Lee Why didn't Lee refuse to obey an immoral order?

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so to avoid

So, let me understand, to avoid anarchy in the south, slavery was introduced?
????? Might try making a coherent question that's based on something

No one had said anything about anarchy in south, so no idea what that even means.
if your going to make assertions out of left field, might explain them and your evidence behind such assertions, Edited.
 
Morality:
a particular system of values and principles of conduct, especially one held by a specified person or society.


According to this definition, likely because in his point of view, it was not an immoral order.
Other, contemporary and modern moral points of view may differ, but it is irrelevant since morality is in the eye of the beholder.
 
All his threads seems riddles that seem to promote nothing but anarchy, and people should be able do whatever, whenever.........things like the majority, laws ect mean nothing.......seems to be the only place he is going with it

are you saying they don't reflect the majority will? Instead of endless 20 or 50 questions, you might present some evidence..

If you have nothing but endless questions, I guess I should conclude your simply clueless

BTW you can think whatever you want goes into reflecting the majority will......However it still doesn't change it is in fact the majority, and the majority governs

Amen.....
 
Do you have a letter by Lee or an order or something that addresses the situation in his own words? That's what I'm looking for here.
yes, posted by 19th Georgia ( I am learning how to post quotes...hope I did it right.)

Longstreet was at Greenwood, PA, on July 1, 1863. That place is about 12 miles north of the border. Where was Pickett at that time?

HEADQUARTERS FIRST ARMY CORPS,
Greenwood, Pa., July 1, 1863-10,30 a. m.
Major General G. E. PICKETT,
Commanding Division:
As directed yesterday evening, if relieved in time to-day by General Imboden, the commanding general desires you to come on this evening as far as this point, and to follow on after the remainder of the command across the mountains tomorrow morning. If you do not start from the vicinity of Chambersburg before to-morrow you may move on across the mountain without stopping here. When you arrive here, either this evening or tomorrow, the commanding general wishes you to relieve a brigade of General Hood at New Guilford, and send it forward to rejoin his division. Your own brigade will in turn be relieved by General Imboden when he gets here and sent on to rejoin you. The captured contrabands had better be brought along with you for further disposition.
I am, general, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
G. M. SORREL,
Assistant Adjutant-General.
<United States War Department, The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate
Armies
, (Washington D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1880-1901), series 1, vol. LI, pt. 2, pp. 732-33.>
 
yes
Morality:
a particular system of values and principles of conduct, especially one held by a specified person or society.


According to this definition, likely because in his point of view, it was not an immoral order.
Other, contemporary and modern moral points of view may differ, but it is irrelevant since morality is in the eye of the beholder.
But to which person wearing which glasses are we to follow?
 
It's been fun, won't be online until after the weekend. Later next week with more questions.
 
Was all Lees decision based on combat, or were there issues based on policy? Did capturing black people and sending them south a combat issue, or policy issue?

I don't know that I could tell you which it was, nor whether it matters. If he received an order from a superior, the questions that apply are:
  1. Is the order a legal one?
  2. If the order is a legal one, does Lee regard it as immoral?
If Lee thinks the order is illegal, I think he would not obey it. If Lee thinks the order is immoral, a command he must reject, I think he would not obey it. Both of those are hard decisions to make, and evaluating them without specifics about the order and the situation is probably not worthwhile.
 
For a man like Lee, the question is more like "when wasn't he in combat conditions?"

The degree of the conditions waxed and waned, but part or all of his army had been involved in active operations from the point where he detached Longstreet on the Suffolk mission through Chancellorsville, Brandy Station, Ewell's Valley operations and the invasion of Pennsylvania, Gettysburg and the Retreat from Gettysburg. On every day in there, under greater or lesser pressure and urgency, Lee was making decisions that dealt with potential and real combat, where men might die because of what he had done or not done. Even during the "down" periods of the winter, his army was in contact with the enemy, close enough that it was possible they might attack at any time with little warning -- meanwhile, his troops were going hungry.

Sorry -- that's all just a long way of saying Lee was always under pressure. Sometimes it was more distant than others, but it was always there.

That is very true. That's why I think it was more of a request than an order - Lee definitely had other objectives and retrieving the runaways was not one of them! Like Sherman, he didn't need the burden of extra mouths to feed either. One of the many reasons he went into PA was to get forage and to give Virginia farmers a little relief.
 
@ebg12 ,

You are basically judging Lee and the ANV with 21st century morality. You claim Uncle Tom's Cabin as a sort of justification to pass a moral judgment without considering the book was considered an extreme abolishinist point of view at the time.

I don't know if you can do such, pass judgment on a moral question using your personal standard in this time while not considering the moral standards of the early 19th century.

For instance, I was shocked to learn that my great-great grandfather owned seven slaves, ranging in ages 6 months to sixty plus years. I find it repugnant that he did, but I base that feeling on my present understanding of how human slavery is viewed in our present.

At the time slavery was not judged by our standards but the people of the time. Yes, slavery was coming under attack and being denounced in Europe and other places, but the movement against slavery in the US was weak and considered unnatural by most as most Americans, North and South, were not primarily concerned with the institution.

Only the South's continued insistence it be protected, expanded, and not subject to restriction, began to bring it center stage to the overall population.

Again, I look at your OP as a means to incite, not to inform.

Unionblue
 
@ebg12 ,

You are basically judging Lee and the ANV with 21st century morality. You claim Uncle Tom's Cabin as a sort of justification to pass a moral judgment without considering the book was considered an extreme abolishinist point of view at the time.

I don't know if you can do such, pass judgment on a moral question using your personal standard in this time while not considering the moral standards of the early 19th century.

For instance, I was shocked to learn that my great-great grandfather owned seven slaves, ranging in ages 6 months to sixty plus years. I find it repugnant that he did, but I base that feeling on my present understanding of how human slavery is viewed in our present.

At the time slavery was not judged by our standards but the people of the time. Yes, slavery was coming under attack and being denounced in Europe and other places, but the movement against slavery in the US was weak and considered unnatural by most as most Americans, North and South, were not primarily concerned with the institution.

Only the South's continued insistence it be protected, expanded, and not subject to restriction, began to bring it center stage to the overall population.

Again, I look at your OP as a means to incite, not to inform.

Unionblue
@2to5th power will give you 32 great-great-great-grandparents,@2to4th power will give you 16 great-great grandparents. @2to 3rd 8 great grandparents. @2to2nd 4 grandparents, @2to1power gives your parents, and @ 2 to zero power equals yourself. So if my 32 great-great-great grandparents lived during civil war the probability that some owned slaves, some were abolishist, some fought for the north, or some for the south is good. Maybe I have an ancestor out of my 64 great great great great parents (6th generation ago) that were slave traders themselfs, or in jail? But a crime is a crime, be it one of 32 possible suspects of yours or mine or anyone’s else......and slavery was crime. How does murder or assault differ today then back in the time of the civil war?
 
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Free or slave they would be a job threat. thus the cause Cincinnati Riots
So all Abolitionists are evil since they only wanted to end slavery to protect their Jobs? The true friend of African Americans was the slave owners since they loved their slave's and did everything they could within reason to keep them happy?
Leftyhunter
 
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Why did Lee obey the immoral order to take black people into slavery when ANV invaded PA? I thought the war was about the south wanting to be sovereign in their own right from the union? Why didn’t he say something like “no, the confederate army will not kidnap black people because we are fighting for our independence, not for the institution of slavery?” If he was so noble in his believes, couldn’t he stand up to the confederate government on returning free blacks to the south as a moral issue, as he stood up to the United States government to fight for the south as a moral issue?

He realized he was inferior to all white northerners, so kidnapping blacks might have validated his self-worth. Nothing moral about Lee, he was your quintessential wolf in sheep's clothing.
 
So all Abolitionists are evil since they only wanted to end slavery to protect their Jobs? The true friend of African Americans was the slave owners since they loved their slave's and did everything they could within reason to keep them happy?
Leftyhunter

What jobs are they talking about? I severely doubt northern abolitionists wanted to pick cotton.
 
What jobs are they talking about? I severely doubt northern abolitionists wanted to pick cotton.
You have to ask does who gave a like to that post. On the other hand there certainly was bitter hatred of African Americans by Irish immigrants most notably in NYC during the draft riots.
Leftyhunter
 
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