Sunday, May 10, 2009

Grant on Slavery - 1863

From a letter to Mr Washburne dated August 30th 1863:

The people of the North need never quarrelled over Slavery. What V-P Stephens acknowledges as the corner stone of the Confederacy is already knocked out. Slavery is already dead and cannot be resurrected. It would take a standing Army to maintain slavery in the South if we were to make peace today,

I never was an Abolitionist, not even what would be called anti-slavery, but I try to judge fairly & honestly and it became patent to my mind early in the rebellion that North and South could never live at peace with each other except as one nation; and that without Slavery. As anxious as I am to see peace re-established I would not therefore be wiling to see any settlement until this question is settled forever.

3 comments:

Trooper York said...

If only Grant were here today. What would he think? I mean he had gone bankrupt and was overwhemled by the sharpe trading of the political establishment. I wonder.

rcocean said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
rcocean said...

ell, the more things change...

But Grant certainly would be amazed to see a "Colored" President from the Sandwich Islands. And I wonder what any 19th Century Lady or Gentlemen would think of Babs Streisand or Paris Hilton.