Oops, big lump of your posts....

[unionblue]

I really like the "and federal military intervention" regarding the border states. Pushing the % agenda regarding the border state, are you?s excludes the federal military intervention as being part of the reason that none of them seceded.

Your above implies that the federal government should have done nothing to prevent further rebellion. It reminds me of the scene of a movie, From Here to Eternity, I saw long ago contained a scene where the Japanese were attacking Pearl Harbor. US soldiers were desperately trying to get arms and ammunition to fire at attacking Japanese planes strafing their barracks and all the while, the arms room sergeant didn't want to unlock the arms room because he didn't have written orders to do so.

The sergeant, like your view above, didn't seem to understand that the situation had changed from peace time normal to war.

You speak of a % of the "agenda" as though it was just another day instead of the enormous impact of losing those states to armed rebellion.

There are two sides to every coin, at least, with a "normal" coin. You're not advocating a two-headed coin toss for every situation and event, are you?

 

[USS ALASKA]

Fordham Law School
FLASH: The Fordham Law Archive of Scholarship and History
Faculty Scholarship
2008

Civil War in the U.S. Foreign Relations Law: A Dress Rehearsal for Modern Transformations, The The Use and Misuse of History in U.S. Foreign Relations Law
by Thomas Lee

Fordham University School of Law, thlee@fordham.edu

This Article is brought to you for free and open access by FLASH: The Fordham Law Archive of Scholarship and History. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Scholarship by an authorized administrator of FLASH: The Fordham Law Archive of Scholarship and History. For more information, please contact tmelnick@law.fordham.edu.

...But the American Civil War also had a significant international dimension. The Confederate States of America claimed from the start that secession made them an independent sovereign nation. And to validate and maintain this status, the Confederate States desperately sought official recognition by foreign countries, international trade, and military aid and alliances, especially with Great Britain and France. Conversely, it was a high priority for the United States of America to prevent the Confederacy from achieving these objectives. Accordingly, from the start of the war, Abraham Lincoln ordered a naval blockade to interdict all maritime trade to southern ports despite preexisting treaties of amity and commerce with, and the specter of military action against, neutral foreign countries; and the State Department lobbied the European powers to deny recognition of the Confederate States.

These positions were notable departures from the general trend of U.S. foreign policy since the founding. The United States had traditionally championed neutrality and the free-trade rights of neutrals (even with belligerents), refrained from threatening military action against the European great powers, and encouraged the speedy recognition of organized rebellions in the Western Hemisphere (typically Latin American ex-colonies). Whether these settled patterns inhabited the hinterland or the heartland of what was permissible under the Constitution, it seems at least possible that the same debate about the Civil War's transformative effect vel non on the domestic Constitution might be had about the foreign affairs Constitution-the Constitution as it regulates interactions between the United States and its citizens on the one hand, and foreign states and citizens on the other.

https://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1408&context=faculty_scholarship
990

Cheers,
USS ALASKA

 

[jgoodguy]

Fordham Law School
FLASH: The Fordham Law Archive of Scholarship and History
Faculty Scholarship
2008

Civil War in the U.S. Foreign Relations Law: A Dress Rehearsal for Modern Transformations, The The Use and Misuse of History in U.S. Foreign Relations Law
by Thomas Lee

Fordham University School of Law, thlee@fordham.edu

This Article is brought to you for free and open access by FLASH: The Fordham Law Archive of Scholarship and History. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Scholarship by an authorized administrator of FLASH: The Fordham Law Archive of Scholarship and History. For more information, please contact tmelnick@law.fordham.edu.

...But the American Civil War also had a significant international dimension. The Confederate States of America claimed from the start that secession made them an independent sovereign nation. And to validate and maintain this status, the Confederate States desperately sought official recognition by foreign countries, international trade, and military aid and alliances, especially with Great Britain and France. Conversely, it was a high priority for the United States of America to prevent the Confederacy from achieving these objectives. Accordingly, from the start of the war, Abraham Lincoln ordered a naval blockade to interdict all maritime trade to southern ports despite preexisting treaties of amity and commerce with, and the specter of military action against, neutral foreign countries; and the State Department lobbied the European powers to deny recognition of the Confederate States.

These positions were notable departures from the general trend of U.S. foreign policy since the founding. The United States had traditionally championed neutrality and the free-trade rights of neutrals (even with belligerents), refrained from threatening military action against the European great powers, and encouraged the speedy recognition of organized rebellions in the Western Hemisphere (typically Latin American ex-colonies). Whether these settled patterns inhabited the hinterland or the heartland of what was permissible under the Constitution, it seems at least possible that the same debate about the Civil War's transformative effect vel non on the domestic Constitution might be had about the foreign affairs Constitution-the Constitution as it regulates interactions between the United States and its citizens on the one hand, and foreign states and citizens on the other.

https://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1408&context=faculty_scholarship
990

Cheers,
USS ALASKA

Practical trumps the ideal sometimes.

 

[USS ALASKA]

Practical trumps the ideal sometimes.

Sir, I believe the term is 'Realpolitik'...

(from German: real; "realistic", "practical", or "actual"; and Politik; "politics") is politics or diplomacy based primarily on considerations of given circumstances and factors, rather than explicit ideological notions or moral and ethical premises. In this respect, it shares aspects of its philosophical approach with those of realism and pragmatism. It is often simply referred to as "pragmatism" in politics, e.g. "pursuing pragmatic policies". The term Realpolitik is sometimes used pejoratively to imply politics that are perceived as coercive, amoral, or Machiavellian.

Source - 'Realpolitik' by Adam R. C. Humphreys

Cheers,
USS ALASKA

 

[jgoodguy]

Sir, I believe the term is 'Realpolitik'...

(from German: real; "realistic", "practical", or "actual"; and Politik; "politics") is politics or diplomacy based primarily on considerations of given circumstances and factors, rather than explicit ideological notions or moral and ethical premises. In this respect, it shares aspects of its philosophical approach with those of realism and pragmatism. It is often simply referred to as "pragmatism" in politics, e.g. "pursuing pragmatic policies". The term Realpolitik is sometimes used pejoratively to imply politics that are perceived as coercive, amoral, or Machiavellian.

Source - 'Realpolitik' by Adam R. C. Humphreys

Cheers,
USS ALASKA

The word I was looking for. Just woke up and access to higher vocabulary was still offline.

 

[Greywolf]

Your above implies that the federal government should have done nothing to prevent further rebellion. It reminds me of the scene of a movie, From Here to Eternity, I saw long ago contained a scene where the Japanese were attacking Pearl Harbor. US soldiers were desperately trying to get arms and ammunition to fire at attacking Japanese planes strafing their barracks and all the while, the arms room sergeant didn't want to unlock the arms room because he didn't have written orders to do so.

The sergeant, like your view above, didn't seem to understand that the situation had changed from peace time normal to war.

You speak of a % of the "agenda" as though it was just another day instead of the enormous impact of losing those states to armed rebellion.

There are two sides to every coin, at least, with a "normal" coin. You're not advocating a two-headed coin toss for every situation and event, are you?

With respect, I see very few from the US viewpoint that entertain any iota of any possibility that there are 2 sides to the coin. In fact, it is gone out of the way to attempt to disprove every secession, compact, slavery, etc. comment made from the other side. If I have a 2 headed coin, Northern advocates have entire pocketfuls of them. This when I do consider myself somewhat moderate on here.
That said, I do understand your point and it has validity. My comment really pointing to the pushing of % of slavery by state as why they seceded. When that is just one side of the coin.

 

[jgoodguy]

With respect, I see very few from the US viewpoint that entertain any iota of any possibility that there are 2 sides to the coin. In fact, it is gone out of the way to attempt to disprove every secession, compact, slavery, etc. comment made from the other side. If I have a 2 headed coin, Northern advocates have entire pocketfuls of them. This when I do consider myself somewhat moderate on here.
That said, I do understand your point and it has validity. My comment really pointing to the pushing of % of slavery by state as why they seceded. When that is just one side of the coin.

It is simply a data point. Perhaps there are other data points to be considered, but we need evidence not disbelief.

Argument from Incredulity

Description: Concluding that because you can't or refuse to believe something, it must not be true, improbable, or the argument must be flawed. This is a specific form of the argument from ignorance.​

​

Logical Form:​

​

Person 1 makes a claim.​

Person 2 cannot believe the claim.​

Person 2 concludes, without any reason besides he or she cannot believe or refuses to believe it, that the claim is false or improbable.​

​

​

​

 

[jgoodguy]

Let us not waste time and energy about arguments from disbelief and await evidence to respond to.

 

[jgoodguy]

Volume 5, Issue Number 4 (May, 2002) of North & South Magazine (pages 80-89) VIRGINIA’S RELUCTANT SECESSION
PP 86

The cane is mighter than the pen. We can say that Southern honor was offended by Yankee words and attitudes. That is a cause of noteworthy of more study but entangled with slavery.

 

[5fish]

Here is the timeline:

Time Line

• February 4, 1861 - Delegates are elected to the Virginia Convention, to convene in Richmond, to consider the constitutional crisis triggered by the election of Abraham Lincoln as U.S. president and the secession of Deep South states.
• February 13, 1861 - The Virginia Convention convenes in the Mechanics Institute at the foot of Capitol Hill in Richmond.
• April 4, 1861 - A motion for secession is defeated, 45 to 90, in the Virginia Convention meeting in Richmond.
• April 8, 1861 - After the General Assembly adjourns, the Virginia Convention moves its deliberations from the Mechanics Institute to the Capitol in Richmond.
• April 15, 1861 - A three-man delegation sent by the Virginia Convention sitting in Richmond meets with Abraham Lincoln at the White House. It is the same day his proclamation calling for volunteers to put down the Confederate rebellion is published in newspapers.
• April 16, 1861 - The Virginia Convention meeting in Richmond goes into secret session so that its deeply divided delegates may speak more frankly. A proposal by Unionist delegate Robert Eden Scott is defeated 64 to 77. It offered to give voters a referendum to choose between immediate secession and consultation with the other slave states of the Upper South.
• April 17, 1861 - Delegates at the Virginia Convention in Richmond pass an Ordinance of Secession by a vote of 88 to 55. Thirty-two of the "no" votes come from trans-Allegheny delegates, who are more firmly Unionist than representatives from other parts of the state.
• April 27, 1861 - Virginia offers to join the Confederate States of America and make Richmond it's capital.
• May 1, 1861 - The Virginia Convention, meeting in Richmond, adjourns, completing its substantive work. There will be a so-called Adjourned Session (June 12 through July 1) and a Second Adjourned Session (November 13 through December 6), but they do little work of note.
• May 23, 1861 - The Ordinance of Secession is approved by Virginia voters by a vote of 125,950 to 20,373, with many western Virginia votes being discarded from the tally.

A Link and snippets...

After more than a month of long-winded speeches, parliamentary delay, and posturing by delegates on all sides, the convention put secession to a vote on April 4. Secessionists rightly concluded that sentiment had moved more in their direction since February, but by believing their own overheated rhetoric and reading too much into the strength of secessionist demonstrations outside the convention, they overestimated their power within it. They were stunned by overwhelming defeat; the vote was 90 to 45 against secession. John Janney, a prominent former Whig Party member from Loudoun County and the president of the convention, exulted in a letter to his wife that the secessionists were now "without the slightest hope of success." The convention, however, did not adjourn but continued to deliberate. Ominously for the Unionists, the vote came a week after Lincoln ended his vacillation over what to do and resolved to send a naval expedition to resupply Fort Sumter with food and water.

...

On April 15, the convention heard from a three-man delegation it had sent to negotiate with Lincoln directly. Their futile meeting at the White House occurred on the day Lincoln announced his response to the surrender of Fort Sumter—a proclamation calling for all loyal states to send their militias to put down the Confederate rebellion. The news sent shock waves throughout the country that engendered a mass outpouring of patriotic demonstrations in the North and defiance in the Confederate States. Alexander H. H. Stuart of Staunton, Baldwin's brother-in-law and law partner and the sole Unionist among the Virginia trio sent to Washington, admitted that Lincoln's proclamation was provocative. But he echoed the fervent hopes of Unionists in the Upper South that they still could prevent civil war and, if not, could somehow shield their region from the fighting. "Secession is not only war," he warned his colleagues, "but it is emancipation; it is bankruptcy; it is repudiation; it is widespread ruin to our people."

...

On April 27, nearly a month before the perfunctory referendum would endorse the Ordinance of Secession, Virginia offered to join the Confederacy and make Richmond its capital. The tragedy of the Unionist majority in the convention was that, though its members loathed the thought of leaving the United States, in the end they could not countenance fighting against fellow white Southerners. In retrospect, their hopes for compromise were unfounded, but in the spring of 1861 they upheld the standard of Upper South unionism as a middle way between the two sides preparing for war.

https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Virginia_Constitutional_Convention_of_1861#start_entry

I would not call them reluctant because they embraced the CSA without much debate... They were committed... If they were reluctant there would have been a debate about it and maybe gone their own way... They were offered the capital and jumped at it...

 

[5fish]

You know Arizona secede from the union too... but it was not about slavery directly... maybe states rights? well, future state?

Are some snippets...

Since 1856, settlers in southern New Mexico Territory had sought to split off and organize their own territorial government. Their aspiration got caught up in the growing sectional tensions of the late 1850s and the belief in the U.S. Congress that the impetus to divide New Mexico Territory into two separate northern and southern territories was that the settlers hoped to expand slavery into the southern portion.

The Ordinance of Secession, creating the Arizona Territory and announcing its intention to join the Confederacy, passed in a convention in Mesilla on March 16, 1861, and a second convention at Tucson on March 28, 1861.

Unique among the secession justifications, slavery was not an explicit issue in this document. Despite a statement complaining of the rise of the Republican party in the North and how it “has disregarded the Constitution of the United States, violated the rights of the Southern States, and heaped wrongs and indignities upon their people,” the Arizona Ordinance of Secession never once mentioned the word “slave” or its variations and its specific reasons for secession instead reflect the problems of settlers in a region in which the American imprint was growing but still limited.

Yet except for language expressing solidarity with the slave states, the specific grievances of the Arizona Ordinance of Secession instead reflected the complaints of frontier settlers–not slaveholders. Congress recently had halted mail service along the stage line linking southern New Mexico territory with the rest of the country. The Arizona Ordinance stated, “That the recent enactment of the Federal Congress, removing the mail service from the Atlantic to the Pacific States from the Southern to the Central or Northern route, is another powerful reason for us to ask the Southern Confederate States of America for a continuation of the postal service over the Butterfield or El Paso route, at the earliest period.” The settlers also were angry at the failure of federal troops to halt Apache Indian raids directed at them. The Ordinance exclaimed, “the Government of the United States has heretofore failed to give us adequate protection against the savages within our midst and has denied us an administration of the laws, and that security for life, liberty, and property which is due from all governments to the people

https://cwemancipation.wordpress.com/2011/03/28/sometimes-the-civilwar-wasnt-about-slavery/

 

[Greywolf]

It is simply a data point. Perhaps there are other data points to be considered, but we need evidence not disbelief.
Argument from Incredulity

Description: Concluding that because you can't or refuse to believe something, it must not be true, improbable, or the argument must be flawed. This is a specific form of the argument from ignorance.​

​

Logical Form:​

​

Person 1 makes a claim.​

Person 2 cannot believe the claim.​

Person 2 concludes, without any reason besides he or she cannot believe or refuses to believe it, that the claim is false or improbable.​

​

​

​

Ok, disbelief? Ignorance? Really...where is my dang cane.

 

[unionblue]

With respect, I see very few from the US viewpoint that entertain any iota of any possibility that there are 2 sides to the coin.

Agreed, especially since most of the period documentation seems to support the idea that there was one, overriding issue that trumped all others.

In fact, it is gone out of the way to attempt to disprove every secession, compact, slavery, etc. comment made from the other side.

In fact, it has simply become almost impossible to ignore the relevant sources of the period, which clearly and repeatedly mention slavery as the primary concern of every Southern slaveholding state that attempted secession, Virginia included.

If I have a 2 headed coin, Northern advocates have entire pocketfuls of them.

No, I really think the ordinary coin keeps coming up on the same side of historical fact, no matter how many times some try to make land on another, less d*a*m*n*ing side.

This when I do consider myself somewhat moderate on here.

I also consider you to be somewhat moderate on this forum and fairly try to present your views, but I always note you leave a "backdoor" whenever you hint at possible wrongdoing by those slaveholding states.

That said, I do understand your point and it has validity.

I appreciate that sentiment. It reminds me of that passage in the Bible, "ALMOST, you persuade me to be a Christian." I'll keep trying to persuade you.

My comment really pointing to the pushing of % of slavery by state as why they seceded. When that is just one side of the coin.

That one side of the coin keeps showing up because it contains more of the precious metal of historical fact.

 

[jgoodguy]

On April 27, nearly a month before the perfunctory referendum would endorse the Ordinance of Secession, Virginia offered to join the Confederacy and make Richmond its capital. The tragedy of the Unionist majority in the convention was that, though its members loathed the thought of leaving the United States, in the end they could not countenance fighting against fellow white Southerners. In retrospect, their hopes for compromise were unfounded, but in the spring of 1861 they upheld the standard of Upper South unionism as a middle way between the two sides preparing for war.

interesting.

 

[jgoodguy]

That one side of the coin keeps showing up because it contains more of the precious metal of historical fact.

IMHO more like a 60 side die.

where each number represents a cause entangled with slavery.

 

[MattL]

There are some people who like to examine other possible reasons for secession. On the other hand, there are those who just find it easier to blame everything on slavery.


Well, you might be waiting for a while. Edited.

Slavery is not an entity, not a person, it really can't own any blame. If the goal is to assign blame you have to assign it to a person, or a collection of people, active entities. Likewise blame will never belong to a single such entity either. Slavery is just a word assigned to a system that had it's roots grown deep into many many other systems. In many ways it was the foundation of a variety of life styles and cultures and as such if you threaten a foundation those relying on what's on top of that foundation might be concerned.

I challenge the premise of seeking blame though. It's about identifying cause and effect, not blame. No need to play the blame game.

 

[byron ed]

This all seems so silly. The trigger for secession in every seceding state - by their own accounts - was the election of an anti-slavery President, the candidate of an anti-slavery party, despite his clearly stated intention that he would not interfere with slavery where it already existed if states could refrain from seceding for that reason. In effect then, from there on it was those slave states themselves crying "slavery, slavery, slavery!" That resulted in secession, which was actually the only thing that caused the the calling up of U.S. troops. Shoot own foot.

And please no more "invasion" Edited. One person's "invasion army" has always been another person's "liberation army;" that's the entire history of the Western world. So after all it's just as "obvious" that an army would be sent South to take back (liberate) what had been taken (forts, armories, ports and unionist votes) as it would be that an army would be sent South to subjugate the white population and its assets.

And think about it, do you really think the hope of the "black Republican's" army was to subjugate the white population? Get real. It was simply the duty of the U.S. Government to defend the majority of the population of the South from a white minority insurrection.

btw I found a copy of the old vinyl LP "Slavery, Slavery, Slavery!" in the Retro bin just the other day.

 

[MattL]

Exploring the WHOLE story, ALL the information, ALL their words, & acts... not just slavery, slavery, slavery, should be in everybody's interest.

It often leaves me scratching my head. That so many only want to acknowledge one narrative, or interpretation. Odd to say the least.

Of course it is. The whole story and all they said isn't ignored, the same alleged historians that focus on slavery also often have massive volumes of works, lectures, etc on all the various other aspects of the period, including things having nothing to do with slavery.

With that said all things are not equally important, they never are.

I've never believed in equal priorities, there's always a priority order, something always places above another thing, and often times the space between priority 1 and 2 are worlds apart.

Choosing to agree with with "narrative, or interpretation" does not dismiss the existence of others and even a slavery as the only thing that truly mattered in deciding about secession (note not in deciding against various other responses to disagreements, but specifically the 1860/61 secession) doesn't dismiss the importance of countless other things in the greater context of concerns and interests.

Just because someone says slavery was priority 1 and basically priorities 2-10,000 were 1/1000th of priority 1 in regards to secession, doesn't dismiss their existence.

This sort of thing is quite common in analyzing human behavior. For example if you read a politicians speech you would never give all words equal weight and value. In fact most of the words have nearly no value, a few have high value, and a small amount have extremely high value. There are always lots of things going on, there were long before 1860, they don't all have equal bearing when specifically referring to the value towards deciding to secession.

 

[jgoodguy]

. It's about identifying cause and effect, not blame.

I agree. Which is why I use the word entangled a lot.

In protecting slavery, the secessionists were protecting their way of life and there are a lot of factors in that from large plantations to college endowments. We have threads on Banking and Industry.

 

[byron ed]

...It's about identifying cause and effect, not blame. No need to play the blame game.

We'll differ on that one. There is some need to assign blame for slavery Edited. It serves the purpose of watchdog for future generations. So assigning blame is relevant, lest bad behavior is excused to re-occur.

If instead you meant that in a different sense: that people today, who had nothing to do with chattel slavery in Virginia, need not own the blame for it, I'd agree with that.