Robert E. Lee On Leadership

C-SPAN ^ | July 14, 1999 | H.W. Crocker

[rockrr]

And yet he was way to the right of any of the confeds.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "You keep saying the jury decided the case, and I keep telling you that is a pretense.
Once the judge allowed the case to go forward on it's ridiculous premise, the jury decision was already fore ordained.
No Jury in the world would resist the emotional arguments that would have been brought to bear.
The decision of law was to allow the Jury to even consider this line of argument, and that was the judge's decision."

We're talking here about the 1781 Massachusetts court cases which effectively abolished slavery, based on their new state constitution which begins:

Article I. "All men are born free and equal, and have certain natural, essential, and unalienable rights; among which may be reckoned the right of enjoying and defending their lives and liberties; that of acquiring, possessing, and protecting property; in fine, that of seeking and obtaining their safety and happiness."

Now DiogenesLamp wishes us to believe than no normal jury would read those words as applying to slavery, except if some judge arbitrarily imposed such a meaning on it.
But those words do speak for themselves, and "all men are born free and equal", seems pretty hard to misconstrue, regardless of what a judge may or may not say about it.

As to the judge's jury instructions, in this particular example, he referred to slavery as "usage" not explicit law, and told the jury that by finding against slavery they were not overturning law, but simply "usage".
That's why DiogenesLamp's argument must boil down to this: what the 1781 Massachusetts judge called "usage" was, in fact, inviolable Massachusetts law supporting slavery and as such it could not be overthrown by mere "flowery language" in their new state constitution, according to DiogenesLamp.

One problem with DiogenesLamp's argument is that nobody at the time or since ever successfully made it in court, or in the Massachusetts' legislature.
So we have to conclude it's just another of DiogenesLamp's endless Lost Cause fantasies, not supported by actual history.

DiogenesLamp to x: "Perhaps someone else will try to defend your position. I would relish that. :)"

I doubt it.

[NKP_Vet]

Think again.

Abraham Lincoln Was a Liberal, Jefferson Davis Was a Conservative: The Missing Key to Understanding the American Civil War https://www.amazon.com/dp/1943737444/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_rxVYCbJDCACEG

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "Before the nation was established as a Democratic Republic?"

I notice DiogenesLamp uses that term "Democratic Republic" several times in this thread.
It's an odd term for a conservative site, we usually say "constitutional republic", and avoid language which sounds uncomfortably close to "Democratic Peoples' Republic".

It also reminds us of the constant Democrat political complaint that President Trump "is undermining our Democracy", where the key to understanding is that "the Democracy" is simply an older term for "Democrat party".
So yes, it's true that President Trump hopes to undermine "the Democracy's" one party rule over the United States.

Regardless, "Democratic Republic" was not our Founders' original intentions in, say, 1776 or 1787, but rather a constitutionally defined representative republic, those representatives elected by strictly authorized voters.

[BroJoeK]

NKP_Vet: "Abraham Lincoln Was a Liberal, Jefferson Davis Was a Conservative:"

Complete nonsense, but consistent with the vast propaganda effort underway to convince Americans that Lincoln's "Black Republicans" were in fact Liberal Democrats and Jefferson Davis's Slave Power Democrats were in fact conservative Republicans.

The real truth of it is that Republicans in 1860, just as today, were the successor party to the old pro-Constitution Federalist & Whig parties, while Democrats, then as now, opposed the Constitution and supported Nullification, secession & resistance when out of power, then a vastly expanded Federal government when Democrats controlled it.

So one example of "Big Government Republicans" was their support for the first transcontinental railroad, right?
But years earlier "Big Government Democrats" under Secretary of War Jefferson Davis had already spent $10 million on the Gadsden Purchase for a Southern route of the transcontinental railroad -- a route which would have financially benefitted Davis himself.

That's why Republicans in 1860, just as in 2016, ran with the promise to, in effect, "drain the swamp" in DC.

Bottom line: regardless of endless propaganda to the contrary, Democrats have always opposed the Constitution, Republicans support it.

[DiogenesLamp]

Shameless! You keep bothering people saying the same thing over and over and over again and never taking into account objections and counterarguments and then when people tell you to get lost, you cackle and think that you've won.

You are deliberately deflecting the topic away from the salient issue here, which is the creating of *FAKE* interpretations of written law.

You supported this fake interpretation of law in the case of what Massachusetts courts did in 1780 and I, on the other hand, have always been opposed to this "Penumbra" style of interpretation of law.

An interpretation that results in significant upheaval to an existing system should never be allowed unless such a law is clearly written to accomplish this effect, and clearly approved by the legislative process.

In the same manner that constitutional clauses cannot be interpreted as having no effect, so too can a law not be interpreted to have effects beyond what is plainly written in the words.

I said before, not to ping me unless you had something new to say. But after that last post, just don't ping me at all with your garbage.

It isn't garbage, you just don't agree with it. You don't agree with it because the logic of it breaks into that safe harbor of what you wish to believe, and you have sufficient perception of what I am saying to realize this.

Making up fake interpretations of Law is denying the people's right to approve laws. It is counter to the concept of "consent of the governed" upon which our system is founded.

[rockrr]

“Unreconstructed Southern historian...” I stopped right there.

Poppycock.

[oldvirginian]

Washington was an exceptional man who never thought he deserved to be President.
He had to be talked into a second term by Jefferson and Hamilton, who were political opposites.
Washington was terrified that the country that so many had bled and died for would fall apart so he took every opportunity to support a national identity.

By the time of the civil war the northern states had seen an influx of European immigrants who knew nothing but strong central governments. Formerly the subjects of kings and queens they saw our small central government as a god-send. These immigrants did think of themselves more as Americans than by their state identity.
These recent arrivals diluted the effect of the original settlers who identified by state first.

The south was still largely populated by Scotts and others with a dislike, if not pure hatred, of overbearing central governments. They overwhelmingly identified with their states first as the smaller state government was the lesser evil and easier to keep under control.

The devil is in the details.
Even the founders argued about how much government was too much.

[arrogantsob]

There is no real “meaning” of Natural law; it is a philosophy without a definitive definition. Some of its believers refused to admit slavery was against Natural Law.

The Union was created by the “Articles of Confederation AND Perpetual Union”.

The reason the Constitution was created was to make the Union “more perfect.” And it did.

[arrogantsob]

The colonies seceded from the United Kingdom not States, there were no states in 1776.

These colonies had never voluntarily joined the UK but was a part through conquest. So there was no real secession.

States which tried to secede were violating the Constitution they had agreed to enact voluntarily, there is nothing but sophistry to claim they they had a right to do so.

At least six were created under that constitution.