Don't spin the Civil War

Washington Post ^ | 12.27.10 | E.J. DIONNE jR.

[trumandogz]

The Civil War is about to loom very large in the popular memory. We would do well to be candid about its causes and not allow the distortions of contemporary politics or long-standing myths to cloud our understanding of why the nation fell apart.

The coming year will mark the 150th anniversary of the onset of the conflict, which is usually dated to April 12, 1861, when Confederate batteries opened fire at 4:30 a.m. on federal troops occupying Fort Sumter. Union forces surrendered the next day, after 34 hours of shelling.

[Drennan Whyte]

It was a Southern President who banned the trans Atlantic slave trade to the US.

It was a U.S. Congress that did that. In the House the vote was 60 for and 49 against. Virtually none of the votes in favor of the end of slave imports came from representatives from slave-holding states. In the Senate the vote was 18 to 8. Many Southern senators didn't vote on the measure, possibly in protest. It might be more accurate to say that slave imports were ended in spite of Southern leaders rather than because of them.

[rockrr]

If responding to a comment on an open thread constitutes ‘stalking’ then perhaps it is you who should tread lightly pokie.

If you believe anything I’ve said to be untrue or against FreeRepublic policy hit the abuse link or, well you know the rest.

[Bigun]

Whether a state had the right to secede was a matter of opinion, neither fact nor law.

I'm afraid that you would have to explain that to the graduates of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point as well as most every Law school in the U.S. prior to 1860 as the primary text they studied with regard to law was BLACKSTONE'S COMMENTARIES: WITH NOTES OF REFERENCE, TO THE CONSTITUTION AND LAWS, OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT OF THE UNITED STATES; AND OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA. IN FIVE VOLUMES. WITH AN APPENDIX TO EACH VOLUME, CONTAINING SHORT TRACTS UPON SUCH SUBJECTS AS APPEARED NECESSARY TO FORM A CONNECTED VIEW OF THE LAWS OF VIRGINIA, AS A MEMBER OF THE FEDERAL UNION. BY ST. GEORGE TUCKER, PROFESSOR OF LAW, IN THE UNIVERSITY OF WILLIAM AND MARY, AND ONE OF THE JUDGES OF THE GENERAL COURT IN VIRGINIA. PHILADELPHIA: PUBLISHED BY WILLIAM YOUNG BIRCH, AND ABRAHAM SMALL, NO. 17, SOUTH SECOND-STREET. ROBERT CARR, PRINTER. 1803.

[rustbucket]

...why didn't Davis go to the Confederate Congress for approval before declaring war on the U.S.? Unlike the U.S. Congress, the Confederate Congress was in session.

Sorry, but the Confederate Congress had been out of session for almost a month when Fort Sumter was fired upon. The first session of the Provisional Confederate Congress lasted from Feb. 4, 1861 to March 16, 1861. The second session took place from April 29 to May 21, 1861.

The first session authorized Confederate commissioners to go to Washington and peacefully negotiate with the new Lincoln Administration over "all matters connected with the public property and the indebtedness of the Government of the United States existing before the withdrawal of any of the States of this Confederacy." Lincoln wouldn't see them. Seward led the commissioners to believe that Fort Sumter would be evacuated, and Lincoln's special agent Lamon told the SC governor the same thing. Once the commissioners realized they had been lied to about Sumter, they accused the Lincoln Administration with "gross perfidy" about Sumter shortly before the Northern battle fleet reached Charleston.

I think you are confused about which president was trying to avoid his Congress. The US Senate was still in session on March 28, 1861. They asked Lincoln whether he had anything of importance to tell them before they adjourned. He replied that he didn't, so they adjourned. However, on that same day Lincoln had a secret order drafted for the battle fleet to go to Charleston. He issued the order to prepare for that expedition on the next day. His cabinet and generals had told him such a mission would result in a shooting war. Was that not important enough to involve Congress?

Davis convened his Congress about two weeks after Sumter was fired on. Lincoln didn't convene his until July 4, well after he had successfully manipulated the country into war.

[Ditto]

“Yes, let’s just stop spinning it, the 3/5ths Compromise, so ignorantly attributed to “racist” southerners and demagogued to infinity, was a compromise insisted upon by northern interests, who did not want slaves counted as fully human in order to prevent Congressional reapportionment from shifting political power to the south.”

You are turning history upside down. Under the Constitution the more heads a state could count, the more representatives in congress it would have. Those opposed to slavery argued that slaves should not count since they were represented. The large slave holding states argued that everyone should count. The compromise reached in the Constitutional Convention was to count slaves as 3/5 of a person.

BUT........... that 3/5 number had a history.

Only four years earlier in 1783 an amendment to the Articles of Confederation was proposed to change the basis for determining the wealth of each state, and hence its tax obligations, from real estate to total population. At that time, the large slave states argued that slaves should not count. The other states argued that everyone should count.

A compromise was reached that called for counting slaves as 3/5 of a person. The amendment eventually failed falling two states short of the unanimous approval required for amending the Articles of Confederation (New Hampshire and New York were opposed). But all of the large slave states supported it.

So when it came to paying taxes on their 'chattel property' they did not want them counted. But when that same chattel could mean more power in Congress, they wanted slaves counted. And in both instances, they were willing to go with the 3/5 count.

[Bigun]

Saving you the trouble of looking it up here is what it says on the subject:

Although the federal government can, in no possible view, be considered as a party to a compact made anterior to its existence, and by which it was, in fact, created; yet as the creature of that compact, it must be bound by it, to its creators, the several states in the union, and the citizens thereof. Having no existence but under the constitution, nor any rights, but such as that instrument confers; and those very rights being in fact duties; it can possess no legitimate power, but such, as is absolutely necessary for the performance of a duty, prescribed and enjoined by the constitution. Its duties, then, become the exact measure of its powers; and wherever it exerts a power for any other purpose, than the performance of a duty prescribed by the constitution, it transgresses its proper limits, and violates the public trust. Its duties, being moreover imposed for the general benefit and security of the several states, in their politic character; and of the people, both in their sovereign, and individual capacity, if these objects be not obtained, the government will not answer the end of its creation: it is therefore bound to the several states, respectively, and to every citizen thereof, for the due execution of those duties. And the observance of this obligation is enforced, by the solemn sanction of an oath, from all who administer the government.

The constitution of the United States, then being that instrument by which the federal government hath been created; its powers defined, and limited; and the duties, and functions of its several departments prescribed; the government, thus established, may be pronounced to be a confederate republic, composed of several independent, and sovereign democratic states, united for their common defense, and security against foreign nations, and for the purposes of harmony, and mutual intercourse between each other; each state retaining an entire liberty of exercising, as it thinks proper, all those parts of its sovereignty, which are not mentioned in the constitution, or act of union, as parts that ought to be exercised in common. It is the supreme law of the land 32, and as such binding upon the federal government; the several states; and finally upon all the citizens of the United States.... It can not be controlled, or altered without the express consent of the body politic of three fourths of the states in the union, or, of the people, of an equal number of the states. To prevent the necessity of an immediate appeal to the latter, a method is pointed out, by which amendments may be proposed and ratified by the concurrent act of two thirds of both houses of congress, and three fourths of the state legislatures: but if congress should neglect to propose amendments in this way, when they may be deemed necessary, the concurrent sense of two thirds of the state legislatures may enforce congress to call a convention, the amendments proposed by which, when ratified by the conventions of three fourths of the states, become valid, as a part of the constitution. In either mode, the assent of the body politic of the states, is necessary, either to complete, or to originate the measure.

Their submission to it’s operation is voluntary: it’s councils, it’s engagements, it’s authority are theirs, modified, and united. It’s sovereignty is an emanation from theirs, not a flame by which they have been consumed, nor a vortex in which they are swallowed up. Each is still a perfect state, still sovereign, still independent, and still capable, should the occasion require, to resume the exercise of it’s functions, as such, in the most unlimited extent.

BLACKSTONE'S COMMENTARIES: WITH NOTES OF REFERENCE, TO THE CONSTITUTION AND LAWS, OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT OF THE UNITED STATES; AND OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA. IN FIVE VOLUMES.

[Idabilly]

Again, your claim was that nobody thought that secession was illegal. You are incorrect in that.

The States ratifying the Constitution didn't think it was. What was said after the fact does not matter!

Nothing in that says anything about secession or how is should, or could, be accomplished. Madison is on record as saying that a lawful secession requires the consent of all the states. The Southern states did not try that route when they chose to leave.

Can you provide anything other than provide letters stating such? No. Madison is on record in Federalist #43 stating this:

The first question is answered at once by recurring to the absolute necessity of the case; to the great principle of self-preservation; to the transcendent law of nature and of nature's God, which declares that the safety and happiness of society are the objects at which all political institutions aim, and to which all such institutions must be sacrificed. PERHAPS, also, an answer may be found without searching beyond the principles of the compact itself. It has been heretofore noted among the defects of the Confederation, that in many of the States it had received no higher sanction than a mere legislative ratification. The principle of reciprocality seems to require that its obligation on the other States should be reduced to the same standard. A compact between independent sovereigns, founded on ordinary acts of legislative authority, can pretend to no higher validity than a league or treaty between the parties. It is an established doctrine on the subject of treaties, that all the articles are mutually conditions of each other; that a breach of any one article is a breach of the whole treaty; and that a breach, committed by either of the parties, absolves the others, and authorizes them, if they please, to pronounce the compact violated and void.

Madison later defended his statement with his Virginia report:

The constitution of the United States was formed by the sanction of the states, given by each in its sovereign capacity. It adds to the stability and dignity, as well as to the authority, of the constitution, that it rests upon this legitimate and solid foundation. The states, then, being the parties to the constitutional compact, and in their sovereign capacity, it follows of necessity that there can be no tribunal above their authority to decide, in the last resort, whether the compact made by them be violated and consequently that, as the parties to it, they must themselves decide, in the last resort, such questions as may be of sufficient magnitude to require their interposition.

You may say, "Federalist #43 is in regards to the Articles of Confederation" -- Remember, the Articles have language of eternity, the Constitution does not.

[Bigun]

Please see #306 above.

[TexConfederate1861]

OK...I stand corrected....however, it wasn’t illegal regardless.

[ROCKLOBSTER]

It was the Republicans vs the RATs...the RATs lost.

Now the South is Republican.

[Idabilly]

Please see #306 above.

Tucker was very well reasoned... as was Thomas Jefferson:

Thomas Jefferson to governor William Giles 1825:

If every infraction of a compact of so many parties is to be resisted at once, as a dissolution of it, none can ever be formed which would last one year. We must have patience and longer endurance then with our brethren while under delusion; give them time for reflection and experience of consequences; keep ourselves in a situation to profit by the chapter of accidents; and separate from our companions only when the sole alternatives left, are the dissolution of our Union with them, or submission to a government without limitation of powers. Between these two evils, when we must make a choice, there can be no hesitation

Thomas Jefferson letter to Madison in August 1799:

[We should be] determined... to sever ourselves from the union we so much value rather than give up the rights of self-government...in which alone we see liberty, safety and happiness.

------------------------------------------------

"I had written to Mr. Madison, as I had before informed you, and had stated to him some general ideas for consideration and consultation when we should meet. I thought something essentially necessary to be said, in order to avoid the inference of acquiescence; that a resolution or declaration should be passed, 1. answering the reasonings of such of the States as have ventured into the field of reason, and that of the committee of Congress, taking some notice, too, of those States who have either not answered at all, or answered without reasoning. 2. Making firm protestation against the precedent and principle, and reserving the right to make this palpable violation of the federal compact the ground of doing in future whatever we might now rightfully do, should repetitions of these and other violations of the compact render it expedient. 3. Expressing in affectionate and conciliatory language our warm attachment to union with our sister States, and to the instrument and principles by which we are united; that we are willing to sacrifice to this every thing but the rights of self-government in those important points which we have never yielded, and in which alone we see liberty, safety, and happiness; that not at all disposed to make every measure of error or of wrong, a cause of scission, we are willing to look on with indulgence, and to wait with patience, till those passions and delusions shall have passed over, which the federal government have artfully excited to cover its own abuses and conceal its designs, fully confident that the good sense of the American people, and their attachment to those very rights which we are now vindicating, will, before it shall be too late, rally with us round the true principles of our federal compact. This was only meant to give a general idea of the complexion and topics of such an instrument. Mr. M. who came, as had been proposed, does not concur in the reservation proposed above; and from this I recede readily, not only in deference to his judgment, but because, as we should never think of separation but for repeated and enormous violations, so these, when they occur, will be cause enough of themselves."

[Drennan Whyte]

OK...I stand corrected....however, it wasn’t illegal regardless.

So you believe. Other's thought differently.

[Drennan Whyte]

Please see #306 above.

I don't see where that opinion trumps the opinion of those who believed that secession without the consent of the states was illegal. Madison certainly believed so.

[DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis]

He rebutted the spurious claims

He did not.

and asked for verification of the numbers asserted

LOL! Any time we gave him documented historical facts he called it all 'fairytales'!

[Drennan Whyte]

The States ratifying the Constitution didn't think it was. What was said after the fact does not matter!

Respectfully that's not what you said. And in order to support your claim you quoted gentlemen speaking long after the Constitution had been ratified. Are you now saying that their opinions did not matter?

Can you provide anything other than provide letters stating such? No. Madison is on record in Federalist #43...

What was Federalist #43 but a letter expressing an opinion? Besides, nowhere in Federalist #43 does Madison mention the mechanics of ending the compact. He did in later letters.

Madison later defended his statement with his Virginia report...

Madison also said later that his writings in the Virginia report in no way indicated support for the idea that a state could secede at will from its union with the other states.

[Bigun]

Madison was on all sides of the issue at some point in his life but was in agreement with St. George Tucker, Thomas Jefferson, George Mason, and many others in later years.

[Bigun]

And BTW:

The book I cited above was THE law textbook of the era and not disputed by anyone for quite some years.

[Idabilly]

Respectfully that's not what you said. And in order to support your claim you quoted gentlemen speaking long after the Constitution had been ratified. Are you now saying that their opinions did not matter?

As with any Government, it grows and usurps authority from it's rightful owners. There were a great many opinions over such matters, as we still have these debates. I ask, under what understanding did the States ratify the Constitution? Was their understanding the same as Madison when he said this during the Virginia Ratification Convention:

That resolution declares that the powers granted by the proposed Constitution are the gift of the people, and may be resumed by them when perverted to their oppression, and every power not granted thereby remains with the people, and at their will. It adds, likewise, that no right, of any denomination, can be cancelled, abridged, restrained, or modified, by the general government, or any of its officers, except in those instances in which power is given by the Constitution for these purposes. There cannot be a more positive and unequivocal declaration of the principle of the adoption — that every thing not granted is reserved. This is obviously and self-evidently the case, without the declaration.

I think the States understood that they could reassume their delegated authority, as their understanding was verified by their ratification documents, and vindicated by the Federalist.

Personally, I believe the Anti-Federalist were correct in their fears. The Constitution has failed to restrict the growth of Government. It has, with the helping hand of the courts, turned the law upside down. I've read some post by you where you've asked the kind gentlemen from Texas about the Chicago court Case regarding firearms and the 14th Amendment. I now will ask you your feelings about federal gun restrictions? Health care? Endangered species acts? Illegal searches? ETC,ETC,ETC??

I'll respond to your reply when I get chance. Speaking of federal agencies, I'll be getting patted down soon, as we have some business to take care of in Arkansas.

Patrick Henry - June 1788:

"How were the Congressional rights defined when the people of America united by a confederacy to defend their liberties and rights against the tyrannical attempts of Great-Britain? The States were not then contented with implied reservation. No, Mr. Chairman. It was expressly declared in our Confederation that every right was retained by the States respectively, which was not given up to the Government of the United States. But there is no such thing here. You therefore by a natural and unavoidable implication, give up your rights to the General Government. Your own example furnishes an argument against it. If you give up these powers, without a Bill of Rights, you will exhibit the most absurd thing to mankind that ever the world saw – A Government that has abandoned all its powers – The powers of direct taxation, the sword, and the purse. You have disposed of them to Congress, without a Bill of Rights – without check, limitation, or controul. And still you have checks and guards – still you keep barriers – pointed where? Pointed against your weakened, prostrated, enervated State Government! You have a Bill of Rights to defend you against the State Government, which is bereaved of all power; and yet you have none against Congress, though in full and exclusive possession of all power! You arm youselves against the weak and defenceless, and expose yourselves naked to the armed and powerful. Is not this a conduct of unexampled absurdity? What barriers have you to oppose to this most strong energetic Government? To that Government you have nothing to oppose. All your defence is given up. This is a real actual defect. . . "

[cowboyway]

it is you who should tread lightly pokie.

We all know your history with mstar so I think that it's you who should tread lightly, punkrr. Perhaps you haven't noticed but, you liberal trolls are being purged from FR.

BTW, how have you managed to escape the ZOT? You're always accusing people of being homophobic which leads me to believe that you're sympathetic to the queer nation cause. Where do you stand on the homosexuals, punk?

I’ve said to be untrue or against FreeRepublic policy

You're not very bright, are you punk.

The point is, this thread makes three different Southern states that you have claimed to have been 'raised' in. I've asked you point blank where you're from and you've always refused to answer.

The bottom line is, you're a lying POS, therefore, anything that you post has ZERO credibility.

Where are you from, punk? Gonna refuse to answer again?

[mac_truck]

I'm afraid that you would have to explain that to the graduates of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point as well as most every Law school in the U.S. prior to 1860 as the primary text they studied with regard to law was BLACKSTONE'S COMMENTARIES:

One of the reasons the American colonists fought the Revolution was for the right to establish their own set of laws. Blackstone was entitled to his opinion, but his opinion had no binding effect on US law. Had the southern states gone to court to assert their right to withdraw from the Union, it is more than likely they would have prevailed. However, they chose instead to fire on the US flag at Ft. Sumter and suffered the deserved consequences.