Posted on 08/21/2017 4:46:48 PM PDT by euram
Lincoln fought the war to preserve the Union.
The South started the war because of the Ruling Classes fear of emancipation of the slaves.
Too bad the feds just didn’t purchase and manumit the slaves. It would have been far less costly. And impossible to take such a step.
Either you have a constitution or you don’t Lincoln showed that we do.
You really must show me your copy of this document. I can't find the words slavery or slave anywhere in it.
I now regret breaking my normal policy on engaging on this issue. Some people just don't want to see what is staring them in the face. I had the experience once of having a gentlemen argue that the Late Unpleasantness was not about slavery--by citing the part of the original Constitution enshrining slavery. (FACEPALM!!!) Now you are citing non-existent content in the Declaration of Independence.
“You really must show me your copy of this document. I can’t find the words slavery or slave anywhere in it.”
See: “He has excited domestic Insurrections amongst us . . .”
“Lincoln fought the war to preserve the Union.”
If that is true, then we can dismiss the claims of some that the North fought the war for some high moral purpose like “freeing the slaves.”
Saving the union was a “high moral purpose” for 19th century Americans.
Either you have a natural law right to independence or you don't. Jefferson and Washington showed that we once did.
Are you arguing that the country was founded to help preserve slavery? That sounds like the argument that someone would deploy to justify tearing down statues of Jefferson and Washington. And if the Royal Governor of Virginia didn't arm slaves, would you be of the opinion that the Declaration of Independence would never have been written?
Of course, the British Empire didn't outlaw slavery for several decades after American independence. So, were the British planning to abolish slavery in America before the Battle of Lexington? Or were British officials merely engaging in expediency much as Lincoln would do several decades later? After all, the British government did employ foreign mercenaries to suppress the rebellion.
And then there is this bit from Wikipedia on the subject (original sources footnoted there):
As a response to the fear that armed blacks might pose, in December 1775, Washington wrote a letter to Colonel Henry Lee III stating that success in the war would come to whatever side could arm the blacks the fastest.[16] Washington issued orders to the recruiters to reenlist the free blacks who had already served in the army; he worried that some of these soldiers might cross over to the British side.
Ironically, Colonel Lee is of course the father of Marse Robert--the Confederacy's most famed general. But it can be seen that Patriot leaders recognized that they needed to recruit black manpower--which gets us back to Robert E. Lee and another case of irony. In the waning days of the American Civil War, Lee successfully got the CSA government to allow the recruitment of slaves, a proposal that earlier stunted the career of Patrick Cleburne.
Unshackled from the liberal North and CA(basically idiots like you) the Red states would be free to do that very thing.
You are correct (of course). There are a few contrarians that look at a tail and call it a leg but they are (literally!) an aberration.
There you go with your logical fallacies...again.
Pointing out the economic reasons for the War of Northern Aggression will quickly get you branded a rayciss, FRiend.
If your facts are hateful, they’re hate facts!
What I pointed out was that one of the justifications of the signers of the DOI for dissolving the Political Bands with England was the King was exciting slave rebellions. And the colonists - North and South - did not like slave rebellions.
Some years later, the states of New York, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Delaware, and Maryland voted to enshrine slavery into the Constitution. As mentioned, Virginia, North and South Carolina, and Georgia also supported slavery.
Another thing - and you correct me if I'm wrong - the founders did not intend for the phrase “all Men are created equal” to make citizens, voters, or jurors of native Americans. Native Americans were referred to in the DOI as “merciless Indian Savages . . .”
In case there is any doubt - no, I don't think the monuments to great Southerners George Washington (Father of the Country); James Madison (Father of the Constitution); George Mason (Father of the Bill of Rights); Thomas Jefferson (author Declaration of Independence); Patrick Henry (Give Me Liberty . . .) should be torn down.
What we should do is to enforce the Constitution as it is written, and to amend the constitution whenever necessary using Article V.
The Constitution formed an indissoluble Union. There was no “right” to illegally violate that Union. Madison put an end to the “conditional ratification” idea in his letter to Hamilton during the NY ratification convention, understanding that treacherous factions would attempt its unraveling.
This was also the principal subject of Washington’s Farewell address addressing the danger of designing men pursuing secession.
Any legal means of leaving would require Congressional action not insurrection or a most probably a constitutional amendment.
There was no eminent “tyranny” facing the Slavers, that is just a Big Lie. Nor is there a Natural Right to overthrow a government without tyranny or oppression. Not because you are worried about your future slave holdings. That is insufficient cause.
There is NO Natural Right to hold slaves.
That is exactly right. The Emancipation Proclamation did not free slaves in Union states.
While it does reflect Lincoln’s humanity and hatred of slavery it was a military expediency intended to hurt the South’s war-making ability and it did.
History is a story of unintended consequences and plans being changed because of developments.
“Lee successfully got the CSA government to allow the recruitment of slaves, a proposal that earlier stunted the career of Patrick Cleburne.”
There is no evidence of this.
You would be wrong, racist or not.
There was no enshrinement of slavery in the constitution it merely stipulated that there could be no Congressional action regarding slavery for 20 yrs after Ratification. They knew that it would eventually be gotten rid of and most of the slave-holding founders recognized it as an evil for the slaveholders and slaves both.
It was a burden to Jefferson and likely the other Founders who felt responsible for the slaves’ welfare.
More indissoluble than the United Kingdom which existed for over a 1,000 years? How can it be more indissoluble than that?
On what basis do you assert that the much older Union could be broken, but this relatively young one with a founding document that explicitly states it is the right of all people to have independence, cannot?
An independent observer at the London Spectator said much the same as you about Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation:
“The Government liberates the enemy’s slaves as it would the enemy’s cattle, simply to weaken them in the coming conflict . . . the principle asserted is not that a human being cannot justly own another, but that he cannot own him unless he is loyal to the United States.”
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