Civil War History - Secession and PoliticsWas it Slavery, or was it States Rights? Perhaps it was the election of Lincoln? What were the real reasons for Southern Secession and what were the political issues in this time of war? Find your answers here in the Secession and Politics Disussion.
With the same view as I started the thread on the Paris Treaty, I would like to begin this thread with another famous view in which many have said has supported the idea that secession was supported by the Constitution in some way.
This view has mainly sprung from the idea of William Rawles view on the Constitution in which he states in Chapter XXXII, entitled, OF THE PERMANENCE OF THE UNION, he states secession is permitted under the Constitution.
It has further been brought to my attention that Rawles book on the Constitution was taught at West Point and somehow contributed to the idea that secession was an OK idea with the military students/cadets of the time. Although it has been pointed out that Rawles book was only used for one or two years in the West Point curriculum, the idea for secession was firmly in place and accepted.
Rawles writings on the Constitution can be found at the following site:
Many of you have claimed that this man's views and writings prove the concept of secession was legal and just. Why? And if you don't agree, why is Rawles wrong?
I await your comments and statements on this one.
__________________ "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
Rawle was a comparatively obscure figure. Many claims have been made about him, but it's incredibly difficult to find any objective writings concerning his life and writings. There are no biographies of him that I could find, nor does his body of work seem to extend much beyond his On the Constitution.} By contrast both James Kent and Joseph Story have far more impressive credentials, a far larger body of writings, and biographies written about them that are available today.
Rawle's book was used at West Point for one year, and one year only, 1826. The only high ranking confederate who appears to have been taught from Rawle was Albert Sidney Johnston. I have an article by Col. Edgar S. Dudley, published in <u>The Century Magazine</u> in August of 1909 which specifically addressed Rawle's book at West Point.
Douglas Southall Freeman debunked Rawle as a source of secessionism among Confederates in Volume 1 of his <u>R. E. Lee: A Biography.</u>
Thomas Fleming writes: "After the Civil War some vengeful anti-West Pointers did indeed try to trace Davis' disloyalty to his education under Thayer. They maintained that the future leader of the Confederacy had derived not a little encouragement from one of his textbooks at West Point, <u>On the Constitution,</u> by a disunionist legal philosopher named Rawle, who taught that the states had a natural right to secede. Davis himself denied that he ever studied Rawle, and West Point defenders, paging through old archives, reported that the book had been used for one year early in Thayer's regime, largely for want of an alternative text. When James Kent, New York State's great Supreme Court justice, sometimes called the American Blackstone, published his <u>Commentaries,</u> which sternly rejected the idea of secession, Thayer immediately snapped up copies fo rhis cadets. Only in this century has the Rawle canard been totally laid to rest in the most definitive possible way. An examination of James Kent's journal for June 3, 1828, reveals him to have been a member of West Point's Board of Visitors. After listening to the cadets recite on constitutional law, he noted 'They appeared to be masters of the first volume of my <u>Commentaries.'</u> The cadet who shone brightest in discoursing on the principles of this rock-ribbed Unionist was Jefferson Davis." [Thomas J. Fleming, <u>West Point: The Men and Times of the United States Military Academy,</u> p. 59]
Rawle provides no support for his assertion. He simply asserts there is a right to secession and moves on. Compare that with Joseph Story, who provides supporting documentation for his view against secession.
Wasn't Rawle one of Philadelphia's legal elite who participated in the formation of the Union, and was a member of PA's constitutional assembly? He accepted Washington's offer to be the first US Attorney for PA, and was actively involved in putting down the Whiskey Rebellion in western PA and actually prosecuted its leaders. He later declined Washington's offer to be US Attorney general, I believe.
As one of the founders, and a US attorney prosecuting the Union's first secessionist threat, he had a preeminent resume on the topic of secession. It is therefore interesting to read his views on secession in that light -- particularly since the federal government's reaction to the Whiskey Rebellion is often used by pro-forced unionists in their arguments against secession.
"Wasn't Rawle one of Philadelphia's legal elite who participated in the formation of the Union, and was a member of PA's constitutional assembly?"
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Rawle was not a member of the Federal Constitutional Convention, nor was he a member of the Pennsylvania Ratification Convention. He appears to have played no role at all in the Framing and ratification of the Constitution.
"He accepted Washington's offer to be the first US Attorney for PA, and was actively involved in putting down the Whiskey Rebellion in western PA and actually prosecuted its leaders. He later declined Washington's offer to be US Attorney general, I believe."
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And yet one cannot find any mention of him in any biographies of Washington, nor are any biographies of Rawle extant. We can't find mention of Rawle in any histories of the Framing of the Constitution or in any histories of the early US under the Constitution, at least that I can find. He was the U.S. Attorney in Pennsylvania, but that is a patronage job. Can anyone actually name more than three or four U.S. Attorneys who were famous because they were U.S. Attorneys? As I said, he was a relatively obscure figure. We know of him only because he is trotted out by prosecessionists, and his reputation is trumped up to give his writings the veneer of credibility.
"As one of the founders,"
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He's not one of the Founders.
"and a US attorney prosecuting the Union's first secessionist threat, he had a preeminent resume on the topic of secession."
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His resumé doesn't seem to be so preeminent. He was not a founder as far as I can determine, although I have corroborated through the George Washington Papers that he was a U.S. Attorney. Being a U.S. Attorney, doesn't qualify him as an expert on secession. The Whiskey rebellion wasn't a secession attempt. It was resistance to paying an excise tax on whiskey that became violent with attacks on Federal Excise agents. The participants who were prosecuted were indicted for treason for levying war against the U.S. by armed resistance to U.S. authority to collect the excise tax.
Cash: "Rawle was not a member of the Federal Constitutional Convention, nor was he a member of the Pennsylvania Ratification Convention. He appears to have played no role at all in the Framing and ratification of the Constitution....His resumé doesn't seem to be so preeminent. He was not a founder as far as I can determine..."
Perhaps you are more informed on William Rawle than Rawle & Henderson LLP (the firm he founded); but they disagree with you:
RAWLE & HENDERSON LLP, the oldest and one of the most distinguished law practices in the United States, was founded by William Rawle in Philadelphia in 1783. Rawle was a grandson of Francis Rawle, Jr., a Quaker merchant, economist, author and lawyer, who emigrated from Plymouth, England to the Province of Pennsylvania in 1686.
William Rawle studied law at Middle Temple, London in 1781, and returned to Philadelphia to open the Rawle Law Offices on September 15, 1783. William Rawle quickly took his place among Philadelphia's legal elite, managing a successful law practice and participating in the formation of the new republic. Rawle's reputation as a lawyer vaulted him into the position of delegate to the Pennsylvania Constitutional Assembly of 1789. Rawle's public service continued when he accepted President Washington's request to become the first U.S. Attorney for the District of Pennsylvania. As U.S. Attorney, Rawle was instrumental in suppressing the Whiskey Rebellion in Western Pennsylvania and prosecuting the leaders of the insurrection. In 1792, Washington offered Rawle the position of federal judge for the new Pennsylvania district. When Rawle declined that post, Washington offered the position of U.S. Attorney General, which Rawle also declined, choosing instead to maintain his thriving private law practice and to serve existing clients and organizations in various positions of leadership.
Rawle became the first chancellor of the newly-formed Philadelphia Bar Association in 1822, and remained in that position until his death. Rawle was a member of the American Philosophical Society, a trustee of the University of Pennsylvania, president of the local anti-slavery society, and founder and president of the Pennsylvania Historical Society
"Cash: The Whiskey rebellion wasn't a secession attempt."
"Perhaps you are more informed on William Rawle than Rawle & Henderson LLP (the firm he founded); but they disagree with you:"
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They do not. They claim he was a member of the Pennsylvania Constitutional Assembly, which would probably be the assembly that rewrote Pennsylvania's state constitution. He was not a member of the Federal Constitutional Convention that framed the U.S. Constitution, nor was he a member of the Pennsylvania Ratification Convention that ratified the U.S. Constitution. One can easily confirm that through Elliott's Debates, which lists the members of both conventions. His name doesn't appear there.
I still have not independently confirmed that Rawle was offered any positions other than U.S. Attorney by George Washington or anyone else. Not that being offered jobs confers any expertise on secession or the Constitution.
I hope I can be pardoned for not believing a website, especially one that does not list primary sources for its assertions and has a vested interest in trumping up the reputation of its subject. I can still find nothing that confirms Rawle was anything but an obscure figure who would be unknown to us today if it were not for the attempts to claim unilateral secession was somehow constitutional.
"Cash: The Whiskey rebellion wasn't a secession attempt."
I don't believe that claim was made.
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I refer you back to your previous posting above:
"a US attorney prosecuting the Union's first secessionist threat"
Did not even Rawle state that secession should be avoided if at all possible, that too many evils and dangers could happen to a state if it did secede?
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
Cash: "His resumé doesn't seem to be so preeminent. He was not a founder as far as I can determine..."
Hal: "Perhaps you are more informed on William Rawle than Rawle & Henderson LLP (the firm he founded); but they disagree with you:"
Cash: "They do not"
Rawle's Law Firm: "William Rawle quickly took his place among Philadelphia's legal elite, managing a successful law practice and participating in the formation of the new republic."
Perhaps your definition of a "founder" is not "one who participated in the formation of our republic." Or perhaps you disagree with them regarding his illustrious resume and/or his role in the formation of the republic.
But the distinction you point out regarding the PA assembly vs. the federal is a good one.
"Did not even Rawle state that secession should be avoided if at all possible, that too many evils and dangers could happen to a state if it did secede?"
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Exactly right. In Chapter 32 of his book, Rawle writes, "The consequences of an absolute secession cannot be mistaken, and they would be serious and afflicting.
"The seceding state, whatever might be its relative magnitude, would speedily and distinctly feel the loss of the aid and countenance of the Union. The Union losing a proportion of the national revenue, would be entitled to demand from it a proportion of the national debt. It would be entitled to treat the inhabitants and the commerce of the separated state, as appertaining to a foreign country. In public treaties already made, whether commercial or political, it could claim no participation, while foreign powers would unwillingly calculate, and slowly transfer to it, any portion of the respect and confidence borne towards the United States.
"Evils more alarming may readily be perceived. The destruction of the common hand would be unavoidably attended with more serious consequences than the mere disunion of the parts.
"Separation would produce jealousies and discord, which in time would ripen into mutual hostilities, and while our country would be weakened by internal war, foreign enemies would be encouraged to invade with the flattering prospect of subduing in detail, those whom, collectively, they would dread to encounter."
It must be pointed out that Rawle cites no authorities when he asserts a state could secede on its own. He is simply stating his opinion, and it's only the opinion of a single lawyer in Philadelphia. In a footnote, Rawle even admits that his opinion is counter to what the Supreme Court held in Cohens v. Virginia. Lysander Spooner makes a much stronger case for his thesis that the Constitution had always prohibited slavery than Rawle makes for a right of unilateral secession.
"Rawle's Law Firm: 'William Rawle quickly took his place among Philadelphia's legal elite, managing a successful law practice and participating in the formation of the new republic.'
"Perhaps your definition of a "founder" is not "one who participated in the formation of our republic." Or perhaps you disagree with them regarding his illustrious resume and/or his role in the formation of the republic."
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An illiterate private in the Continental Army "participated in the formation" of our republic. I don't think that makes him an expert on the Constitution, nor do I think that makes him a "founder." The website is incredibly vague about what Rawle actually did.
To use the term "founder," for me, means that the individual was a signer of the Declaration of Independence or participated in the framing of the Constitution as a member of the Federal Convention or, peripherally, one of the state ratification conventions.
I frankly find his resumé to be less than illustrious and in the absence of further facts and corroboration I find the website to be unconvincing. He was, after all, a lawyer in Philadelphia who did a stint as a U.S. Attorney and wrote a book. Contrast that with Joseph Story, Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court and Dane Professor of Law at Harvard University, who had a very large body of scholarly work on the Constitution and on U.S. law and has had biographies written about him that one can find today. Or James Kent, Professor of Law at Columbia University, Chief Justice of the New York Supreme Court, and former New York legislator whose written opinions shaped American law regarding equity. Compared with these two luminaries, Rawle is an obscure figure, a relative unknown with a miniscule body of work and little influence, and it's not much of a stretch to say he's more a crackpot than a mainstream commentator.
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