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.
Probably when they threatened it in the constitutional convention if slavery were not protected in the Constitution.
Regards,
Cash
How could delegates to the Constitutional Convention threaten secession if the Constitution was not ratified at the time? Did they only threaten not to ratify it and it would not go into effect due to a lack of nine states ratifying it? After rereading the Articles of Confereration and Perpetual Union, ratified 1781, I could not find any right of secession in it. The Articles do say alterations to them can be made through the Confederation Congress and then by all the states. This was done albeit the Constitution went into effect on the ratification of the ninth state, but all thirteen states eventually did ratify it which made it ligitimate with the Articles. Another argument against secession is the Northwest Ordinance forbids new states from leaving the Union.
__________________ "Those who forget to remember the past are condemned to repeat it", George Santayana.
How could delegates to the Constitutional Convention threaten secession if the Constitution was not ratified at the time? Did they only threaten not to ratify it and it would not go into effect due to a lack of nine states ratifying it?
There was a Union before the Constitution was ratified. They threatened to not be a part of the Union under the Constitution unless slavery were protected. That would be a secession from the Union.
As Madison said, "The result is seen in the Constitution. S. Carolina & Georgia were inflexible on the point of the slaves." [James Madison to Thomas Jefferson, 24 Oct 1787]
William R. Davie of North Carolina spoke about it in the convention:
"Mr. DAVIE, said it was high time now to speak out. He saw that it was meant by some gentlemen to deprive the Southern States of any share of Representation for their blacks. He was sure that N. Carola. would never confederate on any terms that did not rate them at least as 3/5 . If the Eastern States meant therefore to exclude them altogether the business was at an end." [Madison, _Notes on the Federal Convention,_ 12 Jul 1787]
Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania responded:
"Mr. Govr. MORRIS. It has been said that it is high time to speak out, as one member, he would candidly do so. He came here to form a compact for the good of America. He was ready to do so with all the States. He hoped & believed that all would enter into such a Compact. If they would not he was ready to join with any States that would. But as the Compact was to be voluntary, it is in vain for the Eastern States to insist on what the Southn. States will never agree to. It is equally vain for the latter to require what the other States can never admit; and he verily believed the people of Pena. will never agree to a representation of Negroes. What can be desired by these States more than has been already proposed; that the Legislature shall from time to time regulate Representation according to population & wealth." [Ibid.]
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina then chimed in:
"Genl. PINKNEY desired that the rule of wealth should be ascertained and not left to the pleasure of the Legislature; and that property in slaves should not be exposed to danger under a Govr. instituted for the protection of property." [Ibid.]
The next day, Pierce Butler of South Carolina was blunt:
"Mr. BUTLER. The security the Southn. States want is that their negroes may not be taken from them, which some gentlemen within or without doors, have a very good mind to do. It was not supposed that N. C. S. C. & Geo. would have more people than all the other States, but many more relatively to the other States than they now have. The people & strength of America are evidently bearing Southwardly & S. westwdly." [Madison, _Notes on the Federal Convention, 13 Jul 1787]
Quote:
Originally Posted by Freddy
After rereading the Articles of Confereration and Perpetual Union, ratified 1781, I could not find any right of secession in it. The Articles do say alterations to them can be made through the Confederation Congress and then by all the states.
Article II: "Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled."
If a state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, then it may leave the union at will anytime it desires. Such a condition does not exist under the Constitution.
There was a Union before the Constitution was ratified. They threatened to not be a part of the Union under the Constitution unless slavery were protected. That would be a secession from the Union.
As Madison said, "The result is seen in the Constitution. S. Carolina & Georgia were inflexible on the point of the slaves." [James Madison to Thomas Jefferson, 24 Oct 1787]
William R. Davie of North Carolina spoke about it in the convention:
"Mr. DAVIE, said it was high time now to speak out. He saw that it was meant by some gentlemen to deprive the Southern States of any share of Representation for their blacks. He was sure that N. Carola. would never confederate on any terms that did not rate them at least as 3/5 . If the Eastern States meant therefore to exclude them altogether the business was at an end." [Madison, _Notes on the Federal Convention,_ 12 Jul 1787]
Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania responded:
"Mr. Govr. MORRIS. It has been said that it is high time to speak out, as one member, he would candidly do so. He came here to form a compact for the good of America. He was ready to do so with all the States. He hoped & believed that all would enter into such a Compact. If they would not he was ready to join with any States that would. But as the Compact was to be voluntary, it is in vain for the Eastern States to insist on what the Southn. States will never agree to. It is equally vain for the latter to require what the other States can never admit; and he verily believed the people of Pena. will never agree to a representation of Negroes. What can be desired by these States more than has been already proposed; that the Legislature shall from time to time regulate Representation according to population & wealth." [Ibid.]
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina then chimed in:
"Genl. PINKNEY desired that the rule of wealth should be ascertained and not left to the pleasure of the Legislature; and that property in slaves should not be exposed to danger under a Govr. instituted for the protection of property." [Ibid.]
The next day, Pierce Butler of South Carolina was blunt:
"Mr. BUTLER. The security the Southn. States want is that their negroes may not be taken from them, which some gentlemen within or without doors, have a very good mind to do. It was not supposed that N. C. S. C. & Geo. would have more people than all the other States, but many more relatively to the other States than they now have. The people & strength of America are evidently bearing Southwardly & S. westwdly." [Madison, _Notes on the Federal Convention, 13 Jul 1787]
Article I: "Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled."
If a state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, then it may leave the union at will anytime it desires. Such a condition does not exist under the Constitution.
Regards,
Cash
You need to read the entire document. I have never heard any scholar suggest that a state could leave the Confederation without the approval of the other states.
__________________ "Those who forget to remember the past are condemned to repeat it", George Santayana.
Freddy:
If I'm reading you right, and I think I am. The "Founders" or "Framers" if you prefer, I'm joining you in a conviction that these guys didn't go go all that work to create a coalition that could be disbanded easily, if at all.
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
Article III: "The said States hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship with each other ... "
A "firm league of friendship" is one from which one can secede at any time, especially when the states retain all of their sovereignty, freedom, and independence. That's why the Constitution doesn't use these words.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Freddy
I have never heard any scholar suggest that a state could leave the Confederation without the approval of the other states.
You haven't consulted very many, then.
Have you heard of the Founding Fathers? Read the Federalist Papers. They saw the Constitution as necessary because the AoC weren't sufficient to preserve the Union.
Ever hear of James Madison?
"In some of the States the Confederation is recognized by, and forms a part of the constitution. In others however it has received no other sanction than thta of the Legislative authority. From this defect two evils result: 1. Whenever a law of a State happens to be repugnant to an act of Congress, particularly when the latter is of posterior date to the former, it will be at least questionable whether the latter must not prevail; and as the question must be decided by the Tribunals of the State, they will be most likely to lean on the side of the State. 2. As far as the Union of the States is to be regarded as a league of sovereign powers, and not as a political Constitution by virtue of which they are become one sovereign power, so far it seems to follow from the doctrine of compacts, that a reach of any of the articles of the confederation by any of the parties to it, absolves the other parties from their respectivie obligations, and gives them a right if they chuse [sic] to exert it, of dissolving the Union altogether." [James Madison, "Vices of the Political System of the United States," April, 1787]
"A strong realpolitik answer was that sovereign states sometimes broke their pledges in order to safeguard their vital interests. If repudiation of the Articles would violate the niceties of international law, so be it. The very violation of the Articles implicit in the Constitution's ratification by a supermajority of nine or more states would only prove that the Confederation was a failed experiment.
"A more legalistic answer was that the material breaches of promised state performance under the Articles gave each compacting party--each state--a right to rescind the agreement under general principles of contractual and international law. Blackstone's influential _Commentaries_ had noted that in the case of a nononfederate 'incorporate union' such as the 1707 union of England and Scotland (the very kind of more perfect union that, as we shall see, the Constitution would later propose) no rescission option existed: 'The two contracting states are totally annihilated [qua sovereign states], without any power of revival; and a third arises from their conjunction, in which all the rights of sovereignty ... must necessarily reside.' But in the case of a simple 'foederate alliance'--that is, a mere confederation or league of sovereign states--an infringement of fundamental conditions 'would certainly rescind the compact.'
"Nor did the language in the Articles of Confederation that 'the union shall be perpetual' doom this legal analysis. This language was itself yoked to a mandate that the Articles 'shall be inviolably observed by every state.' Under standard principles of international law, each of these yoked mandats was a condition of the other. When inviolable observation lapsed, so did the obligation of perpetual union. Indeed, international law principles helped explain why perpetuity and inviolability were so pointedly paired. As the influential jurist Vattel made clear, 'Treaties contain promiss that are perfect and reciprocal. If one of the allies fails in his engagements, the other may ... disengage himself from his promises, and ... break the treaty.' Thus, the legalistic argument went, the decisive fact about the Confederation was that it was a self-described league, a multilateral treaty. The word 'perpetual' merely specified what kind of league it would be: the firmest of leagues, but a league nonetheless." [Akhil Reed Amar, _The Constitution: A Biography,_ pp. 30-31]
and
"But the United States did not become an indivisible nation prohibiting unilateral state secession--the crux of the Gettysburg contest--until 1788." [Ibid., p. 39]
How could delegates to the Constitutional Convention threaten secession if the Constitution was not ratified at the time? Did they only threaten not to ratify it and it would not go into effect due to a lack of nine states ratifying it? After rereading the Articles of Confereration and Perpetual Union, ratified 1781, I could not find any right of secession in it. The Articles do say alterations to them can be made through the Confederation Congress and then by all the states. This was done albeit the Constitution went into effect on the ratification of the ninth state, but all thirteen states eventually did ratify it which made it ligitimate with the Articles. Another argument against secession is the Northwest Ordinance forbids new states from leaving the Union.
The people were building the nation from scratch in those days. It was an experiment, and there was a great deal of controversy about what was meant by what language in the "Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union" as well as the the Constitution. There was substantial debate about what powers and rights the national government had, what powers and rights the individual states had, and whether or not the states could reclaim and powers and rights they passed to the central government.
Personally, I would hold to something close to the opinion of the Chief Justice in the post-Civil War case of White v. Texas. His opinion (written as the majority opinion) was roughly that the United States had pre-existed the Constitution, that there was no right to leave the "Perpetual Union" under the Articles, and that it was hard to see how you could form a "more perfect" version of a "Perpetual Union" by allowing states to leave willy-nilly. However, I can also see where it could be argued that he was wrong. I just do not believe the argument would be compelling enough to get me to agree with it.
Essentially, the basis for a "right of secession" is that the 13 original states were independently sovereign, that while they passed many of the aspects of sovereigity to the central government under the Articles and the Constitution, they could withdraw them and again be independently sovereign.
Everyone must agree that, if they ever were independently sovereign, they did pass many aspects of sovereignity to the US government. The history of the nation from the 1770s to 1860 proves it. Even then, though, opinion is not unanimous.
For example, one of the men charged with actually writing the Constitution in Philadelphia believed that the original 13 had never been independently sovereign (that is never, as in not once, not ever). He felt the 13 had only achieved the state of sovereignity as a group and could not claim to be independently sovereign. His was not what history records as a majority opinion. However, he was a well-respected legal mind of the time, a man of strong background and impressive credentials. He might have been right in his argument.
That said, and accepting the concept that the states had been independently sovereign at some time, the argument over the "right of secession" boils down to whether or not the rights and powers of sovereignity yielded by the states could be reclaimed by the states. Were they given up for ever -- or were they merely loaned out, to be reclaimed at any time? Had they merely been "parked" in Federal care, to be used freely while they were there? Or had the title to them been surrendered to the central government for all time?
Perhaps more to the point, why should all the obvious methods by which the separation of a state can be accomplished under the Constitution be ignored (as was done by the Southern secessionists in 1860-61)? Why should all the checks and balances built in the system suddenly be treated as if they do not exist? Why, when all the states have agreed to submit all such disputes and controversies to the Supreme Court, should a state be able to disregard their promise?
IMHO, it is quite possible for a state to leave the Union, and there are several methods available by which it might be accomplished. The one chosen by the secessionists of 1860-61 just is not one of them.
Perhaps more to the point, why should all the obvious methods by which the separation of a state can be accomplished under the Constitution be ignored (as was done by the Southern secessionists in 1860-61)? Why should all the checks and balances built in the system suddenly be treated as if they do not exist? Why, when all the states have agreed to submit all such disputes and controversies to the Supreme Court, should a state be able to disregard their promise?
Perhaps, because at the end of the day, might makes right, and the secessionist leaders were of an opinion that the land size, wealth of King Cotton, and political solidarity of a confederacy of all the slave states together assured them that they were too much for the North to tangle with. And had all the slave states run to join their sister states in the very beginning, and they did little things like peacefully let Anderson run out of food, they might have been right.
Perhaps, because at the end of the day, might makes right, and the secessionist leaders were of an opinion that the land size, wealth of King Cotton, and political solidarity of a confederacy of all the slave states together assured them that they were too much for the North to tangle with.
I understand what you are saying, but this is not the legal "right of secession" Southerners were claiming. This is the "natural right of revolution", which exists only for those who have the power to make it work (a common concept in such theories in the 19th century) or, at best, the right to TRY to make it work. It is little different than disputes being settled by the knight-champions in the lists in long ago days, with the marshal crying "May God defend the right!" as the battle is joined.
In any event, the history of Southern secession and the Civil War shows that the Southern secessionists badly miscalculated the real balance of might here. In retrospect, their cause seems doomed, although it was not quite so obvious at the time.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cedarstripper
And had all the slave states run to join their sister states in the very beginning, and they did little things like peacefully let Anderson run out of food, they might have been right.
Possibly. I personally believe that a true attempt at legal secession in 1860-61 would have either resulted in a) a peaceful splitting of the nation (however long that lasted) or b) a negotiated compromise with the states remaining within the Union.
But the whole point of Lincoln's April mission to resupply Ft. Sumter is that he was not going to allow that to happen. He was sending supplies to Anderson, and the secessionists would have to either a) allow that peaceful re-supply or b) take action to prevent it. Lincoln was not going to accept the loss of the Fort and everything else by default. Of course, by then the secessionists had already performed so many egregious acts that almost any other nation would have already taken military action against them earlier.
Just to bring this old thread back to the top for those who have not seen it.
Tim
__________________ "Let us, then, consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each state is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy, which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses."
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina, 1740-1824, Revolutionary War soldier, one of the authors of the US Constitution in 1787, speaking at the South Carolina Ratifying Convention in 1788.
CivilWarTalk.com -
A free and friendly Civil War community. 
Linear Mode
