I have several cartoons showing that even the SOUTH rejected the Copperhead position.
Posted on 07/30/2013 7:15:08 AM PDT by NotYourAverageDhimmi
Conservatives are grabbing popcorn and lining up to catch a new historical drama with modern connections.
“Copperhead,” the new film from director Ron Maxwell, focuses on the Northern opponents of the American Civil War and stars Billy Campbell, Angus MacFadyen and Peter Fonda.
At least one conservative — Richard Viguerie, chairman of ConservativeHQ.com — emailed his audience to tell it about the movie “that every conservative needs to see.”
“[W]hile Copperhead is about the Civil War, believe me, it will hit close to home for every conservative fighting to preserve our Constitution and our American way of life,” Viguerie wrote. “Because Copperhead is about standing up for faith, for America, and for what’s right, just like you and I are doing today. In fact, I’ve never seen a movie with more references to the Constitution, or a movie that better sums up our current fight to stand up for American values and get our nation back on track.”
The movie, which is based on the novel by Harold Frederic, follows Abner Beech, a New York farmer who doesn’t consider himself a Yankee, and is against slavery and war in general.
Asked about whether he sees his film as conservative, Maxwell told POLITICO, “I think if ‘Copperhead’ has any relevance at all, in addition to illuminating a time and place from our common heritage, it’s as a cinematic meditation on the price of dissent. I’ve never thought of dissent as a political act belonging to the right or left. It’s an act of liberty, expression of the rights of a free person — free not just in law but free from the confines and pressures of the tyranny of the majority.”
Maxwell said while the concept of dissent is as “old as time,” in the U.S., “it’s protected in the Constitution.”
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...
I have several cartoons showing that even the SOUTH rejected the Copperhead position.
Starring Terry McAuliffe
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There were also abolitionists who opposed the Union's actions in the Civil War because they believed that to force the Confederates to stay part of the Union against their will was, in itself, a form of slavery.
Lysander Spooner was a prominent 19th Century abolitionist and author. Spooner articulated the above theory in No Treason, No. 1 . Here's the opening to that fine treatise...
SPOONER: The question of treason is distinct from that of slavery; and is the same that it would have been, if free States, instead of slave States, had seceded.
On the part of the North, the war was carried on, not to liberate slaves, but by a government that had always perverted and violated the Constitution, to keep the slaves in bondage; and was still willing to do so, if the slaveholders could be thereby induced to stay in the Union.
The principle, on which the war was waged by the North, was simply this: That men may rightfully be compelled to submit to, and support, a government that they do not want; and that resistance, on their part, makes them traitors and criminals.
No principle, that is possible to be named, can be more self-evidently false than this; or more self-evidently fatal to all political freedom. Yet it triumphed in the field, and is now assumed to be established. If it really be established, the number of slaves, instead of having been diminished by the war, has been greatly increased; for a man, thus subjected to a government that he does not want, is a slave. And there is no difference, in principle --- but only in degree --- between political and chattel slavery. The former, no less than the latter, denies a man's ownership of himself and the products of his labor; and [*iv] asserts that other men may own him, and dispose of him and his property, for their uses, and at their pleasure.
Previous to the war, there were some grounds for saying that --- in theory, at least, if not in practice --- our government was a free one; that it rested on consent. But nothing of that kind can be said now, if the principle on which the war was carried on by the North, is irrevocably established. If that principle be not the principle of the Constitution, the fact should be known. If it be the principle of the Constitution, the Constitution itself should be at once overthrown.
Doubtful, although some may have opposed it because they were opposed to war under any circumstance.
In any case, they were wrong, weren't they? If not for the war, slavery would have dragged on for probably at least some decades.
The War ended it 99% in less than 4 years, and 100% in less than 5.
Sophism. Sometimes degree is very important. As LS would no doubt agree if compelled to live a year as a chattel.
The problem with his basic argument is that it is saying that if person A believes his best use of his freedom is to totally take away person B's freedom by enslaving him, person C has no right to intervene.
It also ignores that in two of the seceding states, slaves were an absolute majority of the population, and in others close to a majority.
“Only interested if the South gets to win this time...”
if the “fireworks” breaks out say today, the South will win hands down
I recently read “Rebellion in Bradley County” by J.S> Hurlbut. It chronicles the infliction of the rebellion upon the residents of eastern Tennessee. I’d watch a movie adaptation of that book before wasting any time of the copperhead foolishness.
Our Constitution was formed by "We, the people of the United States" and created a Union between all Americans. The secessionists wanted to deprive Americans living in the South of their rights under the Constitution. The American people were required to utilize military force to protect the constitutional rights of Americans living in the southern states.
It is no doubt true such men existed, but this is about as representative of the generality of Copperheads as a movie about a Vietnam War opponent in the 60s who was strongly anti-Communist. They also probably existed, but they were certainly not representative.
“One shall love life while the other shall despise life and seek to kill the life of each of us ... Bet all know which is which ...”
that’s why the other side has to ‘go’. i;ve said time and time again that we CANNOT co-exist with libs.
Excellent points. It would have been interesting to see how Spooner would have responded.
...and if they are not Democrat and slavers.
“Doubtful, although some may have opposed it because they were opposed to war under any circumstance.
In any case, they were wrong, weren’t they? If not for the war, slavery would have dragged on for probably at least some decades.”
I don’t recall anyone in the North claiming to be waging war with the South to end slavery. That’s a modern interpretation.
Yep.
Spooner also published manifestos (after the War) that the Constitution was only binding on those who actually signed it. All of whom were of course long-dead by then.
He had earlier supported guerilla warfare by southern slaves, and an attempt to forcibly rescue John Brown after his failed insurrection.
He was certainly not against violence, as such, just against violence for what he viewed as insufficiently pure motives.
“if the “fireworks” breaks out say today, the South will win hands down”
Yep. The North no longer has the manufacturing base it once had, nor the food production, nor the skilled workers. Even much of the port trade is now in the South and West, not to mention the vast majority of fuel is produced in the South and piped to the North.
It would be very easy to choke off the North.
In 1861 it was a (small) minority position. By early 1863 it was explicit government policy (implicit well before then).
So by 1863 just about all proponents of the war in the North claimed to be waging war with the South to end slavery.
And the northern opponents of the war, the Copperheads, which this movie is supposedly about, opposed the war very largely because they believed it to be about ending slavery. In fact, most of them only became opponents when the ending of slavery became an explicit war aim.
Yeppers, and many of them were lynched, shot, etc. before the war.
No, it wasn’t worth it. Too bad the fire-eaters insisted on war rather than being willing to consider any limitations on the spread of slavery.
In the western world, only in the USA did slaveowners insist on war rather than accepting the inevitable end of their peculiar institution.
One Tennessee County does not a Confederacy make Johnny One Note.
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