Mike Pesca had a good take on this in his podcast The Gist earlier this week. I’m paraphrasing from memory, but it went something like: “Yeah, if only some sort of compromise could have been worked out, like say, around the state of Missouri. Or in 1850, that would have been a good time to strike a compromise.”
Because aside from the whole Great Man Theory of History implied by the claim that Andrew Jackson could have prevented the Civil War, there’s also the fact that the leaders of the day DID make deals and compromises to avoid a civil war. It’s just that all they managed to do was kick the can down the road and postpone the inevitable.
And then, as now, it was only one party that was truly compromising; the overwrought babies were screaming about not getting absolutely everything they wanted forever, and eventually this led them to tear down the foundations of the Republic. It’s looking more and more like that’s where they’re headed again.
Mike Pesca had a good take on this in his podcast The Gist earlier this week. I’m paraphrasing from memory, but it went something like: “Yeah, if only some sort of compromise could have been worked out, like say, around the state of Missouri. Or in 1850, that would have been a good time to strike a compromise.”
Because aside from the whole Great Man Theory of History implied by the claim that Andrew Jackson could have prevented the Civil War, there’s also the fact that the leaders of the day DID make deals and compromises to avoid a civil war. It’s just that all they managed to do was kick the can down the road and postpone the inevitable.
And then, as now, it was only one party that was truly compromising; the overwrought babies were screaming about not getting absolutely everything they wanted forever, and eventually this led them to tear down the foundations of the Republic. It’s looking more and more like that’s where they’re headed again.