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.
But I assert that you are mischaracterizing Rhett. Your 1881 source gets him garbled. Rhett never said that he considered the FSL to be unconstitutional, just that some others did. Stating that the FSL was unconstitutional would be very un-Rhett. I will look into the proceedings of the South Carolina Convention and let you know.
Tim and others of the board, I owe an apology to all. Since I wrote the above, I have gone back and read the transcripts of the South Carolina Convention, and exactly what Rhett said about the Fugitive Slave Law (FSL). In fact, on December 24th, 1860, in the South Carolina Convention, Rhett did challenge the constitutionality of the FSL. He said, “The only question that the committee to which I belonged [The Committee to draft the Address of the People of South Carolina] considered was, what is the character of the addresses we should put out to the people of South Carolina. How shall that great address defend the great cause in which we are concerned. And they came to the conclusion – first, that whilst they expressed upon the immediate cause which induced the Southern States to secede, that it was not improper for us to go into the previous causes which produced that result. The secession of South Carolina is not an event of a day. It is not anything produced by Mr. Lincoln’s election, or by the non-execution of the fugitive slave law. It has been a matter which has been gathering head for thirty years, and, in the production of this great result, the great men who have passed before us whose great and patriotic efforts have signalized the times in which they lived, have not been lost. Have the labors of Calhoun been forgotten, when he declared a few years ago, for the secession of South Carolina? And, that secession would be the consummation of their liberties? Sir, the election of Lincoln and Hamlin, sectional candidates of the North, was the last straw on the back of the camel. But it was not, the only one. The back was nearly broken before. The point upon which I differ from my friend [Mr. Memminger, who drafted the Declaration] is this. He says he thought it expedient for us to put this great question before all the world upon this simple matter of wrongs on the question of slavery, and that question turned upon the fugitive slave law, according to his statement. Now, sir, in regard to that fugitive slave law, I myself doubt its constitutionality, and I doubted it on the floor of the Senate, when I was member of that body. It was also doubted by a member of the House. Mr. Webster declared it was unconstitutional, and, if I am not mistaken, Mr. Keitt expressed the same opinion. If we look at that clause which requires that fugitive slaves shall be delivered, we will find that it was a guarantee between the States. We cannot go before the Congress in relation to this matter. The States, acting in their sovereign capacity, should be responsible for the rendition of fugitive slaves. That was our best security and hence the attempt of certain States to relieve themselves from the responsibility as States, and go into Congress and legislate upon the subject, was a breech on the part of the North. This report has proceeded, then, upon the elaborate about of a constitutional question which the very ablest men in this States have doubted. While on the floor of the Senate, Judge Butler propounded this question to Mr. Sumner, who had been arguing in favor of the unconstitutionality of this law discussion: ‘If we repeal these laws, will you enforce the obligations of the Constitution between the States?’ And what was the reply? He scorned the idea that the States would do it. Sir, there is no faithful observance to be expected of any agreement made with those States. When we go before the world, if we put it upon mere matter of this kind, we do not do justice to our cause. Sir, to whom are we to speak? Is it simply the North? We are about to sunder our relations with that section, and I trust, forever. Our treaties, I suppose, will be with the nations of Europe will have any sympathy with us, or confidence or affection, because of the violation of the fugitive slave law? Germany, and France, and England, what do they all say? Sir, in setting up our independence we are not to narrow it down simply to the question of slavery. We do not do ourselves justice. The aggressions upon slavery is the last consequence of a great cause, and that great cause is the dissolution of the Constitution of the United States by the agents of the North. It is that which led them to aggression upon the taxing power. It is that which led to the aggression upon the appropriation power. It is that which led to the aggressions on slavery in the District of Columbia. And now, the great cause is, that we do not live in a free Government. We live in a despotism, and that is the despotism of the majority of the North. And when we go before the world and state the great principles on which our Government is based, and how these principles are overthrown – when we go further than that, and show that the great principle of taxation for which our fathers contended, is the one which animates us – and like them we are contending for the rights of all freemen – when we go for free trade and against monopoly – when the great idea of the statesman of Europe is carried out – I say that grievances such as these will elevate our cause and secure for us the admiration and sympathy of the world. Would you place the constitutionality of the fugitive slave law as the cause for which you dissolved your connections with the Confederacy? Mr. President, the most that you can do in preparing an address, is to get such an one that will do. It is not supposed that one can be framed so perfect as to satisfy every man. The object ought to be to secure one that will gain general approbation.” (Charleston Mercury, December 25th, 1860, pg. 4. col. 4-5, emphasis added to the original)
Thus, Rhett did say he doubted the constitutionality of the FSL of 1850, (and again in 1860). So did Webster and Sumner, but for very different reasons. Rhett, Memminger, and Keitt doubted its constitutionality because they felt that the States of the North had a responsibility to extradite fugitive slaves without any Federal law. The fact that the Northern States refused to do this, in Rhett's view, justified secession at that time. But to go to the Congress and seek a Federal law to force States to do what they had agreed to do when they ratified the Constitution was to give Congress the power to legislate over slavery, and this Rhett wished to avoid. Rhett anticipated the Court ruling of Kentucky vs. Dennison in this regard.
In conclusion, I apologize to all for my error as well as any confusion it may have caused. Respectfully, John Taylor
__________________ "In this Constitution, the citizens of the United States appear dispensing a part of their original power in what manner and what proportion they think fit. They never part with the whole; and they retain the right of recalling what they part with." James Wilson of Pennsylvania, October 28th, 1787
This is an interesting debate. I have a question: If the secessions were illegal, why were there not any treason trials after the war?
Four years ago this particular question was discussed. If you go to the last page of this section, Civil War History - Secession and Politics you will find a thread titled Jeff Davis a Traitor? Bunk! The cast of characters is different, but there are at least three pages (30 posts) discussing treason in general and Jeff Davis in particular.
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
You forget the 10th Amend. Whatever powers are not delegated to the fed nor prohibited by it to the states are powers which - like secession - belong to the states or the people. The concept of secession existed well before the CW. Two states, NY and Va., which ratified the Constitution expressly reserved the power of secession in their ratification documents. (I don't think that ratification documents add to the terms of the Constitution, just that they recognized that this state power was preserved by the Constitution.) The right to regulate railroads and electricity didn't exist at the time of the Constitution, but that never stopped states from regulating them once they existed. And they can do that because of constitutional silence on those issues. Just like the states regulate liquor before and after prohibition.
Since secession is a state right, and the USSCt only has the authority to rule on fed law, the USSCt has no jurisdiction over the issue of secession. (That the USSSCt did assert jurisdiction after the CW over secession is an act unsupported by the Constitution and borne of politics.) In any event, the USSCt had not addressed the issue at the time any of the states seceeded.
States needed no change or amendment to the Constitution to secede because the Constitution doesn't prohibit state secession.
The states did secede peacefully and legally. All they did was pass ordinances or statutes of secession. It was the north that sought to forcibly repatriate the seceeded states. You may say that firing on Ft. Sumter started it, and I'd disagree. But even if I did agree, how would South Carolina firing on arguably federal territory justify an invasion of Va.?
I disagree that the seceeding states were 'two-faced.' Insurrection is, by definition, internal conflict. Once the states seceeded, they were no longer 'internal' to the U.S. What you're essentially saying is that the seceeding states needed the permission or consent of the other states to secede. There's no such requirement in the Constitution.
Is secession a Power? Is it a Right? Or is it a term invented long after ratification; i.e., inconceivable at the time of ratification?
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
Tim and others of the board, I owe an apology to all. Since I wrote the above, I have gone back and read the transcripts of the South Carolina Convention, and exactly what Rhett said about the Fugitive Slave Law (FSL).
...
John, thank you.
This issue of compelling a state to comply with its obligations under the Constitution was a common one at the time. It is the same as the one you referred to against the Governor of Ohio and his duty under the Fugitive Slave Law (Kentucky v. Dennison, 1861) In that, the Supreme Court decided 8-0 that it was the governor's duty to comply, but that the Federal government had no power to compel him to comply.
It would be impossible for anyone supporting "state's rights" to concede anything else. Certainly no one who favored and advocated unilateral secession should have been willing to admit the Federal government had the right to compel them to do anything. The Fire-Eaters would have been adamantly against the eventual reversal of Kentucky v. Dennison a century or so later.
Many people in the North who considered there was no "right of secession" also agreed that there was no right to compel the state to remain. That is why the Confederate course of violence and force was so disastrous. When the news of the attack on Federal soldiers in Ft. Sumter arrived in any given area of the North, outrage replaced uncertainty. Men stopped on the spot, filled with anger, and went to volunteer even before Lincoln put out his call.
In the South, men like Robert E. Lee felt the same on the issue: they did not believe in secession, but they were opposed to compelling the states to remain. For them, Lincoln's call pushed them to the other side of the fence, just as men like Davis and Pryor had calculated it would.
Is secession a Power? Is it a Right? Or is it a term invented long after ratification; i.e., inconceivable at the time of ratification?
Ole
Secession comes from the Latin "Secessio Plebis" which would mean roughly "Withdrawal of the Plebes". This was akin to a labor walkout, where the plebes or commoners left town (ancient Rome). This left the patricians to run things, much like the managers at a big company having to do all the grunt work while the workers are out on the picket lines or calling in sick with the "blue flu". Major examples were in 494 BC, 449 BC, and 287 BC.
You can find a fuller explanation at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secessio. My old Latin teacher, Mr. Courtney, would be happy to know I can still remember things like this enough to look them up.
Tim, that is all very true. However, I am curious how you see a people can activate the natural right of revolution. How exactly does a people go about declaring a revolution?
Respectfully,
John Taylor
John, you begin by NOT claiming you are acted legally or constitutionally. The secessionists practiced double-speak with a vengenance, telling everyone that it was the other side that was acting illegally and presenting themselves as the good, noble, true defenders of the American Constitution. It was all bunk. Just the normal sort of thing many politicians do, wrapping themselves in the flag as they say, to make themselves and the cause they espouse look good by association rather than on the merits of what they actually say.
Much better they had simply said: we find living under this agreement intolerable. We reject it. We are breaking with you and setting up our own nation, we will do as we will, and we defy you to stop us.
My family endured it...to them it had gigantic proportions. And, to me.
Undoubtedly it was difficult for anyone involved, and probably as bad as anything in US history. At the same time, it was relatively light treatment by world standards of the day.
For comparison, look at the vision the Founding Fathers might have had in mind when they rebelled: the English responde to the Jacobite rebellion of Bonnie Prince Charlie in Scotland in 1745, barely 30 years in their past. Here's a good summary: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Culloden. Look at what the Duke of Cumberland does after the battle, and the repression of the Highlands that follows.
Is secession a Power? Is it a Right? Or is it a term invented long after ratification; i.e., inconceivable at the time of ratification?
Ole
Ole, good question. I am one of those who believe that governments don't have rights, the people have rights, and delegate powers to them. And the Founders (by which I mean the delegates to the several State Conventions in 1787-1790) didn't use the term secession. They did talk of resuming delegated powers.
Virginia, in ratifying, declared that "the powers granted under the Constitution being derived from the People of the United States may be resumed by them whensoever the same shall be perverted to their injury or oppression and that every power not granted thereby remains with them and at their will."
New York said "That the Powers of Government may be reassumed by the People, whensoever it shall become necessary to their Happiness; that every Power, Jurisdiction and right, which is not by the said Constitution clearly delegated to the Congress of the United States, or the departments of the Government thereof, remains to the People of the several States, or to their respective State Governments to whom they may have granted the same."
Rhode Island declared, "That the powers of government may be reassumed by the people, whensoever it shall become necessary to their happiness."
Technically, South Carolina didn't "secede," she repealed her ratification of the Constitution in 1788. In fact, none of the States that left the Union "seceded." They dissolved the Union between their respective States and the US, but none of them mentioned secession (except Texas in her Declaration on Causes, in which she mentioned the secession of the other six Confederate States).
Someone might be able to convince me that States (and/or the Federal government) have "rights." I'm willing to listen to the argument, but I feel confident with the above distinction.
Respectfully,
John Taylor
__________________ "In this Constitution, the citizens of the United States appear dispensing a part of their original power in what manner and what proportion they think fit. They never part with the whole; and they retain the right of recalling what they part with." James Wilson of Pennsylvania, October 28th, 1787
You forget the 10th Amend. Whatever powers are not delegated to the fed nor prohibited by it to the states are powers which - like secession - belong to the states or the people. The concept of secession existed well before the CW. Two states, NY and Va., which ratified the Constitution expressly reserved the power of secession in their ratification documents. (I don't think that ratification documents add to the terms of the Constitution, just that they recognized that this state power was preserved by the Constitution.) The right to regulate railroads and electricity didn't exist at the time of the Constitution, but that never stopped states from regulating them once they existed. And they can do that because of constitutional silence on those issues. Just like the states regulate liquor before and after prohibition.
Since secession is a state right, and the USSCt only has the authority to rule on fed law, the USSCt has no jurisdiction over the issue of secession. (That the USSSCt did assert jurisdiction after the CW over secession is an act unsupported by the Constitution and borne of politics.) In any event, the USSCt had not addressed the issue at the time any of the states seceeded.
States needed no change or amendment to the Constitution to secede because the Constitution doesn't prohibit state secession.
The states did secede peacefully and legally. All they did was pass ordinances or statutes of secession. It was the north that sought to forcibly repatriate the seceeded states. You may say that firing on Ft. Sumter started it, and I'd disagree. But even if I did agree, how would South Carolina firing on arguably federal territory justify an invasion of Va.?
I disagree that the seceeding states were 'two-faced.' Insurrection is, by definition, internal conflict. Once the states seceeded, they were no longer 'internal' to the U.S. What you're essentially saying is that the seceeding states needed the permission or consent of the other states to secede. There's no such requirement in the Constitution.
As I said before, perhaps the Constitution is silent on the "right of secession" because it does not exist.
I can find no example at any time in history of a people exhibiting this "right of secession" None. I have asked a lot of people over the years, and have never gotten a straight and clear example comparable to what the secssionists of 1860 claimed was an existing "right".
I have not forgotten the 10th Amendment. I merely do not think the "right of secession" ever existed, before or after the Constitution was written. I do not think the 10th Amendment was intended to allow states to invent and claim rights or powers that no one had ever heard of before.
Also, in reference to your statement above about "The states did secede peacefully and legally", it is simply not so. At least six of the first seven states to secede in particular employed force, the threat of force, and the seizure of property even in advance of the adoption of secession. Also, it is highly debatable that any "right of secession" exists at all in that day; if it does not exist, everything they did was illegal, and even if it did, much of their action was illegal even under the laws of the states themselves.
Mind you, I think that there was about a 50% or greater chance they would have managed a victory in the Supreme Court or a congressional/amendment victory if they had simply tried. The point is that those would have been peaceful, legal methods that might have taken a year or two or three -- and the possibility would be there that the legal and peaceful course would have told them there was no such "right of secession". After years of thinking about it, my conclusion is that those urging secession were afraid there case was too weak, and that popular sentiment would turn against them if they did not keep fanning everything to a fever pitch.
CivilWarTalk.com -
A free and friendly Civil War community. 
Linear Mode
