While the CW150 Sesquecentennial programs across the nation are taking shape with plans being made at the State level it becomes IMPERATIVE that an honest discussion of the causes (reasons) leading up to the Civil War be properly placed in these celebrations.

Economics, States Rights and Heritage are promenient among the stated MAJOR causes for Secession and subsquently the Civil War with the defense of Slavery, or Involuntary Servitiude, being cast as a MINOR cause.

I would like to suggest an article and an essay indicating that Slavery had 'more than a MINOR role' as a cause leading to the Civil War.

This 23 Dec 2010 article by E.J. Dione may be viewed at:
http://tinyurl.com/29cq2u6

The essay written by Walter B. Sanderson, III writen in 1995, opens by stating, "On March 21, 1861, Alexander Stephens, the Confederacy’s vice president, gave what came to be known as the “Cornerstone speech” in which he declared that the “proper status of the Negro in our form of civilization” was “the immediate cause of the late rupture.”

This essay appears on the "Lest We Forget" website of Mr. Bennie J. McRae, Jr. and is posted here with the permission of both Mr. Sanderson and Mr. McRae.

Read the complete essay by clicking on the PDF icon. (slow loading)

Thank you Mr. E.J. Dione, Mr. Walter Sanderson, II and Mr. Bennie J. McRae, Jr. for shining some light on the darkness of recent revisionist claims.

Art Thomas