Why preserve the Union?: Unionism vs Secessionism

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Slavery explains the reasons for disunion, it does not explain the reasons for union. That is, slavery does not explain the reasons why so many Americans wanted to keep the Union together.

These two forces - secessionism and unionism - were kind of like a yin and yang. You don't get the full picture until you see both sides of the circle. Protecting slavery was the driving force for the white southern elites who championed a separate slave states' nation. For those in the free states, unionism, IMO, was driven by the feeling that the putative Confederate regime was an economic, military and geo-political threat that was created by traitors who sought to annul an election they lost fair and square. And the threat being made, would not be ignored.​

I am opening this thread to discuss some of the points I made earlier (see above) in another thread.

I find it interesting that we have a forum called "Secession and Politics," but the term unionism is not referred to in this or any forum title. This is one more example of how, IMO, the subject of unionism is not seen as a major focus in discussing the Civil War.

As I posit above, there was a force called unionism that compelled Americans to preserve the Union in the face of slave state secessionism. Unionism was not northernism: there were southerners who supported preserving the Union.

My opinion is that 1860-1865 unionism was mainly a response to the actions of secessionists. Unionists did not care so much about the reasons that caused the slave states to dissolve the union (although many recognized that slavery was the underlying cause); they were upset that the union was being dissolved, period. Even more, the method that the union was dissolved - by armed force - was especially outrageous. This opinion may be controversial.

These are reasons that led to the desire to preserve the union as I currently see it:

(1) Outrage that secessionists annulled an election they didn't like by dissolving the union

In America today, and to many Americans in 1860, victory in a fair election is something that must be respected, regardless of whether we like the results. Yet, here were the secessionists in 1860-61, walking away from the country because the 1860 presidential election didn't go their way.

Secessionism, as I see it, was a reversal of the revolutionary imperative of the Founders. One of their rallying cries was "no taxation without representation." The Founders demanded a democratic process that allowed taxpayers to be heard in government. After independence from Britain was won, a constitutional government was created to enable representation of the people.

Secession was a rejection of the constitution. Rather than accept a election they didn't like, the secessionists bailed out. Abraham Lincoln would intone many times that the seceding states were out of "proper relation with the Constitution." After the attack on Ft Sumter, Lincoln called a special session of Congress into order. In discussing how the country should respond to secession, Lincoln stated:

And this issue embraces more than the fate of the United States. It presents to the whole family of man the question whether a constitutional republic, or democracy -- a government of the people by the same people -- can or cannot maintain its territorial integrity against its own domestic foes. It presents the question whether discontented individuals, too few in numbers to control administration according to organic law in any case, can always, upon the pretenses made in this case, or on any other pretenses, or arbitrarily without any pretense, break up their government and thus practically put an end to free government upon the earth. It forces us to ask -- Is there in all republics this inherent and fatal weakness? Must a government of necessity be too strong for the liberties of its own people, or too weak to maintain its own existence?

Thus, one aspect of unionism was the desire to maintain the supremacy of the Constitution and the American democratic republic. This would manifest itself in a willingness to use armed force to enforce election results, or more precisely/correctly, to use armed force to preserve the Union and its institutions, such as, federal elections.

This was one of many issues that probably resonated with the American (non-secessionist) public. Many were outraged that the slave states could leave the Union after the election of northerner like Lincoln, after so many southerners (and southern slave owners) had held the high office. It seemed to many that southerners were dishonorable - they followed the rules as long as they were winning, but refused to do so when they lost. This betrayal of the constitutional process, and of basic fairness, gave support to a military response to preserve the Union.

- > more to come

- Alan
 
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