There will be many moments in the coming years to examine and discuss the issues that tore our nation apart 150 years ago. Tonight is the 150th anniversary of one of the most important precipitating events in the secession crisis, which led to the American Civil War: the secession of South Carolina from the Union.
Over the years a debate has ensued over exactly why South Carolina dissolved its bonds with the Federal Union, and why other Southern states followed. But as today’s brave editorial in the Columbia, South Carolina State makes clear, the convention-goers who pulled the Palmetto State out of the Union made their cause explicit: it was to protect slavery. In fact, as the document points out – and the State stresses – it was ONLY to protect slavery that led South Carolina to secede.
This does not answer the question of why every other state seceded (especially the Upper South states of Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Arkansas, which split from the Union only after the war began in April 1861). Nor does it address why individual Southerners fought and died for the new Confederate States of America. Nor does it reflect on why the North wen to war against the new Confederacy. But it does demonstrate why the leaders of South Carolina political, economic and social life made this historic decision.
Bravo to the State for your moment of clarity. Your forebears 150 years ago were equally clear.