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.
__________________ "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
"No government has a right to anything, including its own existence; strictly speaking, it has no existence of its own. It is, instead, an artifice we have created to secure our natural rights. Our rights, not its own. The most a government can claim appearing as rights is authority to use its powers for the purposes designated"....
"Having no rights, then, the government also has no interests; though it will exhibit characteristics of human beings - being composed of them - it is not a person except in some legal (?) fiction. Only people have interests. This powers-rights dichotomy is true for government at any level - U.S. or State".....
"Wrapping back around, then, to the issue of what is termed "States' rights," it is clear there is no such thing. The only time the issue really comes up is when the U.S. government legislates, enforces law or interprets law, in a manner contrary to the desire of a certain faction (i.e., interest group)",
Granted, I'm not an educated man. So if I understand what is trying to be put forth here is .... if at any time a state has a gripe with the US Gov it is usually in the name of a special interest group. So to save a lot of hassle and trouble for the ignorant masses, we should all become The United State of America. Abolish all state constitutions, laws, governments, senators, representatives and governors. Because all that really matters in the end is the US Constitution and how it applies to the individual. The division of a statehood has no legal grounds not being specifically mentioned in the AOC nor the Constitution.
"Only people have interests. This powers-rights dichotomy is true for government at any level - U.S. or State (local governments' existence and powers derive from the State, if I'm not mistaken, under the U.S. Constitution, they being not mentioned at all). Thus, States cannot have rights."
If States have no rights ...and therefore do not exist, because what is the use for their existance if they have no ways and means or reason to govern, what is the use to even be, if there is no way to claim or stake rights or ranks or privaleges somewhere somehow in the name of something or for something, namely the people of that state. Then how can there possibly be local governments as mentioned. Local to what and within what parameters, other than a state.
"Thus, I assert that no governmental entity has any rights whatsoever, nor do the persons that hold offices in that entity, except insofar as they hold the same individual rights as the rest of us. The phrase "States' rights" refers to something that does not - cannot - exist in a free society. The proper framing of any argument regarding State versus U.S. powers must fall into the realm of powers - whether delegated, reserved, shared, inherent, implied or withheld - and must be applied to Constitutional interpretation / application of specific powers, rather than as a generalized political philosophy, lest we degenerate into a de facto anarchy in which might, ultimately, does indeed make right."
Once again let me reiterate that I'm not an educated man, but it appears to me that if states rights meant nothing then it never would have meant anything. There never would have been any consideration from the beginning. The founding fathers would have never considered what the individual states/colonies wished, wanted or cared about. No representatives of the original states would have been considered or heard from and the AOC, the constitution and all things from that point on would have been written, approved and instituted no matter what was thought outside of the central base of the government.
I have to disagree without the education to make a formal rebuttal. The argument has been waged since long before I was born and will continue long after I have perished.
My .02
__________________ "Facts are stubborn things, and whatever may be our inclinations, or the dictums of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."
I agree that state rights are a myth for two reasons. First, as shown in the article, states don't have rights, they have powers. People have rights.
Secondly, even if we accept the incorrect formulation of state rights to include the sovereignty of a state over its own laws, when an entire body of laws of the states of Kentucky and Delaware can be overturned, without their consent, by the other states, nobody can truthfully claim that a state in the United States is fully sovereign. The states, in the aggregate and acting together, can exert sovereign powers as much as they like, but a single state can exert only as much sovereign power as the other states will allow it to exert.
Tarheel: You don't need an education to think and apply logic, which you have obviously learned. -- para -- I think you have missed one thing on state and local governments: The framers and signatories accepted and recognized that it would be impossible and not in the intent of the Constitution for a single entity to administer to the needs of such a large populace with such a diverse set of needs. State and local governments were left in place for that reason and for the reason that the Federal Government had no business in the activities of a state -- except as expressed in the constitution. -- para -- The choker came in on that piece of the preamble, "to provide for the common welfare." Essentially, the southern states came to reject that provision and the northern states came to consider that internal improvements provided for the common welfare. (We've gone considerably beyond those simple days.) -- para -- So, yes. If you accept the premise that only people have rights, and government has only powers, regional governance was still required. Ole (big smiley)
__________________ 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
An interesting article, but not entirely convincing.
If governmental entities have no rights, it follows that this applies as much to national as to state or local government. In other words, the United States Government has no rights. So it cannot claim the right to enforce the Union.
As it happens I think the author of this article misses the fundamental point. When we talk about “States’ Rights” we do not mean that the state itself has rights: it is a means of expressing the concept that certain rights are reserved and retained by the people of the various states.
He goes on to quote from the Declaration of Independence: “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the consent of the governed . . ."
From a Confederate point of view, the argument would be that when the majority of the people in eleven states withdrew their consent the U.S. government lost any moral right to govern them. Presumably the pro-Union argument would be that “the consent of the governed” means the consent of the people as a whole, i.e. all American citizens rather than any fraction thereof.
But if we consider the context in which the Declaration of Independence was drafted this makes no sense. The people who signed that document were British subjects. One might argue that they were de facto Americans, but they were de jure Britons. And although there was quite a lot of sympathy with the revolutionaries in Britain, one could not plausibly argue that a majority of Britons consented to the withdrawal of the colonies from their allegiance to the Crown. So the assertion that governments derive their “just powers from the consent of the governed” only makes sense if “the governed” means – in the colonial context - that fraction of the British people living in the American colonies rather than the entire population.
And if that it what the signers of the Declaration meant (and any other interpretation would appear to prove their treason) then the Confederate people could logically assert the same right to withdraw their consent to government from Washington that their grandfathers asserted in respect of government from London. The fact that they were outnumbered (and outvoted) by Northerners would appear to be of no significance whatever.
Bill,
the only question on this is, what about the sometimes extensive union minorities within the 11 states? ie NC TN and VA, how do you accomplish such a separation without it dissolving into absolute chaos, ie Pakistan/India 1947?
Respectfully,
Matt
__________________ Great-Great Grand Nephew of George H. Pfau, 4th NJ Vol Infantry
Where do you cut off the required number of people to give their consent?
If we do agree with the concept all of the people, then this must mean all Americans must give their consent to the idea that part of the people could leave, not just a portion and certainly not a number of states who had no powers at all.
So, did ALL Americans have a say in a portion of their number leaving the entity the called the United States or did they not?
Sincerely,
Unionblue
PS Welcome back.
__________________ "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 problem with your argument is that it means minorities have no rights other than those it pleases majorities to allow them. Majorities "own" minorities in much the same way that slaveholders own slaves: they have complete control over them because they can outvote them.
Norway's population was smaller than Sweden's when it seceded from their union; Belgium's population was smaller than Holland's when it seceded from their union. In neither case did the larger entity initially consent to the split. So, if I understand you correctly, you are saying that neither Norway nor Belgium have any right to exist. And you presumably favour consigning the population of Taiwan to an existence under the jackboot of a Marxist dictatorship? After all, there are more people on the mainland than in the island.
Do you see where this obsession with numbers can lead you? Ultimately it boils down to the thoroughly immoral message of "Do as we tell you because there are more of us." Surely a community of people has the right to say "There may be fewer of us, but we feel a separate identity and assert the right to an independent existence."
Just as the colonists did.
Bill
Last edited by bill_torrens; 01-29-2006 at 05:06 AM.
If we do agree with the concept all of the people, then this must mean all Americans must give their consent to the idea that part of the people could leave, not just a portion and certainly not a number of states who had no powers at all.
So, did ALL Americans have a say in a portion of their number leaving the entity the called the United States or did they not?
Neil:
Are you suggesting that no State may secede for any reason, and if they do, the Federal government can use mililtary force to suppress their withdrawal? When a State peacefully secedes, others can follow or continue on as before - no one's will is compromised. Otherwise, one group of people is imposing it's will on the other at the point of a bayonet.
I find that we talk about secession in the abstract a lot. Bill says Neil would "prefer to consign Taiwan to the jackboot of a Marxist dictatorship."
The only people in the US in 1861 consigned to a jackbooted dictatorship were the slaves.
Also, the North could "own a minority, as the slaveholders owned slaves." I don't think that's accurate. Slaveholders could kill, sell, whip, rape and otherwise exploit the human beings in their power without consequence. Every citizen of the United States has both the Bill of Rights, protecting their individual rights, as well as representatives in Congress to promote their state, sectional, and regional interests. Minority interests are protected in the undemocratic Senate, where every state is represented regardless of its population.
In matters of national interest, for example making war on foreign countries to spread slavery, chasing runaway slaves across state lines, spreading slavery into the western territories, or suppressing slave revolts, the entire nation has a right to decide.
What right was the South denied? The right to secede.
What do you want to secede? Because we don't have the right to secede?
CivilWarTalk.com -
A free and friendly Civil War community. 
The States Rights Myth 
Linear Mode
