Posted on 12/22/2011 3:04:51 PM PST by Federalist Patriot
Now this is a great ad from American Crossroads! Let’s hope we see a 30-second or 1-minute version of this playing in 2012 during the General Election Campaign.
It uses Obama’s own words against him, where he recently decreed himself to be essentially the fourth best President in the history of the United States in terms of his accomplishments! There’s nothing like the ego of “The One.”
(Excerpt) Read more at freedomslighthouse.net ...
I thought the comment about treason was interesting, but I'm not sure I would agree that it is correct. The Constitution actually says:
Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying War against themThe question is whether this envisions levying war against all of the States (which it could only be said Lincoln did by abrogating the Constitution which would also render its definition of treason as meaningless) or if two or more States, or even just one, would be sufficient.
ML/NJ
-There is a good reason why the Lincoln legend has taken on such mythical proportions: Much of what Americans think they know about Abraham Lincoln is in fact a myth. Let’s consider a few of the more prominent ones.
Myth #1: Lincoln invaded the South to free the slaves. Ending slavery and racial injustice is not why the North invaded. As Lincoln wrote to Horace Greeley on Aug. 22, 1862: “My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and it is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it”
Congress announced to the world on July 22, 1861, that the purpose of the war was not “interfering with the rights or established institutions of those states” (i.e., slavery), but to preserve the Union “with the rights of the several states unimpaired.” At the time of Fort Sumter (April 12, 1861) only the seven states of the deep South had seceded. There were more slaves in the Union than out of it, and Lincoln had no plans to free any of them.
The North invaded to regain lost federal tax revenue by keeping the Union intact by force of arms. In his First Inaugural Lincoln promised to invade any state that failed to collect “the duties and imposts,” and he kept his promise. On April 19, 1861, the reason Lincoln gave for his naval blockade of the Southern ports was that “the collection of the revenue cannot be effectually executed” in the states that had seceded.
Myth #2: Lincoln’s war saved the Union. The war may have saved the Union geographically, but it destroyed it philosophically by destroying its voluntary nature. In the Articles of Confederation, the Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution, the states described themselves as “free and independent.” They delegated certain powers to the federal government they had created as their agent but retained sovereignty for themselves.
This was widely understood in the North as well as the South in 1861. As the Brooklyn Daily Eagle editorialized on Nov. 13, 1860, the Union “depends for its continuance on the free consent and will of the sovereign people of each state, and when that consent and will is withdrawn on either part, their Union is gone.” The New York Journal of Commerce concurred, writing on Jan. 12, 1861, that a coerced Union changes the nature of government from “a voluntary one, in which the people are sovereigns, to a despotism where one part of the people are slaves.” The majority of Northern newspapers agreed.
Myth #3: Lincoln championed equality and natural rights. His words and, more important, his actions, repudiate this myth. “I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races,” he announced in his Aug. 21, 1858, debate with Stephen Douglas. “I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position.” And, “Free them [slaves] and make them politically and socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this. We cannot, then, make them equals.”
In Springfield, Ill., on July 17, 1858, Lincoln said, “What I would most desire would be the separation of the white and black races.” On Sept. 18, 1858, in Charleston, Ill., he said: “I will to the very last stand by the law of this state, which forbids the marrying of white people with Negroes.”
Lincoln supported the Illinois Constitution, which prohibited the emigration of black people into the state, and he also supported the Illinois Black Codes, which deprived the small number of free blacks in the state any semblance of citizenship. He strongly supported the Fugitive Slave Act, which compelled Northern states to capture runaway slaves and return them to their owners. In his First Inaugural he pledged his support of a proposed constitutional amendment that had just passed the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives that would have prohibited the federal government from ever having the power “to abolish or interfere, within any State, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State.” In his First Inaugural Lincoln advocated making this amendment “express and irrevocable.”
Lincoln was also a lifelong advocate of “colonization” or shipping all black people to Africa, Central America, Haiti—anywhere but here. “I cannot make it better known than it already is,” he stated in a Dec. 1, 1862, Message to Congress, “that I strongly favor colonization.” To Lincoln, blacks could be “equal,” but not in the United States.
Myth #4: Lincoln was a defender of the Constitution. Quite the contrary: Generations of historians have labeled Lincoln a “dictator.” “Dictatorship played a decisive role in the North’s successful effort to maintain the Union by force of arms,” wrote Clinton Rossiter in “Constitutional Dictatorship.” And, “Lincoln’s amazing disregard for the Constitution was considered by nobody as legal.”
James G. Randall documented Lincoln’s assault on the Constitution in “Constitutional Problems Under Lincoln.” Lincoln unconstitutionally suspended the writ of habeas corpus and had the military arrest tens of thousands of Northern political opponents, including dozens of newspaper editors and owners. Some 300 newspapers were shut down and all telegraph communication was censored. Northern elections were rigged; Democratic voters were intimidated by federal soldiers; hundreds of New York City draft protesters were gunned down by federal troops; West Virginia was unconstitutionally carved out of Virginia; and the most outspoken member of the Democratic Party opposition, Congressman Clement L. Vallandigham of Ohio, was deported. Duly elected members of the Maryland legislature were imprisoned, as was the mayor of Baltimore and Congressman Henry May. The border states were systematically disarmed in violation of the Second Amendment and private property was confiscated. Lincoln’s apologists say he had “to destroy the Constitution in order to save it.”
Myth #5: Lincoln was a “great humanitarian” who had “malice toward none.” This is inconsistent with the fact that Lincoln micromanaged the waging of war on civilians, including the burning of entire towns populated only by civilians; massive looting and plundering; rape; and the execution of civilians (See Mark Grimsley, “The Hard Hand of War”). Pro-Lincoln historian Lee Kennett wrote in “Marching Through Georgia” that, had the Confederates somehow won, they would have been justified in “stringing up President Lincoln and the entire Union high command” as war criminals.
Myth #6: War was necessary to end slavery. During the 19th century, dozens of countries, including the British and Spanish empires, ended slavery peacefully through compensated emancipation. Among such countries were Argentina, Colombia, Chile, all of Central America, Mexico, Bolivia, Uruguay, the French and Danish colonies, Ecuador, Peru, and Venezuela. (Lincoln did propose compensated emancipation for the border states, but coupled his proposal with deportation of any freed slaves. He failed to see it through, however). Only in America was war associated with emancipation.
In sum, the power of the state ultimately rests upon a series of myths about the alleged munificence of our rulers. Nothing serves this purpose better than the Lincoln myth. This should be kept in mind by all who visit the new Lincoln statue in Richmond.
THOMAS DILORENZO
What Lincoln did was forever change the relationship between the people and those who represent them. After Lincoln blew the ideals of federalism all to hell - the only so-called sovereign left in the room was the agent for the "mutual benefit" of the several States.
Lincoln July 4, 1861:
Our States have neither more nor less power than that reserved to them in the Union by the Constitution, no one of them ever having been a State out of the Union . The original ones passed into the Union even before they cast off their British colonial dependence, and the new ones each came into the Union directly from a condition of dependence, excepting Texas; and even Texas, in its temporary independence, was never designated a State. The new ones only took the designation of States on coming into the Union, while that name was first adopted for the old ones in and by the Declaration of Independence . . . . Having never been States, either in substance or in name, outside of the Union, whence this magical omnipotence of "State rights," asserting a claim of power to lawfully destroy the Union itself? Much is said about the "sovereignty" of the States, but the word even is not in the National Constitution, nor, as is believed, in any of the State constitutions. What is a "sovereignty" in the political sense of the term? Would it be far wrong to define it "a political community without a political superior"? Tested by this, no one of our States, except Texas , ever was a sovereignty. . .
James Madison:
Give me leave to say something of the nature of the government. . . . Who are the parties to it? The people--not the people as composing one great body, but the people as composing thirteen sovereignties.
Were it, as the gentleman asserts, a consolidated government, the assent of a majority of the people would be sufficient for its establishment: and as a majority have adopted it already, the remaining States would be bound by the act of the majority, even if they unanimously reprobated it.
A Constitutional History of Secession, Gretna, Louisiana: Pelican Publishing Company, 2002, p. 287:
It is an historical fact that, on two occasions during their deliberations, the framers in the Philadelphia Convention voted to deny Congress the power of calling forth military forces of the Union to compel obedience of a state, and on two further occasions they voted to deny Congress the power of sending the Federal army or navy into the territory of any state, except as allowed under Article IV, Section 4 of the United States Constitution--to repel a foreign invasion or at the request of its legislature or governor to deal with domestic violence.
Federalist #39:
Were the people regarded in this transaction as forming one nation, the will of the majority of the whole people of the United States would bind the minority, in the same manner as the majority in each State must bind the minority; and the will of the majority must be determined either by a comparison of the individual votes, or by considering the will of the majority of the States as evidence of the will of a majority of the people of the United States. Neither of these rules have been adopted. Each State, in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body, independent of all others, and only to be bound by its own voluntary act.
I guess one could say the same of Obama and Depression II. And you would sort of be correct as Lincoln caused the war and Obama is responsible for Depression II.
State sovereignty was ended by Lincoln. It didn't return at all after the war. If you do not think State sovereignty was an important part of what Jefferson, Madison, et al., had in mind then there is no point in continuing the discussion.
ML/NJ
ML/NJ
It also says:
So the US Constitution is absolutely clear in saying that waging war against the United States or giving aid and comfort to our enemies is Treason.
And yet the pro-Confederate propagandists on this Napolitano link turn that on its head, making it sound like Lincoln in defending the United States against those who formally declared war, that Lincoln committed Treason.
Now seriously, Idabilly, you have to know: when they can't make their case without blatant lies, then all we're talking about here is propaganda nonsense.
Napolitano especially, ought to be ashamed of himself.
OK, Mr. "I demand the facts or you shut up" tell us the date of the 10th Amendment's repeal.
Monticello, January 8, 1825.
Dear Sir,—I returned the first volume of Hall by a mail of a week ago, and by this, shall return the second. We have kept them long, but every member of the family wished to read his book, in which case, you know, it had a long gantlet to run. It is impossible to read thoroughly such writings as those of Harper and Otis, who take a page to say what requires but a sentence, or rather, who give you whole pages of what is nothing to the purpose. A cursory race over the ground is as much as they can claim. It is easy for them, at this day, to endeavor to whitewash their party, when the greater part are dead of those who witnessed what passed, others old and become indifferent to the subject, and others indisposed to take the trouble of answering them. As to Otis, his attempt is to prove that the sun does not shine at mid-day; that that is not a fact which every one saw. He merits no notice. It is well known that Harper had little scruple about facts where detection was not obvious. By placing in false lights whatever admits it, and passing over in silence what does not, a plausible aspect may be presented of anything. He takes great pains to prove, for instance, that Hamilton was no monarchist, by exaggerating his own intimacy with him, and the impossibility, if he was so, that he should not, at some time, have betrayed it to him. This may pass with uninformed readers, but not with those who have had it from Hamilton's own mouth. I am one of those, and but one of many. At my own table, in presence of Mr. Adams, Knox, Randolph, and myself, in a dispute between Mr. Adams and himself, he avowed his preference of monarchy over every other government, and his opinion that the English was the most perfect model of government ever devised by the wit of man, Mr. Adams agreeing "if its corruptions were done away." While Hamilton insisted that "with these corruptions it was perfect, and without them it would be an impracticable government." Can any one read Mr. Adams' defence of the American Constitutions without seeing that he was a monarchist? And J. Q. Adams, the son, was more explicit than the father, in his answer to Paine's Rights of Man. So much for leaders. Their followers were divided. Some went the same lengths; others, and I believe the greater part, only wished a stronger Executive. When I arrived at New York in 1790, to take a part in the administration, being fresh from the French Revolution, while in its first and pure stage, and consequently somewhat whetted up in my own republican principles, I found a state of things, in the general society of the place, which I could not have supposed possible. Being a stranger there, I was feasted from table to table, at large set dinners, the parties generally from twenty to thirty. The revolution I had left, and that we had just gone through in the recent change of our own government, being the common topics of conversation, I was astonished to find the general prevalence of monarchical sentiments, insomuch that in maintaining those of republicanism, I had always the whole company on my hands, never scarcely finding among them a single co-advocate in that argument, unless some old member of Congress happened to be present. The furthest that any one would go, in support of the republican features of our new government, would be to say, "the present Constitution is well as a beginning, and may be allowed a fair trial; but it is, in fact, only a stepping-stone to something better." Among their writers, Denny, the editor of the Portfolio, who was a kind of oracle with them, and styled the Addison of America, openly avowed his preference of monarchy over all other forms of government, prided himself on the avowal, and maintained it by argument freely and without reserve, in his publications. I do not, myself, know that the Essex junto of Boston were monarchists, but I have always heard it so said, and never doubted.
These, my dear Sir, are but detached items from a great mass of proofs then fully before the public. They are unknown to you, because you were absent in Europe, and they are now disavowed by the party. But, had it not been for the firm and determined stand then made by a counter-party, no man can say what our government would have been at this day. Monarchy, to be sure, is now defeated, and they wish it should be forgotten that it was ever advocated. They see that it is desperate, and treat its imputation to them as a calumny; and I verily believe that none of them have it now in direct aim. Yet the spirit is not done away.[ Must have known about Saint Lincoln] The same party takes now what they deem the next best ground, the consolidation of the government; the giving to the federal member of the government, by unlimited constructions of the Constitution, a control over all the functions of the States, and the concentration of all power ultimately at Washington.
The true history of that conflict of parties will never be in possession of the public, until, by the death of the actors in it, the hoards of their letters shall be broken up and given to the world. I should not fear to appeal to those of Harper himself, if he has kept copies of them, for abundant proof that he was himself a monarchist. I shall not live to see these unrevealed proofs, nor probably you; for time will be requisite. But time will, in the end, produce the truth. And, after all, it is but a truth which exists in every country, where not suppressed by the rod of despotism. Men, according to their constitutions, and the circumstances in which they are placed, differ honestly in opinion. Some are Whigs, Liberals, Democrats, call them what you please. Others are Tories, Serviles, Aristocrats, etc. The latter fear the people, and wish to transfer all power to the higher classes of society; the former consider the people as the safest depository of power in the last resort; they cherish them therefore, and wish to leave in them all the powers to the exercise of which they are competent. This is the division of sentiment now existing in the United States. It is the common division of Whig and Tory, or according to our denominations of republican and federal; and is the most salutary of all divisions, and ought, therefore, to be fostered, instead of being amalgamated. For, take away this, and some more dangerous principle of division will take its place. But there is really no amalgamation. The parties exist now as heretofore. The one, indeed, has thrown off its old name, and has not yet assumed a new one, although obviously consolidationists. And among those in the offices of every denomination I believe it to be a bare minority.
I have gone into these facts to show how one-sided a view of this case Harper has presented. I do not recall these recollections with pleasure, but rather wish to forget them, nor did I ever permit them to affect social intercourse. And now, least of all, am disposed to do so. Peace and good will with all mankind is my sincere wish. I willingly leave to the present generation to conduct their affairs as they please. And in my general affection to the whole human family, and my particular devotion to my friends, be assured of the high and special estimation in which yourself is cordially held. -Thomas Jefferson
As we have discussed on these threads many times, Lincoln did not do that.
The active agents here were Deep-South slave-holders who:
Nor can Lincoln be blamed for the actions of Southern-supported Progressive Democrats' -- in relentlessly increasing the size and power of the Federal government, beginning over 50 years after Lincoln's death.
And of course you know all this, but you continue to spout your propaganda anyway.
But first remember, the problem with the old Ariticles of Confederation was too much "state sovereignty" and not enough Federal power.
One result was Shay's Rebellion and it was, in part, precisely to provide the Federal government with powers to suppress such rebellions that the new Constitution was framed and ratified.
So "state sovereignty" was already reduced under the new Constitution.
Second, remember our Founders expressed their Original Intent on constitutional methods for secession -- it must be by mutual agreement or, in effect, from some material breech of contract, none of which existed in November 1860, when Deep-South slave-holders first began the process to declare secession.
Third, remember the real assault on "state sovereignty" did not begin until the early 1900s "Progressive Era" constitutional amendments on income tax and direct election of senators.
These allowed the Federal government to grow by a factor of ten -- from around 2% to now over 20% of GDP.
And most of these changes were supported by the allegedly "conservative" Solid South.
Point is, instead of blaming Lincoln for all your woes, how about looking in your own mirror?
It was never intended that the citizens in a majority of states could employ the federal government as an instrument of violence to force the citizens in a minority of states to keep their states in the Union against their will. BTW -The Unconstitutional invasion of Sovereign States was a breech of contract.
“The use of force against a state would look more like a declaration of war than an infliction of punishment, and would probably be considered by the party attacked as a dissolution of all previous compacts by which it might be bound.”
Simultaneously they began to commit many acts of increasing rebellion or war against the United States, culminating in the attack on and seizure of Fort Sumter in April 1861.
First of all, the federal seizure of Fort Sumter was done in violation of the status quo agreement between President Buchanan and South Carolina :
You say that the fort was garrisoned for our protection, and is held for the same purposes for which it has ever been held since its construction. Are you not aware, that to hold, in the territory of a foreign power, a fortress against her will, avowedly for the purpose of protecting her citizens, is perhaps the highest insult which one government can offer to another? But Fort Sumter was never garrisoned at all until South Carolina had dissolved her connection with your government. This garrison entered it in the night, with every circumstance of secrecy, after spiking the guns and burning the gun-carriages and cutting down the flag-staff of an adjacent fort, which was then abandoned. South Carolina had not taken Fort Sumter into her own possession, only because of her misplaced confidence in a government which deceived her.
So the historical fact is that Lincoln responded to the Confederate War of Aggression against the United States. Such necessary actions as he took to win the war cannot be blamed on Lincoln, but on those Deep-South slave-holders who chose to start the war.
Dear BroJoeK,
“That the people of the North shall consider themselves as more blessed than we, more civilized, and happier, is not a matter at which we would complain at all, if they would only content themselves with believing that to be the fact; but when they come and attempt to propagandize, and insist that we shall be as perfect as they imagine themselves to be, then it is that their good opinion of themselves becomes offensive to us.
Let my neighbor believe that his wife is an angel and his children cherubs, I care not, though I may know he is mistaken; but when he comes impertinently poking his nose into my door every morning, and telling me that my wife is a shrew and my children brats, then the neighborhood becomes uncomfortable, and if I cannot remove him, I will remove myself; and if he says to me, “you shall not move, but you shall stay here, and you shall, day after day, hear the demerits of your wife and children discussed,” then I begin to feel a little restive, and possibly might assert that great original right of pursuing whatever may conduce to my happiness, though it might be kicking him out of my door.
If New England would only be content with the blessings which she imagines she has, we would not disturb her in her happiness.”---- Texas Senator Louis Wigfall:
These words could well describe Jefferson's own tenure as President, which means that they basically amount to nothing more than partisan political propaganda in a presidential election which was decided, on February 9, in the House of Representatives.
Remember, in 1825, all four presidential candidates were from Jefferson's own political party -- the Democratic-Republicans -- and that included John Q. Adams who eventually won.
But Jefferson here seems to be arguing against the old Federalists, accusing them of being "monarchists" -- perhaps by implication expressing his opposition to John Q. Adams.
To my knowledge, none of those here accused by Jefferson of being a "monarchist" ever admitted to such a charge.
And Jefferson's own actions increasing the power of Federal government mean that his commentary here amounts to, well, political hogwash.
Idabilly, you know you are nothing but a propagandist when you refuse to acknowledge the basic facts of the case: that not only did Deep-South slave-holders unconstitutionally secede, but they simultaneously committed many acts of increasing rebellion and war against the United States before formally declaring war, on May 6, 1861.
No Federal troops were used to kill any Confederate soldiers before that declaration of war.
And once the Confederacy declared war, all such arguments as you make here are utter and complete rubbish -- fit only for dedicated propagandists.
Idabilly: "South Carolina had not taken Fort Sumter into her own possession, only because of her misplaced confidence in a government which deceived her."
Fort Sumter was Federal property, period.
Any Confederate action to restrict Federal access to Federal property was an act of rebellion or war against the United States.
The Confederacy had no more legal right to seize Fort Sumter than it did to seize a federal fort in, say, Massachusetts.
Idabilly quoting Wigfall: "If New England would only be content with the blessings which she imagines she has, we would not disturb her in her happiness.”---- Texas Senator Louis Wigfall:"
Wigfall resigned from the Senate on March 23, 1861, before Fort Sumter, but he advocated the Confederacy should seize both Sumter and Pickens.
Which means that his words here amount to nonsense and lies.
Wigfall arrived in Charleston, South Carolina, in time to cheer on Confederates seizing Fort Sumter.
He was later appointed a Texas infantry brigade commander, before serving in the Confederate Congress.
After the war Wigfall escaped to live in London, England, where he fomented trouble between the United States and Britain.
He died in 1874 in Galveston, Texas, where he is buried.
And you ignore the fact that the States are sovereign.
THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF WISCONSIN: The Constitution of the United States is, in its more essential and fundamental character, a tri-partite instrument. The parties to it are: The States, The People, and The United States. The latter is, indeed, a resulting party, brought into existence by it, but when thus created, bound in all respects by its provisions. It is practically represented by its several departments, deriving their powers directly and severally through its respective grants. It is derivative, not original. Previous to the operative vitality of the Constitution, this third party to the instrument was non-existent, and of course powerless. The other two parties, the States and the People, were pre-existent, endowed with all the essential elements of sovereignty.
One great and fundamental mistake has been made in respect to the second party to the federal Constitution, viz: the People. This party, here spoken of, cannot be considered as the people inhabiting the whole territory embraced within the boundaries of the original thirteen States, as operating in mass, as one undivided and indivisible community. Previous to the formation of the government of the United States, there was no such political existence; and of course, there being no such government, there could be no people of such government, or political division or organization. It is unnecessary, in this connexion, to refer to the confederation of the States, because that did not, in fact, constitute a government; nor will any one pretend that the people of the confederated States created the present federal government in their capacity of a primary and ultimate source of political power, operating to institute a new and original government; because, to have done this, they must have necessarily first dissolved the State governments under which they were then living and acting, and absolved themselves from allegiance thereto. They did no such thing. The "people" mentioned in the preamble to the Constitution, and often referred to in judicial discussions, must, it seems to me, necessarily mean the people of the United States; that is, the people of the several States united; so many uniting as were deemed a sufficient number to warrant the institution of the new government, and render safe the delegation of certain powers before possessed by the respective States. The State governments pre-existed. If a portion of the citizens of a State had assembled to divest the State of an attribute of its sovereignty, without the assent of the State, it would have been treason, or revolution. If the people of the whole territory of the thirteen States had combined to divest the respective States of any of their proper attributes of sovereignty, without the assent of the States, it would have been closely allied to treason or conquest. But it was neither the one nor the other. The people referred to, must be intended to mean the people of the respective States, operating legitimately through their properly constituted authorities, in conformity with their legally established modes of procedure. As the people of the respective States, did they adopt the Constitution. By the authority of the STATES were the people called upon to adopt or reject the Constitution. By the people of the respective STATES was it adopted and when ratified by nine STATES, Const. U. S. Art. 7, (not a majority of the people of the Union to be formed,) was it to become operative. The States, as such, were distinctly recognized through every stage of progress, from the inception to the consummation of the plan of Union; and through the State organizations only could the first step be taken, and through those organizations only can the people of the Union now impress their will upon the measures or action of the government. Indeed, the federal Constitution provides no mode by which, in any case, can the people of the Union affect the federal government, but through the State organizations, and by the instrumentalities furnished by the governments of the respective States.
The States, therefore, as pre-existing sovereignties, are clearly parties to the federal compact, and, together with their respective people, were the creators of the third party to the compact, viz: The United States.
Nor was the Constitution of the United States submitted to the whole people of the thirteen States for adoption, but to the people of each State, represented in convention called for that purpose, by the authority of each State. On the question of its adoption or rejection, the people of each State, whether many or few, had an equal voice. They spoke on that question for their State, and the small States had an equal voice with the large.
Rubbish.
The degree of "states sovereignty" was previously determined by the old Articles of Confederation, now replaced by the new Constitution.
In neither was sovereignty 100%, since 100% sovereignty would mean states are independent nations, along the lines of, say, France or Britain.
Even in the old Articles of Confederation states, in effect, ceded some of their sovereignty to the national government.
In the new Constitution, they ceded more.
Of course, states never officially ceded as much sovereignty as the Federal government has today assumed.
But the Great Federal Power Grab began under 1900s era Progressive Democrats, not Abraham Lincoln's Republicans.
But let's be truthful here: in the past 100 years states have not seriously contested Federal power because they have been bribed with gushers of Federal money generated by the 1913 16th Amendment income tax.
You might even say that for nearly 100 years now, states have been "drugged" with Federal money, and that is the root cause of their reduced sovereignty.
Myth 1. Lincoln didn’t invade the south to free the slaves. Rather the south illegally pretended secession so they could further slavery. Lincoln didn’t accept their illegal acts, and so the rebels resorted to war, which they lost.
Myth 2. Lincoln’s war saved the Union.
Southerners made war on the US to enable them to break the Union. Lincoln stopped that, at great cost.
Myth 3. Lincoln championed equality and natural rights.
Lincoln supported the 13th 14th and 15th amendment which secured those natural rights.
Myth 4. Lincoln was a defender of the Constitution.
Lincoln responded to the war begun by the southern rebels. In so doing, he did not respond with legal writs vs. Cannonballs. Rebellion is not a legal process. Accordingly, responding to it occurs in ways that are not always bound by legal process. The southern rebels lost their war, and then complain that it wasn’t legal enough. Call an Wahhmbulance!
Myth 5. Lincoln was a “great humanitarian” who had “malice toward none.” Lincoln had malice toward none after the rebellion ended. Hood set fire to much of Atlanta as he withdrew. So did Sherman. Insurrection is a violent bloody thing, very uncomfortable, makes you late for dinner. If you don’t like that game, don’t play.
I contrast your state court ruling with a ruling of the supreme court of the United States, that of Texas v. White, which ruled that secession, as practiced by the states in the rebellion, was illegal.
So cowboy: what is your flavor of religion?
Put up or shut up.
Lincoln didn’t pursue a legal case after the south started shooting. The Confederates never had much of a legal system, Jeff Davis never got around to appointing anyone to the pretended Confederate Supreme Court.
The southern insurrectionists didn’t pursue a legal case until after they lost the war. Then their legal case, (Texas v. White) was lost too.
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