"What are you looking at? Are you looking so fascinated?" Nicole woke up in the morning and saw Tangning reading a newspaper, fascinated, so she put her arms around him from behind and asked curiously.
Tangning pointed to an article in the newspaper titled "Illinois Congressional Senatorial Election Debate-Should Slavery Be Abolition?" and replied to Nicole: "I'm looking at this!"
The reason why Downing paid attention to this news was that one of the participants in the debate was the later famous US President Lincoln. At this time, he was running for the Illinois Senate as a Republican candidate, and his opponent was a representative of the Democratic Party.
Douglas.
For this election, the two sides held seven debates (also known as the Great Debate of 1858). On the surface, this debate was about Lincoln and Douglas competing for the Illinois Senate seat, but on a deeper level,
This was also the debate between the abolition and slavery that lasted for many years in the history of the United States at that time. It was also a historical event that affected the course of American history. It was not only a debate between the two sides on the issue of the existence and abolition of slavery, but also related to the relationship between Lincoln and Douglas.
Their respective ideological concepts and the struggles of the parties they represent.
In fact, the debate about slavery began in the early days of the founding of the United States. Due to the different solutions to slavery, the United States was divided into the North and the South: the seven northern states (Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island) that gradually took measures to abolish slavery;
The six southern states (Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia) that maintained slavery were called slave states.
At that time, the North and the South were roughly equal in terms of economy, population, and land area, and the political power of the two sides was also almost the same. Therefore, a balanced situation was formed nationwide. When it came to the issue of slavery, the North and the South compromised each other.
The 1787 Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia determined that the black population should be calculated as three-fifths of the population when electing members of the House of Representatives, which is a manifestation of this compromise.
However, this kind of compromise is just a helpless move that treats the symptoms but not the root cause. As the United States continues to expand, especially Missouri and Nebraska have successively requested statehood to join the Union. According to the original agreement, both states have
It should belong to a free state, but the slave-holding states were afraid that the addition of these two states would destroy their traditional dominant position in Congress, so they fought to join the union as a slave-holding state, which aroused dissatisfaction in the North. So the two sides fought
The issue of slavery launched a tit-for-tat contest, and the debate between Lincoln and Douglas in 1858 was the product of this North-South contest.
According to the agreement, the seven debates were distributed in different places in Illinois. In each debate, one person would first go on stage to speak for an hour and express his or her views; then another person would go on the stage to speak for one and a half hours, on the one hand to express his own views and on the other hand.
On the one hand, they criticize the former; in the end, the person who came to the stage first will spend half an hour to supplement his own point of view and refute the criticism of the other person; when they reach the other place, they exchange the order with each other, and so on.
This approach is determined by the special location of Illinois - it is located on the north-south dividing line of the United States. The south of the state is more inclined to preserve slavery, while the north is more inclined to abolish slavery. Therefore, this arrangement allows
People from all over the state heard it, thus ensuring the fairness of the debate.
Naturally, Nicole didn't know the importance of this debate, so after taking a quick glance, she said disapprovingly: "Didn't our people win? What are you worried about?"
Tangning shook his head: "Although on the surface, Mr. Douglas did win, if we look at the voters' votes alone, Lincoln actually received 4,085 more votes than Douglas. His defeat was due to the division of electoral districts.
The unreasonableness caused his vote in the state assembly to be lower than that of Douglas.
Because the Democratic Party controlled most of the states in Illinois with relatively few voters at that time, they controlled the state assembly, and the U.S. Senate was elected by the state assembly. Therefore, Douglas, who did not receive as many votes as Lincoln, was elected to the U.S. Senate.
Moreover, as an old politician, Mr. Douglas actually debated seven times with Lincoln, a lawyer who was new to politics. This greatly improved his reputation. You see, after this, those who opposed slavery in the north
This guy will definitely pay attention to him, and in a few years, the war between the north and the south will be inevitable!"
Hearing what Tang Ning said, Nicole thought of Tang Ning's speculation last time and couldn't help but exclaimed: "Do you really think those northerners will come and beat us because of the black slaves?"
"The core of the current dispute between the North and the South is not actually black slaves, but the economic models of both sides. In order to develop industry, the North hopes to increase import tariffs, and we in the South can provide them with cheap raw materials and purchase high-quality industrial products at high prices.
.
From the perspective of our south, this is absolutely unacceptable. If import tariffs are raised, not only will we no longer be able to buy cheap British industrial products, but as retaliation, the UK will definitely increase the import tariffs on our cotton.
The profit of cotton will be reduced and no one will even buy it.
Tell me, is there any other way to resolve such an irreconcilable conflict besides war?" Tang Ning explained.
"Then if war really comes, do you think we will win?" Nicole asked, staring at Tangning.
Tang Ning shook her head and replied: "To be honest, I'm really not optimistic about it, because our industry is really bad. Unless the UK is willing to stand firmly on our side, it will be difficult to win. But judging from the current mainstream public opinion in Europe,
Look, our slavery really cannot be discussed on the table, so Britain can only support it secretly, with limited strength. Another important reason is that we have too few people." (Britain was at this time.
The Chartist Movement had just ended, civil rights consciousness was rising, and even Marx and Engels had a place in the public opinion circle. One can imagine what kind of boycott the British government would be if it openly supported slavery in the United States.)
"There are many more people in the north than us?" Nicole asked puzzledly.
"Although the total number of people is about the same, the problem is that 30 or even 40% of our slaves are black slaves. Do you think they will fight for our war?" Tangning asked.
"You make sense, but what are your plans if we lose?" Nicole asked again.
PS: Thanks to book friends "Xiao Wu and Gu Ge" for their support!