Posted on 08/06/2015 10:18:43 PM PDT by PizzaDriver
You, too. Yankees had slaves, too.
Lincoln SAID his only objective was to save the Union. In one of his most familiar statements, he said he would free the slaves if that would save the Union, or free none of the slaves if that would save the Union, or would free half of them and not free the other half, if that would save the Union.
Making Lincoln into a warrior-saint, who waged war to free the slaves—that’s the revisionism.
Lincoln took an oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States. Nowhere in the Constitution are the states listed. Lincoln’s oath did not commit him to killing hundreds of thousands of people to prevent secession.
As proof it would have been possible for US, the The United Kingdom ended slavery in gradual steps across the Empire without a civil war. That should have been an exemplar for us if sanity had prevailed.
“Lincoln’s oath did not commit him to killing hundreds of thousands of people to prevent secession.”
What are the “lessons learned” and how should the American people apply them?
One way is negative and deflating and the other keeps it real.
Just my opinion after a number of years at FR and observing how some are swayed by the negative route and end up stuck in a useless loop where all they can do is carp about the bad and ignore the good - sure losing strategy.
The ones with staying power will be: Cruz, Trump, Walker, Rubio, Kasich and Bush. The last two I like the least—unfortunately, the MSM luvs them the most.
Huckabee joined the list with his craven, deceptive pandering on Social Security.
Blacks had slaves too. Read the founding documents of the CSA to find that it is slavery first last and always that they cared about. Look back to the 1840s and 1850s leading up to Lincoln’s election in 1860. The southern democrats (the very ones who became KKK and later became the stalwarts of the progressive big government 20th century democrat party) were ties hook line and sinker to slavery. They hated Lincoln before he was elected and made all sorts of statements about what they (the elected elite) would do if he won.
“Making Lincoln into a warrior-saint....”
No one here has done that. Get over yourself. Slavery then as now was evil. That it still occurs is a stain on humanity. That the US had the courage to abolish it is to our nation’s credit.
That Lincoln had motives that were not pure is meaningless. That states seceded in order to keep others in slavery is NOT open to debate. The CSA founding documents prove that the elite democrats of the day did just that.
Your ‘literalist’is nonsense. Through out The Constitution ut refers to the United States, to the several states, to the authority and consent needed to form confederations, make treaties, etc etc.
That you have some odd notion, fed by democrats since the 1840s, that the Civil War was not to keep the Union as a union is nonsense. That you for some reason think it would have been good to break the union and allow others to continue the evil that is and was slavery is an odd way of looking at history
It is revisionist history to suggest that this was only about’ states rights’. That dog didn’t hun t when the defeated confederates spread it during the 1870s. It is as rank today as it was then. It is what was used to justify the evil that the KKK did and the horrors that were inflicted on human beings in the name of ‘tradition’.
The year sir is 2015. It is passed time to acknowledge that slavery is and was wrong. That it is a good thing that this country had the courage to act in an manner to end it
Where was Mitch McConnell and the National Republican Senatorial Committee in 2012 to support Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock, or Christine O'Donnell in 2010?
-PJ
Who said slavery was a good thing? Show me where I said it.
The Southern states exercised their natural right of secession, and Lincoln waged a war for the purpose of snuffing out that right.
Of course the Constitution refers to the States. But it contains no list of the States. And it most assuredly contains not a word by which the States surrender their natural right of secession. That is something that no generation COULD do on behalf of their posterity.
The Civil War was an unjust war. One could argue it was an unjust war on both sides, because the North fought to snuff out the natural right of secession, and the South fought to preserve slavery.
One thing is certain: Because nothing in the Constitution denies the natural right of secession, Lincoln’s oath of office did not oblige or authorize him to wage war against that natural right.
Long before secession, the northern merchants had stopped making money off the importation of new slaves and the Golden Triangle had lost some of its glitter.
Instead, the Union tried to use slaves as an economic sanction against states it was determined to keep in the union as a source of cheap materials for the northern mills, but waited until during the war to do so.
Primarily, the War was like all wars: economic.
When you consider that 90%+ of those who fought for the south did not own slaves, the slavery issue was an issue, but hardly THE issue.
When one considers that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, and that that consent had been revoked, the Union fought to impose its government upon the States in secession.
They had no ‘natural right of secession’.
In case you forgot, the CSA fired the first shot putting them in a state of rebellion against the United States.
Since you want to be such a hot shot tell me where in the Constitution it says there is ANY right to secede??? It doesn’t but it does provide other means to redress grievances.
You can re-fight every war ever fought if you wish but it is futile
Of puhleeeeeze, that is one of the dumbest arguments I have ever heard “But it contains no list of the States.”
You can play the silly game all you want. There is no natural right to secession. (Natural Law never suggests such a thing). The Constitution does not give the states a right to secede. It does give them a means to re-dress grievances. the CSA (driven by democratic elites) fired the first rounds precisely to protect their peculiar instituion.
Had the SCOTUS been anything other than a bought and paid for corrupt institution the Dred Scott case would NEVER have been decided the way it was.
The fact that you seem to think considering some human beings to be less human than others and hence allows you to declare the CIvil War ‘unjust’ shows exactly how corrupt the ‘just war’ theory is
Good list. I’d add Christie.
I have no issue with those who’s ancestors fought for the CSA. My own people fought on both sides of the war. If you have read my posts then you know I have slammed the slave owning plantation owners who were the political elite of the day (and most were Democrat). Families have passed down that the Civil War was about states’ rights but read the newspapers of the time and the founding documents. SCOTUS had wickedly ruled on Dred Scott saying a human being is really property ( ALL should be ashamed of that just as today ALL should be ashamed of Roe v. Wade).
The democrats of the south had promised they would break the union if Lincoln were elected. Even northern democrats were clamoring that Lincoln’s election would be catastrophic.
Never forget that the first shots fired were fired by the CSA. They ignored the Constitution and its remedies for re-dress.
Yes I agree there is a large economic factor ( asz are all wars no?) But continuing to suggest that slavery was not prominent in the founding documents and minds of the leaders of the CSA is nonsense. What was the state right that was being yelled about? That SLAVES who had run away (as any human being who wants to be free would do) HAD to be returned because they were really property. When northern states refused to do so the CSA decided to take matters into their own hands.
The shame of slavery is born by all who tolerated it...Yes timnes were different but the Abolition movement had been around for more than a little while. The idea that one could find justification in the Bible and from God for such treatment of humans is unimaginable. And yet I can turn to as recedtly as the 1960s and listen to the very words of the southern democrat politicians who told us then (as before) that really this is the way things should be.
The consent was not revoked. The CSA attacked the federal government. There were other ways to handle it. Unless of course you are suggesting that going to war against the federal government is somehow better than say using Article V.
I mean you no harm. I do not disrespect your families history. But please let us not pretend that slavery was some how a benign institution that really helped folks.
Read the Declaration of Independence. That there is a natural right to secede from a government or realm is among the self-evident truths asserted at the very beginning of the document.
Obviously, since you are unfamiliar with the Declaration of Independence, there is no reason for anyone to pay attention to your eructations.
I was waiting for that.....
That declaration was to the world in order to try and get support for shay in effect was treasonous behavior.
The Constitution is our governing document.
And had the King’s men beaten us in 1776, then this discussion would be moot.
Your logic and knowledge of history need work
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