If Secession Was Illegal - then How Come...?

The Patriotist ^ | 2003 | Al Benson, Jr.

[Aurelius]

Over the years I've heard many rail at the South for seceding from the 'glorious Union.' They claim that Jeff Davis and all Southerners were really nothing but traitors - and some of these people were born and raised in the South and should know better, but don't, thanks to their government school 'education.'

Frank Conner, in his excellent book The South Under Siege 1830-2000 deals in some detail with the question of Davis' alleged 'treason.' In referring to the Northern leaders he noted: "They believed the most logical means of justifying the North's war would be to have the federal government convict Davis of treason against the United States. Such a conviction must presuppose that the Confederate States could not have seceded from the Union; so convicting Davis would validate the war and make it morally legitimate."

Although this was the way the federal government planned to proceed, that prolific South-hater, Thaddeus Stevens, couldn't keep his mouth shut and he let the cat out of the bag. Stevens said: "The Southerners should be treated as a conquered alien enemy...This can be done without violence to the established principles only on the theory that the Southern states were severed from the Union and were an independent government de facto and an alien enemy to be dealt with according to the laws of war...No reform can be effected in the Southern States if they have never left the Union..." And, although he did not plainly say it, what Stevens really desired was that the Christian culture of the Old South be 'reformed' into something more compatible with his beliefs. No matter how you look at it, the feds tried to have it both ways - they claimed the South was in rebellion and had never been out of the Union, but then it had to do certain things to 'get back' into the Union it had never been out of. Strange, is it not, that the 'history' books never seem to pick up on this?

At any rate, the Northern government prepared to try President Davis for treason while it had him in prison. Mr. Conner has observed that: "The War Department presented its evidence for a treason trial against Davis to a famed jurist, Francis Lieber, for his analysis. Lieber pronounced 'Davis will not be found guilty and we shall stand there completely beaten'." According to Mr. Conner, U.S. Attorney General James Speed appointed a renowned attorney, John J. Clifford, as his chief prosecutor. Clifford, after studying the government's evidence against Davis, withdrew from the case. He said he had 'grave doubts' about it. Not to be undone, Speed then appointed Richard Henry Dana, a prominent maritime lawyer, to the case. Mr. Dana also withdrew. He said basically, that as long as the North had won a military victory over the South, they should just be satisfied with that. In other words - "you won the war, boys, so don't push your luck beyond that."

Mr. Conner tells us that: "In 1866 President Johnson appointed a new U.S. attorney general, Henry Stanburg. But Stanburg wouldn't touch the case either. Thus had spoken the North's best and brightest jurists re the legitimacy of the War of Northern Aggression - even though the Jefferson Davis case offered blinding fame to the prosecutor who could prove that the South had seceded unconstitutionally." None of these bright lights from the North would touch this case with a ten-foot pole. It's not that they were dumb, in fact the reverse is true. These men knew a dead horse when they saw it and were not about to climb aboard and attempt to ride it across the treacherous stream of illegal secession. They knew better. In fact, a Northerner from New York, Charles O'Connor, became the legal counsel for Jeff Davis - without charge. That, plus the celebrity jurists from the North that refused to touch the case, told the federal government that they really had no case against Davis or secession and that Davis was merely being held as a political prisoner.

Author Richard Street, writing in The Civil War back in the 1950s said exactly the same thing. Referring to Jeff Davis, Street wrote: "He was imprisoned after the war, was never brought to trial. The North didn't dare give him a trial, knowing that a trial would establish that secession was not unconstitutional, that there had been no 'rebellion' and that the South had got a raw deal." At one point the government intimated that it would be willing to offer Davis a pardon, should he ask for one. Davis refused that and he demanded that the government either give him a pardon or give him a trial, or admit that they had dealt unjustly with him. Mr. Street said: "He died 'unpardoned' by a government that was leery of giving him a public hearing." If Davis was as guilty as they claimed, why no trial???

Had the federal government had any possible chance to convict Davis and therefore declare secession unconstitutional they would have done so in a New York minute. The fact that they diddled around and finally released him without benefit of the trial he wanted proves that the North had no real case against secession. Over 600,000 boys, both North and South, were killed or maimed so the North could fight a war of conquest over something that the South did that was neither illegal or wrong. Yet they claim the moral high ground because the 'freed' the slaves, a farce at best.

[Capriole]

I take it, then, that you support slavery reparations to African-Americans.

No, I am not asking to be compensated for the loss of a family home. I would not have inherited it anyway. What I'm asking for is that some Northerners who are obsessed with hatred for the South, even after all these years, should understand how Southerners might feel saddened by not only the fact of the War itself, but by the loss of our heritage. This is particularly true when we come from families that did not own slaves or manumitted their slaves long before the War. I ask them to understand that hundreds of thousands of ordinary Southerners fought not because they passionately longed to keep black men in chains but because their homeland was being invaded and their economy throttled.

[Aurelius]

"Do you have another answer?"

Yes I do.

"A question settled by violence, or in disregard of law, must remain unsettled forever."
Jefferson Davis

"Governor, if I had foreseen the use these people desired to make of their victory, there would have been no surrender at Appomattox, no, sir, not by me. Had I seen these results of subjugation, I would have preferred to die at Appomattox with my brave men, my sword in this right hand."
Robert E. Lee
— as told to Texas ex-governor F. W. Stockdale

"I would have never surrendered the army if I had known how the South would have been treated."
"Well, General, you have only to blow the bugle."
"It is too late now."
— exchange between Lee and Colonel T. M. R. Talcott Robert E. Lee

[billbears]

More perfect is not perpetual. More perfect insinuates that the holding bonds of perpetualness are broken and that the states would want to remain together voluntarily. However it does not insinuate that if the union between the states ever came to a point that they could no longer be together, that force would be used in making them remain

[Aurelius]

I am posting this late tonight, in the hope born of Christian charity that you are already passed out and will not see it until early morning when your mental powers will perhaps have a brief respite from your Alzheimers. Presumably you have a care-taker who can read and who has a sixth grade education (as hard as it may be for you to imagine someone reaching that level of education). Have them read a post of the article: If Secession Was Illegal - then How Come...?" and have them try to explain it to you. If that fails, please get back to me and I will try to formulate the main thesis, at least, in terms which might be conprehensible even to you. Best Wishes.

Incomprehensible.

[Aurelius]

I am posting this late tonight, in the hope born of Christian charity that you are already passed out and will not see it until early morning when your mental powers will perhaps have a brief respite from your Alzheimers. Presumably you have a care-taker who can read and who has a sixth grade education (as hard as it may be for you to imagine someone reaching that level of education). Have them read a post of the article: If Secession Was Illegal - then How Come...?" and have them try to explain it to you. If that fails, please get back to me and I will try to formulate the main thesis, at least, in terms which might be conprehensible even to you. Best Wishes.

Incomprehensible.

[nolu chan]

That is false. There was no secession from the Union when the government was changed. The Articles stated in many places that the Union was PERPETUAL. It never claimed the government was perpetual.

Those attempting to deceive the unaware conveniently forget there is a difference between a nation and a government. Wonder why?

The Articles of Confederation, at Article 13, states:

"Every State shall abide by the determination of the United States in Congress assembled, on all questions which by this confederation are submitted to them. And the Articles of this Confederation shall be inviolably observed by every State, and the Union shall be perpetual; nor shall any alteration at any time hereafter be made in any of them; unless such alteration be agreed to in a Congress of the United States, and be afterwards confirmed by the legislatures of every State....".

Representatives of 12 of the 13 members of said perpetual union got together in Philadelphia (Rhode Island refused to send a representative), proposed an entirely new government, and The Constitution, at Article 7 states:

"The ratification of the conventions of nine States shall be sufficient for the establishment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the same."

June 21, 1788: New Hampshire (57-46) was the ninth state to ratify
June 26, 1788: Virginia (89-79) ratified.
July 26, 1788: New York (30-27) ratified.
Eleven states had ratified.

March 1788: Rhode Island (232-2,708) rejected the Constitution.
August 1, 1788: North Carolina (88-188) rejected the Constitution.

30 Apr 1789 - George Washington inaugurated

After 30 Apr 1789, 11 states had formed a new nation. George Washington was the first president of that new nation. Clearly, North Carolina and Rhode Island could not then have been states under the Constitution. They voted to reject it. It was some considerable time after Washington's inauguration before those two states ratified.

21 Nov 1789 - North Carolina (193-75) ratified
29 May 1790 - Rhode Island (34-32) ratified

The Articles of Confederation establish that they could not be changed except upon approval of the legislatures of all 13 states. Clearly, that had not happened.

While the Constitution asserts that it is effective upon the ratification of 9 states, it does not assert that the Articles of Confederation are abolished by that action.

If the union formed by the Articles of Confederation was perpetual and unbreakable, what union existed immediately after Washington was inaugurated?

Rhode Island and North Carolina had already voted not to accept the Constitution.

If the 11 states lawfully seceded, (subsequently followed by the last 2), then certainly they could lawfully form any new government they desired, in any manner desired.

However, if they did not secede, how did they lawfully change so much as one word of the Articles of Confederation while two states had voted to reject the change?

[Non-Sequitur]

The Constitution is pretty much whatever the majority of any given US Supreme Court determines it to be based on their ideology.

I'll take that as a left-handed agreement that the Constitution gives the Supreme Court jurisdiction over issue like this.

[conservativemusician]

Why am I not surprised.

Unsettled forever? So, all violent conflict should be maintained in perpetuity? I guess the British, Mexicans, Spanish, Germans, Japanese, Taliban, and Saddam should all feel the same way. Man, we got an awful lot wars to continue fighting.

Lee supposedly said " if I had foreseen " , "if I had known ". Alot of ifs do not change the fact that he SURRENDERED, thereby ENDING the war.


Nice try, though.

[Poohbah]

More perfect is not perpetual

Uh, billbears...that was NOT the question asked. I can understand your reluctance to answer it.

The Constitution was ordained and established to form a "more perfect union." What union was it supposed to be more perfect than?

[steve50]

A better analogy in this particular case would be that the husband's primary motive in forcing his wife back was to retain control over her paycheck.

We have a winner. It all boils down to tariff laws. Seems like the South were free traders way before the idea got popular in the North.

[JohnGalt]

"We would have been a nuclear pile of ash long before now or enslaved under the most diabolical ISM's known to man!"


Again, you rely on clairvoyance to justify mass slaughter. Nuclear weapons were the result of a government program that sprung from a Red-Brown administration of FDR. The secrets to the bomb were then delivered to Stalin.

If the states had separated, there would have been no Spanish American War, which left the United States with obligations in the Pacific. There would have been no American entry into the First World War, thus the French and British would have sued for peace and the Hapsburg Empire and Kaiser Whilhelm would still have been in power.

With peace, the Germans would not have sent Lenin from Berlin to cause trouble and there would have been no Soviet revolution, and no Stalin. The 20th Century was the most brutal century in the history of man and your thought process, used to justify the state that unleashed the slaughter comes up with the simple explanation that 'things would have been much worse.'

I am not sure how anyone can look at the 100s of millions dead and make such a claim other than to rely on clairvoyance.

[ought-six]

"NONE of the founders agreed with those contentions. Not Washington, not Jefferson, not Madison, not Adams, not Hamilton, not Jackson. ALL abhorred the idea of splitting the Union. EVERY SINGLE ONE."

Absolutely NOT true! While the Founders were all for a strong union, they also recognized that there might come a time when that union was no longer supportable or useful. Good grief, the Declaration of Independence itself was testimony to how they felt about unions and when such unions should be dissolved. Jefferson, particularly, said on many occasions that people (and states) had the right to disassociate from a union if that union no longer served the purposes for which it was created.

[Consort]

I'll take that as a left-handed agreement that the Constitution gives the Supreme Court jurisdiction over issue like this.

Try to take my statement for what it says; not for what it doesn't say. Try to read what I wrote; not what I didn't write. What I said was a fact as I see it whether or not I (or you) agree with it and whether or not the Constitution gives the Supreme Court jurisdiction over such issues.

[vaudine]

Interesting. Elaborate.

vaudine

[billbears]

More perfect than the one under the Articles, one that was voluntary instead of mandatory. Sheesh Poohbah how more perfect will a union be when members of the union know they have the right to leave when their concerns aren't being met? At least that's how northerners saw it in 1814. Or are we not supposed to compare Southerners to the all but out in the open northern secessionist states of 1814?

[WhiskeyPapa]

Secession is clearly outside U.S. Law.

The Militia Act of 1792 as amended in 1795 gives the president sole discretion as to when insurrection or rebellion exists. The Act further allows him to call out the militia of the several states to suppress such rebellion or insurrection.

Walt

[WhiskeyPapa]

That is false. There was no secession from the Union when the government was changed. The Articles stated in many places that the Union was PERPETUAL. It never claimed the government was perpetual.

Good point.

E PLURIBUS UNUM was adopted in 1782, and so it has remained unbroken since that time.

Walt

[Aurelius]

"Secession is clearly outside U.S. Law."

That is correct in the sense that the U.S. Constitution makes no mention of secession. Thus, under the Anglo-Saxon legal principle that "all is permitted which is not explicitely prohibited", secession is permitted under the Constitution.

I and others on numerous occasions have carefully and patiently explained to you why the Militia Act of 1792 or its amended version of 1795 does not apply in the case of states that have seceded from the Union. It would apppear to be pointless to go through that again.

[WhiskeyPapa]

I and others on numerous occasions have carefully and patiently explained to you why the Militia Act of 1792 or its amended version of 1795 does not apply in the case of states that have seceded from the Union.

Laws are enforced by power, in this case military power. No state can get out of the Union unless it can fight its way out. No state has been able to do that.

No state has ever been out of the Union for single second.

You should be glad that President Lincoln always took this as a starting point. As soon as the so-called seceded states published their secession documents, many in the north (including Frederick Douglass) lobbied to have them branded as traitors who had forfeited their rights as citizens; further, according to this reasoning, their property could be seized.

Later in the war, it was proposed in Congress that the insurgent area be broken up into military districts. President Lincoln also resisted this initiative.

Walt

[Aurelius]

Force was used to reverse secession; no law was being enforced.