REMEMBERING MR. LINCOLN

Powerline ^ | 12 Feb 2024 | Scott Johnson

[x]

I find in the very article you linked to:

But for two passages in the Committee of Five's draft that were rejected by the Committee of the Whole the work was accepted without any other major changes. One was a critical reference to the English people and the other was a denunciation of the slave trade and of slavery itself.

In other words, the five might have thought the passage ill-advised, but they left it in the draft they submitted to the whole Continental Congress, "the Committee of the Whole."

I don't know how the Continental Congress made its decisions or how the debate went. Do we have anything more that Jefferson's sentence or two about why the passage was removed? He was not without an ax to grind in his later years. Did all the Virginians really agree with him? Were the Northerners who opposed the passage really more concerned about the slave trade than about keeping South Carolina and Georgia in the union? Do we know?

.

What the Founders were trying to do in the immediate situation and what they believed, or came to believe, weren't necessarily the same thing. I said that you aren't being serious because you take the immediate concern of the Founders as the whole of their thinking on the subject of human rights, liberty, and equality.

Lincoln has been attacked by modern historians for not being poetic or philosophical in the Emancipation Proclamation. Richard Hofstadter said that the Proclamation "had all the moral grandeur of a bill of lading." But the Emancipation Proclamation was intended to fulfill a specific purpose. It's similar for the Constitution. The Declaration was a little more than that. As well as breaking with England and making the case for independence, Jefferson was being philosophical and stating general truths in an exalted and elevated way. You can't just throw that whole side of the Declaration away.

.

Can you really say that Jefferson was willing to free the slaves in 1776? He wasn't even willing to free his own slaves when he died 50 years later. But other delegates went back to their states and drafted emancipation laws and emancipation plans. It's true that they didn't want to share the government or the country with large number of African-Americans, but they did take the Declaration's message about the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness to heart.

[ProgressingAmerica]

“I don’t think you gave me a good answer, because I don’t recall it.”

This is a recurring pattern with you and your crew. Bet if it was CW related it would be immediately and forever committed to memory.

As to the request, here’s where it comes from. You’ll note that others in this discussion have also brought up GA/SC in relation to that specific passage to the Declaration. It’s not a secret. You almost have to not want to know it, to not know it.

https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/creating-the-united-states/interactives/declaration-of-independence/slavery/enlarge5-transcribe.html

We need to come to grips with the fact that CRT-history is quite a lot older than just the last 10 years. Progressives have been sowing these seeds for many decades under the guise of history.

[ProgressingAmerica]

One of the big problems, unfortunately, is the reality that the time to abolish slavery was before independence. It was much easier to stoke patriotic sentiments in relation to slavery as "subjects" during the time period when they did these things.

That is, what they would have said at the time is:

(Parag. written as if the year is 1775) Slavery is the crown's slavery, and these vetoed laws or otherwise unenforced laws by crown governors is "them" imposing on us a system we do not want against our will. (Parag. written as if the year is 1775)

But after 1776, then each state has to take upon the responsibility for itself. Many states abolished, some sooner than others, once they no longer had the crown veto stopping them.

[BroJoeK]

FLT-bird: "Lincoln arrested more people by all accounts."

Relative to their population, Confederates arrested as many pro-Union Southerners as the Union arrested Copperhead Democrats.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln suspended Habeas Corpus - unconstitutionally."

The CSA declared war on the USA on May 6, 1861 -- meaning any Union citizen who supported the Confederacy was then, by Constitutional definition, guilty of treason and subject to arrest & prosecution.

SCOTUS Chief Justice Crazy-Roger Taney:

Lincoln's constitutional authority to suspend habeas corpus was challenged in June 1861 by SCOTUS Chief Justice Crazy-Roger Taney, the same lunatic whose Dred Scot blatherings arguably caused the Civil War, but this time Taney babbled as a circuit court judge, not as SCOTUS, and so Lincoln properly ignored him.

The US Congress took up the issue in June 1861, but was blocked by Democrats from approving Lincoln's actions until December 1862.
The bill which finally passed in March 1863 authorized:

"That during the present rebellion, the President of the United States, whenever in his judgment the public safety may require it, is authorized to suspend the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus in any case throughout the United States..."

In the meantime, Jefferson Davis happily declared martial law and suspended Habeas Corpus in the Confederacy whenever he saw fit.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln signed an arrest warrant for the chief justice of the Supreme Court when the chief justice ruled in ex parte Merryman that this was unconstitutional."

Lincoln's body guard Ward Lamon, 25 years later:

Only claimed 25 years later by Lincoln's bodyguard, Ward Hill Lamon, confirmed by nobody else, ever.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln stuffed ballot boxes."

No, but FLT-bird has stuffed his own head full on nonsense.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln shut down over 100 opposition newspapers by force."

So often claimed by pro-Confederates, but actual records show only two Northern newspapers -- New York World and New York Journal of Commerce -- shut down by Lincoln's order in May 1864 after they published forged documents claiming the government was planning another draft.

Of course, many newspapers did open during the war, and some closed, for many reasons, including for having made their neighbors angry at their political opinions.
Claims that Lincoln was involved or responsible for many of these are not supported by facts.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln arrested a sitting US Congressman."

Democrat Copperhead Ohio Congressman Clement Vallandigham, arrested in May 1863, tried and convicted of, in effect, treason.
He was arrested on orders of Union Gen. Burnside, not Lincoln.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln banished a sitting US Senator."

CSA Gen. John C. Breckenridge:

Kentucky Senator John C. Breckenridge, in effect declared war against the United States, in October 1861, was then banished by the US Senate, not Lincoln.

Brecdkenridge declared: " 'I exchange with proud satisfaction a term of six years in the Senate of the United States for the musket of a soldier.'[118][122]
He was indicted for treason in U.S. federal district court in Frankfort on November 6, 1861, having officially enlisted in the Confederate army days earlier.[26]
On December 2, 1861, he was declared a traitor by the U.S. Senate.[123]
A resolution stating 'Whereas John C. Breckinridge, a member of this body from the State of Kentucky, has joined the enemies of his country, and is now in arms against the government he had sworn to support: Therefore—Resolved, That said John C. Breckinridge, the traitor, be, and he hereby is, expelled from the Senate,' was adopted by a vote of 36–0 on December 4.[48][124][125]"

Copperhead Democrat Ohio Congressman Clement Vallandigham:

Back to Congressman Vallandigham -- Burnside's military court sentenced Vallandingham to prison for the war's duration.
Lincoln's order released Vallandingham from jail and exiled him to the Confederacy.
On arrival in the Confederacy, Jefferson Davis ordered Vallandingham held under guard as an "alien enemy".
In June 1863 Vallandingham traveled to Richmond, VA and may or may not have recommended another Confederate invasion of Pennsylvania, sources differ.
He then traveled to Ontario, Canada, from where he was nominated by Democrats for Ohio governor, and lost in a landslide.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln censored all telegraph traffic."

Well, Union Secretary of War Edwin Stanton:

"For the remainder of the war, Stanton controlled the Army’s communications and oversaw the censoring of telegraphic news dispatches."

Telegraphic news dispatches were not such a problem in the Confederacy, whose telegraphs were less extensive and often out of order.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln presided over the only mass execution in American history."

After the 1862 Dakota War in Minnesota, Lincoln reviewed the death sentences of 303 Dakota warriors and decided:

"I caused a careful examination of the records of trials to be made, in view of first ordering the execution of such as had been proved guilty of violating females.
Contrary to my expectations, only two of this class were found.
I then directed a further examination, and a classification of all who were proven to have participated in massacres, as distinguished from participation in battles.
This class numbered forty, and included the two convicted of female violation."

In the end, 38 of the 303 were lawfully executed.

Of 18 famous Civil War illegal massacres:

1. 7 committed by Confederates against Union troops
2. 4 committed by Confederates against Unionist civilians
3. 1 committed by Unionists against pro-Confederate civilians
4. 1 committed by Union troops against Confederate troops
5. 1 committed by Union troops against pro-Confederate civilians
6. 1 (multiple) committed by Indians against Minnesota civilians.
7. 1 committed by Union troops against Colorado Indians
8. 2 committed by Indians against Confederates

FLT-bird: "Lincoln also presided over the infamous union death camps including the infamous Camp Douglas which produced the largest mass grave in American history. "

There were about 15 POW camps on each side, the most notorious of which were:

1. CSA's Andersonville, Georgia, where 13,000 of 45,000 Union troops there died =29%

2. USA's Camp Douglas, Chicago, where 4,000 of 26,000 Confederate troops there died = 15%.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln presided over the ethnic cleansing and genocide committed against native peoples in Minnesota."

The Minnestoa Dakota War of 1862 resulted in around 150 Indians killed out of a population counted at 2,369 in the 1860 census.
The number of whites killed was 471, of whom 358 were massacred civilians.
Today Native Americans are about 1.2% of Minnesota's population, the same as they were in 1860 and 1880.

FLT-bird: "This was after he refused to honor the treaty the US Government had with the Santee Sioux and pay them the money they were owed so they could avoid starving."

In 1862, the US government was two months behind in its payments to Dakotas, possibly due to corruption among US Indian agents, and so merchants refused to offer the Dakota Indians credit, for fear of US government non-payments because of the Civil War.
Lincoln himself was not involved in any of this.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln also deliberately started the war without the consent of Congress."

CSA Pres. Jefferson Davis:

Jefferson Davis deliberately started Civil War, at Ft. Sumter, without a declaration of war from the Confederate congress -- as noted and quoted many times on these threads.

"There would be to us an advantage in so placing them [Lincoln] that an attack by them [Lincoln] would be a necessity, but when we are ready to relieve our territory and jurisdiction of the presence of a foreign garrison [Fort Sumter] that advantage is overbalanced by other considerations."
[Jefferson Davis to Braxton Bragg, 3 Apr 1861]

[ProgressingAmerica]

I don’t need any more of the civil war pings. I don’t want them either.

Thank you.

[DiogenesLamp]

I don't know how the Continental Congress made its decisions or how the debate went. Do we have anything more that Jefferson's sentence or two about why the passage was removed? He was not without an ax to grind in his later years. Did all the Virginians really agree with him? Were the Northerners who opposed the passage really more concerned about the slave trade than about keeping South Carolina and Georgia in the union? Do we know?

Where do we get this "South Carolina and Georgia" idea? Is it because these reps objected, while the rest remained silent? In parliamentary procedure, how many people have to make a motion before the topic is considered by the whole? Isn't it just two?

I find it ridiculous to believe that out of a committee made from reps of 13 slave states, that only two would make an issue of something they would see as damaging to their economic interests or damaging to the coalition.

In any case, whether it be the committee of the five, or the committee of the whole, they removed the problematic language.

Can you really say that Jefferson was willing to free the slaves in 1776? He wasn't even willing to free his own slaves when he died 50 years later. But other delegates went back to their states and drafted emancipation laws and emancipation plans.

Later. Later.

I have said many times that the Declaration inspired people afterward to consider this idea in the context of slaves, but the point here is that it wasn't the focus of the Declaration, as Lincoln implies it was in his speech.

The Declaration was on the very opposite side of Lincoln. It would rebuke him if it had a voice.

[DiogenesLamp]

I see now why I don't remember it. You are equating something Jefferson said to being the objective truth, and conflating it to signify the same thing as you wish to believe.

You are then interpreting the alleged silence of 11 other slave state reps as promoting your anti-slavery message, when that interpretation stretches credibility.

You are also equating an opposition to further importation of slaves as the same as opposition to slavery in general.

You are painting your own views onto the faces of those long ago dead reps, and doing so without presenting any evidence (beyond their silence) that this is what they thought.

Not very objective thinking you present here.

It is ridiculous to think that representatives of the 11 other slave states would be fine with verbiage portraying themselves as bad people. This runs contrary to human nature, and in any case, they agreed to remove the language, so that says a lot more about what they thought than Jefferson's assertion as to what happened.

[DiogenesLamp]

Relative to their population, Confederates arrested as many pro-Union Southerners as the Union arrested Copperhead Democrats.

Bro, this is not an argument to justify why Lincoln did it.

You are advancing a fallacy known as "argumentum ad tu quoque." Which means, "Because someone else did something bad, you can't complain about my guy doing something bad."

Well yes. Yes we can. Your guy shouldn't have done the bad thing, and neither should the other guy, but what the other guy did doesn't excuse your guy.

[FLT-bird]

Relative to their population, Confederates arrested as many pro-Union Southerners as the Union arrested Copperhead Democrats.

No they didn't.

The CSA declared war on the USA on May 6, 1861 -- meaning any Union citizen who supported the Confederacy was then, by Constitutional definition, guilty of treason and subject to arrest & prosecution.

No it didn't. The CSA did not declare war. Objecting to starting a war is not treason as per Article III section 3 clause 1 of the US Constitution.

Lincoln's constitutional authority to suspend habeas corpus was challenged in June 1861 by SCOTUS Chief Justice Roger Taney, the same lunatic whose Dred Scot blatherings arguably caused the Civil War, but this time Taney babbled as a circuit court judge, not as SCOTUS, and so Lincoln properly ignored him.

Suspension of the habeas corpus at a time when the courts are functioning is unconstitutional. This has been the ruling of the Supreme Court and no, not just Taney. Lincoln acted unconstitutionally.

The US Congress took up the issue in June 1861, but was blocked by Democrats from approving Lincoln's actions until December 1862. The bill which finally passed in March 1863 authorized: "That during the present rebellion, the President of the United States, whenever in his judgment the public safety may require it, is authorized to suspend the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus in any case throughout the United States..."

In the meantime, Jefferson Davis happily declared martial law and suspended Habeas Corpus in the Confederacy whenever he saw fit.

He did so less than Lincoln and arrest FAR fewer people.

Lincoln's body guard Ward Lamon, 25 years later: Only claimed 25 years later by Lincoln's bodyguard, Ward Hill Lamon, confirmed by nobody else, ever.

Read the Real Lincoln. Others confirmed it as well. Its documented and footnoted. He did it.

No, but FLT-bird has stuffed his own head full on nonsense.

Lincoln won New York state by 7000 votes "with the help of federal bayonets," wrote Pulitzer Prize—winning Lincoln biographer David Donald in Lincoln Reconsidered.

BroJoeK gets it stuffed down his throat again.

So often claimed by pro-Confederates, but actual records show only two Northern newspapers -- New York World and New York Journal of Commerce -- shut down by Lincoln's order in May 1864 after they published forged documents claiming the government was planning another draft.

In May 1861 the New York Journal of Commerce published a list of 100 Northern newspapers that opposed the Lincoln administration. Lincoln ordered the Postmaster General and the army to shut them all down.

May 18, 1864, Lincoln order that directly issued to General John Dix: "You will take possession by military force, of the printing establishments of the New York World and Journal of Commerce . . . and prohibit any further publication thereof . . . you are therefore commanded forthwith to arrest and imprison . . . the editors, proprietors and publishers of the aforesaid newspapers." For good measure, all telegraph communication in the North was censored as well.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln arrested a sitting US Congressman." Democrat Copperhead Ohio Congressman Clement Vallandigham, arrested in May 1863, tried and convicted of, in effect, treason. He was arrested on orders of Union Gen. Burnside, not Lincoln.

One of those imprisoned for fourteen months for simply questioning the unconstitutional suspension of habeas corpus was Francis Key Howard, the grandson of Francis Scott Key and editor of the Baltimore Exchange newspaper. In response to an editorial in his newspaper that was critical of the fact that the Lincoln administration had imprisoned without due process the mayor of Baltimore, Congressman Henry May, and some twenty members of the Maryland legislature, he was imprisoned near the very spot where his grandfather composed the Star Spangled Banner. After his release, he noted the deep irony of his grandfather's beloved flag flying over "the victims of as vulgar and brutal a despotism as modern times have witnessed" (John Marshall, American Bastile, pp. 645—646).

A military kangaroo court claimed sitting US Senator Vallandingham was guilty of treason and banished him from the US. Where was that provision allowing military tribunals over US Senators? I can't seem to find it.

BTW, no I'm not talking about Breckenridge.

Well, Union Secretary of War Edwin Stanton: "For the remainder of the war, Stanton controlled the Army’s communications and oversaw the censoring of telegraphic news dispatches." Telegraphic news dispatches were not such a problem in the Confederacy, whose telegraphs were less extensive and often out of order.

Long winded way of admitting, yes. Lincoln censored all telegraph traffic in addition to shutting down over 100 opposition newspapers.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln presided over the only mass execution in American history." After the 1862 Dakota War in Minnesota, Lincoln reviewed the death sentences of 303 Dakota warriors and decided: "I caused a careful examination of the records of trials to be made, in view of first ordering the execution of such as had been proved guilty of violating females. Contrary to my expectations, only two of this class were found. I then directed a further examination, and a classification of all who were proven to have participated in massacres, as distinguished from participation in battles. This class numbered forty, and included the two convicted of female violation." In the end, 38 of the 303 were lawfully executed.

38 Santee Sioux were publicly executed after "trials" that lasted on average, 10 minutes each.

FLT-bird: "Lincoln also presided over the infamous union death camps including the infamous Camp Douglas which produced the largest mass grave in American history. " There were about 15 POW camps on each side, the most notorious of which were: CSA's Andersonville, Georgia, where 13,000 of 45,000 Union troops there died =29% USA's Camp Douglas, Chicago, where 4,000 of 26,000 Confederate troops there died = 15%.

Its more like 6,000 who were murdered at Camp Douglas. Unlike the CSA, there was no shortage of food or medicine in the US during the war.

The Minnestoa Dakota War of 1862 resulted in around 150 Indians killed.

False.

It was determined that two of the 38 hanged men had been killed by mistake. One of these victims, Wasicuƞ, had been acquitted but somehow still ended up on the gallows and they hanged another man, Wicaƞḣpi Wastedaƞp, due to a mix-up with his name, according to The U.S.-Dakota War of 1862.

The rest of the Santee Sioux also suffered in the war's aftermath. The people of Minnesota wanted the Native Americans out of the state — the lands the whites had stolen — and the U.S. government agreed to these demands, per "The Great Father." The government revoked the earlier treaties and shipped the rest of the bands to a desolate piece of land in South Dakota, which was then known as the Dakota Territory, according to The U.S.-Dakota War of 1862. In the first year in their new home, more than 200 people died, mostly children. https://www.grunge.com/930169/the-true-story-behind-the-execution-of-over-3-dozen-native-americans-in-minnesota/

He specifically refused to pay the Santee Sioux of Minnesota the $1.5 million owed them by the U.S. government according to the terms of two major 1851 treaties (Traverse des Sioux and Mendota) and three additional 1858 treaties involving the sale of 24 million acres of land, including most of the state of Minnesota, to the U.S. government. Instead, Lincoln sought new treaties to dispossess Indian nations of additional lands as quickly and as cheaply as possible.

In 1862, after a crop failure, famine broke out among the Indians of Minnesota. The conduct of the U.S. government turned a natural disaster into man-made tragedy. Local authorities refused to supply the starving Indians with the food stockpiled for them in accordance with the terms of the treaties. One Minnesota trading-post operator summed up the government's response: "If they're hungry, let them eat grass or their own dung."

Political expediency, not compassion, dissuaded Lincoln from having all the condemned hanged. He feared a mass execution would inflame public opinion in Europe and provide a pretext for the British and French governments to recognize the Confederacy. At the same time, Lincoln had to satisfy the Minnesotans' demand for justice if he was to maintain their support for his war against the South. So he crafted a compromise: Lincoln had only 38 Indians hanged but would later expel the rest of the Indians from the state. As part of that understanding, more than 300 Indians were immediately imprisoned for three years in Davenport, Iowa, where over one third of them died. Their families were incarcerated at Fort Snelling.

Volumes V, VI, and VII of The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, edited by Roy P. Basler (Rutgers University Press), contain official correspondence on the 1862 Indian uprising in Minnesota and reveal Lincoln as corrupt and cowardly.

https://chroniclesmagazine.org/cgi-bin/magazine.cgi/Yr%202007/February/Contents.html?seemore=y

CSA Pres. Jefferson Davis: Jefferson Davis deliberately started Civil War, at Ft. Sumter, without a declaration of war from the Confederate congress -- as noted and quoted many times on these threads. "There would be to us an advantage in so placing them [Lincoln] that an attack by them [Lincoln] would be a necessity, but when we are ready to relieve our territory and jurisdiction of the presence of a foreign garrison [Fort Sumter] that advantage is overbalanced by other considerations." [Jefferson Davis to Braxton Bragg, 3 Apr 1861]

Lincoln deliberately started the war without the consent of Congress.

"Lincoln and the First Shot" (in Reassessing the Presidency, edited by John Denson), John Denson painstakingly shows how Lincoln maneuvered the Confederates into firing the first shot at Fort Sumter. As the Providence Daily Post wrote on April 13, 1861, "Mr. Lincoln saw an opportunity to inaugurate civil war without appearing in the character of an aggressor" by reprovisioning Fort Sumter. On the day before that the Jersey City American Statesman wrote that "This unarmed vessel, it is well understood, is a mere decoy to draw the first fire from the people of the South." Lincoln's personal secretaries, John Nicolay and John Hay, clearly stated after the war that Lincoln successfully duped the Confederates into firing on Fort Sumter. And as Shelby Foote wrote in The Civil War, "Lincoln had maneuvered [the Confederates] into the position of having either to back down on their threats or else to fire the first shot of the war."

Here is Lincoln's Letter congratulating his naval commander, Fox for having started the war Lincoln wanted:

"May 1st, 1861. Washington Capt. G.V. Fox:

My Dear Sir, I sincerely regret that the failure of the late attempt to provision Fort Sumter should be the source of any annoyance to you. The practicability of your plan was not, in fact, brought to a test. By reason of a gale, well known in advance to be possible, and not improbable, the tugs, an essential part of the plan, never reached the ground ; while, by an accident, for which you were in nowise responsible, and possibly I, to some extent, was, you were deprived of a war-vessel, with her men, which you deemed of great importance to the enterprise.

I most cheerfully and truthfully declare that the failure of the undertaking has not lowered you a particle, while the qualities you developed in the effort have greatly heightened you in my estimation. For a daring and dangerous enterprise of a similar character, you would, to-day, be the man of all my acquaintances whom I would select. You and I both anticipated that the cause of the country would be advanced by making the attempt to provision Fort Sumter, even if it should fail ; and it is no small consolation now to feel that our anticipation is justified by the result. Very truly your friend, A. LINCOLN."

Lincoln sent a fleet of heavily armed warships to invade South Carolina's sovereign territory which it duly did. This forced the CSA to either defend itself by opening fire or to allow itself to be invaded without firing a shot in its own defense. The Confederates did what any other country would do upon being invaded - they fired to drive the invaders away. An aggressor is one who invades the land of another - not one who fires to drive an invader away.

[FLT-bird]

Bro, this is not an argument to justify why Lincoln did it. You are advancing a fallacy known as "argumentum ad tu quoque." Which means, "Because someone else did something bad, you can't complain about my guy doing something bad." Well yes. Yes we can. Your guy shouldn't have done the bad thing, and neither should the other guy, but what the other guy did doesn't excuse your guy.

Its not even true. No less a PC Revisionist than James McPherson confirms that.

"Davis . . . possessed the authority to suspend the writ of habeas corpus for a total of only sixteen months. During most of that time he exercised this power more sparingly than did his counterpart in Washington. The rhetoric of southern libertarians about executive tyranny thus seems overblown." (McPherson, The Battle Cry of Freedom, p. 435)

[BroJoeK]

FLT-bird: "Lincoln sent ships which repeated invaded South Carolina's sovereign territory."

Name even one ship which you can prove "invaded South Carolina's sovereign territory"?

FLT-bird: "He then sent a heavily armed fleet which was to threaten Charleston.
This forced the Confederates to open fire to evict the illegal squatters."

And yet there was no "heavily armed fleet" threatening Charleston, there was only one small ship even there, a revenue cutter, the Harriet Lane and it threatened no Confederates in Charleston or anywhere else that day.

FLT-bird: "If you don't acknowledge that Lincoln deliberately started the war according to his own letter to his naval commander and according to both of his personal secretaries, then it is just another PC Revisionist lie."

And so, we see, yet again, that under no circumstances can a dedicated propagandist like FLT-bird ever be forced to confess the truth, which even his own master, Jefferson Davis, readily admitted the week before events unfolded at Fort Sumter.

Lincoln's words -- three weeks later, on May 1, 1861 -- are clearly intended to console Capt. Fox over the failure of his mission to resupply Fort Sumter and to put the best face possible on it.

The choice to start war at Fort Sumter was made by Jefferson Davis long before any ships left port in the North, as Davis himself confessed to Gen. Bragg on April 3, 1861.

FLT-bird: "But for the invasion of their territory, they wouldn't have opened fire."

By Jefferson Davis' own words of April 3, he intended to start war at both Fort Sumter and Fort Pickens as soon as he felt ready, regardless of what Lincoln did or didn't do.

Those are facts you chose to ignore because you loathe and despise the real truth.

[ProgressingAmerica]

If we are going to disregard original sources, then we don't have much of a Founding left worth discussing.

"You are also equating an opposition to further importation of slaves as the same as opposition to slavery in general."

I can't help what early abolitionists wrote. But it is clear that the problem is with me because I don't disregard original sources.

"It is ridiculous to think that representatives of the 11 other slave states would be fine with verbiage portraying themselves as bad people.

It's ridiculous to think that there were 11 of them who would've taken issue with it in any way. There were easily 4 of them that were attempting to get rid of slaving only to be met with a big fat no from the crown, especially when that clause made it clear that the King was the villain. Who knows how many saw the crown vetoing and realized they had no point to go down that road if the law would be denied or unenforced anyway.

This is what I mean about you failing to commit things to memory, unless it's CW trivia. That's alright. Just don't try to convince me you have all this massive love and respect for the Founding of the country when you're treating it like a salad bar.

You have too big of an investment in the Critical Race Theory version of history.

[ProgressingAmerica]

- - - BroJoeK, - - -

I don’t need any more of the civil war pings. I don’t want them either.

Thank you.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "*AFTER* Lincoln started a war with them.
That's fair game, *AFTER* someone invaded them first."

But, of course -- endless lies about it notwithstanding -- Lincoln didn't invade first and didn't start the Civil War.
In fact, there was no Union "invasion" of any Confederate state before the Confederate congress formally declared war on the United States on May 6, 1861.

Indeed, the Civil War's very first military invasions were Confederate forces into Union West Virginia and Missouri, in May 1861.
There were no Union military actions into Virginia until after Virginians formally declared secession and war against the United States, on May 23, 1861.

Further, there's a long list of Secessionists' invasions/seizures of Union properties before Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861.
Secessionist illegally seized Union properties in Union states before those states declared secession in:

1. Georgia
2. Alabama
3. Florida
4. North Carolina
5. Louisiana
6. Arkansas
7. Oklahoma

So, clearly, Confederates cared nothing about legalities of the Union's "sovereign territory", even before they declared war on the United States, May 9, 1861.

Union Fort Pulaski, Savanah, Georgia, seized by secessionists two weeks before Georgia declared secession, January 1861.

[FLT-bird]

Name even one ship which you can prove "invaded South Carolina's sovereign territory"?

so you are claiming Lincoln did not send ships which invaded South Carolina's territorial waters?

And yet there was no "heavily armed fleet" threatening Charleston, there was only one small ship even there, a revenue cutter, the Harriet Lane and it threatened no Confederates in Charleston or anywhere else that day.

and yet there was a heavily armed fleet threatening Charleston as has already been outlined in this thread.

And so, we see, yet again, that under no circumstances can a dedicated propagandist like BroJoeK ever be forced to confess the truth, which even his own master, Lincoln Davis, readily admitted to his Naval commander that he wanted a war and even if both of his personal secretaries confirmed it.

FIFY

Lincoln's words -- three weeks later, on May 1, 1861 -- are clearly intended to console Capt. Fox over the failure of his mission to resupply Fort Sumter and to put the best face possible on it.

LOL! Pure BS. Console? He was jubilant as his letter clearly shows. He got the war he wanted.

The choice to start war at Fort Sumter was made by Lincoln when he sent a fleet of warships to invade South Carolina's territory.

FIFY

By Jefferson Davis' own words of April 3, he intended to start war at both Fort Sumter and Fort Pickens as soon as he felt ready, regardless of what Lincoln did or didn't do.

Davis was compelled to open fire to drive away the invasion fleet Lincoln sent.

Those are facts you chose to ignore because you loathe and despise the real truth.

Those are the actual facts which you refuse to admit because they run directly contrary to the lies and propaganda you are so desperate to push.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "The ships orders were sent to the Confederates, and they knew exactly what those ships orders said.
"If resisted, Use Entire Force..." and they looked at it as an attack, which is exactly how Lincoln wanted them to see it.
So yes.
WAR FLEET.
SENT TO ATTACK.
Proved."

No, you've proved nothing except that you love to lie straight-faced.

The truth is that Lincoln himself informed SC Gov. Pickens of his resupply mission to Fort Sumter, and that no force would be used unless it was resisted.
So Pickens and Davis had every opportunity to allow the resupply, and no force would be required or used on either side.

But that's not what Davis or Pickens wanted -- both wanted a showdown to force Ft. Sumter's surrender, and to spill enough blood to get Virginians off their fence sitting to vote for secession.

"There are the words of Virginian Roger Pryor, who, speaking to a Charleston audience on April 10, 1861, said,

"But I assure you that just as certain as tomorrow's sun will rise upon us, just so certain will Virginia be a member of the Southern Confederacy; and I will tell your Governor what will put her in the Southern Confederacy in less than an hour by Shrewsbury clock. Strike a blow!"

[Ibid.,_ p. 289] "That same day, Davis received a telegram from Louis T. Wigfall, urging,

"General Beauregard will not act without your order.
Let me suggest to you to send the order to him to begin the attack as soon as he is ready.
Virginia is excited by the preparations, and a bold stroke on our side will complete her purposes.
Policy and prudence are urgent upon us to begin at once."
[Wigfall to Davis, 10 Apr 1861, quoted in Richard N. Current, _Lincoln and the First Shot,_ p. 151]"

As Jefferson Davis himself confessed to CSA Gen. Bragg at Pensacola, FL:

"There would be to us an advantage in so placing them [Lincoln] that an attack by them [Lincoln] would be a necessity, but when we are ready to relieve our territory and jurisdiction of the presence of a foreign garrison [Fort Sumter] that advantage is overbalanced by other considerations.

The case of Pensacola [Ft. Pickens] then is reduced [to] the more palpable elements of a military problem and your measures may without disturbing views be directed to the capture of Fort Pickens and the defence of the harbor. You will soon have I hope a force sufficient to occupy all the points necessary for that end.
As many additional troops as may be required can be promptly furnished.'
[Jefferson Davis to Braxton Bragg, 3 Apr 1861]"

Davis intended to start Civil War at both Forts Sumter and Pickens regardless of what Lincoln did or didn't do.

So this whole argument is simply ridiculous and you guys 100% know the truth, but 100% refuse under all circumstances to confess it.

Why?

[x]

I don't take what Jefferson said as the objective truth, but his claim that South Carolina and Georgia had serious objections to the passage has the ring of truth. As for the rest of the state delegates, maybe they objected to the passage as such, or maybe the SC and GA delegates were so uncompromising in their objections that the other delegates felt they had to give in or risk losing those two states.

Jefferson's passage may have been regarded as too inflammatory and too likely to lose the revolution support even (or especially) in Jefferson's Virginia. Delegates may also have thought that blaming George III for slavery and the slave trade was going too far and ultimately nonsensical. Some might have disliked the implied threat to the slave trade in the passage, but there were many other possible grounds for objection.

And there were other changes presented to the draft. Maybe they were all presented together in an "omnibus" motion and people who had no objection to the slavery passage voted for the motion because it included other changes that they thought were important.

The Committee of the Five didn't take the condemnation of the slave trade out, but they may have toned it down a bit. Here is Jefferson's original "rough draught":

he has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating it's most sacred rights of life & liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating & carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither. this piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is the warfare of the CHRISTIAN king of Great Britain. determined to keep open a market where MEN should be bought & sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this execrable commerce: and that this assemblage of horrors might want no fact of distinguished die, he is now exciting those very people to rise in arms among us, and to purchase that liberty of which he has deprived them, & murdering the people upon whom he also obtruded them; thus paying off former crimes committed against the liberties of one people, with crimes which he urges them to commit against the lives of another.

That made slavery and the slave trade more prominent a part of the document than it was in the draft submitted by the Five. It would have opened up the Congress to bitter and counterproductive debates. The objections of Adams, Franklin, Livingston, and Sherman were likely to the language and prominence of the passage. Their objections weren't strong enough to have them entirely delete Jefferson's condemnation of the king for enslaving Africans.

Jefferson's verbiage put the blame on the king and his ministers. It didn't portray his fellow delegates or fellow colonists as bad people. The Founders didn't think of themselves in that way. Jefferson didn't think of himself that way either. The Founders were doing what they thought was right and focusing on what was necessary at the time, but they articulated a general principle that had other applications as well as the immediate one, and many went on to act on that principle in their own states.

Secessionists claimed that the Continental Congress didn't mean Africans or slaves when it asserted that men had a right to liberty. I'd say that the Founders were thinking of themselves, and they meant "us," the colonists, but the Declaration didn't explicitly exclude Africans or slaves. It articulated a general truth that was true for other peoples around the world and true for slaves at home.

Jefferson and the Continental Congress didn't have to invoke a universal principle to declare their independence. They could haver relied on their rights as British subjects, or specifically restricted rights to White, property owning, English-speakers, or explicitly excluded Blacks or slaves from having any rights. They didn't. They asserted a general principle and people would have to work out who it applied to.

[woodpusher]

As a politician and as president, Lincoln was a profound student of the Constitution and constitutional history.

The income tax became law during the Special Session of Congress that was called July 4, 1861. This unapportioned income tax was unconstitutional. Also established was the Internal Revenue Bureau, later renamed the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to enforce the then unconstitutional income tax.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commissioner_of_Internal_Revenue

The list of commissioners of the IRS shows the first commissioner as George S. Boutwell, whose term ran from July 17, 1862 to March 4, 1863.

https://emergingcivilwar.com/2021/07/27/us-government-financing-of-the-civil-war/

Personal Income Tax

The Revenue Act of 1861 was passed to increase import tariffs, property taxes, and for the first time, to levy a flat rate income tax of 3% on incomes above $800. Its drawback was that it lacked a comprehensive enforcement mechanism. Thaddeus Stevens, chairman of the House Committee of Ways and Means Committee, avowed, “This bill is a most unpleasant one. But we perceive no way in which we can avoid it and sustain the government. The rebels, who are now destroying or attempting to destroy this Government, have thrust upon the country many disagreeable things.”

In 1862, President Lincoln signed a law imposing a graduated income tax. The law levied a 3% tax on incomes between $600 and $10,000 and a 5% tax on higher incomes. The law was later amended in 1864; it levied a 5% tax on incomes between $600 and $5,000, a 7.5% tax on incomes in the $5,000-$10,000 range and a 10% tax on all higher incomes.

1861 saw the Revenue Act with an income tax. It was passed during the Special Session of Congress that began July 4, 1861. 1862 saw the first commissioner of the Internal Revenue Bureau take office to enforce the income tax.

H.R. 54, Inroduced July 16, 1861. Amended July 29, 1861. Became law as Act of August 5, 1861. 12 Stat. 292.

Income tax at Sections 49 and 50.

[Start of Act] https://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llsl&fileName=012/llsl012.db&recNum=323

[Sections 49 and 50] https://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llsl&fileName=012/llsl012.db&recNum=340

https://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llhb&fileName=037/llhb037.db&recNum=182

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES.
JULY 27, 1861.

Ordered to be printed.

AMENDMENT

Proposed by Mr. SIMMONS to the "bill (H. R. 54) to provide
increased revenue from imports, to pay interest on the public
debt, and for other purposes," viz: insert the following additional
sections.

1 SEC. 8. And be it further enacted, That from and after the
2 first day of January next there shall be levied, collected, and
3 paid, upon the annual income of every person residing in the
4 United States, whether such income is derived from any kind
5 of property, or from any profession, trade, employment, or voca-
6 tion carried on in the United States or elsewhere, or from any
7 other source whatever, if such annual income exceeds the
8 sum of one thousand dollars, a tax of five per centum on the
9 amount of such excess of such income above one thousand
10 dollars: Provided, That upon such portion of said income as
11 shall be derived from interest upon treasury notes or other
12 securities of the United States, there shall be levied, col-
13 lected, and paid a tax of two and one-half per centum.

14 Upon the income, rents, or dividends, accruing upon any prop-
15 erty, securities,- or stocks owned in the United States by any
16 citizen of the United States residing abroad, there shall be
17 levied, collected, and paid, a tax of seven and one-half per
18 contum, excepting that portion of said income derived from
19 interest on treasury notes and other securities of the govern-
20 ment of the United States, which shall pay two and one-half
21 per centum. The tax herein provided shall be assesed upon
22 the annual income of the persons herein named for the year
23 next preceding the time for assessing said tax, to wit: the
24 year next preceding the first of January, eighteen hundred
25 and sixty-two; and the said taxes, when so assessed and
26 made public, shall become a lien on the property or other
27 sources of said income for the amount of the same with the
28 interest and other expenses of collection until paid.

1 SEC. 9. And be it further enacted, That it shall be the
2 duty of the President of the" United States, and he is hereby
3 authorized, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate,
4 to appoint one principal assessor and one principal collector
5 in each of the States and Territories of the United States, to
6 assess and collect the taxes imposed by the first section of
7 this act, with authority in each of said officers to appoint so
8 many assistants as the public service may require, to be
9 approved by the Secretary of the Treasury.

[...]

[woodpusher]

As a politician and as president, Lincoln was a profound student of the Constitution and constitutional history.

Collected Works Vol. 1, pp. 438-439.

Lincoln on January 12, 1848 to Congress:

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,—a 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 much of the teritory as they inhabit. More than this, a majority of any portion of such people may revolutionize, putting down a minority, intermingled with, or near about them, who may oppose their movement. Such minority, was precisely the case, of the tories of our own revolution. It is a quality of revolutions not to go by old lines, or old laws; but to break up both, and make new ones.

Collected Works Vol. 4, pg. 162-163.

Gen. Duff Green. Springfield, Ill. Dec 28th 1860.

My dear Sir—I do not desire any amendment of the Constitution. Recognizing, however, that questions of such amendment rightfully belong to the American People, I should not feel justified, nor inclined, to withhold from them, if I could, a fair opportunity of expressing their will thereon, through either of the modes prescribed in the instrument.

In addition I declare that the maintainance inviolate of the rights of the States, and especially the right of each state to order and control its own domestic institutions according to its own judgment exclusively, is essential to that balance of powers on which the perfection, and endurance of our political fabric depends—and I denounce the lawless invasion, by armed force, of the soil of any State or Territory, no matter under what pretext, as the gravest of crimes.

I am greatly averse to writing anything for the public at this time; and I consent to the publication of this, only upon the condition that six of the twelve United States Senators for the States of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, and Texas shall sign their names to what is written on this sheet below my name, and allow the whole to be published together. Yours truly

A. LINCOLN.

We recommend to the people of the States we represent respectively, to suspend all action for dismemberment of the Union, at least, until some act, deemed to be violative of our rights, shall be done by the incoming administration.

[BroJoeK]

Regarding how Jefferson's anti-slavery text got deleted from the Declaration of Independence, DiogenesLamp argues it was Northerners, not Southerners, who deleted Jefferson's words:

DiogenesLamp: "Everyone but Jefferson. He was the *ONLY* Southerner on the committee...
Pretty hard sell when the Northerners are the majority and *THEY* are against what the Southerner wrote.
Clearly the vote was either 3/2 or 4/1, with the Northern majority voting to get rid of it."

Declaration Committee of Five: Franklin, Adams, Jefferson, Sherman & Livingston:

So, the issue here is whether Jefferson's anti-slavery text was deleted by the Declaration committee of five, or by the entire Congress of 56 delegates.
If it was deleted by the five committee members, then DiogenesLamp has to be correct that the others were all Northerners and so they must have voted against Jefferson's anti-slavery words.

However, that's not what history tells us.
Rather history says Jefferson's text was deleted by the entire Congress of 56 delegates:

"What is known is that the 33-year-old Jefferson, who composed the Declaration between June 11 and June 28, 1776, sent a rough draft to members of a pre-selected committee, including John Adams and Benjamin Franklin, for edits ahead of its presentation to Congress.
Between July 1 and July 3, congressional delegates debated the document, during which time they excised Jefferson’s anti-slavery clause."

So, apparently, Jefferson's words made it through the mostly Northern declaration committee, but were deleted during Congressional debate.
One way we know this for certain is from Jefferson himself:

"Decades later, in his autobiography, Jefferson primarily blamed two Southern states for the clause’s removal, while acknowledging the North’s role as well:

'The clause...reprobating the enslaving the inhabitants of Africa, was struck out in compliance to South Carolina and Georgia, who had never attempted to restrain the importation of slaves, and who on the contrary still wished to continue it.
Our Northern brethren also I believe felt a little tender under these censures; for tho' their people have very few slaves themselves, yet they had been pretty considerable carriers of them to others.' "

So, according to Jefferson himself, it was South Carolina and Georgia who insisted on deleting his anti-slavery words, with a slight acquiescence from some northern slave traders -- ahem... ahaw... Rhode Island?

Since important votes had to be unanimous, it only needed South Carolina and Georgia in opposition to delete Jefferson's anti-slavery text, with no need to force Northern delegates to put their mouths where their money was. 😉

56 delegates discussed and deleted Jefferson's anti-slavery text: