From Georgia?s Declaration of Causes:The people of Georgia having dissolved their political connection with the Government of the United States of America, present to their confederates and the world the causes which have led to the separation. For the last ten years we have had numerous and serious causes of complaint against our non-slave-holding confederate States with reference to the subject of African slavery?A brief history of the rise, progress, and policy of anti-slavery and the political organization into whose hands the administration of the Federal Government has been committed will fully justify the pronounced verdict of the people of Georgia?Northern anti-slavery men of all parties asserted the right to exclude slavery from the territory by Congressional legislation and demanded the prompt and efficient exercise of this power to that end. This insulting and unconstitutional demand was met with great moderation and firmness by the South?From Mississippi?s Declaration of Causes:In the momentous step which our State has taken of dissolving its connection with the government of which we so long formed a part, it is but just that we should declare the prominent reasons which have induced our course. Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin. From South Carolina?s Declaration of Causes:And now the State of South Carolina having resumed her separate and equal place among nations, deems it due to herself, to the remaining United States of America, and to the nations of the world, that she should declare the immediate causes which have led to this act. ?an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery?. The States of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa, have enacted laws which either nullify the Acts of Congress or render useless any attempt to execute them. In many of these States the fugitive is discharged from service or labor claimed, and in none of them has the State Government complied with the stipulation made in the Constitution. The State of New Jersey? the current of anti-slavery feeling has led her more recently to enact laws which render inoperative the remedies provided by her own law and by the laws of Congress. In the State of New York even the right of transit for a slave has been denied by her tribunals?The right of property in slaves was recognized by giving to free persons distinct political rights, by giving them the right to represent, and burthening them with direct taxes for three-fifths of their slaves; by authorizing the importation of slaves for twenty years; and by stipulating for the rendition of fugitives from labor. We affirm that these ends for which this Government was instituted have been defeated, and the Government itself has been made destructive of them by the action of the non-slaveholding States. Those States have assume the right of deciding upon the propriety of our domestic institutions; and have denied the rights of property established in fifteen of the States and recognized by the Constitution; they have denounced as sinful the institution of slavery; they have permitted open establishment among them of societies, whose avowed object is to disturb the peace and to eloign the property of the citizens of other States. They have encouraged and assisted thousands of our slaves to leave their homes; and those who remain, have been incited by emissaries, books and pictures to servile insurrection. From Texas?s Declaration of Causes:When we advert to the course of individual non-slave-holding States, and that a majority of their citizens, our grievances assume far greater magnitude. The States of Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan and Iowa, by solemn legislative enactments, have deliberately, directly or indirectly violated the 3rd clause of the 2nd section of the 4th article [the fugitive slave clause] of the federal constitution, and laws passed in pursuance thereof; thereby annulling a material provision of the compact, designed by its framers to perpetuate the amity between the members of the confederacy and to secure the rights of the slave-holding States in their domestic institutions-- a provision founded in justice and wisdom, and without the enforcement of which the compact fails to accomplish the object of its creation. Some of those States have imposed high fines and degrading penalties upon any of their citizens or officers who may carry out in good faith that provision of the compact, or the federal laws enacted in accordance therewith. In all the non-slave-holding States, in violation of that good faith and comity which should exist between entirely distinct nations, the people have formed themselves into a great sectional party, now strong enough in numbers to control the affairs of each of those States, based upon an unnatural feeling of hostility to these Southern States and their beneficent and patriarchal system of African slavery, proclaiming the debasing doctrine of equality of all men, irrespective of race or color-- a doctrine at war with nature, in opposition to the experience of mankind, and in violation of the plainest revelations of Divine Law. They demand the abolition of negro slavery throughout the confederacy, the recognition of political equality between the white and negro races, and avow their determination to press on their crusade against us, so long as a negro slave remains in these States. For years past this abolition organization has been actively sowing the seeds of discord through the Union, and has rendered the federal congress the arena for spreading firebrands and hatred between the slave-holding and non-slave-holding States. By consolidating their strength, they have placed the slave-holding States in a hopeless minority in the federal congress, and rendered representation of no avail in protecting Southern rights against their exactions and encroachments. They have proclaimed, and at the ballot box sustained, the revolutionary doctrine that there is a 'higher law' than the constitution and laws of our Federal Union, and virtually that they will disregard their oaths and trample upon our rights. They have for years past encouraged and sustained lawless organizations to steal our slaves and prevent their recapture?

Here is the full text of the article.

By James W. LoewenThe Washington PostSunday, January 9, 2011; 12:00 AM One hundred and fifty years after the Civil War began, we're still fighting it -- or at least fighting over its history. I've polled thousands of high school history teachers and spoken about the war to audiences across the country, and there is little agreement even on why the South seceded. Was it over slavery? States' rights? Tariffs and taxes? As the nation begins to commemorate the anniversaries of the war's various battles -- from Fort Sumter to Appomattox -- let's first dispense with some of the more prevalent myths about why it all began. 1. The South seceded over states' rights.Confederate states did claim the right to secede, but no state claimed to be seceding for that right. In fact, Confederates opposed states' rights -- that is, the right of Northern states not to support slavery. On Dec. 24, 1860, delegates at South Carolina's secession convention adopted a "Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union." It noted "an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery" and protested that Northern states had failed to "fulfill their constitutional obligations" by interfering with the return of fugitive slaves to bondage. Slavery, not states' rights, birthed the Civil War. ....http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/07/AR2011010703178.html?sid=ST2011010703601(ed. Sorry I had to chop this down to avoid copyright entanglements. - Phid)

Personally, I disagree about the side proclaiming that History of France would start with the Merovigians : these were Franks, speaking a germanic language and with a total different culture. I tend to consider the beginning of what is France with the Treaty of Verdun (843 AD) and more specifically with the Capetians (987-1792 AD) because of the language, the culture and their roots.

I agree.

I suppose it's possible. Although I doubt it.At the time of the Babylonian Captivity a group of Jews fled to Egypt (after assassinating the governor of Jerusalem the Babylonians installed).  They took forcibly took the prophet Jemimah with them and killed him after reaching Egypt.  There are also reports the Jews built a temple somewhere in (lower) Egypt (and also one in Babylon).  Ethiopia has long claimed a connection to Israel; Ethiopian emperors claimed to descend from Salomon and the Queen of Sheba.  At one time the Coptic Church of Ethiopia was the equal of the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches.  At the time of Christ more Jews lived outside of Israel than within its borders.  Alexandria in Egypt for centuries had a huge Jewish population.  They'd mostly forgotten Hebrew and for their benefit about 200 B.C. the Old Testament was translated into Greek becoming the Septuagint version of the Scriptures that New Testament writers quoted. There are some very black skinned people in Africa today who claim Jewish linage.  My understanding is Israel has granted them immigrations rights without requiring them to undergo the conversion ceremony. There are many who think/speculate the Ark of the Covent was hidden in Ethiopia.  So I suppose it's possible it traveled all the way to Zimbabwe, although I doubt it.  But I wouldn't be surprised to learn that Zimbabwe had contact with some or all of a long list of peoples including Jews, Arabs, Phoenicians, Egyptians, and (sub continent) Indians.  

I don't know enough about military tactics in WWI to answer the question.  But I'll respond with a question.In some wars the defense has a advantage.  In the Civil War, for example, due to the tactics and weapons in use, it was easier to defend a position than assault one.  So the offense suffered more causalities.  In WWI most of the time Germany was fighting a defensive war on the Western front.  Is it the case in WWI, like the Civil War, that due to the tactics and weapons in use the defense suffers fewer casualties?

As Shelbe Foote has pointed out, Americans are usually very good at compromise.  The great exception (thanks to the fire eaters) was at the time the Civil War began.

You HAVE to look at the historical details and not let personal feelings and 140 year bias cloud your viewpoint.

Slavery isn't just seen as being evil in the 20th/21st century.  Prior to the Civil War slavery was seen as being evil in Europe, the North, and the most of the rest of the "civilized world" outside the South.  I'm not using contemporary morality to say slavery was evil; I'm using the standards of the era to say it was evil.