Forrest was also an advocate of voting rights. As a Southerner born of wealthy and powerful family on both paternal and maternal sides, I was always taught that racial prejudice was associated with "white trash", especially moneyed trash. I use the term "colored", as does the NAACP, because it was considered the polite term at that time, although I understand that some people associate it with a time period when it was used officially on signs such as "No Colored Allowed". I will not use the term used on unofficial signs. Those unofficial signs were meant to be impolite.
Don't forget, earlier in the 20th century there was a large Klan presence in the North as well.

 

It has also occurred to me to mention that the quotation mentioned by Kate above may also reflect that Forrest was probably talking to people who may have been prejudiced. By emphasizing the need to have laborers he would have been bypassing prejudice by appealing to practicality. In the early 1970s I was talking to an elderly African American gentleman who was lamenting the loss of the good old days of segregation. He told of how he would go to the back door when visiting white friends so that their houses wouldn't get burnt down and he hanged. We all coped with the prejudice while we worked for change. One step at a time.

 

That certainly makes sense, @thomas pendrake ... and yes, some people just need to be treated with kid gloves because they misunderstand something and get bent out of shape. If that's the case, I agree that his statement was a wise one and perhaps the only way to get through to those people and their prejudices.

Yes, one step at a time.

 

I can't even imagine what it was like to have thousands of thousands of recently free people that didn't know how to act like that and that many people still saw them as inferior, a really complicated and hard transition.

 

The north definitely had a lot of racists, just like the south, but unlike the south they had people who worked hard to help freemen. There were people in the north who genuinely cared about the freed slaves and tried to help them. They were definitely in the minority, unfortunately, but their efforts shouldn't be ignored.

 

I don't know if they were in minority trose, if they were in minority how did they manage to start a war and win it mainly because of slavery?

 

They didn't start the civil war. The north tried to avoid the civil war, but the south started it. They responded by fighting to protect the union, not to end slavery. Slaves were only emancipated in the states that joined the rebellion. Some slave states stayed in the union and kept slavery around legally until after the war ended. So, yes, those against slavery were still in the minority at the time.

 

So now I do raise the question, sorry about my ignorance, why did the south started the war really? What were they after?

 

The answer to your question is a matter of controversy some insist is settled, of course that depends on who you ask, for some the south seceded from the union for states rights, while others insist it was to keep their slaves. It is a popular academic view that the civil war was over slavery and if you do not agree you get labeled as a southern sympathizer and a racist. If you disagree with the states rights view you get labeled a liberal, a socialist, or a commie.

 

Yes... I don't let labels bother me. Sometimes it's just the way bullies try to get their own way and force others to "respect" them. This is a great answer to Peninha's question. Any time there's a controversial topic, it turns into a Catch22.

I personally don't think it was because of slavery... but that ended up playing a role.

 

Agreed, slavery was not the primary cause, yet there are those today that benefit from that view, just as there are those who are do not wish to accept that there is still some issues that were not totally settled by the civil war.

 

There were people in the South who cared about both free and unemancipated slaves, and, unlike the Northerners, risked their lives to work to help them. In many states educating a slave was a crime, but people still did it. More anti-South prejudice.