Walter Williams: Wrong on Secession

vanity ^ | 4/3/02 | Self

[El Gato]

Try plotting just say 1850-1900

Or better yet plot on a log-log scale, or even just with the vertical axis being a log scale. That will reveal more "early" detail than a strictly linear plot.

[El Gato]

Nowhere in the COnstitution is MURDER explicitly forbidden. Therefore, in your opinion, the right to MURDER is reserved to the states, or to the people. Cockeyed, as usual.

The power to deal with murder was left to the individual states. Thus explaining why some states have the death penalty for it, and others do not. The Constitution is a document organizing the federal government, laying out its powers and laying a few limiations on the powers of the states, mainly in areas where they would conflict with those of the national governement, i.e. foreign affairs, interstate commerce, and coinage of money. It does not put limitations on individual citzens, but rather on governments' powers to restrict citizens rights. Murder is a state matter, except in the District of Columbia and on federal reservations, such as military bases, or in cases arrising in the military forces.

I suppose the states could grant people the power to commit murder, but in any event that is left up to them, except in the circumstances indicated. OTOH, it would probably conflict with the power and obligation of the federal government to guarantee a Republican government to the states.

[El Gato]

there was no power of unilateral secession granted to the states in the Constitution

The Constitution doesn't grant powers to the states, anymore than it grants rights to the people. It does restrict powers of the states, but no such restriction on secession exists. It protect other powesrs of the states, as well as the rights of the people.

[Steve Van Doorn]

It is amazing how people forget the constitution is a contract between States. The States signed into the contract and they can also brake the contract if the contract is not being upheld.

[El Gato]

Name one Constitutional violation involved in emancipation. And tell me, if it were you or your loved ones being held in bondage, would you bend the Constitution as far as you could to free them?

Taking property without compensation. For legally the slaves were property, whether we like it or not. Seems like amending the Constitution would have been better, especially in the long run, but in the short run too. I'd have probably "stolen" my loved ones, and killed those holding them, if I could. However as it is, my oath is to the Constitution and emancipating the slaves and preventing secession both violate the Constitution as it existed at the time.

As I noted in Post #275, the Confederates placed a value of $3 billion on their slaves -- equivalent to $58 billion in current dollars and $3 trillion as a percentage of GDP.

And how much did the war cost in those terms? Besides that was an opening price not a final value. Slaves were becoming uneconomical and a final price surely would have been less. It could also have been paid over time. Perhaps abolitionists would have donated part, even most, of the money to speed the process.

[dasboot]

Hey! Just popped back in to see how the fight was going. Nice job, ElGato!

But where's Walt? Not like him to give up so early in the game. Or did he pass the keys to his spam library hall-of-shame to ravinson?

[Maelstrom]

Uh...re: your #62, Northern Sympathizers were jailed, censored, and driven underground by a totalitarian regime.

[Maelstrom]

Uh...re: your #62, Northern Sympathizers were jailed, censored, and driven underground by a totalitarian regime.

[Maelstrom]

Exactly...Either the right to secede exists and existed or the framers of the Constitution LIED.

Either case makes the contract in question invalid.

Personally, I believe Lincoln was at fault as *leaving* is neither insurrection nor rebellion.

[Maelstrom]

Moreover, what is clear is that the U.S. Constitution never included a secession provision. If the people of the Southern states really wanted to preserve a Constitutional right to secession, they were foolish for not demanding a Constitutional provision on the issue. Any half decent partnership agreement, for example, contains a dissolution clause which sets forth the procedures for winding up the partnership should one or more of the partners choose to go their separate way which specifies how the assets and liabilities will be distributed. The absence of such a provision in the U.S. Constitution strongly suggests that peaceful secession was never seriously considered by any state entering into the Union.

This can only be true, if, and only if, the 9th and 10th Amendments are meaningless. If they are meaningless, the situation begs the question, why are they there?

So, now answer: Why do you believe the 9th and 10th Amendments exist given your above stated belief?

[Maelstrom]

Re: 288 1st Amendment, Freedom of Association, but that doesn't support the power of government over states either.

[Movemout]

"If it takes approval of the Fed Congress to change a state boundary how in the world would it be constitutional for a state to drop out of the union? "

An interesting question- if you are from Texas, as your nick implies, you might note the unusual conditions that Texas imposed on the USA prior to joining the union. One was the right to secede from the USA. r9etb has written a nice piece here but it ignores the context in which the union was formed. I do not think that any state was willing to concede its existence to the power of a federal authority.

[Maelstrom]

re:295

Worse than that, the Federal troops moved into Ft. Sumpter as an effective choke point against Charleston once reinforcements arrived. The commander knew reinforcements were coming with appropriate artillery. The reason the Feds were there in the first place was to collect the tariffs that was one of the sticking points causing the South to secede.

[Non-Sequitur]

1816.

[Non-Sequitur]

It was part of the Supreme Court's majority decision in Texas v. White which found the southern acts of arbitrary secession illegal.

[The Raven]

You assume liberism is NOT an insurrection. The Fed has already been captured.

Williams said "states were sovereign; the federal government was a creation, an agent, a servant of the states."

Which was correct. And you need not go back to the Civil War - just check out Alaska's politics in the 90's.

I would support and applaud a State's right to secede. If Alaska gets fed up with Left Coast liberalism and it's duly elected legislature opts out of the Union, that's not an insurrection - it's state-of-the-art, lassiez-faire ("leave me alone" [Fr.]) capitalism.

[Non-Sequitur]

Thanks, but dueling is for gentlemen and that leaves her out.

[The Raven]

>> but the 2nd amendment is specifically designed so the people can be armed should a rebellion be necessary.

Pure freedom requires a volunteer army and besides, the Founders were skeptical of a standing army.

[Non-Sequitur]

If states have territorial sovereignty then why do they need consent of Congress. Congress cannot split or join states against their will, but if the legislature of two states agree to join the states together that vote still means nothing unless Congress approves. It has an effective veto on any actions of the states which affect their status in any way. That doesn't sound like state sovereignty to me.

[Non-Sequitur]

No, what it says is powers reserved to the United States. It says nothing about having to be explicit. The fact that no other change in status of the states is allowed without consent of Congress and that no other arbitrary actions are permitted on the part of the states where the interests of other states may be involved are allowed by the Constitution makes it clear that these are powers reserved to the United States and neither the states or their people can assume them.