In praise of (three) modern Doughface Northerners

vanity | 3/17/2012 | BroJoeK

[LS]

Dred Scott, horrible as it was as a legal ruling, was inevitable. If the nation took the political option of the Lewis Cass/Stephen Douglas position (”popular sovereignty”), the South would lose because it would soon be outnumbered by new free states and outvoted, and eventually would lose the protections of slavery.

If it took the Daniel Webster position that Congress had authority over slavery, the South would lose, for the same reasons: the North would, with its population growth, overwhelm the South in the Senate and House.

Only John C. Calhoun’s position-—that only a preexistent state government could abolish slavery-—would preserve slavery, so that is what Taney’s Court went with. That made slavery the de facto position of every new state, which was also unacceptable to the vast majority of Americans.

When Taney declared that Negroes were not people, he sealed the quicker and bloodier doom of slavery, but I don’t see how it was going to be accomplished without a war.

[PeaRidge]

Actually, I think you misread the speech.

His essential point was that liberty is earned through education and actions, and that the state must protect liberty of the people above all else.

Governments should not engage in legislative action based on illogical concepts of egalitarian crusading, and that was what was happening in 1848 in the US Congress.

I personally think that this speech was probably his most important work. Many have concluded that his commentary is in direct opposition to Jefferson's DOI phrase that "all men are created equal". Jefferson used that phrase to refute the "divine right of kings" argument against Independence.

I do not think it was connected with egalitarian thought on the continent.

[PeaRidge]

With the Dred Scott decision by the Supreme Court, the passing of the Corwin amendment in March of ‘61 by the Congress, and Lincoln's endorsement in his inauguration speech, all of the branches of the United States government were aligned in support of legalized slavery.

Since the deep South had already seceded, there was no point in conflict as a moral issue.

[LS]

I'm not following. Lincoln was elected primarily on his main platform plank of no slavery in the territories, and stated unequivocally (the first president to do so) that slavery was a moral evil. The Democrats, as headed by Stephen Douglas, had taken the exact opposite decision, that slavery was "individual choice" or, if one went with the leading southern spokesmen, that it was a matter of state law.

But no one thought that this meant that slavery would any longer be tolerated in the territories, and Lincoln was elected precisely because the Dred Scott decision was so morally wrong. And four slave states remained in the Union.

[BroJoeK]

LS: "Only John C. Calhoun’s position-—that only a preexistent state government could abolish slavery-—would preserve slavery, so that is what Taney’s Court went with.
That made slavery the de facto position of every new state, which was also unacceptable to the vast majority of Americans."

The Dred Scott decision is more than a little confusing.
Thanks for a clear explanation.

[PeaRidge]

I understand your comments and know Lincoln’s position on slavery.

As Lincoln took office, he no longer had a slave problem. The states with the highest populations of slaves had seceded. This no longer affected his Presidency, either culturally or morally. The problem was gone.

With the morality argument being moot, and what was to happen in the territories being in the hands of a unified US Congress, Lincoln had a clean slate for governance.

Secession solved the problem.

[x]

So would you with “your guys”.

"My guys" would probably include radical abolitionists and whatever believers in racial equality there were at the time.

They didn't get along with the rest of the guys, but both bunches of guys were on the same side against your guys.

[PeaRidge]

That's right. Your guys, the self-righteous and indignant fire eaters that wanted to cause as much chaos as possible elected a bumbling backwoods lawyer from the midwest that knew nothing of statesmanship and lamely started a massive war.

Our guys, believing in liberty and justice for all, endured the atrocities until it all ended. Along with it died the concept of a nation governed by men enlightened with the concept of liberty, not egalitarianism.

[x]

Our guys, believing in liberty and justice for all ...

Back to where we started. If you don't see that, there's no hope for you. "Your guys" didn't believe in liberty and justice for all. Not many people did back then, but we can at least put in a good word for the few who went a little further than the others.

Along with it died the concept of a nation governed by men enlightened with the concept of liberty, not egalitarianism.

C'mon, egalitarianism came in with Andrew Jackson. You can't break history down like that -- Southerners for liberty and against egalitarianism. Liberty and equality and slavery are pretty well mixed together in American history, and that includes Southern history.

[rockrr]

Secession solved nothing and made a precarious situation even more so.

[rockrr]

That's right. Your guys, the self-righteous and indignant fire eaters that wanted to cause as much chaos as possible elected a bumbling backwoods lawyer from the midwest that knew nothing of statesmanship and lamely started a massive war.

Pretending that the instigators weren't from the south and that the north is to blame for the insurrection is kinda like the rapist saying to the woman, "Lady, there ain't nothing you can do so you may as well lay back and enjoy it" lol.

Our guys, believing in liberty and justice for all, endured the atrocities until it all ended. Along with it died the concept of a nation governed by men enlightened with the concept of liberty, not egalitarianism.

You can say that about the modern-day south but that's not remotely the conditions on the ground during any part of the confederacy. And definitely not for the incorrect melanin-hued.

[BroJoeK]

PeaRidge: "Your guys, the self-righteous and indignant fire eaters that wanted to cause as much chaos as possible elected a bumbling backwoods lawyer from the midwest that knew nothing of statesmanship and lamely started a massive war."

I been thinking about posting a bestiary -- that is, an I.F.F. dictionary of politically active names related to Civil War politics.

In no particular sequence, here's what I have so far (mostly quoted from Wiki):

• Fire Eaters: an easily provoked, belligerent person.
  in U.S. History: an early and extreme Southern advocate of secession before the Civil War.

  "Wigfall, for one, actively encouraged an attack on Fort Sumter to prompt Virginia and other upper Southern States to secede as well.
  Thus, the Fire-Eaters helped to unleash a chain reaction that eventually led to the formation of the Confederate States of America and to the American Civil War.
  Their influence waned quickly after the start of major fighting."

• The Slave Power: (often called the "Slaveocracy") was a term used in the United States ca. 1840-1865 to denounce the political power of the slaveholding class in the South.
  The argument was that this small group of rich men had seized political control of their own states and was trying to take over the national government in illegitimate fashion to use it to expand and protect slavery.
  Massachusetts, Wooster Republican, February 2, 1859 (Reproduction):
  

• Dough face: 1. a Northerner who sympathized with the South during the controversies over new territories and slavery before the Civil War.
  2. a congressman from a northern state not opposed to slavery in the South.

• Bucktails: A New York political machine first formed by the Tammany Society, later controlled by future President Martin Van Buren.
  Van Buren first expressed the winning Democrat strategy of nominating for president, "Northern men of Southern principles," (aka Dough Faces).
  He was the first, President James Buchanan was the last.

• Wide Awakes: In 1856, across the North, the new Republican party organized young men's marching clubs called "Rocky Mountain Clubs", "Wide Awakes", "Freedom Clubs", and "Bear Clubs"
  The term "Wide Awakes" became popular in the 1860 campaign.
  In Chicago on October 3, 1860, 10,000 Wide Awakes marched in a three-mile procession.
  

• Young Hickories: Similar organizations affiliated with the Democratic Party were called the "Douglas Invincibles", "Young Hickories" or "Earthquakes".

• Douglas Invincibles: Loosely organized political clubs sprang up in numerous towns and cities across the nation during the 1850s.
  They adopted names like the Fremont “Bears,” the Douglas “Invincibles,” and the Lincoln “Rail Maulers” and “Wide-Awakes.”

• Minute Men: Southern organizations were called the "Minute Men".

• Copperheads: A vocal group of Democrats located in the Northern United States of the Union who opposed the American Civil War, wanting an immediate peace settlement with the Confederates.
  Republicans started calling anti-war Democrats "Copperheads," likening them to the venomous snake.
  The Peace Democrats accepted the label, but for them the copper "head" was the likeness of Liberty, which they cut from copper pennies and proudly wore as badges.
  After the fall of Atlanta in September 1864 military success seemed assured, and Copperheadism collapsed.

  Copperhead 1864 pamphlet, USA, mocking President Abraham Lincoln.
  

Does anyone know more names to add to the list?

[LS]

Radial (Republicans): those who sought to use the war to prostrate the South and to end slavery, as opposed to merely reunify the nation.

[LS]

BTW, I would add that Lincoln knew more about statesmanship than all the so-called southern “diplomats,” senators (including that buffoon Marxist John C. Calhoun), and spokesmen who ever walked the earth.

[rockrr]

For your consideration:

Loyal Union League: A Union League is one of a number of organizations established starting in 1862, during the American Civil War to promote loyalty to the Union and the policies of Abraham Lincoln. They were also known as Loyal Leagues. They comprised upper middle class men who supported efforts such as the United States Sanitary Commission, which helped treat wounded soldiers after battle. The Clubs supported the Republican Party, with funding, organizational support, and political activism

One of the Lost Causers attempted to equate the Union League with the KKK on a WBTS thread a while back. When pressed fro details of their more notorious misdeeds the best the I got back was that they advocated against electing democrats. LOL

[PeaRidge]

Pardon the length of this but I see that your understanding of liberty, as granted under the Constitution, and antebellum egalitarianism is decidedly incomplete, so let's go back to school, X.

Keeping in mind that although a French term, egalitarian thought was evident at the time of Plato, the Apostles, and all the way through the dark ages.

You hark en to Jackson, who was not an egalitarian by any stretch.

As posted earlier, I think Calhoun's speech of 1848 shows more than anything else his and other Southerner's opposition to political egalitarianism that was being thrust into the discussion of new territorial law and exacerbating the political unrest of the period. He said so in this passage:

I have, on all proper occasions, endeavored to call the attention of both the two great parties which divided the country to adopt some measure to prevent so great a disaster, but without success. The agitation has been permitted to proceed with almost no attempt to resist it, until it has reached a point when it can no longer be disguised or denied that the Union is in danger. You have thus had forced upon you the greatest and gravest question that can ever come under your consideration: How can the Union be preserved?

Mr. Calhoun's comments were directed toward his fellow Congressmen's efforts to make important decisions on territorial and state laws based on their impressions of slavery rather than the more important and fundamental protections of liberty that he recognized as the prime responsibility of his government. He addressed the ongoing confusion of leaders engendered by the egalitarian ideas expressed in the DOI but not embodied in the Constitution.

He refers to egalitarian ideas embodied in legislative actions based on:

a proposition which originated in a hypothetical truism, but which, as now expressed and now understood, is the most false and dangerous of all political error.  The proposition to which I allude has become an axiom in the minds of a vast majority on both sides of the Atlantic, and is repeated daily, from tongue to tongue, as an established and incontrovertible truth; it is, that “all men are born free and equal.”  I am not afraid to attack error, however deeply it may be intrenched, or however widely extended, whenever it becomes my duty to do so, as I believe it to be on this subject and occasion.

In pointing out this, Mr. Calhoun was exposing the cultural and social fallacies of the phrase "all men are born free and equal". That explanation has its roots in Plato's discussions on the relationship of the individual to the state. It would seem that Calhoun read Plato, and Hegel; as well as most assuredly Aquinas, Locke and Hobbes.

Practically every one of these thinkers rejected the concepts of government by democracy and that egalitarianism should guide political action. Although embodied in social interactions, especially certain religious movements, liberty was always valued over equality by some that understood the value of our constitution.

He said in this speech:

Instead, then, of all men having the same right to liberty and equality, as is claimed by those who hold that they are all born free and equal, liberty is the noble and highest reward bestowed on mental and moral development, combined with favorable circumstances. Instead, then, of liberty and equality being born with man; instead of all men and all classes and descriptions being equally entitled to them, they are prizes to be won, and are in their most perfect state, not only the highest reward that can be bestowed on our race, but the most difficult to be won and when won, the most difficult to be preserved.

In your research, have you found anyone that understood the fundamental concept of liberty and its total underpinning of government any more thorough than Calhoun?

[PeaRidge]

On the contrary, secession was a well thought out solution that had totally positive consequences.

As of Lincoln's first day, the states with slaves had largely disappeared from his per view. The political opponents had withdrawn. The Southern states were asking for peace. The Davis government was issuing offers of reimbursement for federal facilities.

Trade was continuing. The banks were prospering. Shipping was continuing without any violence. People were traveling.

All was well.

[PeaRidge]

When it comes right down to it, you really do not know anything about which you posted, and using a contrived analogy does not help.

[PeaRidge]

More names for your list?

How about Senator Charles Sumner of Boston.

He was a member of the Republican Radicals, a faction of the new Republican party, which was a highly verbal and charged group of men that wanted to abuse Southern states.

In March 1861, after the withdrawal of Southern Senators, Sumner became chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations.

The Radicals primarily advocated the immediate abolition of slavery and the destruction of the Southern planter class. Senate Radicals included Sumner, Sen. Zachariah Chandler, and Sen. Benjamin Wade.

Wade was probably the most radical in the Congress at the time. During the American Civil War, Wade was highly critical of President Abraham Lincoln.

In a September 1861 letter, he privately wrote that Lincoln's views on slavery “could only come of one born of poor white trash and educated in a slave State.” (source: Wikipedia)

How about US Postmaster General Amos Kendall?

[PeaRidge]

Have you ever studied logic, and the fallacy of gross generalization?

If you were to study Marxism, I do not think you would want to use the name Calhoun with the movement.

A more likely name of the time would be Ben Wade from Ohio.