Secession: It's constitutional (Walter E. Williams offers evidence from .... U.S. history)

WND ^ | November 27, 2012 | Walter E. Williams

[Tau Food]

They all missed the one way that would have been legal.

A legal way would be to amend the Constitution to provide for secession procedures.

The most fundamental problem for secessionists right now is that there are very few secessionists. Too many people are too patriotic. The most immediate danger for secessionists would involve the risk that their own neighbors might do them harm, particularly in a place like Texas.

[hopespringseternal]

Secession does not solve every problem, it just substitutes a new more manageable set of problems for the insurmountable problems created by an out of control FedGov™.

Unless you implement meaningful voting reforms it won't solve any problem except in the shortest of terms.

Basically, no one should be allowed to vote who has a tap into the public treasury. It is a conflict of interest.

[MrChips]

Under the Articles, no state could secede lawfully unless all states seceded simultaneously. But the Constitution—which Lincoln had just taken an oath to uphold—did not contain that clause (or any other like it); so any state could secede lawfully at any time. And the Southern states did secede lawfully. Honest Abe flat-out lied when he said that was not so in his inaugural address; and he subsequently used his blatant lie to slaughter 623,000 people and wage war on women and children whom, in his view, were his own people.

[central_va]

Too many people are too patriotic.

I would say loyalty to the current FedGov™ is the antithesis of patriotism.

[rockrr]

And you call tearing apart our great nation patriotic?!

[donmeaker]

No. Controversies between the states or between the states are clearly stated in Article 3 to be resolved by legal action with the supreme court as original jurisdiction.

You don’t get to avoid the agreed and stated method of resolving a disagreement by pretending that you don’t want to be part of the agreement and refusing to follow laws. That is called “insurrection”.

[donmeaker]

No he didn’t.

“... We are not enemies but friends...” from his inaugural address.

In response to that the rebels fired on US forces, starting the war.

[central_va]

I would say read Mr. Williams article. It speaks for me.

FedGov™ is 535 fools pretending to know what they are doing.

[Tau Food]

I would say loyalty to the current FedGov™ is the antithesis of patriotism.

What do you mean by "would" say that? You can say that, thanks to our First Amendment.

The fundamental problem is that there just aren't enough people who are prepared to sever the US. If I wanted to grow a secessionist movement, I would try to find a single uncompromisable issue to divide people into two groups. Slavery was that kind of issue. I don't see such an issue out there right now.

[central_va]

I don't see such an issue out there right now.

I guess you must be a socialist.

[Tau Food]

No, it's certainly not that. I personally don't think that the government should be involved in health care at all. I personally think that Medicare, Medicaid and Obamacare are all unconstitutional. But I know that I am in the minority in that regard.

Too many people have conflicting feelings about government. I know many, many folks who hate socialism and "believe in small government," but somehow also believe in Medicare. What side of the secession issue will they choose?

[central_va]

But I know that I am in the minority in that regard.

The media has mad it seem that way to you. The tail is waging the dog.

[Sherman Logan]

Thanks for your far more than averagely thoughtful reply.

I hate to break it to you, but the theory that the war was over trade issues is a revisionist falsehood, or at least exaggeration. Its support comes almost exclusively from three sort-of contemporary sources:

1. Post-war apologists who couldn’t convincingly defend slavery as a bright and shining cause, so came up with the notion of tariffs and trade as “the cause.”

2. European America-haters like Dickens, who refused to ascribe anything but the most base motives to Americans.

3. Radicals like Marx, who ascribed EVERYTHING to the most base materials motives.

The notion that the war was fought over control of trade and desire to maintain its revenue doesn’t even make any sense. Let us assume the South paid the entire revenue of $60M the government took in, and further that the entire revenue was spent in the North, neither one of which is even vaguely true. But under this most extreme of possible scenarios the North is ripping off the South for $60M/year.

The final cost of the war for the Union was over $6000M. Thus the Union taxed itself to spend 100x the money they were supposedly extorting from the South, and without which “their finances would collapse.” Well, don’t you think it would have made a lot better financial sense to just tax themselves to replace the “lost” $60M, rather than spend 100x that amount to get it back?

The notion of the protective tariff as “the cause” is particularly odd. The PT started, pushed most strongly by Henry Clay, a southerner and slaveowner, BTW, after the War of 1812, when it became perfectly clear that depending on imports for military and other necessary industrial supplies might not be the best idea. Especially when the Royal Navy controlled the seas, and Britain was a quite likely future antagonist. So the idea was that vital “infant industries” would be protected against foreign competition so they could get a running start.

Obviously protective tariffs soon got caught up in political deals and logrolling. But the notion that the CSA would not be impelled itself to put in protective tariffs, had it won independence, is ludicrous. The CSA wouldn’t want to build up its own armament industry? It would be content to leave its military supplies open to blockade by the USA or UK? Really?

I could be wrong on this, but I believe the pre-secession tariff was the lowest in decades. Each of the seceding states laid out a declaration of the reasons impelling it to do so.
Every single one featured the protection of slavery as a primary cause, most as THE primary cause. I believe only one or two, at most, even mentioned trade or tariff issues as a cause.

In his great Cornerstone Speech, acclaimed at the time as the most eloquent and comprehensive statement of the southern cause, the Veep of the CSA stated that tariffs and trade weren’t the issue, that the South seceded to uphold the great principle of human inequality, on which the Founders were unfortunately mistaken.

The Lincoln/Douglass debates, which I recently read in full, were widely accepted at the time as the most comprehensive spelling out of the issues between the sections. Every single debate was totally concerned with slavery. Not one other issue was even brought up. Odd if slavery was only a side issue, with trade and tariffs the main thing.

Perhaps most importantly, one must distinguish between the causes of secession, and the causes of the war. At least in theory, it would have been possible for the South to secede peacefully.

As others have pointed out, the primary reason the South seceded was that it wanted to protect its way of life against what it saw as mortal threat. Unfortunately, the way of life it wanted to protect was based on slavery. Southerners at the time were perfectly clear in saying so. Only after the war did some of the wimpier ones try to find other reasons for secession.

Did the Union go to war, initially, to destroy slavery? Nope, but the destruction of slavery was an inevitable consequence of the war itself, as I’ve pointed out in a timeline upthread.

The oddest thing of all, to me, is the implicit assumption in the argument that trade caused the war that the really very minor economic exploitation claimed (whether it existed in fact is another issue) by the South somehow justified the war when the defense of slavery could not.

The entire US federal budget in 1860 was $60M. The GDP was $4345M. The federal government therefore consumed about 1.4% of GDP. I suspect most of us wish we could return to those days of intolerable federal oppression justifying secession and civil war!

(We are presently closing on 20% of GDP spent by the feds.)

I also suspect any conceivable CSA government, after independence was won, would have consumed a good deal more than 1.4% of the CSA’s GDP.

It’s all really quite simple. The only “uncompromisable” issue between the sections was slavery. The South insisted it be accepted as a positive good, and its expansion protected by federal law and federal troops. The North refused this and demanded that slavery be confined to its existing locations. Since neither side would back down, the only solution was secession. Secession led directly to war.

Had the Union agreed to let the erring sisters go in peace, I suspect the CSA would have immediately made demands for a peace or all of the territories. After all, the precipitating cause of secession was a demand for access to the territories. So after secession they happily agree to keep slavery cooped up in the existing states, the very cause that impelled them to secede? Really?

I also suspect the CSA would have demanded that MO, KY and MD be allowed to join them, and would have gone to war if the demand were resisted.

IOW, had war not started at Sumter, it almost certainly would have started over the territories or border states.

[Nowhere Man]

The precedent denying secession by state action alone is Texas v. White.

Law does not really matter, force does or the threat thereof. Robert A. Heinlein said in "Starship Troopers" where "the use of naked force has decided more issues" than any other method in history. Well, I guess it decided the Civil War when the Confederacy lost. Still there might be a time that if a group of State woulds secede, there might be a debate on whether force should be applied to make them stay or not and if it woulds be worth it to use such force. I am sympathetic to the Confederacy, if I was around then, I would have supported the South. I am also sympathetic to the idea of secession if all else fails such as going by the 10th Amendment and so on.

I guess if in today's or in the world of nearly tomorrow, if a group of States want to break away, they must be able to cash the checks they write, either by showing the ability to stand up well enough to make the other party say, "well, let 'em go, the fight will not be worth it" or if needed, to be able to fight and throw off the unionists or at least wear them down enough to where they would say uncle. Two other plusses, if you get a great power nation or two to recognize you such as a Russia, Japan, France, etc. as a separate nation and if you can score some nukes.

I suppose there is the guerrilla route too like the Afghans, Algerians, Vietnam (until the NVA came in) East Timor and so on where asymmetrical warfare comes into play where over time the underdogs get their point across by grinding down the bigger power. We are having loads of trouble in Afghanistan so we need to remember not even the mighty USSR could tame that place nor even Queen Victoria's finest.

The big thing is you got to be strong enough to beard the lion in his den.

Just an academic discussion here.

[Nowhere Man]

The war saved lives. If the rebels had won, WWI would have had its branch in North America, and millions of US and pretended confederate soldiers would have fought and died then too. By contrast the 11 million killed in WWII had only about 100,000 US soldiers.

You've been reading Harry Turtledove's "Southern Victory" series, haven't you? Good series. It's tough to say about WWI and so on. There was one alternate scenario written in 1960 where both the South and North were on the same side in WWI, so who knows?

[Nowhere Man]

Under the Articles, no state could secede lawfully unless all states seceded simultaneously. But the Constitution—which Lincoln had just taken an oath to uphold—did not contain that clause (or any other like it); so any state could secede lawfully at any time. And the Southern states did secede lawfully. Honest Abe flat-out lied when he said that was not so in his inaugural address; and he subsequently used his blatant lie to slaughter 623,000 people and wage war on women and children whom, in his view, were his own people.

Yeah, myself, I guess Lincoln did what he thought was right but there is another side of me that thinks he was a monster. I lean towards the latter, he suspended a lot of the Constitution and habeus corpus for one. I'd rate even Jimmy Carter and James Buchanan above Lincoln, Lincoln was more of an early Woodrow Wilson type.

[Nowhere Man]

I have to respectfully disagree still, slavery was a side issue or at least it was an issue to whip up anti-Southern feelings. The main problem the South had was the lack of ability to manufacture munitions like the North did. In short, you had an industrial nation of 22 million beating up an agrarian nation of 9 million.

I do see President Lincoln as a monster, I'd even vote for 1970's era Jimmy Carter if he was running against Lincoln.

The South did one big mistake, they fired the first shot. If the North fired the first shot, I think it would have been easier to get a few nations to support the South in sympathy. It's like as schoolyard fight, the guy getting hit by the first punch gets a lot of sympathy.

Well, I remember one episode of "Litle House on the Prarie" where the Civil War was still a huge controversy in the 1880's, now it is 2012 and it still is.

[myself6]

They will never figure that out.... Even when this one is gone, they will replace him with someone just as bad or, most likely, worse.

[MrChips]

Nobody wanted war except for Lincoln, a few rabid abolitionists and, a handful of Northern capitalists whose fortunes were threatened. Certainly, the Republican Party at large did not want it. And keep in mind that the federal government was largely funded by tariffs on goods entering Southern ports. Follow the money. Slavery? Well, one should also keep in mind that there were 33 states, and had the number of slave states remained constant, 27 more free states would have had to be admitted into the Union--for a total of 60 states--before an abolition amendment could possibly be ratified. That was not an immediate threat to the South as that was not likely to occur anytime soon. But, with the Southern states seceding -- or being forced to secede -- the issue of slavery could then be settled by force of arms at an time (although I do not consider that to be the primary motive; the South had been threatening secession since the Tariff of Abominations in 1828, which was a boon to northern industrialists -- to whom Lincoln eagerly prostituted himself --, but harmful to Southern agrarian interests -- and to New England ship owners -- and probably unconstitutional). And so, consider the following direct actions taken by Mr. Lincoln:

(1) Before his inauguration, Lincoln sent a secret message to Gen Winfield Scott, the U.S. general-in-chief, asking him to make preparations to relieve the Union forts in the South. Lincoln knew what he was going to do long before he even took office.

(2) Jefferson Davis sent peace commissioners to Washington to negotiate. Lincoln refused to meet with them.

(3) After inaugurated, Lincoln's generals recommended the immediate evacuation of Anderson's men from Fort Sumter. He knew that to resupply it by force at this point would be a deliberate act of war.

(4) Lincoln sent Gustavus Fox, a retired Navy captain who had come up with a plan for resupplying Fort Sumter which would force the Confederates to fire the first shots (under circumstances which would make them take the blame) down to Fort Sumter to talk with Maj. Anderson about the plan; Anderson wanted no part of it.

(5) Lincoln had Fox pitch the plan to his Cabinet They said that Fox's plan would start a war and were unenthusiastic. But he had Fox make the pitch a 2nd time and they gave in.

(6) Lincoln ordered the sending of three warsips and 500 troops to Ft. Sumpter to "relieve" the 86 who were stationed there.

(7) Lincoln informed the governor of South Carolina that he would re-supply Ft. Sumpter either peacably or by force, if necessary.

(8) Lincoln wrote to Fox, pronouncing the mission a great success,ending his letter with, "You and I both anticipated that the cause of the country would be advanced by making the attempt to provision Fort Sumter, even if it should fail; and it is no small consolation now to feel that our anticipation is justified by the result."

(9) Lincoln did not call Congress into session to declare war (until several months later in order to rubber-stamp it). He simply declared war.

(10) Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address, usually read as an attempt to "heal" the nation's wounds, but delivered to a Northern audience only, with the South in shambles, hundreds of thousands dead, can also be read as Lincoln's (guilt-ridden?) self-justification and glorification of his actions in which he wraps himself in the mantle of God and declares that, as for war, "all dreaded it -- all sought to avert it." Hardly the case.

No, Lincoln had nothing to do with the start of the war. Uh huh. That's a good one.

And at what cost? To the Constitution? Yes; we are still fighting those losses -- disdain for the federal government, preference for state and local control, opposition to taxes, a continuing culture war . . . . And to the people of the time? Well, the latest revisions of the number of people killed run upwards of 850,000 (an equivalent percentage of today's population would be 8 or 9 million) and 2 million refugees. The new estimates mean that more Americans lost their lives than in all other American wars combined, and that far more women were widowed and more children were orphaned as a result of the war than has long been suspected. The printing of money drove the country into an economic depression, one which in the South would last for generations. But then, destruction of property in the South, in today's dollars, would be somewhere in the neighborhood of $800 billion.

And there were much larger philosophical consequences. In a letter to former Confederate General Robert E. Lee dated November 4,1866, British historian Lord Acton wrote " I saw in States Rights the only available check upon the absolutism of the sovereign will, and secession filled me with hope, not as the destruction but as the redemption of Democracy. I deemed you were fighting the battles of our liberty, our progress, and our civilization and I mourn for that which was lost at Richmond more deeply than I rejoice over that which was saved at Waterloo."

But, Lincoln's war? Well, I think so. But, it has been put more simply. The late Shelby Foote, widely recognized as the leading historian on the War, when asked to explain the cause of the war, responded with a simple story: "A Union soldier met a Southern soldier on the battlefield and asked, "Just why are you fighting?' And the Southern soldier replied to the Yankee, 'Why, we're fightin' because y'all are down here'." Indeed.

[hopespringseternal]

You don’t get to avoid the agreed and stated method of resolving a disagreement by pretending that you don’t want to be part of the agreement and refusing to follow laws. That is called “insurrection”.

If both parties no longer desire an agreement, there isn't one.

At some point holding even one party to an agreement they really don't want to be part of just isn't workable. By fielding an army for the purposes of rebellion, the South unintentionally formed the conditions for keeping them in the Union: military defeat.

The left has conquered this nation and subverted its constitution and laws precisely by never creating and confrontation or conditions that could lead to their defeat. They simply kept selling their ideas and gaining ground in the institutions (schools, media outlets) that could promote their ideas until they had a critical mass of thought on their side. A majority of the federal budget now goes to essentially buy votes for their way of thinking.

They did all this by never admitting what they were really up to and by strategically undermining everything that made this nation what it was.

We have been trying to conserve what was left of freedom and the rule of law, and some will continue to do so until all they are conserving is words on pages in history books. That is a defensive war, doomed to failure.

We must start to act and think in terms of gaining ground. We have to be subversive to their goals, constantly attacking the political left's underpinnings, taking out their power base and salting the very institutions they are using to promote their ideals. Part of that strategy has to be strategic withdrawal. None of this is in any way violent -- violence opens the possibility of losing to a superior force. The idea of secession is powerful. It is worth considering that if we keep on our present course it won't be long before there won't be anything to secede from.