re: #236 Decatur Deb

The South got half a loaf or less. Without a movement to reconcile we would remain two societies—a country and a colony. The only way to actually defeat the separatists was to pull them back into a true union. That’s a process that is not yet complete, and might yet fail.

The South “winning” the peace hurt them a bit in the long run. Additional turmoil and Jim Crow was a disincentive for capital to be spent there to rebuild or develop new industries. It’s one reason the region languished while the Northeast and Midwest industrialized, modernized, and became wealthier.