The Confederates were much better than the Yankees

For the debater who accepts, you can start posting arguments when you post your Round 1. In other words, fire the opening shots. And thanks in advance to the debater who accepts this debate, and make sure you are ready for a good debate.

Better: Of a more excellent or effective type or quality
http://www.google.com...

C1: The North won the war

I will easily prove this. Bur for people who don't know:

well: here;s my explanation [1]

yep a footnote.

C2: population

This is a problem, as their workforce is smaller and their greatest size for an army would be limited.

confederate population: 9,103,332 [2]
Union population: over 20 million [3]

C3: the economy

their economy relied heavily on slaves and cotton and had the 4th largest economy in the world. [4]

While factories were built all over the North and South, the vast majority of industrial manufacturing was taking place in the North. The South had almost 25% of the country's free population, but only 10% of the country's capital in 1860. [5]

basically saying although they had a good economy it was only 10% of the whole nations. So the Union = 90% of American economy vs confederate 10%

C4: Navy

guess who?

The task was daunting; the Southern coast measured over 2,500 miles and the Union navy numbered less than 40 usable ships. [6]

yeah both navies sucked:

The Southern states had few resources compared to the North: a handful of shipyards, a small merchant marine, and no navy at all. [6]

basically the south made a few ships later on but they lost most of the battles. like :

In April 1863, the Union navy turned with force on the Southern port cities when it took on the defenses of Charleston, South Carolina. [6]

or

Early 1862 also marked the beginning of the Union campaigns to split the Confederacy apart along the Mississippi River. A fleet of gunboats was built to support Ulysses S. Grant's army as it moved from Illinois down the Mississippi River into the heart of the South. [6]

pwnage.

C5: stance on slavery

On November 6, 1860 Abraham Lincoln was elected President of the United States -- an event that outraged southern states. The Republican party had run on an anti-slavery platform, and many southerners felt that there was no longer a place for them in the Union. [7]

Lincoln = republican

and a less credible source:
The union was against slavery.
[8]

yeah being pro slavery isn't "better"

C6: they could have never won.

they had navy, economy, and population against them. and when they went offensive they lost:
.
They lost [9] lol

So how could they win the war if they can't win an offensive battle? They where crushed, ex pickets charge.

==conclusion==

I accepted despite of the vague resolution, it may come back to haunt me. I have proven the Union to be "better". I urge you to vote con.

http://en.wikipedia.org... [1]
http://en.wikipedia.org... [2]
http://www.historyplace.com... [3]
http://en.wikipedia.org... [4]
http://www.historycentral.com... [5]
http://www.civilwar.org... [6]
http://www.pbs.org... [7]
http://wiki.answers.com... [8]
http://en.wikipedia.org... [9]

We are debating strictly on the war. No other statistic should be used becuase it it irrelevant. Better is not defined as having more things, people, and economy.

Attack Point 1: Most Confederate Generals were A LOT better than most Union Generals.
Examples for the Confederacy:
Robert E. Lee
Stonewall Jackson
James Longstreet
Jubal Early
Albert S. Johnston
A.P. Hill
Nathan Bedford Forrest

Exceptions:
Braxton Bragg
John Hood

Examples for the Union:
Ambrose Burnside
Joseph Hooker
John Pope
George S. Rosecrans
Oliver O. Howard
George McClellan
Benjamin Butler

Exceptions:
Ulyssus S. Grant
William T. Sherman

Attack Point 2: Confederate Soliders were A LOT better fighters than Yankee Soldiers.
Example Battles:
First Manassas
Second Manassas Chancellorsville
The Wilderness
The Crater
Bentonville
Throughout the Shenandoah Valley Campaign of 1862
Sailor's Creek
Sharpsburg
Brice's Crossroads
Wilson's Creek

Exceptions:
2nd Day of Gettysburg
Assaults on Petersburg March 31st-April 2nd 1865
Chattanooga

Attack Point 3: The War lasted A LOT longer than the Yankees were expecting.
The Yankees expected to win First Manassas, and with it, the war. What good that prediction was.

Attack Point 4: The War could have been A LOT longer.
In early April of 1865, just before Lee signed the surrender papers, several of his leading generals devised a plan of splitting up, and engaging in guerrilla warfare until the got out, and then do whatever was necessary to win after that. This plan would have worked, but most likely, would have lead to the same outcome. So Lee smartly said no.

Response Point 1: The North only won the war because of a few costly mistakes by the Confederacy. They could have waged the war a lot better. Not to mention, the North was so much more industrialized and populated (numbers range from 3-4 times more non-slave men in the North than in the south).

Response Point 2: The North or South couldn't help this. They did not get higher population by working for it. They just had more territory. This does not mean the north was better than the south.

Response to Point 3: Again, neither side could "really" help this. The south was meant to be agarian, and the north was meant to be industrialized. That is just how both sides wanted this. But unfortunately, this division of economics was the leading factor in the decision for Civil War.

Response to Point 4: Again, a cause of the industrialization of the North.

Response to Point 5: The Confederacy could not "really" help their stance on slavery until they too became industrialized. If there was a sweeping law prohibiting slavery in say 1858, then not only the southern, but the northern economy would take nose dives. There would be an extreme recession. The South, by the time of the Civil War, was lessening it's need for slaves.

Response to Point 6: The Confederacy could have won with some smarter moves at the beginning, and still could probably could have won the war if they weren't so stupid with Tennessee and Vicksburg, and had won Gettysburg. If these two things had gone in the South's favor, most likely the South would have won the war. If you doubt me, ask, and I will tell you next round.

16KADAMS: If this is not what you wanted to debate, simply ask the voters for a tie. If so, good luck debating.

Ok. Maybe you do not grasp the concept tha you can have more people and a better economy, but that still does not necessarily mean that one is better than another.

Response Point 1:
One, you only said that the Confederates could not have won a long term war. That is true. But they could have beaten the Union until right before Pickett's Charge. If that charge had worked, the South probably would have won. And again, as stated for the third time, to be better does not mean that you have to have a better economy. We are talking about a better fighting force and spirit and populus (to be better does not mean to have more, except for fighting spirit, which we are debating). You are conceding to me that the Confederacy had better generals. That is an important shot to your debate. But the North's economy is not a shot to mine.

Response Point 2:
Ok. I will talk about your rebuttal with three seperate parts. First, the top third again has nothing to do with this debate. Second and third are finally debateable points.

First Debateable Point: "Their morale was lower (citizen wise)."
"The Union Army also faced large scale desertions. Confederate forces lost fewer to desertion than did the northern forces. This has been partly attributed to the southern soldiers fighting a defensive war, on their own ground, rather than an offensive war of invasion, which gave the southern soldiers a sense that they were defending their homeland which is always an advantage in any war. In addition, up until late 1863 the South had many victories (in fact more than the North), and many northern soldiers felt the war was a lost cause. For example, New York alone suffered 44,913 desertions by the war's end, with Pennsylvania having 24,050 and Ohio having 18,354, not to mention the desertions faced by the other northern states.":http://en.wikipedia.org.... This disproves your soldier theory. And on the civilian side, the civilians actually had great morale when taken into account what they went through. In Virginia, barely one acre of ground had a battle not been fough on. In Georgia and South Carolina, Sherman burned a trail through. In Mississippi and especially Tennessee, the populus had to live under Union control for almost the whole war. In the Confederate States to the west of the Mississippi, they were completely isolated from the Confederacy from after July 1863 to the end of the war. The populus sustained famine, pillaging, burning, and stealing on a regular basis. And the Union populus NEVER had to go through this. The populus had a very high morale throughout the war. If they had not, then the war would have been over at their discresion.

Second Debateable Point: "ACTUALLY THE AMOUNT OF MAJOR BATTLES WON OR LOST IS TIED (4 VS 4) THIS IS MAJOR BATLES NOT MINOR ONES."
The Major Civil War Battles: http://history-world.org....
Fort Sumter: Victory for the Confederacy
First Manassas: Victory for the Confederacy
Second Manassas: Victory for the Confederacy
Seven Days Battles: Strategic Tie, Tactical Victory for the Confederacy (The Union abandoned the whole campaign, so a win for the Confederacy)
Perryville: Tie
The Battle of the Ironclads: Tie
Shiloh: Victory for the Union
Antietam: Strategic Confederate Victory, Tactical Union Victory (I will rule this a tie)
Fredericksburg: Victory for the Confederacy
Vicksburg: Victory for the Union
Battle of Chancellorsville: Victory for the Confederacy
Chattanooga: Victory for the Union
Spotsylvania: Strategic Confederate Victory, Tactical Union Victory (I will rule a tie)
Cold Harbor: Victory for the Confederacy
I would like to add:
Stone's River: Tie
Gettysburg: Victory for the Union
Chickamauga: Victory for the Confederacy
Wilderness: Strategic Confederate Victory, Tactical Union Victory (I will rule a tie)
Petersburg: (This was a series of battles fought over a period of nine months. All were Confederate Victories until March 31st at Fort Steadman). This is a Union victory, but there were so many defeats to the Union and the cost was so high that I will label this a tie.
Final Statistics:
Victories for the Confederacy: 8
Victories for the Union: 4
Ties: 6 (And most of the ties should have been victories for the Union, but there were costly mistakes, so it should be pointed out that ties are better for the Confederacy than the Union.)

Response Point 3:
Yes, but the Union had to fight a war a lot longer than expected. That should be a strike against the Union.

Response Point 4:
Again, I will cover two points.

First Point:
This does not really go against either side. I was just pointing out that the war could have been a lot longer.

Second Point:
The war most certainly would have been longer if Lee did not reject Gordon's plan of Guerrilla Warfare against the Union Army. If Lee had allowed for it, most of the army would have most certainly been able to slip away, and fight a guerrilla war for at least two more years, maybe even longer. But it would have been useless and wasteful. I am saying that the Confederacy could have fought the war for longer, I did not say that war a good idea.

Response Point 5:
I knew you were going to come back with that, and would have explained better if I had had more room. But one, the Union made A LOT more mistakes and A LOT more costly mistakes, but they could afford most of them (except if they hadn't, maybe they would have won the war sooner). And two, the few mistakes that the Confederacy made were very costly because they could not afford them. So my point was that the Confederacy had little margin for error, and by human nature and the amount of people in the Army, there was a slim to none chance of the war going exactly to plan. If it had, the Confederacy would have most certainly won the war. Hands down. But being said that the Union made a lot more mistakes is another strike against them.

Response Point 6:
The difference in population still does not make the Union Army better than the Confederate Army. It is like saying the World War II Russian Army was better than the World War II German Army because the Russian Army had more men. If both sides had equal numbers of men, the Germans would have crushed the Russians in two or three months. And plus, the Germants had to contend with the Russian winter. These two Russian factors of population and winter do not mean the German Army is worse. Only a fool would admit that. In fact Operation Barbarossa was a lot like the American Civil War for various reasons.

Response Point 7:
A crushed European Economy beat a booming German Economy (just before the start of World War II because the were building so many weapons, thus increasing GDP).

Response Point 8:
Yet again, a superior German navy was beat by the British Navy.

Response Point 9:
If the Confederates were organized enough to pursue the routed Union Army after the battle of First Manassas, if Lee had gone after Washington instead of Western Maryland in the First Northern Invasion, if the Confederacy had won Gettysburg, in the Confederacy had won the battle of Columbus, and if Bragg won Perryville.

Attacks:
How the South could Have Won the Civil War:
"I've heard and read novice Civil War buffs assert that the South's defeat in the ACW was strictly preordained because of their imbalance in resources and manpower with the North. This assertion does not stand up to scrutiny.": http://www.physicsforums.com.... Please read this and debate the numbered points.
"The South could have won the civil war in many ways and at various points, even late into the war." All the first five answerers say yes: http://wiki.answers.com....
http://www.americancivilwar.asn.au.... Please read this and debate whatever you feel like.
http://clevelandcivilwarroundtable.com.... Please read this and debate whatever you feel like.

I accept 16kadams's offer of a tie.

VOTERS: Please vote this a tie.

16KADAMS: I'm sorry. I thought that I had specified this enough in my title and Round 2 arguments. Sorry about the confusion.

WILLING DEBATERS: If anyone wants to debate the topics that I have specified in Round 3, please e-mail me a request. There will be an open challenge made sometime from today to next Sunday. Stay tuned to the open challenges. If I do not post one in that amount of time, that means someone has already asked me to debate this. Remember, the resolution of this debate is on the fighting spirit of the Confederacy. Remember that. I will not accept forfeits or ties next debate. I will make the resolution as clear as possible. It will look something like my Round 3 argument. First come first serve policy is in effect.

VOTERS: 16kadams makes a great point. Voters, you could not vote if you want. Or, you could make the last 5 points ties (the first two are the voter's opinion).

16KADAMS: That was a great idea you suggested for voting. Thanks for accepting my apology. That helps.

yes please vote, optional as always, and if you do make it a TIE. Also in your RFD say who you thought was winning before I conceded due to those terms. Ex: 16k was winning because or paul was winning b/c. SO vote tie, and please have additional feedback.