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Comment by smsm42 | Hacker News Reader

I would disagree that Civil War represents the example of why weak federal system is unworkable. The question of slavery, which ultimately led to secession and the war, was arguably impossible to resolve within the unified state politically, as the sides were disagreeing on the most basic questions, such as whether half of the population of the state can be deemed subhumans and excluded from the human rights system altogether. Absent such fundamental difference weak federal system may very well be workable.

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In addition, the federal government was controlled by the Southern pro-slavery majority until about 1850. They would have tried to use any strong federal power to suppress the antislavery movement and prevent the question of slavery from ever arising.

I'm not sure if this would have prevented the Civil War. The Gilded Age robber barons would eventually have amassed enough economic power to challenge the southern planters. If they avoided the slavery question, the Union might have held together until mechanized farming made slavery obsolete, perhaps during the 1940's. Northern industrialization would likely have involved more turmoil. The U.S. might also have taken over various Caribbean and Central American nations. I doubt this situation is an improvement over the real historical one.

> I would disagree that Civil War represents the example of why weak federal system is unworkable.

I understand why one might (or disagree that the failure of the AoC is a good illustration of the same point) -- my point was simply to illustrate that the "no need to look farther than the US" proposition does not require the current US government to be a weak federal system. Whether particularl issues that occurred under the past weak federal systems in the USA (including that of the CSA) each really illustrate problems inherent to weak federal systems or whether each is simply an example of problems that happened to a country with a weak federal system that aren't inherently related to having such a system is a whole series of other arguments.

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