Posted on 03/10/2010 6:35:02 PM PST by Idabilly
Over the course of American history, there has been no greater conflict of visions than that between Thomas Jefferson’s voluntary republic, founded on the natural right of peaceful secession, and Abraham Lincoln’s permanent empire, founded on the violent denial of that same right.
That these two men somehow shared a common commitment to liberty is a lie so monstrous and so absurd that its pervasiveness in popular culture utterly defies logic.
After all, Jefferson stated unequivocally in the Declaration of Independence that, at any point, it may become necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them…
And, having done so, he said, it is the people’s right to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Contrast that clear articulation of natural law with Abraham Lincoln’s first inaugural address, where he flatly rejected the notion that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed.
Instead, Lincoln claimed that, despite the clear wording of the Tenth Amendment, no State upon its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the Union; [and] resolves and ordinances [such as the Declaration of Independence] to that effect are legally void…
King George III agreed.
(Excerpt) Read more at southernheritage411.com ...
>To 104 - Yes, I am aware of that. I was asking you to elaborate on how Jefferson was elected ‘due to the efforts of Hamilton’.
By his efforts on the Representatives in the House while they were voting... it is conceivable that they would have elected Burr had he not. ...perhaps I should have prefaces “due to the efforts” with ‘partially.’
> Corrupt aristocracy? I’ll let you defend that one — you and Alexander Hamilton, who threw a woman’s honor and good name under the bus to protect his own reputation from charges of defalcation.
>
>Correction, he took her honor when he bedded her. He threw her name out on the curb, to be run over by a bus, when the political fur began to fly.
Hm, I hadn’t heard that before. Who was the woman?
I'll have to go back to the Jefferson bios and re-read that episode.
Thank you, OWS.
>They were so corrupt, they jury rigged congress to count their slaves as 3/5ths of a person to gain representation in Congress to which they were not entitled.
If they were that corrupt then they would have made the number 0; that it was less than 1 meant that the Union would HAVE to take up the issue at some point in the future. Remember that the primary author of the Constitution refused to sign it because they didn’t outright abolish slavery; that they didn’t outright abolish slavery was only because of politics. (Kind of like the reverse of Catholics and the health-care-reform bill; congress/Obama could garner a LOT more support [from the Catholics] if they were to drop abortion-funding wholly from the bill — in fact, it can be argued that the VERY reason this bill will fail is because it’s an “my or not at all” approach that is being pushed.)
They had to take it up because the number was over 0. That was the corruption. Jefferson's aristocracy got 3/5ths more representation in Congress for every slave it held. Jefferson and his fellow slave owners did what ACORN does today--rig Congress in favor of Democrats (Jefferson ran from the label "democrat". Being called that was almost as bad as being called a "Jacobin". Jefferson insisted he held republican values. But soon his faction called itself "Republican-Democrat" and then, once they had grabbed power, "Democrat").
Pick a better statesman, Ida. Jefferson changed his mind about so many things that "serious students of history" can certainly wonder about what view he would have taken. Politicians are like that, and Jefferson in office certainly was a politician.
Jefferson didn't believe the federal government had the right to purchase the lands west of the Mississippi from France, but when it looked like the opportunity would pass he changed his mind. Here's one writer's view of the embargo crisis:
How long could the end of peaceable coercion abroad be supported in the face of economic deprivation, loss of liberty, disobedience to law, division of the Union, and Republican collapse at home? Despite rising opposition, Jefferson stood firmly by the policy. Perhaps he recalled his experience in another crisis, when he, as Virginia's governor, was accused of jeopardizing the safety of the commonwealth by feeble and temporizing measures. To Gallatin, who complained that the embargo could be saved only by new and arbitrary enforcement powers, Jefferson replied, "Congress should legalize all means which may be necessary to obtain its end ," not excluding military force.
That's just one person's view of course. But to say that it's a given that Jefferson would have sat back and done nothing in a secession crisis is to make a questionable assumption.
Fair enough. I'll put you down as picking Lincoln, overseer of the giant slave plantation known as the United States of America. After all, after the Emancipation Proclamation the only blacks left in slavery where in the territories controlled by Lincoln's armies.
As did Lincoln:
“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. This is a most valuable and most sacred right - a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world. 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 many of the territory as they inhabit.”
Abraham Lincoln
Thomas Jefferson, while in office, contradicts the pandering political Abe Lincoln.
“The future inhabitants of the Atlantic & Missipi States will be our sons. We leave them in distinct but bordering establishments. We think we see their happiness in their union, & we wish it. Events may prove it otherwise; and if they see their interest in separation, why should we take side with our Atlantic rather than our Missipi descendants? It is the elder and the younger son differing. God bless them both, & keep them in union, if it be for their good, but separate them, if it be better.”
http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/P/tj3/writings/brf/jefl159.htm
“Fair enough. I’ll put you down as picking Lincoln, overseer of the giant slave plantation known as the United States of America”
Amen!
They closed down the Southern plantation and replaced it with the Federal Plantation.
Our Government is no longer in TRUST but a Right
I guess I’m just a damn Yankee. I don’t really get why some people want to keep fighting the civil war on behalf of the Confederacy.
Whether they had a right to succeed or not they sure did it for a bad reason.
There are some things Lincoln did I don’t agree with but politically speaking Lincoln, Davis and everyone from 1861 would be disgusted with what we have now.
“Whether they had a right to succeed or not”
You’re quite welcome.
Doh!
Except that the Supreme Court, in the Dred Scott decision, essentially said that that part of the Northwest Ordinance was completely without force, because as soon as the Constitution was adopted, it trumped anything in the Ordinance. That was one of the reasons the north was outraged by Dred Scott--it looked like the court was laying groundwork for forbidding the outlawing of slavery anywhere in the United States. Some southern newspapers were crowing that they'd be running slave auctions in Boston Commons before long.
Lincoln had faults, but his vision of the declaration was every bit as perfect as Jefferson's and his actions no more, or less, defensible.
Good take. Neither was perfect. Both loved the country. But in a crisis, I’d take Lincoln any day.
A state has a right to secede for any reason (your agreement means nothing). To think otherwise makes you a tyrant or a Yankee.(redundant) As far as you being a Yankee, hopeless.
Do you think secession was the right thing for them to do?
Now your question. Is secession right?
It was right then and it would be right now. Let socialists carve off a piece of the USA and create a socialist "utopia", don't let us down here hold them back. Just let the South go in peace. This county is too divided. We (individualists) can't live with those people (socialists). We need real solutions, not just listening to Rush and Hannity. That isn't getting us ANYWHERE.
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.