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.
What does the term natural right mean to you, in your own words?
What do the terms secession and revolution mean to you, in your own words?
Sincerely,
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
The restored Union-oriented government of Virginia lived briefly and with little notoriety during the War Between the States.
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A red flag just went up. Use of this term indicates the article may not be completely objective.
The second Wheeling Convention assumed power, in an arbitrary fashion, by calling the existing government in Virginia illegal.
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Which it was, under the US Constitution. By Article VI, Section 3 of the Constitution, every member of the Richmond Government was no longer qualified to hold office if they supported Virginia's secession.
In order to give West Virginia statehood a legal ediface (sic), the consent of the Restored Government was of paramount importance. Article 4, section 3 of the Federal Constitution provides that "no new state shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other state; nor any state be formed by the junction of two or more states, or parts of states, without the consent of the legislature of the states concerned, as well as of the congress."
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True.
The dubious constitutional authorization for West Virginia came up often during the debate leading to statehood. Senator Powell of Kentucky questioned whether the Restored Legislature of Virginia represented the will of loyal Virginia.
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Congress officially recognized the restored legislature as the legitimate government of Virginia. Sen. Powell was outvoted.
Representative Joseph Segar of Virginia was alone in his delegation opposing West Virginia statehood. He maintained in a House debate that "there is no evidence that the majority of people within the counties which were to compose the new state had ever given its assent to its formation." He called the statehood bill a punitive measure chastening Virginia.
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Note that he is not contesting the legitimacy of the Restored Government, merely the plebiscite. Note also he specifies the people within the counties which were to compose the new state. But as we saw earlier in this article, the people of West Virginia did in fact vote overwhelmingly for statehood.
In the same theme Representative James Blaine of Maine argued that "essentially the government of West Virginia was giving permission to the formation of a new state of West Virginia."
Representative Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania expressed an opinion held by many:
"We may admit West Virginia as a new state, not by virtue of any provision of the constitution, but under an absolute power which the laws of war give us. I shall vote for this bill upon that theory, for I will not stultify myself by supposing that we have any warrant in the constitution for this processing."
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Once again, these men were in the minority. They lost the vote. Congress recognized the Restored Government as the legitimate government of Virginia, and Congress approved the admission of West Virginia as a state.
Even after West Virginia was admitted to the Union, Senator Davis of Kentucky objected to seating its Senators in the upper house:
"I hold that there is, legally and constitutionally no such state in existence as the state of West Virginia and consequently no senators from such a state. My object is simply to raise a question to be put upon the record, and to have my name as a Senator recorded against the recognition of West Virginia as a state of the United States. I do not believe that the Old Dominion, like a polypus, can be separated into different segments, and each segment become a living constitutional organism in this node. The present state of West Virginia as it has been organized, and as it is seeking representation on the floor of the Senate, is a flagrant violation of the Constitution."
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Again, he lost the vote. He was in the minority, so his opinion was overruled by the majority, who said that there most definitely was, legally and constitutionally, a state of West Virginia in existence.
Virginia had lost a third of its area when in entire violation of the Federal Constitution, its western part had been torn away, organized and admitted to the union as the state of West Virginia.
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This is a false statement. The Restored Government of Virginia was recognized by both Congress and the President as the Legitimate Government of Virginia. This government gave its consent to the partition, the People of West Virginia approved the application for statehood, a constitutional convention wrote a state constitution, and Congress approved the admission of the state. It was fully and completely legal.
Jefferson Davis in his memoirs wrote, with considerable bitterness, on the creation of West Virginia:
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Would we expect Jefferson Davis to be an impartial commentator? The bias in this article is so thick we can cut it with a knife.
President Lincoln had doubts about the legality of admitting West Virginia to the Union:
"We can scarcely dispense with the aid of West Virginia in this struggle, much less can we afford to have her against us, in Congress and in the field. Her brave and good men regard her admission into the union as a matter of life and death. They have been true to the union under many severe trials. The division of a state is dreaded as a precedent but a measure expedient by a war is no precedent for times of peace.
It is said that the admission of West Virginia is secession, and tolerated only because it is our secession. Well, if we call it by that name, there is still difference enough between secession against the constitution and secession in favor of the constitution. I believe the admission of West Virginia into the union is expedient."
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That's what he said.
It would seem that President Lincoln did consider the creation of West Virginina as an act of "secession," only tolerated because it was "for the Union."
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No. People who say this focus on only a part his statement, to wit: "there is still difference enough between secession against the constitution and secession in favor of the constitution."
But that ignores all that comes before it: "It is said that the admission of West Virginia is secession, and tolerated only because it is our secession. Well, if we call it by that name, ... " In other words, he recognizes that some people have claimed it was a secession. He did not agree, but he said that "if we call it by that name" there's still enough of a difference to make it okay. He was dealing in hypothetical, which is why he used the word "if."
Cash, you said: "Two very separate and distinct things. In 1848, Lincoln was talking about the natural right of revolution that all people possess. This is an extraconstitutional and extralegal right. In 1861 he was replying to those who claimed there was a legal, constitutional right to secede." You've lost me here...are you suggesting that the natural right to revolution didn't exist in 1861, and that perhaps there were "rights" in the Constitution that weren't blatantly obvious?
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The natural right to revolution did exist in 1861, but the conditions for that, laid out in the Declaration of Independence, did not exist. And there is no constitutional right to unilateral secession.
As for Mr. Greeley running hot and cold with his views on secession, I would suggest that he was not the only man to change his opinions, depending upon the rustling of the wind. And I suppose we will have to disagree that the destruction of the Consitution was not an act of tyranny.
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There was no destruction of the Constitution.
You say that "all sides agreed that the states were surrendering their sovereignty by ratifying the Constitution."
What I would like to see is the documentary evidence of that communal agreement, rather than a succession of individual opinions.
Unless the man in the street in every state got to vote on the specific issue of perpetual surrender of sovereignty, rather than on the more ambiguous issue of ratification, I remain of the opinion that either (a) no such surrender took place or (b) that such a surrender was null and void because it lacked a proper democratic mandate.
"Cash, you said: "Two very separate and distinct things. In 1848, Lincoln was talking about the natural right of revolution that all people possess. This is an extraconstitutional and extralegal right. In 1861 he was replying to those who claimed there was a legal, constitutional right to secede." You've lost me here...are you suggesting that the natural right to revolution didn't exist in 1861, and that perhaps there were "rights" in the Constitution that weren't blatantly obvious?"
The natural right to revolution and the legal right to secession are distinctly different but - and here's the important thing - they are not mutually exclusive. So in claiming a right to secede Southerners were not waiving their right to revolution. This is why they actually took pride in the epithet of "rebels", because they were conscious that American history and lore had already made that word glorious. And, as you say, Lincoln himself explicitly supported the right to revolution. During his presidency he got round this inconsistency by clinging to the fiction that the majority of people in the seceding states wanted to remain in the Union and were the victims of a coup d'etat.
I'm sorry, but again, in your opinion, why did the South leave the Union?
Sincerely,
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
My definition of "natural rights" are those rights of man and nature which are based on natural law (laws originating from nature) such as life and liberty - or a liason between a government and it's people. A "revolution" is a drastic change in thinking/actions, or the overthrow of one's government. "Secession" - to withdraw or separate.
I would be interested to know your definition of "conceived in liberty" and Lincoln's proposition that "all men are created equal."
What would you call the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, the military arrest of thousands of Northern political opponents (including newspaper editors and owners), suspension of civil liberties, creation of West Virginia, and the censorship of telegraph communciations...destroying the Constitution in order to save it, or that the "end justified the means?"
"I'm sorry, but again, in your opinion, why did the South leave the Union?"
We have a saying in England: "What's that got to do with the price of fish?" It is a response to any non-sequitur. As far as I can see, your question is precisely that.
Bill, what I showed you was the very open and public debate that took place in a literate society in which both sides of the ratification question in each of the states acknowledged a loss of sovereignty on the part of the states. Everyone knew this prior to ratification. What I've done is kick the football through the goal. You are asking me to give you the seamstress who sewed the stitches on the ball before you can count the goal.
What would you call the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus,
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A power the Constitution says the government possesses and may be exercised in cases of invasion or rebellion when the public safety requires it.
the military arrest of thousands of Northern political opponents
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Mostly a myth in that the vast majority of those who were arrested were not political opponents but in fact were southerners who were in the North and were suspected of espionage and attempted sabotage. The next largest group were blockade runners. See Mark Neely, _The Fate of Liberty._ He did extensive research on the arrests.
(including newspaper editors and owners), suspension of civil liberties,
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Which civil liberties do you claim were suspended?
creation of West Virginia,
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The creation of one state from another in accordance with the requirements of the Constitution.
and the censorship of telegraph communciations.
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A necessity to protect the security of military operations. James G. Randall has written on this extensively: "All telegraphic communications concerning military matters not authorized by the Secretary of War, or the commanding general of the district, were forbidden; no further facilities for receiving information by telegraph or transporting their papers by railroad were to be extended to journals violating the order." [James G. Randall, _Constitutional Problems Under Lincoln,_ p. 483] What was happening was newspaper reporters were transmitting sensitive military information over the telegraph wires, revealing classified details to the enemy. Surely you understand the need to maintain the security of information such as size of formations, troop movements, locations and strengths of defenses, locations of guns, etc.
What the reporters did was they filed their stories by mail or sent them via messenger.
The Constitution was never destroyed. That hyperbole takes away credibility from those who proclaim it.
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