Posted on 01/10/2011 8:57:06 AM PST by cowboyway
The Illinois Butcher™ wouldn't negotiate, he was to busy sharpening is cleaver to talk to the delegation sent to DC.
The Deep South first seceded over slavery, and nothing else -- nothing else had ever been important enough to them to cause secession.
Only the perceived potential threat from Abolitionist Republicans was serious enough to drive the Deep South to secede.
Look again at the South Carolina Declaration of Causes of Secession -- in the first sentence it refers to itself and "other slaveholding states".
They thought of themselves as first-and-foremost, "slaveholding states."
And all of the reasons for secession are related directly to their existence as "slaveholding states."
Here is the key statement:
"On the 4th day of March next, this party [Abolitionist Republicans] will take possession of the Government.
It has announced that the South shall be excluded from the common territory, that the judicial tribunals shall be made sectional, and that a war must be waged against slavery until it shall cease throughout the United States."
In fact, no such "announcement" had been made.
It was all a fantasy about what might happen in the future.
I wish you could see that what we are engaged in is a disagreement over what constitutes "conservatism." IOW, what exactly are we trying to conserve?
We have a different opinion as to whether the CSA was erected in defense of basic American founding principles or in rejection of them.
Let me state that I am fully in agreement that parts of what the CSA fought for were fully defensible. But any nation based on the explicit statement that its "Cornerstone" is a doctrine of human inequality is in direct and irreducible conflict with the core doctrine of the Founding, that "all men are created equal."
In fact, the right to revolt and replace a government proclaimed in the DOI was based on that revolt being to defend this equality. It justified no right of group A to revolt in order to impose or defend the oppression of group B. The Spartans would not have been justified in revolt in order to impose helotry on their neighbors.
So, no, I don't consider defense of an anti-American doctrine to be "conservative."
I don't believe I've ever said that, and if I did I apologize.
Here is what I do believe:
Over the course of the 20 years previous to 1860, almost every national institution, including most churches, split apart over the issue of slavery. The last to come apart explicitly over this issue was the Democrat Party, in the summer of 1860. I find it difficult to believe that when the country itself came apart, it had nothing to do with the same issue.
I am perfectly willing to agree other issues were involved, from states' rights to tariffs. It is notable that these issues received little discussion as primary causes at the start of the war, but were suddenly hauled out after the loss of the war discredited slavery.
But is is important to distinguish between the root cause of the disagreement and ancillary ones. Secession was in many ways like a divorce. Few people have ever divorced to prove they had the right to do so, the equivalent of a states' rights argument. People divorce because they are really mad at the other person. States secede because they are really angry.
The relevant issue is not the right to divorce or secede, it is why the anger exists. In the case of the South in 1860, they were very tired of being told they were morally in the wrong. This is an utterly understandable human reaction, especially when what you are being told you are wrong about is something you cannot change without massive disruption of your society. But, unfortunately, they were in the wrong.
The immediate cause of the war, to be sure, was not secession. It was the refusal of Lincoln and Unionists to accept secession as legitimate. IMO most southerners fought primarily not to defend the institution of slavery, but to protect their homes, just as most Union soldiers fought primarily to preserve the Union, not to destroy slavery.
But those who schemed and plotted to bring secession about, the Fire-Eaters were different. They quite explicitly and openly proclaimed their desire to create a great slave empire by conquest to the south. They pushed secession through in defense of slavery.
No slavery, there would never have been any secession. No secession, no war. It's really quite simple.
It was only about slavery, as far as the Deep South's secession was concerned.
Read again the four Declarations of Reasons for Secession by the Deep South.
"Slavery" (slaveholding, anti-slavery, etc) and "property" are mentioned over 100 times.
Tariffs are not mentioned even once.
That's because it was not about tariffs, it was all about slavery.
To defend their "peculiar institution" the Deep South:
The South declared war to protect slavery.
The North accepted war first to preserve the Union, only later to free the slaves.
And yet your arguments are so weak you had to resort to posting a picture of a dead soldier.
Fail.
Then by all means stop responding to my posts. Believe me I won't be slighted.
< tinfoil > I personally believe that a severe states rights conflict is a lot closer than we think. If it were to go down along the red-blue demarcation, a lot of you cold state FREEPERS are gonna run South as fast as you can. I will welcome you, but call you a hypocrite(with a smile of course). Like I said i could be full of crap, but who knows. I do hope I am wrong but I see no other solution to our philosophical differences.< /tinfoil >
Yep. You’re full of crap. Glad you admitted it finally. LOL
How desperate is the left, they are willing to exploit a 9 year old girls murder for political purposes. We are close to a catastrophic political crises. Very close.
No, but you've misstated the case.
Both the old Articles of Confederation and the new Constitution were considered "perpetual" and "forever."
The new Constitution provided methods to change or amend it, but no methods for unilateral secession.
Yes, the Founders recognized that the Union might be dissolved, but only by mutual consent or from "usurpations" or "abuses" having that same effect.
In their ratification statement, Virginia spelled this out with the following words:
"powers granted under the Constitution, being derived from the people of the United States may be resumed by them whensoever the same shall be perverted to their injury or oppression"
But in December 1860, when South Carolina first seceded, there were no "abuses" or "usurpations" or "injury" or "oppression."
There was only a perceived possible future threat against slavery, represented by the Abolitionist Republicans, and their President-elect, Lincoln.
And Southerns did not just unilaterally, unconstitutionally secede -- they also immediately began unlawfully seizing Federal forts, armories, ships, customs houses, a mint, etc.
At the same time, they began firing on Federal Forces, and on May 6, 1861 declared war on the United States.
The South wanted war, the South got war.
And of all Confederate States, no state wanted war more than Virginia, which did not actually join the Confederacy until after it declared war on the United States.
Unlike, say, Florida or Alabama, which joined the Confederacy while it was still technically at peace, Virginia had a choice and it chose war.
That wasn't possible then, AND STILL isn't possible. The USC remains silent on the issue.
The new Constitution was intended to be "perpetual" and "forever."
The Founders considered disolving the Union a possibility, but only by mutual consent, or by "usurpations" or "abuses" having that same effect.
In December 1860, when South Carolina first seceded, there were no "usurpations", no "abuses" "injuries" or "oppressions" that might remotely justify secession.
And when you read the South's reasons for secessions, it all boils down to their fears about what the new Abolitionist Republicans might do in the future.
And Southerners did not just secede, they also provoked and then declared war on the United States.
I’m going to jump in here and point out something. First, if you honestly believe that people are less likely to achieve spiritual liberty when they are physically enslaved, then how do you deal with Philemon and some of the other books of the New Testament which deal with slavery in a manner that is different than what we deal with it?
The Bible, which was a constant source of guidance to many major figures on both sides of this conflict, is explicit in that personal freedom is inferior to spiritual freedom. Now, with this in mind, go back and reread what Lee wrote. He understands that personal liberty is desireable, but not at the expense of salvation. As the saying goes, what does it profit a man if he gains the entire world, yet loses his soul?
Now, look at Lee’s predictions that it would be better if Providence’s guidance would be allowed to proceed unhindered as opposed to man acting before it was time. What is the current state of mankind in America thanks to the Civil War? Would you still consider us a Christian nation, or one that is quickly sliding towards secularism? What drives that secularism?
One last quote and I’ll leave it alone.
“In the end, the state of the Union comes down to the character of the people. … I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her commodious harbors, her ample rivers, and it was not there. I sought for it in the fertile fields, and boundless prairies, and it was not there. I sought it in her rich mines, and vast world commerce, and it was not there. Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits aflame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power.” - Alexis de Tocqueville
Are we sure that personal liberty trumps spiritual liberty in importance? I hold no desire to make a slave of anyone, but at the same time, I realize that the Civil War had us as a nation trade one form of slavery (physical slavery) for another (spiritual slavery to Mammon) and we not only asked for it, but we celebrated it and still celebrate it.
First of all, the document was never published and is not authenticated -- could easily be some later construction. Indeed, it sounds like a later construction, compared to the other secession documents.
But even so, read it again, pal.
It contains not one word about some major "usurpation" or "abuse," "injury" or "oppression" which did happen, but only expressions of fear about what might happen in the future.
Southerners had no real reasons to secede, nor to seize Federal properties, nor to fire on Federal forces, nor to declare war on the United States.
But they did it anyway.
The South chose its fate, and should now be happy with it.
Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Arkansas all seceded after the Confederacy declared war on the United States, May 6, 1861.
They wanted war. They chose war. They got war.
They should be happy.
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