Napolean complex....
Posted on 09/07/2010 12:43:35 PM PDT by gjmerits
The Gettysburg speech was at once the shortest and the most famous oration in American history...the highest emotion reduced to a few poetical phrases. Lincoln himself never even remotely approached it. It is genuinely stupendous. But let us not forget that it is poetry, not logic; beauty, not sense. Think of the argument in it. Put it into the cold words of everyday. The doctrine is simply this: that the Union soldiers who died at Gettysburg sacrificed their lives to the cause of self-determination - that government of the people, by the people, for the people, should not perish from the earth. It is difficult to imagine anything more untrue. The Union soldiers in the battle actually fought against self-determination; it was the Confederates who fought for the right of their people to govern themselves.
(Excerpt) Read more at wolvesofliberty.com ...
Fine. Okay. Makes perfect sense.
But once a state secedes, there is no federal law in that state.
Thank you for your post 317. You are concise with your argument and I am not. Your post 317 sums up the point I have been trying, without much success, to convey.
Your intellectual, historical, and written skills are impressive. I don’t think I am alone in expressing admiration for your talents.
No, there wouldn’t be....as long as they seceded legally.
Where are the WORDS in the Constitution that prohibit secession.
You can’t just say “if the Constitution means anything, it means...”
Where are the WORDS.
[Sunshine]like the Belle she is, "Again, please show me the wording in the U.S. Constitution which declares secession to be revolt against the established government.
I'd like to point "Mr. Big Government r9etb" to a few facts. That is, after he swallows his dictionary of course.
There seems to be a major flaws in his augments. The people surrendered nothing when ratifying the Constitution, and the people talk as a State. They are in fact Sovereign. Somehow, he believes the General Government to be sovereign? FYI: the people and their states are what made the General Government, by which there lays a right to alter or abolish it when the Government no longer suits their interest.
Section 4. The United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion; and on application of the legislature, or of the executive (when the legislature cannot be convened) against domestic violence.
Now, was the Southern State legislatures able to convene? Yes, as a matter of fact they did. They never once asked their agent the General Government for help of any sort. They voted for Secession, which is an act and a right of Sovereigns. There was no insurrection, there was Secession.
I'm sure if you gave him proper recognition that Idabilly would be glad to let you quote him.
It doesn't say that, and I've never claimed it has. But a proper secession, as Madison noted, requires the consent of the states. And the Supreme Court also found that to be true in their Texas v White decision.
The CSA was well aware of it's sovereignty.
Nobody else was. If a tree falls in the forest with nobody around does it make a sound. If you declare yourself sovereign and nobody recognizes you as such then are you really sovereign?
The CSA had one heckuva struggle for four years.
Yep, one does have to feel for the South. All that death and destruction. All that blood and suffering. All self-inflicted. All for naught.
You think Rustbucket has it bad? Try dealing with brain-dead Lost Causers for a while. There are days when you all are enough to piss off the Pope.
Hate to break it to you, but Article VI says otherwise:
This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.
The Constitution is the supreme law of the land. State officers were bound by oath to support it. Your boys broke their oath. Rebellion. Insurrection. Eventual and utter defeat.
Score one for the good guys.
Sadly, and I mean real sadly. Government is a God to many, and even hear on FR. They forget one, it’s not a mind freeze on their part, in my opinion. In all their forgetfulness they’ve forgotten what is perpetual in this universe, and it sure isn’t the Federal Government
No one has ever argued that they do not have that power and certainly not I but you have yet to show me the Article, phrase, or word, in the Constitution which would prohibit a sovereign state from leaving. When you do that you have won the argument until you do so you are just making lots of noise and throwing stuff against the wall hoping something will stick.
With respect, I don't agree with your assertion. I agree instead with people who ratified the Constitution.
But then ... the Constitution really didn't mean anything to your boys, did it?
If that were true, they wouldn't have patterned the great bulk of the Confederate Constitution after the US Constitution.
Speaking of insurrection and following the Constitution, let's look at how well the Northern states were following the Constitution about the return of fugitive slaves before states began seceding. I'm not arguing that slavery was right. Obviously it wasn't. I'm just citing history as it was. I apologize to others who saw the following information I posted on a previous thread. I don't think you were on that thread.
My newspaper quotes come from the original newspapers in a library or reproductions of those newspapers on microfilm in a library. Images of the old newspapers might be subject to copyright, hence I do not post photographs I've taken of them. However, the old words themselves are no longer protected under copyright allowing me to post them. Looking at old newspaper articles is a good hobby. I recommend it to you.
If the South were to violate any part of the Constitution intentionally and systematically, and persist in so doing, year after year, and no remedy could be had, would the North be any longer bound by the rest of it? And if the North were deliberately, habitually, and of fixed purpose to disregard one part of it, would the South be bound any longer to observe its other obligations? I have not hesitated to say, and I repeat, that if the Northern States refuse, willfully and deliberately, to carry into effect that part of the Constitution which respects the restoration of fugitive slaves, and Congress provide no remedy, the South would no longer be bound to observe the compact. A bargain cannot be broken on one side and still bind the other side. [Massachusetts Senator Daniel Webster, 1851]
THE CITIZENS OF MASSACHUSETTS AND THE PERSONAL LIBERTY BILLS. Chief Justice Shaw, B. R. Curtis, Joel Parker, and other citizens of Massachusetts equally distinguished, have addressed a letter to the people of that State on the Personal Liberty Bills, which they declare to be unconstitutional. They urge strongly the repeal of them. … “We would repeal them under our own love of right; under our own sense of sacredness of compacts; under our own convictions of the inestimable importance of social order and domestic peace; … [they] stand as conspicuous and palpable breaches of the national compact by ourselves.” [Philadelphia Public Ledger, December 20, 1860. rb note: Shaw was Chief Justice of the Mass. Supreme Court, Curtis was a former Justice of the US Supreme Court, Parker was professor of constitutional law at Harvard and former Chief Justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court.]
Frederick County, Va. Resolved. That in our judgment the refusal and failure of the New England States to keep the obligations of the federal compact would long since have justified any Southern or any slaveholding State in pronouncing the compact broken, and the Union made by it dissolved. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 2, 1861]
That was the nature of the offence [high treason as defined by Chief Justice Marshall years before the offence] which Theodore Parker, Wendell Phillips, and their associates were charged with when they incited the mob in Fanueil Hall to go to the Courthouse to rescue Burns, the fugitive slave, in which unlawful enterprise Batchelder, one of the marshal's deputies, was murdered. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 4, 1861, recounting the 1854 return of Burns, the last slave returned from Massachusetts.]
Annual Message of the Governor of New York. It [the New York law] has been universally held to be obsolete by all our commentators, and all our public authorities [by virtue of Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842)] although now improperly classed among what are technically called “personal liberty laws,” and made occasion for jealousies and discontents. I recommend its repeal. In this connection, and while disavowing any dispositions to interfere with what exclusively pertains to the individual States, and in a spirit of fraternal kindness, I would respectfully invite all those States which have upon their statute books any laws of this character, conflicting with the federal constitution, to repeal them at the earliest opportunity … [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 4, 1861]
Gov. Banks Recommends the Abrogation of the Personal Liberty Bills. Boston, Jan. 3,. – Gov. Banks to-day delivered his valedictory to the Legislature in the presence of a large crowd of citizens. He recommended the abrogation of the personal liberty bills. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 4, 1861]
It would be the same in Massachusetts, if, under the personal liberty bill, a fugitive from labor should be taken before a jury to be tried. No Massachusetts jury could be found to agree that he was a fugitive slave. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 4, 1861. rb note: If a Massachusetts jury found him not to be a fugitive slave even though he might be, the Massachusetts law could severely jail and fine the person seeking his return.]
Views of Gov. Banks. Governor Banks, of Massachusetts, in his valedictory delivered Thursday, contended that there can be no peaceable secession. The government cannot be dissolved at the bidding of any dissatisfied State, nor can that portion of the continent occupied by the American States, be portioned out to hostile nations. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 5, 1861]
Message of the Governor of Delaware. Gov. Burton, in his message to the Legislature of that State, reviews at some length the aggressive spirit exhibited by the North toward the South, and maintains with forcible arguments the necessity for each state to enforce the laws and comply fully with the letter and spirit of the constitution, as the only means by which the Union can be preserved. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 5, 1861]
The Michigan Legislature. … The retiring Governor delivered his annual message to both Houses. He takes strong ground against the right of secession; charges the President of the United States with misrepresenting the principles of the republican party … In relation to the personal liberty laws of this State, he says if they are unconstitutional and in conflict with the fugitive slave law, they should be repealed, but says these laws are right and speak to the sentiments of the people; are in strict accordance with the constitution, and ought not to be repealed. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 5, 1861]
The Governor of Michigan Advocating Coercion. The Governor denies that the personal liberty bills have prevented the execution of the fugitive slave law in a single instance. The law has always been enforced on an appeal being taken. ... He recommended the State Legislature to manifest its loyalty to Michigan and proffer the President the use of the whole military power of the State to sustain the integrity of the Union. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 5, 1861]
Absurd and Impudent Action by the Michigan Legislature. We can conceive of nothing more absurd than the passage by either house of the Legislature, at Lansing, of the resolutions which are reported to have passed concerning national affairs, while the personal liberty bill still stands. The personal liberty law -- so the legislature of 1859 construed it, and such is the only construction which it will bear -- "was designed to and if faithfully executed will prevent the delivering up of fugitive slaves." It is therefore plain, palpable, unadulterated nullification of the fugitive slave law. … how absurd is it, how impudent is it, in her to pass resolutions that the Constitution of the United States, and all laws in pursuance thereof, "are the supreme law of the land" … that "Michigan is now, as she has always been, entirely loyal to the Constitution.” ... We know of nothing better calculated to stimulate secession than this action, especially as it is the action of a State whose professions of loyalty to the Constitution are a lie. [The Detroit Free Press as quoted in the State Gazette of Austin, Texas, March 2, 1861]
Detroit, Monday, April 8. About three hundred fugitive slaves, principally from Illinois, have passed into Canada at this point since Saturday, and large numbers more are reportedly on the way. Many are entirely destitute, and much suffering is anticipated, notwithstanding the efforts made for their relief. [New York Times, April 9, 1861]
Inaugural Message of Governor Andrew of Massachusetts. The enrolled militia in the state exceeds 155,000 men, while the active militia numbers about 5,600. The Governor suggests that a larger number be placed on an active footing, so that the state may be ready to contribute her share of force in any exigency of public danger. … The personal liberty law he believed to be strictly constitutional, as the right of a person to reclaim an alleged fugitive must always be subordinate to the indefeasible right of every free man to liberty. … He denies the right of a state to secede …[Baltimore Sun, Jan. 7, 1861]
Fugitive Slaves in Pennsylvania. A bill has been reported in the Pennsylvania Legislature to repeal the sections of the penal code of that State which obstruct the enforcement of the fugitive slave law. The part punishing kidnapping, &c., is allowed to remain, but the part obstructing the recapture of fugitives, and punishing the magistrates or other officers who may aid (for they are not compelled to do so) in the execution of the fugitive slave law is repealed. … [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 9, 1861]
The Fugitive Slave Law in the Pennsylvania Legislature. Harrisburg, Pa., Jan. 10, midnight. –The republican resolutions relative to the Union were up to-day for consideration in the Senate. Senator Welsh, of York, offered a substitute declaring the provision in the constitution relative to fugitive slaves binding upon the people of all States, recommending the repeal of all statutes interfering with the fugitive slave law, asserting the equal rights of all the States in the Territories, and expressing the devotion of Pennsylvania to the Union and the constitution. This will be endorsed by the democratic Senators. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 11, 1861]
Pennsylvania Legislature Refuses to Repeal the Anti-Fugitive Slave Law. Harrisburg, Pa., Jan 11. – Senator Welsh’s resolutions, proposing to repeal the obnoxious provisions of the act of 1847, and the penal code, were voted down to-day, all the republicans voting against them. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 12, 1861]
Message of the Governor of New Jersey. Governor Olden, of New Jersey, in his annual message, opposes secession, but advocates concession and compromise, urges the repeal of all laws of the State, if such there be, which are unjust to the South, calls upon Congress to agree upon some plan of adjustment of the national troubles, and in case of failure, urges the New Jersey Legislature to invite all the States to meet in national convention to concert measures whereby the Union may be saved. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 12, 1861]
The Case of the State of Kentucky Against the Governor of Ohio, for Refusing to Issue a Warrant for the Arrest of Lago. Washington, Jan. 11. – The case of the State of Kentucky against the Governor of Ohio, who refused to issue his warrant for the arrest of Lago, charged with having enticed a slave from Kentucky into Ohio, was set for to-day, in the Supreme Court, but the Attorney-General of Ohio having forwarded an affidavit of a professional engagement which prevented his attendance, the case was postponed until the 8th of February. Kentucky was ready by counsel. [Baltimore Sun, Jan. 12, 1861]
Washington, Jan. 12. Hon. Wm H. Seward, of New York, addressed the Senate to-day, on the President's message. He said Congress ought, if it can, redress any real grievances of the offended States, and then supply the President with all the means necessary to maintain the Union. He argued that the laws contravening the constitution, in regard to the escape of slaves, ought to be repealed. He was willing to vote for an amendment to the constitution, that Congress should never have the power to abolish or interfere with slavery within the States. [The Daily Mississippian, Jackson, Mississippi, Jan. 16, 1861]
Departure of Fugitive Slaves for Canada Chicago, Monday, April 8. One hundred and six fugitive slaves left this city last night for Canada via the Michigan Southern Railroad. It is estimated that over one thousand fugitives have arrived in this city since last Fall, most of whom have left since the recent arrest of five by the United States Marshal. … [New York Times, April 9, 1861]
Lincoln’s two secretaries, Nicolay and Hay, in Volume 3 of their book Abraham Lincoln, A History noted that a careful 1860 study of the personal liberty laws by the National Intelligencer found that the personal liberty laws of Vermont, Massachusetts, Michigan and Wisconsin were clearly unconstitutional.
... During the four months preceding the outbreak of the Civil War, Rhode Island and Maine repealed their personal liberty laws. The personal liberty laws of Massachusetts and Vermont were modified, and the legislature of Wisconsin passed a resolution which recommended the revision of her personal liberty laws. ... A majority of the northern states now exhibited every effort to prevent the personal liberty laws and opposition to enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Law from being used as a pretext for secession. They were too late. [The Slave Catchers by Stanley Campbell]
John Quincy Adams was eight years old in 1775 - he was not one of the founders.
The founding fathers, if alive, would have spit in the face of Lincoln.
Maj Innes Randolph sentiments are understandable, when all you have left is sarcasm and ridicule is another secession far off? Let's hope not.
Congress shall authorize a Union to force the Laws of the Union, but only if those people who refuse to obey the law call themselves insurrectionists instead of secessionists? Yeah, that makes a whole lot of sense. And again, by what means do such a people declare themselves secessionists, instead of insurrectionists?
"Say Mr. President, these people want to abandon the Union!"Or let's look back at the Constitution of Virginia of 1776, shall we?"Why that's terrible! Call in the army to put down these insurrectionists!"
"Well, they've called themselves 'secessionists' instead of 'insurrectionists,' and claimed ownership of all federal lands, fortresses, and wealth within their territory, and attacked our mutual army!"
"Oh, thank goodness; I thought we had a problem! Invite their ambassadors here to establish trade treaties with them!"
When Virginia was a separate state, owing no allegiance to any power whatsoever, they established that to secede from the state of Virginia, or invalidate any state law would constitute insurrection on the explicit basis that uniformity of Law was necessary for the proper exercise of Law. But you would suppose that Virginia would join the Union explicitly reserving their own right to sever their ties to the Union, and establish within the former boundaries of that Union an independent nation owing that Union no allegiance?
Virginia's constitution might have outlawed secession from itself, but the Constitution did not prohibit secession from the Union.
But you would suppose that Virginia would join the Union explicitly reserving their own right to sever their ties to the Union, and establish within the former boundaries of that Union an independent nation owing that Union no allegiance?
They did. Madison, Marshall, and three other Federalists wrote the Virginia ratification document. When Virginia voted to join the Confederate States of American, they reserved the right to secede from them too. I've never seen that 1861 Virgina document, but I've read that they reserved the right to secede from the CSA when they joined in 1861.
Which brings us to another seeming dilemma.
When the ninth state ratified the Constitution what instantly became the status of the 4 states of the former "perpetual" union under the articles of confederation who had not yet chosen to ratify the same?
Secession was never made unlawful, never brought up in the document, never mentioned in Article 1 section 8. Are you claiming that the founding couldn't spell "secession"? They could, despite your demerits. They left it out why you ask? Because it is a right retained by the States and their people. Your points are moot.
As Thomas Jefferson said to Mr. Madison :"[We should be] determined... to sever ourselves from the union we so much value rather than give up the rights of self-government...in which alone we see liberty, safety and happiness."
Would it make sense to have a "red-diaper doper baby" as a neighbor? No. So why should the South?
Oooooooo....BURN!
Gee, that's funny. I seem to recall the United States establishing itself as a Republic, not a Confederation. Whatever could that John Adams have been referring? Oh, wait, that's right! That quote is from 1777, written a full ten years before the Constitution... about the time of the Articles of Confederation. Seems those didn't work out at all, because they were too weak, and the founders had to work some way of forging a more perfect union.
But, now that you mention the Declaration of Independence:
Let's see... what were those causes? "We want to be able to legally flay the skin off our slaves for no cause whatsoever, without facing any question from any legal authority, and when such slaves run away, we want to be able to invade other states so as to violently recapture our possession, regardless of the rights of self-determiniation of those other states." Well, not exactly."When in the Course of human events it becomes 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, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."
Let's read some more, shall we?
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and 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. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government.Wait a second... Go back... what was that bit about Men having a duty to overthrow tyrannical governments?The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.Wow. So when Men recognized that slavery was far from dying off as more modern means of agriculture had arrived, but instead had evolved into something far more sinister and diabolical, they had a duty to destroy such a government? Which side of the Civil War are you citing this in defense of? Oh, but I taunt.
And you'll notice the phrasing, "it is the Right of the People to abolish it, and to institute new government... It is their right, it is their duty to throw off such government." You see, the colonies saw the British rule over them as a government separate from the British domestic government, which, in fact, had recognized to its own people the rights to which they aspired. That's why they called it "the American Revolution" and not a "British Civil War." They were abolishing the evil government. They didn't assert the right to divide the British government, forming a separate state within that portion of Great Britain which lie in the Americas (for indeed there was no such portion of Great Britain). They asserted the duty to abolish that tyrannical government imposed by Great Britain.
And they asserted that what gave them such a duty was the tyranny to which they were subject. And they recognized that it was necessary to declare before the world precisely what intolerable tyranny they were subject to.
The Confederate States, on the other hand, were fearful that the Union might some day prevent them from the capricious intent of flaying their subjects' skin from their flesh. Not exactly the same thing.
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