Posted on 04/14/2015 6:57:32 AM PDT by Paisan
On this date in 1865, Good Friday, Abraham Lincoln was shot at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. The 16th president died the next morning.
A fact irrelevant to the point. That England was an Empire and the United States was a Nation does not make George III an evil tyrant and Abe Lincoln a saint.
They both did exactly the same thing.
For all intents and purposes he was dead the instant the bullet entered his brain. His bodily functions simply stopped on Saturday. I doubt that he could have been saved if he were shot in 2015 and had all the advanced medical equipment of today . . . even if the machinery were right there in the box with him.
Well that’s a shame, because I’m using actual history, and not the same histrionics that Confederates used back in 1860 to justify their stupidity, and their defenders still use to this day.
” A fact irrelevant to the point. That England was an Empire and the United States was a Nation does not make George III an evil tyrant and Abe Lincoln a saint.
They both did exactly the same thing. “
Ok, you got to help us out here....
WHAT EXACTLY are the parallels between the stat of the American Revolution and the Civil War?
Paisan, you may live in South Carolina now, but it is clear you are not a Southerner.
Gosh, I have one of those things in my father’s belongings. Never thought it was real. I need to take a second look.
No, I will not discuss it further. I have better things to do.
Let me point out something else, which puts the Confederate effort into a clearer perspective, in terms of the "Law Of Nations" (as according to Vattel, the authority that the Founding Fathers looked to). The Revolution was justified in terms of the compact theory of Government (popular in the Anglo/Norman/Celtic world since Magna Carta). It was a true Counter Revolution, premised on the beleif that the Government had broken the compact.
But whereas the Colonies did not have sovereignty before the Revolution, the status of the original States as independent Nations was internationally recognized by the Treaty Of Paris, two years after Washington's victory at Yorktown. And, hence, under that prevailing understanding of the Law Of Nations, it was recognized that those new Nations were the judges of their own internal affairs.
Now it is true that the new States gave up some of their sovereignty to the new organization, in ratifying the Federal Union. But they did not give up the right to leave that Union, nor to subject their internal institutions & social values, in the new specifically limited Compact (Constitution)to some form of a collective. In terms of legality, then, they remained in a stronger position than their Colonial forefathers.
Now, as a Conservative Ohioan, I am very glad that the Southern States are still in the Union. But the social ostracization of pro-Confederates, to me, violates both the spirit of 1776, and the Constitution. as well as any sense of elemental fairness. It also illustrates the hubris always present when one generation assumes the right to pass judgment on others who walked in different times, in ways that reflected their own experiences, not the shallow & myopic experiences of their later critics.
William Flax
The primary reason they wanted to secede was over tariffs. The federal government imposed heavy tariffs on imported goods, and used the money to fund improvements (mostly in the North).
Initially, the Civil War was about keeping the Union together. Not ony most Northerners but a significant minority of Southerners supported that cause. Then Lincoln made a major strategic mistake with the emancipation proclamation, which made the war seem to be "about" slavery. This made him wildly unpopular among many stalwart Unionists who (rightly) thought they were dealt a bait and switch, told that they were fighting to preserve the Union, a cause they believed to be worth fighting for, but were now told that they were fighting to end slavery.
Even anti-slavery northerners were generally not willing to fight and die, or see their sons and brothers fight and die to end slavery (and rightly so - "ending slavery" wasn't worth 600K + lives and a ruined nation). With the Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln not only lost most sympathy in the South, but he lost a lot of political capital in the North as well. While only a small number of Northerners went "Copperhead," he wasn't exactly the most popular man among Union soldiers either.
I do not dispute that Lincoln was very much against slavery. I do not doubt that he would have done anything of which he could think to interfere with it and oppose it. I just dispute that the Union reasons for fighting the war had anything to do with it. Up till January of 1863, the continuance of slavery was an acceptable condition for a peace settlement. Leaving the Union was not.
Throughout the conflict, the one non negotiable was the exercise of that right expressed in the Declaration of Independence; The Right to leave. That was the one sticking point of the war.
Sure. Wars were fought all over the world to abolish chattel slavery. Wait. What?
He was the first to turn the Presidency into a Dictatorship.
They buried him in a steel cage under three tons of concrete, just so nobody could dig him up and shoot him again.
This Republic was killed in 1865.
Lincoln was the murderer.
Washington sacrificed beyond the call of duty, and continued to do so, even when all that he wanted was to retire to Mount Vernon and live peacefully with his wife.
Yours is an almost reasonable argument. You bring up a couple of valid points. If coercion was used at the secession conventions, then it may have thereby thwarted the actual will of the people.
The CSA did blunder and waste a legitimate opportunity for secession. They made several blunders in their efforts to break away.
But where I fault your argument is the thinking that they have to have good reasons or even coherent reasons for leaving. I believe people have a right...
to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Untrue.
The CSA agreed to raise some black troops. On March 13. (Apparently it was not a top priority for them.) This was done only after Lee himself more or less suggested it was the last chance the South had.
They still could not bring themselves to promise freedom even to those who fought for them.
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/confederacy-approves-black-soldiers
One politician asked, “What did we go to war for, if not to protect our property?” Another suggested, “If slaves will make good soldiers, our whole theory of slavery is wrong.”
That the CSA was still having debates of this type, in March of 65, just goes to show how delusional they'd become.
I agree. I think our second Greatest was Ronald Reagan.
See my post #72. Lincoln's big strategic mistake was turning a war that was about preserving the Union (which most in the North and many in the South thought was a worthy cause) into a war that was, rightly or not, perceived as being fought "to free the slaves." Many more people were willing to fight and die to preserve the union than to liberate slaves, and rightly so.
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