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A police officer is said to have the task of protecting and serving. It is written on many of their cars...
It is a shock, then, when he learns that he really only has one actual job which occurs during the act of performing all his other variegated tasks: To report the commission of crime to the state... in writing.
That 'state' could be a city municipality, a county administration under an elected shire reeve (sheriff), the state police (for traffic and other selected functions), and the federal government (the FBI, DEA, interstate crimes, et cetera).
Now, to perform this task, he will need to make some basic assumptions. From these, he will build a case, and from this, convictions will be made in court.
Historians do not generally do this, but it might be enlightening if they did in fact follow the rules of the
street cop in making a case against the various elements of the Civil War, and following through.
The cop has two element that the historian may also use:
Probable Cause, which he uses, and A Preponderance of the Evidence, which the jury uses, and which comes from weighing Reasonable Doubt against the Chain of Evidence.
We are, after all, innocent until proven guilty.
We know of things which happened during this time, but if we simply believe what is recorded, officially, we get very little in the way of scope as to what actually might have happened.
Probable Cause is about a 50% assurance that facts and circumstances are present which show that a crime has been, is being, or will be committed, and that the interested party is the perpetrator of the offense. That he is then said to be guilty.
A Preponderance of the Evidence is a 75% or higher, belief in the accused being guilty.
That is all that is required to take a man's life on death row.
So, what if we did this with the Civil War?
For example, most pro Unionist historians today take the side and position of the 1860's abolitionist in their defense of the Union. They are in fact just as hostile to the South, and to Slavery, as the John Brown Secret Six. They do not realize this, but they are very much like these men...
The pro-Secessionists, on the other hand, have no modern day use for slavery, and a great many of them are actually not in the least racist. They simply want their flags, their symbols, and their culture. They are accused of wielding a Lost Cause... But as Jefferson Davis wrote, 'if the Cause was lost, what Cause was it?"
These people were culturally very different from us, today.
Virtually none of them believed in assassination, nor even the abolitionist's creed.
And yet, there was this sight, which, at first glance, one sees as many Rebels as Yankees involved in this war...
Many at the North have posited that the South gathered around Slavery like a cherished newborn, and held onto it lovingly... The South almost unanimously denies this then, and now...
But did they?
If we logically study the great war, and 'try' it in an open court, what do we learn?
Well, unfortunately they admitted it in the various causes of secession. An 'admission' of that nature is highly probative.....guilty.
Please the court, the trial extends to all avenues of the war, not just the South's alleged fetish for African slavery.
But the South's assumed fetish does in fact figure in, and not just as an excuse for a civilian-decimating invasion, so we can address that case, at any point, as well.
The Defense in the above-styled cause will produce several exhibits, and will show that extreme prejudice was being used against a people for no constitutional reason.
To wit: Slavery was legal throughout the Civil War. When people do not feel safe, or feel threatened, it is quite common for them to 'take the law into their own hands' and seek redress elsewhere. The guilt of these people is then decided (in another case, of course), and so the various trials are held as in real life civil and criminal courts.
Therefore, Defense Exhibit A: A growing dissatisfaction with the government; to wit, the expansion of the United States into the territories all the while not including the South due to sectionally UNCONSTITUTIONAL efforts to deny slaves and their masters the right to traverse the common property held by the Union in the aggregate.
The effects of this activity by the LEFT in the NORTH, then,
were several:
1). To deny negro entry into a haven where White Supremacist and president of the Illinois Colonizationalist Society A. Lincoln admits he'd like to keep lilly-white and sanitized from the Negro. This would devalue the purchase price of all slaves, and make property in slaves worth much less to their owners, who did own this type of property. They could not borrow money against such a devalued commodity, nor could they continue their wealth 'on paper' as before, in times of bad harvests and misfortune. No governmental programs suggested for these people EVER.
This RACISM on the part of the North would normally raise great hackles at the North and the Left today, save it would incriminate the Leader of the Left and the North at this time of the conflict...
2). Defense Exhibit B: The fact that the Institution of Slavery was 'not looked down upon' by the federal government before the sectional aggrandizement and usurpation of the Radical Republican party. This was the result of social force by those of the Abolitionist organizations. The Second Party became increasingly joined with them, until Salmon Portland Chase and William Seward began supporting John Brown's brand of
terrorism, and the raid upon a FEDERAL installation at Harper's Ferry Landing.
3). Defense Exhibit C: The South rightfully felt abandoned by the general government and the people of North America due to these 'Northern Agitators', none of whom helped to advocate Federal monies to compensate for a believable and practical emancipation program, nor to do any activity save for depriving the South of their lives, their liberty to do as before, and pursuit of their domestic tranquility from these factions at the North through the constant threats of incendiary publications, insurrections, and political grandstanding.
(Speeches by Senator Davis, the gentleman from Mississippi, will also be admitted into evidence forthcoming...)
But the South's assumed fetish does in fact figure in, and not just as an excuse for a civilian-decimating invasion, so we can address that case, at any point, as well.
One of these days, someone is going to have to explain to me what invasion we're talking about.
Very well said, Beowulf. It's full of doodoo, but it remains very well said.
ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
Ah, yes...the American Civil War...the supposed War Against Slavery....
...but slavery still exists today in this 'enlightened' age...
Any wars being fought against it?...None that I know of...
__________________ POWER & MONEY
"Your New-York bankers and merchants are shrewd people, but I never gave them credit for so much sagacity as when they took the Government Loan. It was not merely patriotism, it was a high stroke of policy. It has saved the Government, and what they will regard as equally important, saved them from a great financial disaster."
Ah, yes...the American Civil War...the supposed War Against Slavery....
...but slavery still exists today in this 'enlightened' age...
Any wars being fought against it?...None that I know of...
Ah, yes...The War of the Rebellion...the supposed War That Had Nothing To Do With Slavery...
And the denial continues to this very day. Any who are willing to admit that slavery actually had something to do with the cause of the war? Even as a side issue? Anyone? None who are willing to twist history completely out of shape to advance a 21st century viewpoint.
Unionblue
__________________ "The American people and the Government at Washington may refuse to recognize it for a time but the inexorable logic of events will force it upon them in the end; that the war now being waged in this land is a war for and against slavery." Frederick Douglass
"Loyalty to our ancestors does not include loyalty to their mistakes." George Santayana
Ah, yes...The War of the Rebellion...the supposed War That Had Nothing To Do With Slavery...
And the denial continues to this very day. Any who are willing to admit that slavery actually had something to do with the cause of the war? Even as a side issue? Anyone? None who are willing to twist history completely out of shape to advance a 21st century viewpoint.
Unionblue
Today's neo-Confederates deny the fact that slavery was THE cause of the Civil War for one of two reasons... or sometimes a combination of both.
1) They do not wish to admit that dear old g-g-g grandad fought to preserve, protect and expand slavery.
2) They do not wish to admit that their support for secession and the cause of the Confederacy today links them inextricably to a defense of the cause of slavery.
Had there been no slavery there would have been no secession. Had there been no secession there would have been no rebellion, no war.
Today's neo-Confederates deny the fact that slavery was THE cause of the Civil War for one of two reasons... or sometimes a combination of both.
1) They do not wish to admit that dear old g-g-g grandad fought to preserve, protect and expand slavery.
2) They do not wish to admit that their support for secession and the cause of the Confederacy today links them inextricably to a defense of the cause of slavery.
Had there been no slavery there would have been no secession. Had there been no secession there would have been no rebellion, no war.
...except for that money problem...keeps popping up, you know-
"They [the South] know that it is their import trade that draws from the people's pockets sixty or seventy millions of dollars per annum, in the shape of duties, to be expended mainly in the North, and in the protection and encouragement of Northern interest.... These are the reasons why these people do not wish the South to secede from the Union. They [the North] are enraged at the prospect of being despoiled of the rich feast upon which they have so long fed and fattened, and which they were just getting ready to enjoy with still greater gout and gusto. They are as mad as hornets because the prize slips them just as they are ready to grasp it."
New Orleans Daily Crescent, January 21, 1861
"... the mask [of protecting slavery] has been thrown off and it is apparent that the people of the principal seceding states are now for commercial independence. They dream that the centres of traffic can be changed from Northern to Southern ports. The merchants of New Orleans, Charleston, and Savannah are possesed of the idea that New York, Boston, and Philadelphia may be shorn, in the future, of their mercantile greatness, by a revenue system verging on free trade....The government would be false if this state of things were not provided against."
Boston Transcript, March 18, 1861
__________________ POWER & MONEY
"Your New-York bankers and merchants are shrewd people, but I never gave them credit for so much sagacity as when they took the Government Loan. It was not merely patriotism, it was a high stroke of policy. It has saved the Government, and what they will regard as equally important, saved them from a great financial disaster."
A police officer is said to have the task of protecting and serving. It is written on many of their cars...
It is a shock, then, when he learns that he really only has one actual job which occurs during the act of performing all his other variegated tasks: To report the commission of crime to the state... in writing.
That 'state' could be a city municipality, a county administration under an elected shire reeve (sheriff), the state police (for traffic and other selected functions), and the federal government (the FBI, DEA, interstate crimes, et cetera).
Now, to perform this task, he will need to make some basic assumptions. From these, he will build a case, and from this, convictions will be made in court.
Historians do not generally do this, but it might be enlightening if they did in fact follow the rules of the
street cop in making a case against the various elements of the Civil War, and following through.
The cop has two element that the historian may also use:
Probable Cause, which he uses, and A Preponderance of the Evidence, which the jury uses, and which comes from weighing Reasonable Doubt against the Chain of Evidence.
We are, after all, innocent until proven guilty.
We know of things which happened during this time, but if we simply believe what is recorded, officially, we get very little in the way of scope as to what actually might have happened.
Probable Cause is about a 50% assurance that facts and circumstances are present which show that a crime has been, is being, or will be committed, and that the interested party is the perpetrator of the offense. That he is then said to be guilty.
A Preponderance of the Evidence is a 75% or higher, belief in the accused being guilty.
That is all that is required to take a man's life on death row.
So, what if we did this with the Civil War?
For example, most pro Unionist historians today take the side and position of the 1860's abolitionist in their defense of the Union. They are in fact just as hostile to the South, and to Slavery, as the John Brown Secret Six. They do not realize this, but they are very much like these men...
The pro-Secessionists, on the other hand, have no modern day use for slavery, and a great many of them are actually not in the least racist. They simply want their flags, their symbols, and their culture. They are accused of wielding a Lost Cause... But as Jefferson Davis wrote, 'if the Cause was lost, what Cause was it?"
These people were culturally very different from us, today.
Virtually none of them believed in assassination, nor even the abolitionist's creed.
And yet, there was this sight, which, at first glance, one sees as many Rebels as Yankees involved in this war...
Many at the North have posited that the South gathered around Slavery like a cherished newborn, and held onto it lovingly... The South almost unanimously denies this then, and now...
But did they?
If we logically study the great war, and 'try' it in an open court, what do we learn?
Beowulf
I don't know where you studied law. But,your understanding of the burden of proof in criminal cases is simply wrong. The burden is not a "preponderance of the evidence" it is "beyond a reasonable doubt." Even in civil cases where "preponderance of the evidence" is a standard the definition is not 75%. In any case if I were picking a jury to try the Civil War, I would challange you for cause on the grounds of prejudice, and win. No amount of evidence will satisfy a juror who has already mde up his mind.
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