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What Ron Paul Gets Wrong
Townhall.com ^ | November 17, 2012 | Ken Blackwell

Posted on 11/17/2012 8:17:44 AM PST by Kaslin

Congressman Ron Paul has just delivered his valedictory address in the House of Representatives. And he has told TV interviewers that the American Revolution was a wonderful example of secession. He's a much better OB/GYN, I'm sure, than he is a student of America's history. He could be cited for political malpractice.

If the Founding Fathers and the Patriots who fought and won the Revolution were seceding, why is it that none of them ever called it secession? They certainly had the word back then. They invoked the well-known right of revolution. They had read their John Locke and their Montesquieu, to be sure, but they most often listened to sermons advocating independence--especially those of the New England clergy.

Then, again, why is it that the Confederates of 1861 did not claim that their Secession movement was an exercise of the right of revolution? They were careful not to call it revolution. That's because if they as slaveholders had a right of revolution--to secure what they regarded as their unalienable rights--then so did their slaves.

No one was more eloquent on this point than Thomas Jefferson. Although a slaveholder throughout his life, and never able to disentangle himself from that peculiar institution, Jefferson wrote at length about the injustice of slavery. "The God who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time." Speaking of slavery, Jefferson said "we have the wolf by the ears."

Movingly, he said "I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just and His justice cannot sleep forever." He went on to say that in a revolution by the slaves to secure their undeniable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, God would be on the side of the slaves.

Congressman Paul is wrong to suggest that our American War of Independence was an act of secession from the British Empire. Those Whiskey Rebels ion the Pennsylvania frontier in 1794 were certainly unhappy with taxes on their only cash crop, corn. They rebelled against the Excise Taxes imposed by the new Washington administration. President Washington himself led troops into the field to put down that rebellion by force. It was an overwhelming show of force, too.

President Andrew Jackson was himself a slaveholder, but when in 1832 South Carolina tried to nullify federal laws within their state's borders, Jackson called it treason. And he rattled his saber. Ex-President James Madison backed him up to the hilt. Madison compared the leader of the "Nullies"--John C. Calhoun--to the serpent in the garden. Tough stuff.

When Virginia's governor told Jackson he could not march troops through the Old Dominion, Old Hickory roared back. He would march at the head of the army, he said, and if any man tried to bar his way, "I will hang him as high as Haman!"

Virginia backed down. South Carolina backed down. And John C. Calhoun, it is recorded, became even paler.

What Ron Paul is talking about is dangerous. Those of us who are dissatisfied with the election results--and there are millions of us--have no recourse but to ballots. There must be no recourse from ballots to bullets, said Jefferson. Said Lincoln.

If Ron Paul wants to advocate revolution or civil war, he should say so openly. If he wants to invoke the right of revolution, he should tell his followers to count the cost. We suffered 630,000 dead in the Civil War. Is he willing to lose that many again? Or, with our population increase, ten times that many?

Other politicians, those in Lincoln's time, pooh-poohed the idea of much bloodshed from secession. One fire-eating secesh leader said he would wipe up with his handkerchief all the blood that might be shed over secession.

Such careless men were not hanged, mercifully. But they deserve the awful censure of history.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial
KEYWORDS: americanhistory; ronpaul; secession
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To: Kaslin

Amazing how one word “SECESSION” can evoke such passions. To the status quo lovers it is like showing the cross to a vampire. To the lover of the republic, it is a gate to freedom. No other word does this.


21 posted on 11/17/2012 10:08:35 AM PST by central_va ( I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: central_va; rockrr; Ditto
Amazing how one word “SECESSION” can evoke such passions. To the status quo lovers it is like showing the cross to a vampire. To the lover of the republic, it is a gate to freedom. No other word does this.

Actually no. A lot of other words evoke political passions. It's just that this is something that you are personally interested in. And what "lovers of the republic" seek to tear it apart?

22 posted on 11/17/2012 10:12:21 AM PST by x
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To: x

Funny how you instantly responded to something that you feel no passion about.


23 posted on 11/17/2012 10:13:40 AM PST by central_va ( I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: central_va

It happens when I read something particularly stupid online.


24 posted on 11/17/2012 10:17:35 AM PST by x
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To: Kaslin
My fellow townsman, Ken Blackwell, is playing word games here, but to what actual point? There were a great many comparisons of the right to sever the bonds, as it were, in the discussions leading up to both the severing in 1776 & in 1860 & 1861.

The issue in each case is not the verbiage but the asserted grievances, and those can stir up quite a row among Conservatives--something we really do not need at this moment in time--when directed to the 1860 & 1861 decisions.

While, frankly, I believe--as did many in New England, also, in 1812--that there is a Constitutional right to secede, I sincerely hope that no one will do so, at this time. We have not exhausted the less extreme ways to deal with the terrible crisis in America.

Incidentally Ken needs to understand an essential point. While the colonies were in point of fact, really States in 1775 & 1776, it took the Revolution to vindicate that & the Treaty of Paris to recognize their sovereignty--as opposed to the House of Hanover holding the sovereignty. Secession was seen as an act based upon that sovereignty. (See, if you are interested, Treaty Of Paris--1783, on the sovereignty question.)

William Flax

25 posted on 11/17/2012 11:53:42 AM PST by Ohioan
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To: Twinkie

who fired the first shot of the civil war??

south or north???

please answer


26 posted on 11/17/2012 11:53:54 AM PST by joe fonebone (The clueless... they walk among us, and they vote...)
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To: central_va

“Amazing how one word “SECESSION” can evoke such passions.”

We’re discussing fundamental questions about our republican values, same as our forebearers. And since we’re playing semantic games here, let’s get the definitions right:

se·cede [si-seed]
verb (used without object), se·ced·ed, se·ced·ing.
to withdraw formally from an alliance, federation, or association, as from a political union, a religious organization, etc.

rev·o·lu·tion [rev-uh-loo-shuhn]
noun 1. an overthrow or repudiation and the thorough replacement of an established government or political system by the people governed.

The defitions overlap in some ways, but it seems to me that the South seceded and the War of Independance was a revolution. That’s my $0.02.


27 posted on 11/17/2012 12:46:26 PM PST by Owl558 ("Those who remember George Satayana are doomed to repeat him")
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To: joe fonebone

“please answer”

Maybe the better answer is that the issue was highly contensious through colonial times right through the drafting of the constitution, to the Missouri Compromise, abolition, Nat Turner, Bleeding Kansas, Harper’s Ferry...

Making it an “either or” trivia questions seems kind of small.


28 posted on 11/17/2012 1:06:08 PM PST by Owl558 ("Those who remember George Satayana are doomed to repeat him")
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To: Owl558
The War of Independence has been referred to as a Revolution. It was really a counter-revolution, in a sense. But the word "Revolution" does not appear in the Declaration of Independence. Blackwell's essential point, here, really discredits his knowledge of the subject, not Ron Paul's.

As a fellow Cincinnatian, I am embarrassed for Ken. He should stick to what he knows.

29 posted on 11/17/2012 1:32:44 PM PST by Ohioan
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To: joe fonebone

At Fort Sumter, S. Carolina, my great great grandfather, BECAUSE YA’LL WERE DOWN HEAH!!!!


30 posted on 11/17/2012 3:39:15 PM PST by Twinkie (Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.)
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To: all the best

Bfl


31 posted on 11/17/2012 11:53:17 PM PST by Reddy (B.O. stinks)
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To: rockrr

secede: To withdraw formally from membership in an organization, association, or alliance.


American Revolution declared independence from Great Britain. This is secession.


32 posted on 11/18/2012 7:46:17 AM PST by VitacoreVision
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To: VitacoreVision

The colonialists, having failed at achieving the recognition and representation they believed they were entitled to as true subjects, openly rebelled against the crown. This is rebellion, not secession.


33 posted on 11/18/2012 8:23:12 AM PST by rockrr (Everything is different now...)
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To: rockrr

The Declaration of Independence says differently.

“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, ...”

- Declaration of Independence


34 posted on 11/18/2012 8:40:51 AM PST by VitacoreVision
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To: VitacoreVision

That doesn’t change the fact that The American Revolution was an open and violent rebellion to the authority of the crown.


35 posted on 11/18/2012 8:46:53 AM PST by rockrr (Everything is different now...)
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To: Ohioan

“Secession was seen as an act based upon that sovereignty.”

I like your point about sovereignty.


36 posted on 11/18/2012 9:53:58 AM PST by Owl558 ("Those who remember George Satayana are doomed to repeat him")
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To: VitacoreVision

This Ken Blackwell is now on the pay-no-mind list with Mitch Daniels, anyone named Bush, anyone named Romney, Krispy Kreme, etc.


37 posted on 11/18/2012 11:27:47 AM PST by Kenneth J. Conner (Rezko for Radicals)
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To: rockrr
Your comment implies something that was not intended. They defined what they were doing in the Declaration as separating from another people. They certainly were not trying to overthrow the Monarchy, rather to separate from its realms. The War Effort was a defensive one, against an occupying Army.

The Declaration of Independence should be carefully studied, by the way. It is not at all what it has been misrepresented as by many on the Left, and even some in the center. (See Declaration Of Independence--With Study Guide.)

William Flax

38 posted on 11/19/2012 10:20:15 AM PST by Ohioan
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To: Ohioan
Your comment implies something that was not intended.

That may be your inference but that is not in what I said.

39 posted on 11/19/2012 10:47:26 AM PST by rockrr (Everything is different now...)
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