Posted on 07/11/2015 9:54:21 AM PDT by golux
The Confederate Flag Needs To Be Raised, Not Lowered
Ladies and gentlemen, I submit that what we see happening in the United States today is an apt illustration of why the Confederate flag was raised in the first place. What we see materializing before our very eyes is tyranny: tyranny over the freedom of expression, tyranny over the freedom of association, tyranny over the freedom of speech, and tyranny over the freedom of conscience.
In 1864, Confederate General Patrick Cleburne warned his fellow Southerners of the historical consequences should the South lose their war for independence. He was truly a prophet. He said if the South lost, “It means that the history of this heroic struggle will be written by the enemy. That our youth will be trained by Northern school teachers; will learn from Northern school books their version of the war; will be impressed by all of the influences of History and Education to regard our gallant dead as traitors and our maimed veterans as fit subjects for derision.” No truer words were ever spoken.
History revisionists flooded America’s public schools with Northern propaganda about the people who attempted to secede from the United States, characterizing them as racists, extremists, radicals, hatemongers, traitors, etc. You know, the same way that people in our federal government and news media attempt to characterize Christians, patriots, war veterans, constitutionalists, et al. today.
Folks, please understand that the only people in 1861 who believed that states did NOT have the right to secede were Abraham Lincoln and his radical Republicans. To say that southern states did not have the right to secede from the United States is to say that the thirteen colonies did not have the right to secede from Great Britain. One cannot be right and the other wrong. If one is right, both are right. How can we celebrate our Declaration of Independence in 1776 and then turn around and condemn the Declaration of Independence of the Confederacy in 1861? Talk about hypocrisy!
In fact, Southern states were not the only states that talked about secession. After the Southern states seceded, the State of Maryland fully intended to join them. In September of 1861, Lincoln sent federal troops to the State capital and seized the legislature by force in order to prevent them from voting. Federal provost marshals stood guard at the polls and arrested Democrats and anyone else who believed in secession. A special furlough was granted to Maryland troops so they could go home and vote against secession. Judges who tried to inquire into the phony elections were arrested and thrown into military prisons. There is your great “emancipator,” folks.
And before the South seceded, several Northern states had also threatened secession. Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island had threatened secession as far back as James Madison’s administration. In addition, the states of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware were threatening secession during the first half of the nineteenth century--long before the Southern states even considered such a thing.
People say constantly that Lincoln “saved” the Union. Lincoln didn’t save the Union; he subjugated the Union. There is a huge difference. A union that is not voluntary is not a union. Does a man have a right to force a woman to marry him or to force a woman to stay married to him? In the eyes of God, a union of husband and wife is far superior to a union of states. If God recognizes the right of husbands and wives to separate (and He does), to try and suggest that states do not have the right to lawfully (under Natural and divine right) separate is the most preposterous proposition imaginable.
People say that Lincoln freed the slaves. Lincoln did NOT free a single slave. But what he did do was enslave free men. His so-called Emancipation Proclamation had NO AUTHORITY in the Southern states, as they had separated into another country. Imagine a President today signing a proclamation to free folks in, say, China or Saudi Arabia. He would be laughed out of Washington. Lincoln had no authority over the Confederate States of America, and he knew it.
Do you not find it interesting that Lincoln’s proclamation did NOT free a single slave in the United States, the country in which he DID have authority? That’s right. The Emancipation Proclamation deliberately ignored slavery in the North. Do you not realize that when Lincoln signed his proclamation, there were over 300,000 slaveholders who were fighting in the Union army? Check it out.
One of those Northern slaveholders was General (and later U.S. President) Ulysses S. Grant. In fact, he maintained possession of his slaves even after the War Between the States concluded. Recall that his counterpart, Confederate General Robert E. Lee, freed his slaves BEFORE hostilities between North and South ever broke out. When asked why he refused to free his slaves, Grant said, “Good help is hard to find these days.”
The institution of slavery did not end until the 13th Amendment was ratified on December 6, 1865.
Speaking of the 13th Amendment, did you know that Lincoln authored his own 13th Amendment? It is the only amendment to the Constitution ever proposed by a sitting U.S. President. Here is Lincoln’s proposed amendment: “No amendment shall be made to the Constitution which will authorize or give Congress the power to abolish or interfere within any state with the domestic institutions thereof, including that a person's held to labor or service by laws of said State.”
You read it right. Lincoln proposed an amendment to the U.S. Constitution PRESERVING the institution of slavery. This proposed amendment was written in March of 1861, a month BEFORE the shots were fired at Fort Sumter, South Carolina.
The State of South Carolina was particularly incensed at the tariffs enacted in 1828 and 1832. The Tariff of 1828 was disdainfully called, “The Tariff of Abominations” by the State of South Carolina. Accordingly, the South Carolina legislature declared that the tariffs of 1828 and 1832 were “unauthorized by the Constitution of the United States.”
Think, folks: why would the Southern states secede from the Union over slavery when President Abraham Lincoln had offered an amendment to the Constitution guaranteeing the PRESERVATION of slavery? That makes no sense. If the issue was predominantly slavery, all the South needed to do was to go along with Lincoln, and his proposed 13th Amendment would have permanently preserved slavery among the Southern (and Northern) states. Does that sound like a body of people who were willing to lose hundreds of thousands of men on the battlefield over saving slavery? What nonsense!
The problem was Lincoln wanted the Southern states to pay the Union a 40% tariff on their exports. The South considered this outrageous and refused to pay. By the time hostilities broke out in 1861, the South was paying up to, and perhaps exceeding, 70% of the nation’s taxes. Before the war, the South was very prosperous and productive. And Washington, D.C., kept raising the taxes and tariffs on them. You know, the way Washington, D.C., keeps raising the taxes on prosperous American citizens today.
This is much the same story of the way the colonies refused to pay the demanded tariffs of the British Crown--albeit the tariffs of the Crown were MUCH lower than those demanded by Lincoln. Lincoln’s proposed 13th Amendment was an attempt to entice the South into paying the tariffs by being willing to permanently ensconce the institution of slavery into the Constitution. AND THE SOUTH SAID NO!
In addition, the Congressional Record of the United States forever obliterates the notion that the North fought the War Between the States over slavery. Read it for yourself. This resolution was passed unanimously in the U.S. Congress on July 23, 1861, “The War is waged by the government of the United States not in the spirit of conquest or subjugation, nor for the purpose of overthrowing or interfering with the rights or institutions of the states, but to defend and protect the Union.”
What could be clearer? The U.S. Congress declared that the war against the South was NOT an attempt to overthrow or interfere with the “institutions” of the states, but to keep the Union intact (by force). The “institutions” implied most certainly included the institution of slavery.
Hear it loudly and clearly: Lincoln’s war against the South had NOTHING to do with ending slavery--so said the U.S. Congress by unanimous resolution in 1861.
Abraham Lincoln, himself, said it was NEVER his intention to end the institution of slavery. In a letter to Alexander Stevens who later became the Vice President of the Confederacy, Lincoln wrote this, “Do the people of the South really entertain fears that a Republican administration would directly, or indirectly, interfere with their slaves, or with them, about their slaves? If they do, I wish to assure you, as once a friend, and still, I hope, not an enemy, that there is no cause for such fears. The South would be in no more danger in this respect than it was in the days of Washington.”
Again, what could be clearer? Lincoln, himself, said the Southern states had nothing to fear from him in regard to abolishing slavery.
Hear Lincoln again: “If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it.” He also said, “I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the states where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so and I have no inclination to do so.”
The idea that the Confederate flag (actually there were five of them) stood for racism, bigotry, hatred, and slavery is just so much hogwash. In fact, if one truly wants to discover who the racist was in 1861, just read the words of Mr. Lincoln.
On August 14, 1862, Abraham Lincoln invited a group of black people to the White House. In his address to them, he told them of his plans to colonize them all back to Africa. Listen to what he told these folks: “Why should the people of your race be colonized and where? Why should they leave this country? This is, perhaps, the first question for proper consideration. You and we are different races. We have between us a broader difference than exists between almost any other two races. Whether it is right or wrong I need not discuss; but this physical difference is a great disadvantage to us both, as I think. Your race suffers very greatly, many of them, by living among us, while ours suffers from your presence. In a word, we suffer on each side. If this is admitted, it affords a reason, at least, why we should be separated. You here are freemen, I suppose? Perhaps you have been long free, or all your lives. Your race is suffering, in my judgment, the greatest wrong inflicted on any people. But even when you cease to be slaves, you are yet far removed from being placed on an equality with the white race. The aspiration of men is to enjoy equality with the best when free, but on this broad continent not a single man of your race is made the equal of a single man of our race.”
Did you hear what Lincoln said? He said that black people would NEVER be equal with white people--even if they all obtained their freedom from slavery. If that isn’t a racist statement, I’ve never heard one.
Lincoln’s statement above is not isolated. In Charleston, Illinois, in 1858, Lincoln said in a speech, “I am not, nor have ever been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races. I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races from living together on social or political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white.”
Ladies and gentlemen, in his own words, Abraham Lincoln declared himself to be a white supremacist. Why don’t our history books and news media tell the American people the truth about Lincoln and about the War Between the States?
It’s simple: if people would study the meanings and history of the flag, symbols, and statues of the Confederacy and Confederate leaders, they might begin to awaken to the tyrannical policies of Washington, D.C., that precluded Southern independence--policies that have only escalated since the defeat of the Confederacy--and they might have a notion to again resist.
By the time Lincoln penned his Emancipation Proclamation, the war had been going on for two years without resolution. In fact, the North was losing the war. Even though the South was outmanned and out-equipped, the genius of the Southern generals and fighting acumen of the Southern men had put the northern armies on their heels. Many people in the North never saw the legitimacy of Lincoln’s war in the first place, and many of them actively campaigned against it. These people were affectionately called “Copperheads” by people in the South.
I urge you to watch Ron Maxwell’s accurate depiction of those people in the North who favored the Southern cause as depicted in his motion picture, “Copperhead.” For that matter, I consider his movie, “Gods And Generals” to be the greatest “Civil War” movie ever made. It is the most accurate and fairest depiction of Confederate General Thomas Jonathan “Stonewall” Jackson ever produced. In my opinion, actor Stephen Lang should have received an Oscar for his performance as General Jackson. But, can you imagine?
That’s another thing: the war fought from 1861 to 1865 was NOT a “civil war.” Civil war suggests two sides fighting for control of the same capital and country. The South didn’t want to take over Washington, D.C., no more than their forebears wanted to take over London. They wanted to separate from Washington, D.C., just as America’s Founding Fathers wanted to separate from Great Britain. The proper names for that war are either, “The War Between the States” or, “The War of Southern Independence,” or, more fittingly, “The War of Northern Aggression.”
Had the South wanted to take over Washington, D.C., they could have done so with the very first battle of the “Civil War.” When Lincoln ordered federal troops to invade Virginia in the First Battle of Manassas (called the “First Battle of Bull Run” by the North), Confederate troops sent the Yankees running for their lives all the way back to Washington. Had the Confederates pursued them, they could have easily taken the city of Washington, D.C., seized Abraham Lincoln, and perhaps ended the war before it really began. But General Beauregard and the others had no intention of fighting an aggressive war against the North. They merely wanted to defend the South against the aggression of the North.
In order to rally people in the North, Lincoln needed a moral crusade. That’s what his Emancipation Proclamation was all about. This explains why his proclamation was not penned until 1863, after two years of fruitless fighting. He was counting on people in the North to stop resisting his war against the South if they thought it was some kind of “holy” war. Plus, Lincoln was hoping that his proclamation would incite blacks in the South to insurrect against Southern whites. If thousands of blacks would begin to wage war against their white neighbors, the fighting men of the Southern armies would have to leave the battlefields and go home to defend their families. THIS NEVER HAPPENED.
Not only did blacks not riot against the whites of the South, many black men volunteered to fight alongside their white friends and neighbors in the Confederate army. Unlike the blacks in the North, who were conscripted by Lincoln and forced to fight in segregated units, thousands of blacks in the South fought of their own free will in a fully-integrated Southern army. I bet your history book never told you about that.
If one wants to ban a racist flag, one would have to ban the British flag. Ships bearing the Union Jack shipped over 5 million African slaves to countries all over the world, including the British colonies in North America. Other slave ships flew the Dutch flag and the Portuguese flag and the Spanish flag, and, yes, the U.S. flag. But not one single slave ship flew the Confederate flag. NOT ONE!
By the time Lincoln launched his war against the Southern states, slavery was already a dying institution. The entire country, including the South, recognized the moral evil of slavery and wanted it to end. Only a small fraction of Southerners even owned slaves. The slave trade had ended in 1808, per the U.S. Constitution, and the practice of slavery was quickly dying, too. In another few years, with the advent of agricultural machinery, slavery would have ended peacefully--just like it had in England. It didn’t take a national war and the deaths of over a half million men to end slavery in Great Britain. America’s so-called “Civil War” was absolutely unnecessary. The greed of Lincoln’s radical Republicans in the North, combined with the cold, calloused heart of Lincoln himself is responsible for the tragedy of the “Civil War.”
And look at what is happening now: in one instant--after one deranged young man killed nine black people and who ostensibly photo-shopped a picture of himself with a Confederate flag--the entire political and media establishments in the country go on an all-out crusade to remove all semblances of the Confederacy. The speed in which all of this has happened suggests that this was a planned, orchestrated event by the Powers That Be (PTB). And is it a mere coincidence that this took place at the exact same time that the U.S. Supreme Court decided to legalize same-sex marriage? I think not.
The Confederate Battle Flag flies the Saint Andrews cross. Of course, Andrew was the first disciple of Jesus Christ, brother of Simon Peter, and Christian martyr who was crucified on an X-shaped cross at around the age of 90. Andrew is the patron saint of both Russia and Scotland.
In the 1800s, up to 75% of people in the South were either Scotch or Scotch-Irish. The Confederate Battle Flag is predicated on the national flag of Scotland. It is a symbol of the Christian faith and heritage of the Celtic race.
Pastor John Weaver rightly observed, “Even the Confederate States motto, ‘Deovendickia,’ (The Lord is our Vindicator), illustrates the sovereignty and the righteousness of God. The Saint Andrews cross is also known as the Greek letter CHIA (KEE) and has historically been used to represent Jesus Christ. Why do you think people write Merry X-mas, just to give you an illustration? The ‘X’ is the Greek letter CHIA and it has been historically used for Christ. Moreover, its importance was understood by educated and uneducated people alike. When an uneducated man, one that could not write, needed to sign his name please tell me what letter he made? An ‘X,’ why? Because he was saying I am taking an oath under God. I am recognizing the sovereignty of God, the providence of God and I am pledging my faith. May I tell you the Confederate Flag is indeed a Christian flag because it has the cross of Saint Andrew, who was a Christian martyr, and the letter ‘X’ has always been used to represent Christ, and to attack the flag is to deny the sovereignty, the majesty, and the might of the Lord Jesus Christ and his divine role in our history, culture, and life.”
Many of the facts that I reference in this column were included in a message delivered several years ago by Pastor John Weaver. I want to thank John for preaching such a powerful and needed message. Read or watch Pastor Weaver’s sermon “The Truth About The Confederate Battle Flag” here:
The Truth About The Confederate Battle Flag
Combine the current attacks against Biblical and traditional marriage, the attacks against all things Confederate, the attacks against all things Christian, and the attacks against all things constitutional and what we are witnessing is a heightened example of why the Confederate Battle Flag was created to begin with. Virtually every act of federal usurpation of liberty that we are witnessing today, and have been witnessing for much of the twentieth century, is the result of Lincoln’s war against the South. Truly, we are living in Lincoln’s America, not Washington and Jefferson’s America. Washington and Jefferson’s America died at Appomattox Court House in 1865.
Instead of lowering the Confederate flag, we should be raising it.
© Chuck Baldwin
Should note that one did not have to pronounce that the Founders were wrong in order to believe blacks were not equal.
You could simply decide they weren’t really men and therefore the DoI did not refer to them.
Some who believed in the positive good of slavery chose option A and others option B. Stephens was an option A type. The Founders had simply been ignorant of the scientific facts that had become available by 1861.
The big difference between the two "teams" (as you call them) concerned the issue of slavery. That was the big issue (according to the secessionists). Yeah, I guess you can say that I'm with the Union team on that issue and I'm happy to say that the vast majority of the people (South and North) agree with me about slavery. It's over and it's not coming back.
The America I want to live in is a set of ideas and principles, not a place. This place is becoming a third world version of Nazi Germany as fast as it can, with the difference being that we have no where to run to escape the Nazis this time.
Well, if you live, you have to live in a place. Most people accept that reality.
If America makes you miserable, you're probably not going to find happiness in this world. If you can't make it here, then your situation may be hopeless because I don't know of a better "place" to be right now. Very few people think that the antebellum South was a better "place" so we're not likely to recreate that nightmare soon.
I suggest that you try to find some kind of happiness here. You're very lucky to be here. Just do the best that you can. ;-)
That is not true, because Abraham Lincoln himself said so. His exact words were:
"If you want your Slavery, you can keep your slavery."
No, the difference between them was "Who is going to rule the South?"
The Union team said "Keep slavery, but accept Rule from Washington." The Confederate team said "We will not accept rule from Washington, but prefer instead to rule ourselves.
It's over and it's not coming back.
It's not over, it's just been relatively benign for awhile. It's changing for the worse as most sensible people have been noticing. *We* are the new slaves.
Well, if you live, you have to live in a place. Most people accept that reality.
As did the Colonists, but they did not accept the rules being imposed upon them.
Very few people think that the antebellum South was a better "place" so we're not likely to recreate that nightmare soon.
This has nothing to do with the antebellum South, or even the South at all for that matter. I don't live in "The South" and never have, but that monster which laid them low is slobbering over the rest of us too.
I suggest that you try to find some kind of happiness here. You're very lucky to be here. Just do the best that you can. ;-)
And I take it you think all those Nazi feet marching can be used as the beat for background music or something?
You need to wake up and smell the Fascism.
I would think a big clue to what was the primary purpose of the Declaration of Independence ought to be the fact that It asserted a right to leave England while all the states, it's authors and most of it's signers still owned slaves.
Why do you engage in deliberate history revision? I've seen enough of your writing to realize you have a good historical background. Why do you insist on conflating the zeitgeist of one era with one completely inappropriate to it?
Completely ignored by you is the fact that *WITH SLAVERY* they would have continued in the United States. The rest of the Union was jumping through hoops to guarantee it to them. The Union was perfectly willing to accept perpetual slavery as a condition for the South Remaining in the Union.
Why do you not grasp that Slavery wasn't the sticking point of the Union, that remaining under the Control of Washington D.C. was the only non negotiable demand?
Had the South not Left, Slavery would have continued for Decades, perhaps even longer. That was the Union bargain with them.
I get the Fascist/Nazi vibe from his as well.
"I will say here, while upon this- subject, that I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so. I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and the black races. There is a physical difference between the two which, in my judgment, will probably forever forbid their living together upon the footing of perfect equality; and inasmuch as it becomes a necessity there must be a difference, I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position. I have never said anything to the contrary..." (Lincoln Douglas Debates)
In his Inaugural Address he reiterated the fact that he had no inclination to interfere with the institution of slavery.
I don’t think you read my last comment. I said that even if it were true that their only reason to secede was slavery (which it was NOT), then they still would have had the constitutional right to do so.
Reminds me of Obama saying he was against gay marriage.
He did that on the campaign trail too.
Isn't that how the colonies left Great Britain?
Maybe in a purely legalistic sense. But Americans have long regarded the Declaration as something more than a narrowly legalistic text. If you're going to honor and cherish the Declaration, you're going to reflect about what "all men are created equal" could possibly mean.
Before Andrew Jackson's time most of the states or colonies had severely restricted suffrage. Only those with enough property could vote. Under the influence of the civic egalitarianism of the Declaration, voting rights were extended to all adult white men.
Should we not have done that? Should we have kept property qualifications for voting? Were they somehow enshrined by the fact that the Founders accepted them?
He seems to be the sort of fellow who cannot accept someone else's right to do something unless he approves of it. This is no different from supporting "freedom of speech" provided it is speech with which you agree.
"I will say here, while upon this- subject, that I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so. I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and the black races. There is a physical difference between the two which, in my judgment, will probably forever forbid their living together upon the footing of perfect equality; and inasmuch as it becomes a necessity there must be a difference, I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position. I have never said anything to the contrary..." (Lincoln Douglas Debates)
And because he believed that blacks and whites could never live together in equality, he was in favor of sending blacks back to Africa.
Well, you're creating your own soundtrack. If it's making you miserable, then change your tune. If what you're doing makes you unhappy, then try something else. Pushing the cause of slaveholders may not be good for you. What makes you believe that you can convince anyone to follow you to a "place" where you are finding so much misery?
Find a constructive issue. Or, take up golf or painting. Your happiness is worth some effort.
Let the "fascists" take care of themselves for awhile. Take a long lunch. Things won't be much different when you come back, but you may discover that you don't want to come back. Happiness can become a habit.
I know right. Lol. Politicians always changing their tune depending on who they are talking to.
all the states, it's authors and most of it's signers still owned slaves.
As far as the Declaration goes, it was written by five men. Of those five, three were anti-slavery, one was a slaveowner, and I've been unable to find information on the position of the fifth with regard to the institution. Franklin had owned slaves earlier in his life, but by the time of DoI (or perhaps shortly thereafter) was anti-slavery.
So that's three or possibly four out of the five who not only did not own slaves, but were anti-slavery.
Slavery was indeed legal in all states when the DoI was written. Fail to see why that had all that much bearing on whether they were allowed to proclaim an eternal principle that often failed to take effect.
I've never seen any evidence that "most" of the signers of DoI owned slaves, at least not at the time of the signing. But I suspect most owned or had owned slaves at some point during their lives.
There are many, many examples of various of the Founders expressing their discomfort with the contrast between the lofty principles expressed in DoI and the realities of American slavery. Including a good many of the Founders that owned slaves. Washington, Madison and Jefferson, for instance. None of which, AFAIK, ever stated that they thought the principles of DoI did not apply to blacks.
Since they were concerned with this conflict, seems like a claim that blacks weren't included would have been an easy way out. But they didn't take it.
I do know that Nathan Bedford Forrest was one who believed in social equality for blacks more than many people of his time.
Yep, that’s how liberalism works. :-)
Here are the relevant quotes. Please show me where I’m misrepresenting either document.
DoI: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Cornerstone Speech: But whether he (Jefferson) fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution, were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with, but the general opinion of the men of that day was that, somehow or other in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away. This idea, though not incorporated in the constitution, was the prevailing idea at that time. The constitution, it is true, secured every essential guarantee to the institution while it should last, and hence no argument can be justly urged against the constitutional guarantees thus secured, because of the common sentiment of the day. Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the government built upon it fell when the “storm came and the wind blew.”
Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth. This truth has been slow in the process of its development, like all other truths in the various departments of science. It has been so even amongst us. Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well, that this truth was not generally admitted, even within their day. The errors of the past generation still clung to many as late as twenty years ago.
IOW, it’s not me saying the Founders believed blacks were, or should be equal. That’s Stephens kindly forgiving them for their ignorance of the great principle they had misunderstood.
So who is misrepresenting the past, you, me or Stephens?
The essence of the document is that they had a right to leave. The further contention that slaves had a right to be free was a subsequent "Living Declaration" construction, the sort to which we normally object when applied to constitutional interpretation.
But Americans have long regarded the Declaration as something more than a narrowly legalistic text.
Subsequently, and only as a result of Jefferson introducing those words. Had he not done it, the primary purpose of the document would not have been subsequently misapplied to mean something it was never intended by it's signatories or the states they represented, to mean.
If you're going to honor and cherish the Declaration, you're going to reflect about what "all men are created equal" could possibly mean.
In the context of the time it was written, it meant they wanted some flowery and noble sounding verbiage to make the document more persuasive. They wanted it to aid their cause, and to appeal to a sense of equality among Englishmen. They did not intend to make it into a condemnation of slavery due to it's inherently unequal nature. That was a later and subsequent interpretation starting I believe, in Puritan, Fanatical, Liberal Massachusetts. Whether it be hunting Witches, or Abolishing slavery, or promoting "Gay marriage", whatever they do, they do it with zeal and fanaticism.
Before Andrew Jackson's time most of the states or colonies had severely restricted suffrage. Only those with enough property could vote. Under the influence of the civic egalitarianism of the Declaration, voting rights were extended to all adult white men.
Who paid taxes, is my understanding. I think the removal of that condition is what launched the nation into fiscal insanity since 1964.
Should we not have done that? Should we have kept property qualifications for voting? Were they somehow enshrined by the fact that the Founders accepted them?
Whether we should have kept those restrictions or not is irrelevant to the fact that the Founders never intended or possibly even contemplated such a thing when they wrote that document. As the courts of the time were found of saying, "Such was not comprehended by the law" of that time.
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