Posted on 02/25/2004 11:52:26 AM PST by 4CJ
THOMASVILLE -- Nelson Winbush knows his voice isn't likely to be heard above the crowd that writes American history books. That doesn't keep him from speaking his mind, however.
A 75-year-old black man whose grandfather proudly fought in the gray uniform of the South during the Civil War, Winbush addressed a group of about 40 at the Thomas County Museum of History Sunday afternoon. To say the least, his perspective of the war differs greatly from what is taught in America's classrooms today.
"People have manufactured a lot of mistruths about why the war took place," he said. "It wasn't about slavery. It was about state's rights and tariffs."
Many of Winbush's words were reserved for the Confederate battle flag, which still swirls amid controversy more than 150 years after it originally flew.
"This flag has been lied about more than any flag in the world," Winbush said. "People see it and they don't really know what the hell they are looking at."
About midway through his 90-minute presentation, Winbush's comments were issued with extra force.
"This flag is the one that draped my grandfathers' coffin," he said while clutching it strongly in his left hand. "I would shudder to think what would happen if somebody tried to do something to this particular flag."
Winbush, a retired in educator and Korean War veteran who resides in Kissimmee, Fla., said the Confederate battle flag has been hijacked by racist groups, prompting unwarranted criticism from its detractors.
"This flag had nothing to with the (Ku Klux) klan or skinheads," he said while wearing a necktie that featured the Confederate emblem. "They weren't even heard of then. It was just a guide to follow in battle.
"That's all it ever was."
Winbush said Confederate soldiers started using the flag with the St. Andrews cross because its original flag closely resembled the U.S. flag. The first Confederate flag's blue patch in an upper corner and its alternating red and white stripes caused confusion on the battlefield, he said.
"Neither side (of the debate) knows what the flag represents," Winbush said. "It's dumb and dumber. You can turn it around, but it's still two dumb bunches.
"If you learn anything else today, don't be dumb."
Winbush learned about the Civil War at the knee of Louis Napoleon Nelson, who joined his master and one of his master's sons in battle voluntarily when he was 14. Nelson saw combat at Lookout Mountain, Bryson's Crossroads, Shiloh and Vicksburg.
"At Shiloh, my grandfather served as a chaplain even though he couldn't read or write," said Winbush, who bolstered his points with photos, letters and newspapers that used to belong to his grandfather. "I've never heard of a black Yankee holding such an office, so that makes him a little different."
Winbush said his grandfather, who also served as a "scavenger," never had any qualms about fighting for the South. He had plenty of chances to make a break for freedom, but never did. He attended 39 Confederate reunions, the final one in 1934. A Sons of Confederate Veterans Chapter in Tennessee is named after him.
"People ask why a black person would fight for the Confederacy. (It was) for the same damned reason a white Southerner did," Winbush explained.
Winbush said Southern blacks and whites often lived together as extended families., adding slaves and slave owners were outraged when Union forces raided their homes. He said history books rarely make mention of this.
"When the master and his older sons went to war, who did he leave his families with?" asked Winbush, who grandfather remained with his former owners 12 years after the hostilities ended. "It was with the slaves. Were his (family members) mistreated? Hell, no!
"They were protected."
Winbush said more than 90,000 blacks, some of them free, fought for the Confederacy. He has said in the past that he would have fought by his grandfather's side in the 7th Tennessee Cavalry led by Gen. Nathan Bedford Forest.
After his presentation, Winbush opened the floor for questions. Two black women, including Jule Anderson of the Thomas County Historical Society Board of Directors, told him the Confederate battle flag made them uncomfortable.
Winbush, who said he started speaking out about the Civil War in 1992 after growing weary of what he dubbed "political correctness," was also challenged about his opinions.
"I have difficulty in trying to apply today's standards with what happened 150 years ago," he said to Anderson's tearful comments. "...That's what a lot of people are attempting to do. I'm just presenting facts, not as I read from some book where somebody thought that they understood. This came straight from the horse's mouth, and I refute anybody to deny that."
Thomas County Historical Society Board member and SVC member Chip Bragg moved in to close the session after it took a political turn when a white audience member voiced disapproval of the use of Confederate symbols on the state flag. Georgia voters are set to go to the polls a week from today to pick a flag to replace the 1956 version, which featured the St. Andrew's cross prominently.
"Those of us who are serious about our Confederate heritage are very unhappy with the trivialization of Confederate symbols and their misuse," he said. "Part of what we are trying to do is correct this misunderstanding."
For the secessions, that's what it was considered. They saw their secession as legit and when they made deals to join, there was a breakage of Article I also.
'Once it was clear that a secession convention of some sort would meet, [Texas Governor] Houston convened the legislature in mid-January with the hope that it would declare the convention illegal. Instead, legislators validated the calling of a convention, turned over the House chambers to the convention, and adjourned.'All prefectly constitutional. The Texas Chief Justice, Oran Roberts, presided over the convention. The delegates to the convention were not the Texas legislators, they were men elected by the people as delegates. If a "coup d'etat" occurred, why was such never reported, and why did the people overwhelmingly approve of the convention's actions?
You wanted proof of a state petitioning Congress before allowing their people to act and I gave it to you.
...also provide examples of a coup in which a the actions taken were subjected to a popular vote by the entire electorate as was done in Texas?
Saddam Hussein got 100% of the vote. That doesn't mean Saddam was a legitimate leader. The convention-holders grabbed power also.
The voting results of your analogous cases would also be nice, if it is not too much trouble. I wonder if most sovereign people acting in their capacity as citizens of a state in participating in a vote approved their coup by as wide a margin as did the people of Texas.
You can't beat 100% as in Iraq. That doesn't make Saddam's rule right and it doesn't make those who grabbed power at that convention right. It's what Article IV is for, to prevent these Saddam Hussein incidents in our own land.
The Governer himself said it was illegal! Dissenters were browbeaten and discouraged from participating! You think that's a way to pass laws? And again Saddam got 100% of the vote so the popularity of thugs makes no difference. We are a nation of laws and due process, not a nation of bullies who got their hands on a gavel. It's what Article IV protects us from, states acting without following process or at least allowing a fair hearing from dissenters.
The Governer is NOT the Texas Supreme Court. FWIW, several of the members of the Texas secession convention were justices of that court.
Dissenters were browbeaten and discouraged from participating!
But preventing Southern whites from voting (Reconstruction), or preventing Democrats (Yankee elections 1864) from voting was ok?
You think that's a way to pass laws?
Not passing a law here. It was a call for elections per the Texas Constitution.
We are a nation of laws and due process, not a nation of bullies who got their hands on a gavel.
BINGO! That's why the Governor could not impede the will of the people. He's not a dictator.
It's what Article IV protects us from, states acting without following process or at least allowing a fair hearing from dissenters.
Huh???? Where in Article IV does it stae that the federal government proscribes the legislative process of the several states? Dissidents are heard through the election process.
I just wished to document that your search criteria had nothing to do with the U.S. Constitution, or Article 4, Section 1 thereof; nor anything to do with the full faith and credit clause; nor anything to do with proving a state Act.
Just because your search criteria was irrelevant to our discussion does not mean the effort was useless. If the subject of a state petitioning Congress for relief from the restrictions of the Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act does come up, you have a head start on that conversation.
If unionist officials in any county had fraudulently transposed the voting results, the pattern of aberrant support against secession would resemble that of Uvalde County in that the amount of inflated unionist strength would exactly match the extent of discounted secessionist ballots.Throughout Texas the number of Breckinridge voters who subsequently cast ballots against secession was insignificant. However, if all Uvalde County voters who participated in the 1860 election returned to the polls three months later to vote in the secession referendum, then over half of them would have had to "switch" from the Southern Rights Democracy to the unionist camp to achieve the overwhelming anti-secessionist vote registered in their county.
Dale Baum, The Shattering of Texas Unionism: Politics in the Lone Star State During the Civil War Era, Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press (1998), p. 63
If you say so.
SOURCE:
[1] Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary
COUP. a brilliant, sudden, and usu. highly successful stroke or act.
[2] Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary
COUP. a brilliant, sudden, and usually highly successful stroke or act.
[3] Oxford Dictionary of Current English
COUP. successful stroke or move.
We the People (white, male, Protestant, mostly motivated by their pocketbooks) met to end the form of government established by the Revolutionary War heroes, the first Founders of the United States, a government without taxes, the one established by the "traitorous" Founding Fathers, or so those at the Constitutional Convention said.
Of course who met to draft the Constitution were traitors, going beyond their assigned proper delegated power to meet "for the sole and express purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation".
There were 13 separate sovereign nations, nine of whom had their own navies, and seven of whom printed their own money, not interchangeable with the other nations of the United States. They fought small battles against each other, such as Pennsylvanians trying to keep out settlers from Connecticut, their armies meeting near Wilkes-Barre. New Jersey was bankrupt and talking about merger with New York or Pennsylvania.
The ordinary people were quite happy with the government. They had full liberty. But the "better sort" thought the weak central government was too "embarrassing" and too near anarchy. They wanted a strong central government to match those in Europe. There were rebellions in the States, people taking up pitchforks against foreclosures and jail sentences. Merchants were terrified and wealthy landowners and bankers demanded a strong government to impose strict law and order.
Rhode Island refused to participate in the Convention, quite happy and pleased with things they way they were. But Connecticut and Massachusetts wanted Rhode Island abolished and its territory divided among them.
55 eventually showed up but average daily attendance was less than thirty. Thirteen quit, nine for personal reasons, and four in opposition to the proposed new setup. Luther Martin returned to Maryland to fight ratification of the "conspiracy" for "total abolition and destruction of all state governments".
Patrick Henry refused to be a delegate and said he "smelt a rat" and that his "disgust exceeded all measure". Adams and Jefferson were in Europe. Sam Adams and Paul Revere and Governor John Hancock were denied delegate status. John Jay said he was too busy, and Aaron Burr wasn't interested.
No women, no blacks, no Indians, but the Confederation of the United States had just offered the Cherokee Nation Statehood. Ben Franklin was 81, fat, and so ill with gout that he was carried by four convicts in a sedan chair around town.
James Madison said he wanted "a strong consolidated Union in which the idea of states should be nearly annihilated". Patrick Henry said this was the rat he smelt.
The Constitutional Convention met in secret, since after all, they were plotting treason. "Sentries are planted without and within--to prevent any person from approaching near..." The proceedings of the Convention were sealed for fifty years, not released until 1836 after the death of Madison, in his will, and after all the other delegates to the Convention were dead. For the first five years of the new Constitutional United States, the Senate met behind locked doors in secret session, so the public would learn nothing about their deliberations. Not until 1873 were the proceedings of both houses made available to the public.
George Washington spoke to the Convention only once, on its last day, to ask for more members in the House.
James Madison warned that the numerous poor rather than the few rich would someday gain the power. Many of his 150 speeches vigorously opposed the idea of equality. At the last minute, property ownership was removed as a condition for holding federal office ("veneration of wealth" it said was required). Madison said "it was an indecent thing and might, in time, prove dangerous... to let Congress set its own wages".
The Convention voted down a National University, "in which no preferences or distinctions should be allowed on account of religion".
George Mason, who wrote Virginia's Bill of Rights, said he would "sooner chop off his right hand than put it to the Constitution". Two others agreed with him and walked out, refusing to sign it.
The sole reason income tax was kept out of the Constitution is because the South feared slaves might be taxed as "three-fifths" of a person.
Until the last month, delegates favored one seven- year term for the president, and until the last month most favored a three-person co-equal presidency. "A single executive is the fetus of a monarchy" said Governor Edmund Randolph of Virginia.
The office of Vice President was not discussed until the last week of the Convention. Only four States had a vice president or lieutenant governor, and the office was almost unknown and considered unnecessary.
The proposal for a presidential cabinet, or "privy council" which eight States had, was never voted upon.
The Supreme Court is a "continuing Constitutional Convention" the Founders said. (The Court hears less than 200 of the more than 5,000 requests each year.)
Barely more than 50% of the delegates signed the Constitution. In the last week, the delegates rejected pleas by Gerry and Mason for a Bill of Rights.
Quartering and burning at the stake were legal punishments at the time of ratification. Only one State, Quaker Pennsylvania, had prisons, believing that prison would reform criminals.
Not a single delegate anticipated political parties.
In 1860, President James Buchanan wrote "there is nothing in the Constitution to prohibit secession. I will be the last President."
Days before his death, Lincoln signed the proposed 13th Amendment that would have prohibited Congressional interference with slavery. It would have ended slavery gradually over a fifty-year period, in 1915, with the federal government paying full compensation to slave owners. President Buchanan earlier endorsed it and two States had already ratified it.
The 21st Amendment is the only one ratified by State Conventions rather than State legislatures.
Some real history rather than the "patriotic" myths so prevalent on the Internet.
As were the justices that gave Lautenburg his seat. If I'm another state, I'm not satisfied with their proof. Thugs driving out dissent isn't my idea of good government.
But preventing Southern whites from voting (Reconstruction), or preventing Democrats (Yankee elections 1864) from voting was ok?
Once rebellion was the order of the day, it's up to the Congress to impeach if they think unnecessary steps are taken.
Not passing a law here. It was a call for elections per the Texas Constitution.
Elections where some were threatened not to participate. Not good enough proof for me.
BINGO! That's why the Governor could not impede the will of the people. He's not a dictator.
The people didn't elect, thugs appointed.
Huh???? Where in Article IV does it stae that the federal government proscribes the legislative process of the several states? Dissidents are heard through the election process.
States must allow Congress to guide how a state proves it's acts. If I'm another state, thuggery doesn't make the grade.
They were certainly coerced not to participate.
Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution 3:§§ 1298--1307
§ 1302. The clause of the constitution propounds three distinct objects; first, to declare, that full faith and credit shall be given to the records, &c. of every other state; secondly, to prescribe the manner of authenticating them; and thirdly, to prescribe their effect, when so authenticated. The first is declared, and established by the constitution itself, and is to receive no aid, nor is it susceptible of any qualification by congress. The other two are expressly subjected to the legislative power.
§ 1305. The next section of the clause is, "And the congress may by general laws prescribe the manner, in which such acts, records, and proceedings shall be proved, -- and the effect thereof." It is obvious, that this clause, so far as it authorizes congress to prescribe the mode of authentication, is wholly beside the purpose of the preceding. Whatever may be the faith and credit due to the public acts, records, and proceedings of other states, whether primâ facie evidence only, or conclusive evidence; still the mode of establishing them in proof is of very great importance, and upon which a diversity of rules exists in different countries. The object of the present provision is to introduce uniformity in the rules of proof, (which could alone be done by congress.) It is certainly a great improvement upon the parallel article of the confederation. That left it wholly to the states themselves to require any proof of public acts, records, and proceedings, which they might from time to time deem advisable; and where no rule was prescribed, the subject was open to the decision of the judicial tribunals, according to their own views of the local usage and jurisprudence. Many embarrassments must necessarily have grown out of such a state of things. The provision, therefore, comes recommended by every consideration of wisdom and convenience, of public peace, and private security.
§ 1307. ... The act of 26th of May, 1790, (ch. 11,) after providing for the mode of authenticating the acts, records, and judicial proceedings of the states, has declared, "and the said records and judicial proceedings, authenticated as aforesaid, shall have such faith and credit given to them in every court within the United States, as they have by law or usage in the courts of the state, from whence the said records are or shall be taken." It has been settled upon solemn argument, that this enactment does declare the effect of the records, as evidence, when duly authenticated. It gives them the same faith and credit, as they have in the state court, from which they are taken. If in such court they have the faith and credit of the highest nature, that is to say, of record evidence, they must have the same faith and credit in every other court. So, that congress have declared the effect of the records, by declaring, what degree of faith and credit shall be given to them. If a judgment is conclusive in the state, where it is pronounced, it is equally conclusive every where. If re-examinable there, it is open to the same inquiries in every other state. It is, therefore, put upon the same footing, as a domestic judgment.
So says you. I say it does. Gianni asked for an example where a state petitioned the legislatue. "state petition congress" was as a direct a search as you can get with "illinois petition congress" not far behind. Simple. 2 minutes.
Just because your search criteria was irrelevant to our discussion does not mean the effort was useless.
Not irrevelant at all. It's exactly what Gianni asked for. Go and look at what he asked, word for word.
If the subject of a state petitioning Congress for relief from the restrictions of the Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act does come up, you have a head start on that conversation.
Illinois could ignore Article IV and Article I like the southern states did but apparently we try to stay true to our word more. Indiana, Missouri and Kentucky would be pretty mad if we acted without their sayso. That's what Article IV is about.
All the more reason for the seceding states to follow Article IV.
No. STATE elections are matters for the STATE to handle. Nothing in Article IV delegates power to the federal government to interfere with state elections.
Proving a Public Act consists of affixing the Official State Seal per 1 Stat. 122 1790 .
As for elections involving vote suppression, you must invalidate the 1864 election of The Lincoln.
On Nov. 7th, the day before the election, after Butler had placed his troops and made all arrangement necessary to control the ballot, he wrote to Secretary of War Stanton a letter in which he said:
"I beg leave to report that the troops have all arrived, and dispositions made which will insure quiet. I enclose copy of my order No. 1, and trust it will meet your approbation. I have done all I could to prevent secessionists [Democrats] from voting, and think it will have some effect."
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