Posted on 01/20/2016 5:03:47 AM PST by Kaslin
Last July, Anthony Hervey, an outspoken black advocate for the Confederate flag, was killed in a car crash. Arlene Barnum, a surviving passenger in the vehicle, told authorities and the media that they had been forced off the road by a carload of "angry young black men" after Hervey, while wearing his Confederate kepi, stopped at a convenience store en route to his home in Oxford, Mississippi. His death was in no small part caused by the gross level of ignorance, organized deceit and anger about the War of 1861. Much of the ignorance stems from the fact that most Americans believe the war was initiated to free slaves, when in truth, freeing slaves was little more than an afterthought. I want to lay out a few quotations and ask what you make of them.
During the "Civil War," ex-slave Frederick Douglass observed, "There are at the present moment many colored men in the Confederate army doing duty not only as cooks, servants and laborers, but as real soldiers, having muskets on their shoulders, and bullets in their pockets, ready to shoot down loyal troops, and do all that soldiers may to destroy the Federal Government and build up that of the traitors and rebels" (Douglass' Monthly, September 1861).
"For more than two years, negroes had been extensively employed in belligerent operations by the Confederacy. They had been embodied and drilled as Rebel soldiers, and had paraded with White troops at a time when this would not have been tolerated in the armies of the Union." (Horace Greeley, in his book, "The American Conflict").
"Over 3,000 negroes must be included in this number (of Confederate troops). These were clad in all kinds of uniforms, not only in cast-off or captured United States uniforms, but in coats with Southern buttons, State buttons, etc. These were shabby, but not shabbier or seedier than those worn by white men in rebel ranks. Most of the negroes had arms, rifles, muskets, sabres, bowie-knives, dirks, etc. They were supplied, in many instances, with knapsacks, haversacks, canteens, etc., and were manifestly an integral portion of the Southern Confederacy Army. They were seen riding on horses and mules, driving wagons, riding on caissons, in ambulances, with the staff of Generals, and promiscuously mixed up with all the rebel horde" (report by Dr. Lewis H. Steiner, chief inspector of the U.S. Sanitary Commission).
In April 1861, a Petersburg, Virginia, newspaper proposed "three cheers for the patriotic free Negroes of Lynchburg" after 70 blacks offered "to act in whatever capacity" had been "assigned to them" in defense of Virginia.
Those are but a few examples of the important role that blacks served as soldiers, freemen and slaves on the side of the Confederacy. The flap over the Confederate flag is not quite so simple as the nation's race "experts" make it. They want us to believe the flag is a symbol of racism. Yes, racists have used the Confederate flag as their symbol, but racists have also marched behind the U.S. flag and have used the Bible. Would anyone suggest banning the U.S. flag from state buildings and references to the Bible?
Black civil rights activists, their white liberal supporters and historically ignorant Americans who attack the Confederate flag have committed a deep, despicable dishonor to our patriotic Southern black ancestors who marched, fought and died not to protect slavery but to protect their homeland from Northern aggression. They don't deserve the dishonor. Dr. Leonard Haynes, a black professor at Southern University, stated, "When you eliminate the black Confederate soldier, you've eliminated the history of the South."
It's just as likely that the Confederate States would have thrown in Early with England in Fighting World War I, (Because England Recognized them and helped them win Independence.) and as a result, Germany would have been defeated quickly. They wouldn't have had time to send Lenin to Russia, and that would have wiped out the Communist menace before it started.
So since we are predicting fantasy histories, I will argue that the Confederate Defeat in the Civil War caused over 100 million dead in the 20th century.
You mean like all the problems and wars we've had with Canada for the last 100 years?
I would just like to add to your post that Alexander Stephens was at the Hampton Roads meeting with Lincoln. Alexander Stephens was also arrested for treason and imprisoned after the unconditional surrender. He spent five months in a prison cell in Boston Harbor. Never convicted.
I guess it has been a while since you have read President Lincoln's First Innaugural Address. He uses the analogy of a divorcing couple to the "separating" of the Union. But he takes it much further than you and makes a much better opposing argument out it.
CBW: You mean like all the problems and wars we've had with Canada for the last 100 years?
No, I mean, "think it through". Would you like to try again, Sidewinder? Would you like to think about it a little longer Mr Potshot Bushwacker? I know that you are trying to behave yourself and are trying very hard to come off now as a rational thinker, but don't you think it's a little too late for that (based on your record in this thread?) I think you have, by now, revealed your capacity for "thinking something through".
Anybody else think it through? I'm done with Buckaroo Hipshot.
Of course, you are totally free to leave the United States, any day, any hour, for any reason, real or imaginary, or for no real reason at all, it's 100% your right to separate at pleasure.
But the US Constitution is, in effect, a contract voluntarily entered by "we the people", a contract which can only lawfully be broken under two conditions:
Unilateral declarations of secession, "at pleasure" were not intended, and are not authorized by our Founders.
Well, remember, all those who served the Union were promised their freedom in return, and it seems to me, iirc, also those very few at the war's end who were finally enlisted in the Confederate Army.
Indeed, I'm certain that's one reason the Confederate leadership delayed enlisting blacks until the very last bitter-end.
They didn't wish to promise freedom for slaves.
jmacusa: "A slave revolt in a victorious south would have been a horrifying situation, most especially for the slave population."
Obviously a victorious Confederacy would have a much easier time of it than a defeated one.
I know the problem (!), and it's even worse when posting from my supposedly "smart phone" with its small keys, small display and word-completion function.
Sometimes what comes out is nothing like what I intended. ;-)
Proof-read, proof-read, then proof-read it again.
No, the Confederacy would have been way too busy taking advantage of Britain's & others' distractions by gobbling up their colonies in the America's.
And, by 1914, the Confederate slavocracy would find they felt much more akin to the German military empire than to an "effete" British monarchy.
Remember, the Confederate slave-power expressed its love and affection for Britain in 1861, by refusing to ship the commodity both British & Deep-South economies depended on: cotton.
So, there's no reason to expect a victorious Confederacy to be any less withholding in 1914.
Thanks.
Seems to me there were very few Confederate leaders imprisoned after the war, but I've never seen a list of who was & for how long.
My guess is Davis & Stephens spent more time in prison than anyone else.
Obviously you didn't or you wouldn't have made such a foolish statement.
Nice dodge though. (You need to work on you rant. Kinda weak.)
Your comment was ridiculous on its face considering that multiple nations have lived together side by side in complete peace and harmony since the beginning of civilization.
You ever heard of a treaty?
The problem is that you False Causers are so emotionally wrapped up in your self righteousness over being the belligerents during America’s internal war that you come up with the most illogical excuses that one can possibly imagine as justification and then weave that into your complete distortion of the facts.
A contract; not a suicide pact.
1.Mutual consent, meaning the approval of Congress, or 2.A serious breach of contract such as "usurpations" or "abuses of power" having the same effect.
Where is that in the Constitution? My copy doesn't seem to have that. (You got that 'mutual consent' from Texas v White. The other half of the Texas v White dicta was successful rebellion.)
Tell us a little bit about Jefferson Davis' trial, professor.
I think I read recently that the only one arrested, tried and convicted and then hung, in D.C., was the guy in charge at Andersonville Prison during the War.
Cowboyway: “Where is that in the Constitution? My copy doesn’t seem to have that. ”
It comes from the link I provided in my post.
It is a famous letter from Madison on this very subject.
It expresses the idea more directly than any other I’ve seen, but here’s the key point: no founder ever contradicted Madison ‘ s words.
That makes them indisputably Founders’ Original Intent.
Of course, in your own wisdom, you may well decide to reject Founders’ Original Intent as your starting point for understanding the Constitution.
But Founders ‘ Original Intent is the Conservative point of view, so if you reject one, you’ve also rejected the other, FRiend.
Yes, but others were arrested and held before President Andrew Johnson pardoned them, Davis last of all, iirc.
So, was it only Davis & Stephens, or were there more?
You may remember that Democrat President Andrew Johnson, from Eastern Tennissee, pardoned all remaining Confederates when he left office in 1869.
That ended any discussion about trying Davis for treason.
Davis then became a model citizen, urging reconciliation between South & North.
Lincoln wanted the war over with. And so did the American people on both sides. When Grant was leaving for Appomattox Lincoln said to him “Let them up easy’’. It was obvious he didn’t want further resentment and rebellion if he tried him for treason.
"He was charged with treason after the Civil War, and his defense team claimed that the 14th Amendment already punished Davis by preventing him from holding public office in the future and that further prosecution and punishment would violate the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment.
In fact, the 14th Amendment had been passed during the time of Davis' indictment in the federal court system, when the case of United States v. Jefferson Davis was being heard.
One of the trial justices in the Davis case in 1868 was Supreme Court Chief Justice Salmon Chase, who was at the district court in his role as a circuit judge. Chase wanted the treason charges dismissed, but a second judge, John C. Underwood, disagreed with him.
With a deadlock in district court, the Davis case would head automatically to the Supreme Court. But President Andrew Johnson issued a general pardon on Christmas Day in December 1868 for all those who fought for the Confederacy, provided that anyone eligible applied for one.
It was actually Johnson's fourth amnesty provision for Confederates, and it restored civil and property rights and provided immunity from treason charges. But it didn't allow former Confederate officials to vote or hold office.
In 1872, the Amnesty Act was amended to allow almost all former Confederates, expect for several hundred former high-ranking officials (such as Davis), to hold public office and vote.
So while Davis became eligible for a general pardon, he didn't have full citizenship rights if he wanted to hold elected federal office."
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