HISTORICAL IGNORANCE II: Forgotten facts about Lincoln, slavery and the Civil War

We call the war of 1861 the Civil War. But is that right? A civil war is a struggle between two or more entities trying to take over the central government. Confederate President Jefferson Davis no more sought to take over Washington, D.C., than George Washington sought to take over London in 1776. Both wars, those of 1776 and 1861, were wars of independence. Such a recognition does not require one to sanction the horrors of slavery. We might ask, How much of the war was about slavery?

Was President Abraham Lincoln really for outlawing slavery? Let's look at his words. In an 1858 letter, Lincoln said, "I have declared a thousand times, and now repeat that, in my opinion neither the General Government, nor any other power outside of the slave states, can constitutionally or rightfully interfere with slaves or slavery where it already exists." In a Springfield, Illinois, speech, he explained: "My declarations upon this subject of Negro slavery may be misrepresented but cannot be misunderstood. I have said that I do not understand the Declaration (of Independence) to mean that all men were created equal in all respects." Debating Sen. Stephen Douglas, Lincoln said, "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; and 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 living together on terms of social and political equality."

What about Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation? Here are his words: "I view the matter (of slaves' emancipation) as a practical war measure, to be decided upon according to the advantages or disadvantages it may offer to the suppression of the rebellion." He also wrote: "I will also concede that emancipation would help us in Europe, and convince them that we are incited by something more than ambition." When Lincoln first drafted the proclamation, war was going badly for the Union.

London and Paris were considering recognizing the Confederacy and assisting it in its war against the Union.

The Emancipation Proclamation was not a universal declaration. It specifically detailed where slaves were to be freed: only in those states "in rebellion against the United States." Slaves remained slaves in states not in rebellion — such as Kentucky, Maryland, Delaware and Missouri. The hypocrisy of the Emancipation Proclamation came in for heavy criticism. Lincoln's own secretary of state, William Seward, sarcastically said, "We show our sympathy with slavery by emancipating slaves where we cannot reach them and holding them in bondage where we can set them free."

Lincoln did articulate a view of secession that would have been heartily endorsed by the Confederacy: "Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government and form a new one that suits them better. ... Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people that can may revolutionize and make their own of so much of the territory as they inhabit." Lincoln expressed that view in an 1848 speech in the U.S. House of Representatives, supporting the war with Mexico and the secession of Texas.

Why didn't Lincoln share the same feelings about Southern secession? Following the money might help with an answer. Throughout most of our nation's history, the only sources of federal revenue were excise taxes and tariffs. During the 1850s, tariffs amounted to 90 percent of federal revenue. Southern ports paid 75 percent of tariffs in 1859. What "responsible" politician would let that much revenue go?

If you were to emphasize that aspect of your proposal (i.e., that a reorganization would be based upon the wishes of a significant percentage, a majority at a minimum) you could make that argument as a prospective proposal that wouldn't entangle you with the Confederacy, slavery, etc. Scotland just had a similar election.

You can't. People won't let you. It always goes back to "Why do you support Slavery?"

And Yes, Scotland did have just such a referendum. I am actually disappointed in the Scots. They have gone from the "Brave and Proud" to the whiny and dependent. England pumps great quantities of money into them, and it has turned them into a nation of indolent Dole recipients.

England managed to convince them to remain in the Union with even more bribes to their welfare class.

Until financial factors are considered, one might suppose that red states would be more disposed to separate from the USA than blue states. But, as shown by Wallet Hub (a financial website), red states are more financially dependent on the Federal government than blue states.

I know this has been asserted, but I think a lot of proxies are being used to arrive at this conclusion. It is obviously true that many Liberal States (Blue is the Conservative Color. It is the Media that deliberately portrayed us as "Red" to cover for Bill Clinton's obvious communist leanings in 1992.) are very wealthy, and contribute a great deal of money into the Federal Treasury, but much of the outgoing money sent to the states is not really benefiting the state.

As I pointed out with the Scots, funding the Dole is counterproductive to the well being of a state. Yes, there are a lot of poor people in Conservative States (I theorize that Wealth is a common factor in promoting Liberalism) but as Benjamin Franklin pointed out:

“I am for doing good to the poor, but...I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. I observed...that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer.”

Likewise, Federal matching funds, and Federal Highway dollars have become a cronyism graft distribution system with side orders of coercion of the States into follow the Dictates of the Federal Bureaucrats.

The Education system is another example of where Federal money meddling has made things worse, not better. And so on.

In other words, just gross numbers does not give an accurate assessment of the costs versus benefits of taking money from one group of people and giving it to other groups of people. Of course this middleman Control and Skimming scheme is what Washington Runs on. Indeed, LBJ demonstrated that if you control where the Federal Dollars go, you can bribe voters into keeping you in power. It is why the Democrats held congress from the early 1960s to 1994.

It is also the single most significant factor in the destruction of other civilizations throughout history.

Overall, the Federal government is being used to transfer financial resources from blue states to red states. It would be a huge mistake to overlook or to ignore this fact.

Hasn't been overlooked, it has just not been looked on as all that wonderful of a situation. I could write a dozen essays on the damage to society caused by Federal dollars going to places where they shouldn't. It is not much different from the Eurozone funding Greece and achieving the same bad results.

At the present time, there isn't any state in which anything like a majority of people would wish to sever their connection with the USA.

Nor I, at the Present time, but I see this as a distortion of the financial system. Let me give you an analogy.

Let us say that a group of People finding themselves on a lifeboat after their ship sinks represent a fair distribution of the American populace. The more sensible believe that they should save their stores of food and water and ration it carefully to make it last as long as possible, because rescue is uncertain and they have a grim but realistic view of things.

The majority, being accustomed to comfort, wants to eat full portions at their convenience, and show no signs of understanding the possibility that the little group may face desperate times.

The rational and sensible people, would be foolish to take their portions and hold some of them back, because if they do so, when the majority becomes hungry, they will simply seize the rationed portions from the sensible people.

The only rational course of action is for the sensible to eat their portions, just like the foolish. That way they will at least be equal in strength to the foolish, rather than at a disadvantage when things get grim.

I refer to this principle as "Enlightened Hypocrisy", because it is hypocritical to advocate one thing, and then do another, but the point remains that in grim circumstances it is foolish to hold to a principle that puts you at a serious disadvantage, merely because you believe it is correct.

In the same manner, the Federal government has been throwing a money party for many decades, racking up higher and higher debt each year, and counting on future money to keep the credit coming in. The math says this is an exponential function, and at some point must become unsustainable, at which point the party stops, and things will likely become grim.

Look at Federal dollars flowing out to the various state economies as those rations on that Life Boat. It would be a foolish state to stand on principle and say "The Federal Government should not be spending this money on these things, so therefore we will reject it."

This would put them in the position of instantly being disadvantaged relative to everyone else who have been accepting the money, and it would very likely result in their ouster from government, for far too many people of even the most conservatives states are all too addicted to Federal dollars.

So therefore, I advocate that everyone continue to accept the Federal dollars because it is foolish to make a gesture that will have no impact on anyone but themselves, and the only impact it will have will be to put them at a disadvantage relative to everyone else.

We must all eat the rations until they are all gone.

The fiscal problem may have to get worse before there will be enough political will to reverse course.

There is not now, nor will their ever be, enough political will to reverse course. The population is ruined morally, and is incapable of denying itself it's monetary addiction. We will go the way of the Romans, and for exactly the same reasons.

The Modern equivalent of "Bread and Circuses" is Welfare and Television (now Internet) and in any case, accomplishes the same purpose; To make the indolent members of society mollified enough to keep voting the "vote farmers" in positions of power so that they can enrich themselves.

Rome Debased their currency, and we do the same thing through inflation. Rome allowed non-loyal barbarians to immigrate without assimilation into Roman culture, and we are doing the same.

The Human question is not new. The same social forces that motivated people a thousand years ago are the same social forces that motivate us today. We just keep playing this game over and over again, because as a sequence of offspring, we have no recollection how this same scenario worked out in previous iterations, though there are some clues.

You’re the one who is confused, not me.

I understand the basic difference between right and wrong.

The natural law is the basis of our constitutional form of government.

If men screw up our constitutions by adding provisions that violate the natural law, the natural law rules.

These principles have been understood in Western Civilization since before the earthly life and ministry of Christ, all the way back to Cicero. Thomas Aquinas clearly stated it. So did Blackstone, and later Samuel Adams and Alexander Hamilton.

“True law is right reason in agreement with nature; it is of universal application, unchanging and everlasting; it summons to duty by its commands, and averts from wrong-doing by its prohibitions. And it does not lay its commands or prohibitions upon good men in vain, although neither have any effect on the wicked. It is a sin to try to alter this law, nor is it allowable to attempt to repeal a part of it, and it is impossible to abolish it entirely. We cannot be freed from its obligations by Senate or People, and we need not look outside ourselves for an expounder or interpreter of it. And there will not be different laws at Rome and at Athens, or different laws now and in the future, but one eternal and unchangeable law will be valid for all nations and all times, and there will be one master and ruler, that is, God, over us all, for He is the author of this law, its promulgator, and its enforcing judge. Whoever is disobedient is fleeing from himself and denying his human nature, and by reason of this very fact he will suffer the worst penalties, even if he escapes what is commonly called punishment ...”

— Marcus Tullius Cicero, 59 - 47 B.C.

“Human law is law only by virtue of its accordance with right reason; and thus it is manifest that it flows from the eternal law. And in so far as it deviates from right reason it is called an unjust law; in such case it is no law at all, but rather a species of violence.”

— Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, Ia-Ilae, q. xciii, art. 3, ad 2m.

“Those rights, then, which God and nature have established, and are therefore called natural rights, such as are life and liberty, need not the aid of human laws to be more effectually invested in every man than they are; neither do they receive any additional strength when declared by the municipal laws to be inviolable. On the contrary, no human legislation has power to abridge or destroy them, unless the owner himself commit some act that amounts to forfeiture.”

— William Blackstone

“If men through fear, fraud or mistake, should in terms renounce and give up any essential natural right, the eternal law of reason and the great end of society, would absolutely vacate such renunciation; the right to freedom being the gift of God Almighty, it is not in the power of Man to alienate this gift, and voluntarily become a slave.”

— Samuel Adams, Rights of the Colonists, 1772

I don't want to speak for anyone else, but my impression is that these folks don't support slavery. I think that the range of views about the 1860's here at FR reflect the range of views out in the real world. Here is a 2011 public opinion poll regarding some of these issues.

Argumentum ad populum. I think people have been misinformed about the war since 1861, and even more so 150 years later. I think most modern people lack the necessary cognitive capabilities to comprehend the zeitgeist of that time period, and always try to evaluate it based on what are the modern herd impression.

They are also unaware of how so many things that are a result of that war, and continue to negatively impact society today. Illegal Immigration, Abortion, Government's Anti-Religious policies, and Gay Marriage can all be traced back to the aftermath of that war.

In a sense, we might just as well be talking about the Battle of Culloden.

Funny you should mention that, because I have seen it argued in more than one place that the Civil war was really just a continuation of that and previous wars between the Scots and the English.

Nobody at FR was around in the 1860's and nobody at FR has ever even known anybody who was around in the 1860's. Surely, some of us have ancestors who were around, but we didn't know any of them.

I knew a man who's grandfather fought in the Civil war, but I have not seen him for awhile now. He was more than middle aged in the 1990s, and I suspect he is no longer around.

I really think that most of the people who speak favorably about secession do so in large part because they see in secession some sort of answer to their frustrations about life in America now.

Not just frustrations, but concern that the economic path we are on will only end in tragedy. When chained to a mob that cannot comprehend that you can't have an everlasting spending party, one becomes desperate to disassociate from such individuals who will obviously come to ruin at some point.

The problem is that when they make their pitch for secession they allow themselves to get all tangled up with the controversies surrounding the secessions of the 1860's

Allow? When it is the first thing out of the mouths of people to whom the subject is broached, what do you suggest can be used to steer the conversation back on track? It's not that people allow themselves to get tangled up in the slavery issue, it's that any discussion of secession cannot be considered rationally by the team cheerleaders for the Union. They have a religious fervor regarding the question of separating from the Union. To allow such a thing is tantamount to saying their "team" was in the wrong, and they simply love their team, and will admit no such thing under any circumstances.

They have bought in to the belief that Separation is impossible, and if you disagree, you must be a supporter of Slavery, and therefore your opinion need not be respected.

was irrelevant (despite what the secessionists back then claimed) and that the USA is just some sort of a joint venture of states, etc.

It was very relevant to the economics and financial assets of the South, but it was completely irrelevant to whether or not they had a right to leave; A distinction which is apparently too subtle for many people to grasp.

Again, if they had a right to leave, their reasons for doing so are irrelevant. If they did not have a right to leave, then no reason is sufficient, and is also therefore irrelevant.

The only relevant question is "Did they have a right to leave?"

The interesting question for me is why some of these folks find that life in the USA seems so intolerable.

It is not that it is currently intolerable, it is that we can see conditions approaching during which it will become increasingly intolerable. We can see the trends, and we very much fear where they are leading.

I have a very good track record for being accurate. My best Friend in High School is Black, and he and I used to argue about things all the time. He always said I was exaggerating the danger, and none of the stuff I worried about would ever happen. (This was decades ago.)

He called me up back around 2005, and told me I was absolutely right about everything I said would happen. He was astonished that so many things he thought impossible, turned out just the way I said they would.

I just look which direction things are going, and extrapolate while assuming the worst. People generally try to follow the easy path, and that always helps with predictions.

Obviously, we all have some good reasons to criticize this or that, but all in all this country seems to me a paradise compared to most places in the world.

Places in the World who's ideas and cultures we have been adopting, and with obvious and predictable consequences of becoming more like them.

Back in 2008 I joked that "African Prince Obama will do for the US what African leaders have been doing for African nations for quite awhile now." He is not American in culture, he is Marxist/African in his World View, and he cannot improve America, he can only make it look more like Kenya, or more accurately Rhodesia.

I feel very lucky to have been born here.

Amen. Still the best nation in the world, but working mightily to become like the others.

Some of us would rather jump ship before this happens.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.