Secession; Always Viewed As A Right?

[Beowulf]

Originally Posted by unionblue

Beowulf,



And I am of the opinion the South wanted to maintain its own control of the federal government, which it had done for over seventy years prior to the war, for the sole purpose of defending and protecting slavery.

When it could no longer do so by means of a fair election, it took the untested, untried and most dangerous of routes in hopes of disguising a full-out rebellion.

Unilateral Secession.

A theory that was always debated and never looked upon by the majority of the American people nor its leaders as a 'right' always taken for granted.

Hence that little dust-up we call the Civil War.

Unionblue

So, we seceded from Britain because... why? Taxes or the
fact that they had made their fortunes in the slave trade, and their AMAZING GRACE period was just around the corner, and we weren't about to be party to any of that???

If I recall, the New England states requested the SLAVE TRADE be allowed to continue, so their economy would not collapse, for another 20 or so years? Early 1800's?

And so, solely over our desire to hold the black man down, and to keep him as a slave, we went to war with the North?

No further questions, your honor. Defense rests. Call your next witness....

[Beowulf]

Originally Posted by OpnDownfall

Jefferson passed himself off as a strict constructionist of the Constitution, but when an opportunity to stretch the Constitution to favor a pet project (acquiring western lands), Jefferson was first in a line of all the other Presidents in our history.
Well IF, the north protested the stretching of the authority of the Constitution because of slavery, then by that logic, Jefferson and the supporters of his questionable actions (by his own views) did it to further the aims of the pro-slavers in the south. Even, IF true such a view only proves that slavery was the motive force for the social and geographical division within the Union itself.
Since Beowulf admits that there was no concensus and yet it was done, it really leaves little room to protest if the south tried another act with no concensus to support it, and it was NOT done.
Contrary to accepted wisdom from Di Lorenzo, The south was perfectly willing to trample on the Civil Rights of the Northern States and it's individual citizens in the name of protecting their (the south's) slaves, but when the south thought its slaves were no longer safe under the Constitution, they did not even think twice about trying to take their slaves and go home. such thinking may work with 10 year olds in a marble game, but something more substantive is required from those who purport themselves to be adults, when things don't go their way.




P.S. Beowulf, you do know what courts are for, don't you?

I do.

I don't, however, think that state representation was as life-or-death as it would become later on. While the Conservatives ran things, the Era of Good Feelings and
other nicenesses seemed to negate, at least at the time, an arms race for filling in the territories with voters one way of the other...

I think Jefferson was just trying to politely get rid of the Napoleon and the French.

[OpnDownfall]

I am sorry Beowulf, but the Reolutionary War was not about taxes. Just as tariffs was not the reason for the CW.
Secession was a question for the Supreme Court, except the south was determined to secede and wanted to take no chances, even with a Taney court.
The question of secession was life or death, Not State Representation. Significantly, the question of state representation started no wars; but the question of slavery did.
The 'Era of Good Feeling' ended long before the turbulent 1850's. Check out the presidents and thier states and which party was in control of both houses of Congress.



P.S. Beowulf, You do know, what 'objective' means, don't you? If I make a statement you agree with, does that make it objective?

[Beowulf]

Originally Posted by OpnDownfall

I am sorry Beowulf, but the Reolutionary War was not about taxes. Just as tariffs was not the reason for the CW.
Secession was a question for the Supreme Court, except the south was determined to secede and wanted to take no chances, even with a Taney court.
The question of secession was life or death, Not State Representation. Significantly, the question of state representation started no wars; but the question of slavery did.
The 'Era of Good Feeling' ended long before the turbulent 1850's. Check out the presidents and thier states and which party was in control of both houses of Congress.



P.S. Beowulf, You do know, what 'objective' means, don't you? If I make a statement you agree with, does that make it objective?

objective |əbˈjektiv|
adjective
1 (of a person or their judgment) not influenced by personal feelings or opinions in considering and representing facts : historians try to be objective and impartial. Contrasted with subjective .
• not dependent on the mind for existence; actual : a matter of objective fact.
2 [ attrib. ] Grammar of, relating to, or denoting a case of nouns and pronouns used as the object of a transitive verb or a preposition.
noun
1 a thing aimed at or sought; a goal : the system has achieved its objective.
2 ( the objective) Grammar the objective case.
3 (also objective lens) the lens in a telescope or microscope nearest to the object observed.
DERIVATIVES
objectively adverb
objectiveness noun
objectivity |ˌäbjekˈtivitē| noun
objectivization |əbˌjektəviˈzā sh ən| noun
objectivize |-ˌvīz| verb
ORIGIN early 17th cent.: from medieval Latin objectivus, from objectum (see object ).


adjective
1 I was hoping to get an objective and pragmatic report impartial, unbiased, unprejudiced, nonpartisan, disinterested, neutral, uninvolved, evenhanded, equitable, fair, fair-minded, just, open-minded, dispassionate, detached, neutral. antonym biased, partial, prejudiced.

noun
you can't achieve your objectives unless people understand them aim, intention, purpose, target, goal, intent, object, end; idea, point, design, plan, ambition, aspiration, desire, hope.


Okay. I'll bite: So as not to break the thread etiquette, be brief.

What was the Revolutionary War about, if not "NO TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION?"


I fail to see, as clinical as you guys are in some respects, how you can pack all this off on SLAVERY. An institution whose trade the North basically started, in the Golden Triangle, and whose denouncement of, right now, borders the completely hypocritical. Pot calling the kettle black.

There is so much more we have over which to disagree! So many more bones of contention!
60,000 freed negroes were said to be living in the South at the time of the Civil War, and one estimate from an historian at Cedar Creek says that 4,400 of these freed men were masters on their own plantations.

Slavery caused Secession? Secession caused a War?

Lincoln was just, what? There?

The Slavery excuse is "exceeding thin and airy", as I see it.

And the Secession thing! COME BACK OR WE'LL KILL YOU?!

Right. Anyone looking in (from the Third Line of Reasoning) can see what the problem was... there.

There could have been no slaves without Yankee traders.
There could have been no secession without the perceived threats to the Southern safety and well-being of its people.

(Paraphrase Conner, here:
"Slavery only became an egregious evil after the Yankees got out of it". (The trade itself was always pure evil).
There could have been no war without Mr. Lincoln. Which is why the South calls it Mr. Lincoln's War).

Where do we go to talk about atrocities? I am convinced that nothing new is to be gained here.

And one other point:

If Secession is the root of all evil, please allow me to quote a "flip-flopping" Whig Liberal of the period for you!

"Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right - a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world. Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people, that can, may revolutionize, and make their own of so much of the territory as they inhabit".

(speech: 12 January 1848 House of Reps)

Abraham Lincoln


And this...


State Sovereignty the Foundation of the Union

It is clear from the available historical facts that the Constitution would have never been ratified if it had been understood that, in doing so, the States would surrender their sovereignty, as well as their right of secession should the experiment fail. We need look no further for proof of the reserved right of secession than in the ratification of at least three of the original thirteen States. Following are excerpts from the ratifications of the States of Virginia, New York, and Rhode Island respectively:

We, the delegates of the people of Virginia, duly elected in pursuance of a recommendation from the general assembly, and now met in convention, having fully and freely investigated and discussed the proceedings of the Federal Convention, and being prepared as well as the most mature deliberation hath enabled us to decide thereon, Do, in the name and in behalf of the people of Virginia, declare and make known 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.... That each State in the Union shall, respectively, retain every power, jurisdiction and right which is not by this Constitution delegated to the Congress of the United States, or to the Departments of the Federal Government.(25)

We, the delegates of the people of New York... do declare and make known that the powers of government may be reassumed by the people whenever 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 department 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; and that those clauses in the said Constitution, which declare that Congress shall not have or exercise certain powers, do not imply that Congress is entitled to any powers not given by the said Constitution; but such clauses are to be construed either as exceptions in certain specified powers or as inserted merely for greater caution.(26)

We, the delegates of the people of Rhode Island and Plantations, duly elected... do declare and make known... that the powers of government may be resumed by the people whenever 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 department 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;... that the United States shall guarantee to each State its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this Constitution expressly delegated to the United States.(27)
The importance of these statements was explained by Jefferson Davis:
These expressions are not mere obiter dicta, thrown out incidentally, and entitled only to be regarded as an expression of opinion by their authors. Even if only such, they would carry great weight as the deliberately expressed judgment of enlightened contemporaries, but they are more: they are parts of the very acts or ordinances by which these States ratified the Constitution and acceded to the Union, and can not be detached from them. If they are invalid, the ratification itself was invalid, for they are inseparable. By inserting these declarations in their ordinances, Virginia, New York, and Rhode Island, formally, officially, and permanently, declared their interpretation of the Constitution as recognizing the right of secession by the resumption of their grants. By accepting the ratifications with this declaration incorporated, the other States as formally accepted the principle which it asserted.(28)

Amen.

Beowulf

[cash]

[quote beowulf]

[unquote beowulf]

I removed all the irrelevant comments so that I could respond to your relevant, substantive comments left intact above.

But I don't know how to respond to nothing.

Regards,
Cash

[cash]

Originally Posted by Beowulf

Clearly the South did view Secession as a right. And still does.

Wrong. The south doesn't believe it's a right. And there's considerable evidence that the majority of the south didn't believe it was a right in 1861 either.

Regards,
Cash

[unionblue]

Beowulf,

"So, we seceded from Britain because...why?"

We REBELLED from Britain, we did not secede. What we did in the 1700's is exactly what the South did in the 1800's, a REVOLUTION was enacted where one attempt at rebellion succeeded and another, later attempt at rebellion failed.

The War between England and the American colonies was NOT called the The Secession War or other some such nonsense. It was called The Revolutionary War for good reason.

Trying to rename it doesn't even come close to what it was.

Unionblue

[cash]

Originally Posted by Beowulf

Yet, your subsequent attitude shows me your line of thought. You speak of the Constitution as a trap. A
type of a Hotel California, where you can "never leave".

Please show me anywhere in the debates over the Constitution, when anti-Federalists like Patrick Henry said that once ratified the states would never be able to get away from the Constitution, where anyone refuted that claim by saying, "Don't worry, if anything goes wrong a state can just secede."

Originally Posted by Beowulf

My thought is that the founding fathers were not car salesmen, tricking the several states into signing away their hard-won autonomy. This would make them the most reprehensible men who ever lived, on par with a Hitler, or a Saddam.

The states all knew at the time that they were signing up to a complete commitment they couldn't leave without permission.

Originally Posted by Beowulf

No, the reason the Constitution was signed was that it seemed to offer a freedom that England did not; the right to leave. I see it as a peace treaty.

You have no understanding of the Constitution and why it came about, then.

Originally Posted by Beowulf

And it 'won't scour', as Lincoln, himself, said of the Gettysburg Address.

Myth. He never said it.

Regards,
Cash

[Beowulf]

Originally Posted by cash

Wrong. The south doesn't believe it's a right. And there's considerable evidence that the majority of the south didn't believe it was a right in 1861 either.

Regards,
Cash

Is there anything I have ever been told that you DO agree with?

Anything?

Beowulf

[Beowulf]

Originally Posted by unionblue

Beowulf,



We REBELLED from Britain, we did not secede. What we did in the 1700's is exactly what the South did in the 1800's, a REVOLUTION was enacted where one attempt at rebellion succeeded and another, later attempt at rebellion failed.

The War between England and the American colonies was NOT called the The Secession War or other some such nonsense. It was called The Revolutionary War for good reason.

Trying to rename it doesn't even come close to what it was.

Unionblue

So how are you fixed on "Civil War" as a title? (I won't dare assume a side, or a viewpoint, until I know what denomination you are!).