Posted on 03/20/2011 6:47:46 AM PDT by ml/nj
Just wondering what people might have to say about this.
Both would say they tried to preserve their union. Both employed military might to do so and killed lots of their own citizens.
ML/NJ
It was not their property to "reclaim".
Are you insinuating that that was a cause for Lincoln to initiate the invasions of Sumter and Pensacola, call up troops, and declare a blockade?
There was no "invasion" of Sumter and Pensacola - why would they need to invade properties that belonged to them?
That is truly farfetched(sic).
Many of your notion are...
Well fashioned logic, there.
Incorrect.
Most of the various military and federally occupied locations had originally belonged to the states, and in the case of Ft. Sumter, the State of South Carolina.
The actual fort was erected by the Federal Government under the Constitutional guarantee of protection from invasion.
In this regard, under the related article against "denial or disparagement" of the claims of any state, the Federal government had no more claim to the territory than some pecuniary interest in the materials of the Fort itself.
It is likewise guaranteed in Article IV, Section IV that the United States could only involve itself militarily within a state on application (and approval) of the State's legislature.
Once Major Anderson moved from Ft. Moultrie, he was involving his forces in the sovereign and independent actions of the State of South Carolina. The same was true in the event of the appearance of the "Star of the West" and the "Harriette Lane", both Federal warships attempting to interrupt the protected intercourse of the state of South Carolina.
As such, South Carolina was entirely within its rights as a sovereign state to order foreign aggressors from its borders, and to use whatever reasonable force was necessary in order to do so.
The fort and the ground it stands on was deeded to the federal government in perpetuity. It belongs to the federal government and it is up to the discretion of the federal government as to its determination, not the state.
What you do not acknowledge is that it was a "rabble rousing speech of interesting historical note" given by a highly eccentric politician who also happened to actively oppose secession throughout the entire process of his state and who had no role in the confederacy's formation until after Georgia seceded against his wishes, at which point he sided with her and altered his position to one espousing the new southern government.
To treat Alexander Stephens as some sort of rabid secessionist leader who held the key to the confederacy and all the movements that brought it about is an abusive and unhistorical telling of events to its very core.
"If you accept, as Lincoln did and I do, the DOI as the best expression of what it means to be an American, the Cornerstone Speech proclaimed a declaration of war by the CSA on the very concept of America.
That is the same type of self-righteous hyperbole that Stephens used in his speeches, and did nothing to restrain the outright venomous hostility that pushed the Union into war against the South.
I made no such claim, and I'm fully aware that Stephens, and for that matter Davis, opposed secession up to the point where it became inevitable. The true fire-eaters, such as Slidell and the Rhetts, were pretty much excluded from office in the CSA, the politicians being scared of their radicalism. Davis and Stephens were known as conservatives, in the southern tradition of the time, of course, which in my opinion is diamatrically opposed to true American conservatism.
Which actually adds to my point. Even those who were not originally in favor of secession accepted as a matter of course that slavery should be not only maintained but also extended, that it was a positive good. That human inequality should be the basis of society, not human equality. IOW, as I said, Stephens expressed the conventional wisdom of the South at the time.
If you disagree, feel free to point me towards the public speeches and editorials that disagreed with him at the time. I always appreciate being shown where I have misinterpreted history.
I have no problem with the 13th, nor do most of the people assumed to be on the side of the originator of this thread, but the snide assumption behind your comment points up your own bigotry against those who disagree with you.
The poorly defined word, “some,” was a poor choice on my part, but if we look at the mess that has flowed out of the 15th, I include that one, certainly. It was proposed - behind the cloak of human rights issues - for purely political reasons, to insure the continuation of the Republican power base in both the North and the South, just as the efforts to expand it have continued to be pushed in recent years by the Dems.
If we add to that amendment what can only be considered - by its original two page length, by its multiple sections, and by its multiple, often unrelated decrees - as several amendments rolled into one, the collection of crap that is the 14th certainly fulfills my statement no matter how you define “some.” The 14th was highly controversial even in its day; it was born of extra-Constitutional maneuvering, and it has been used since inception with enormous damage by those who would destroy this constitutional republic.
The motives behind, and the details of these amendments do not paint a very noble picture of the victors in our Civil War. Coupled with the cruelties inflicted unnecessarily by the North upon the soldiers and the non-combatants of the South - both during and after the war - it is not hard to understand why this war continues to resonate with a large part of our country. I have relatives that fought prominently on both sides, and I grew up in both Maryland and Virginia where that history is still kept alive on both sides. I am not upset, as you assume, with the official ending of slavery as a by-product of that conflict, but in the main I side with the South, and I have little affection for those from the North - either of that era, or of any generation since.
“The points in post 120? What points?”
Well let me help you out, BigOaf:
The Progressive Party was formed in 1912 out of a split in the Republican Party, contrary to this gem of ignorance posted up thread:
“The Confederacy, the Progressive movement, the People’s party, the KKK, were ALL democrat created and run”
As for the “People’s party”, the Populist Party, it had nothing at all to do with the Confederacy, despite what your Illustrated History of Late 19th Century Politics says between all the neat cartoon drawings. It was an agrarian movement formed in reaction to the prolonged deflation in agriculture prices, and it culminated in the Free Silver movement.
It’s greatest strength was in the Great Plains and the Southwest, which aren’t the old Confederacy, but perhaps maps aren’t your forte. The Populists did manage to elect a Republican governor in North Carolina, and when they joined forces with the Democrats in the 1890s they nominated William Jennings Bryan, late of Illinois and Nebraska, for President. Perhaps you labor under the impression that Illinois and Nebraska were part of the Confederacy, but alas they weren’t.
And then we had this curious claim of yours:
““Wilson the first democrat President after the Civil war filled much of cabinet with Confederate democrats””
I listed a few members of Wilson’s cabinet: McAdoo at Treasury, McReynolds Attorney General, Garrison War Dept, Wilson at Labor, and asked you which of these were ‘Confederate Democrats’, seeing as they hailed from New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. I could have added Bryan at State who was from Nebraska.
Somehow you neglected to point out which of these fine yankees were secret Confederates. Perhaps you were just being coy. Or maybe these weren’t the guilty parties. Well don’t be shy, Iffy, tell us who the Confederates filling Wilson’s cabinet were. Inquiring minds want to know.
And as for this BigIffy gem, “ Wilson the first democrat President after the Civil war”, well once again the first Democratic President after the Civil War was Grover Cleveland not Woodrow Wilson, and old Grover was a pro-business Bourbon Democrat. Cleveland’s advocacy of the gold standard was one of the reasons the People’s Party formed to run against both the Democrats and the Republicans, the populists believing that both major parties were tools of the big bankers.
So those are a most of the points, Iffy. I also mentioned the enthusiasm Karl Marx and Frederick Engels expressed for Lincoln and Union cause, which those two gents regarded as the vanguard of the Revolution back in the day. Now it’s likely that Abe didn’t pay any attention to the two proto-communists, but they certainly believed he was a fellow Progressive.
So I hope that clears up “what points”, BigGuy. If not, well that invincible ignorance stuff is hard to overcome, that’s why they call it invincible. You may just have to live with it.
William Gibbs McAdoo was born in Georgia and educated in Tennesee. His uncle was a Confederate General out of Texas. McAdoo's law partner in New York was the son of John C. Pemberton, another Confederate General. McAdoo gave contributions to Confederate veterans groups and married Wilson's daughter. Generally a progressive, he won KKK support in his 1924 race for the Democratic nomination against Al Smith, a Catholic.
James Clark McReynolds was born in Kentucky and educated in Tennessee. Like McAdoo he lived and practiced in New York, but his roots were Southern. FWIW McReynolds, who Wilson later appointed to the Supreme Court was what used to be called a "colorful character" but is now described with other words:
McReynolds would not accept "Jews, drinkers, blacks, women, smokers, married or engaged individuals as law clerks". A blatant anti-Semite, "Time [magazine] called him 'Puritanical', 'intolerably rude', 'savagely sarcastic', 'incredibly reactionary', and 'anti-Semitic'". McReynolds refused to speak to Louis Brandeis, the first Jew on the Court, for three years following Brandeis's appointment and, when Brandeis retired in 1939, did not sign the customary dedicatory letter sent to justices on their retirement. He habitually left the conference room whenever Brandeis spoke. When Benjamin Cardozo's appointment was being pressed on President Herbert C. Hoover, McReynolds joined with fellow justices Butler and Van Devanter in urging the White House not to "afflict the Court with another Jew". When news of Cardozo's appointment was announced, McReynolds is claimed to have said "Huh, it seems that the only way you can get on the Supreme Court these days is to be either the son of a criminal or a Jew, or both." During Cardozo's swearing-in ceremony, McReynolds pointedly read a newspaper, and would often hold a brief or record in front of his face when Cardozo delivered an opinion from the bench. Likewise, he refused to sign opinions authored by Brandeis. Wikipedia
Must have been the New Yorker in him. There were a lot of Southerners who'd moved up to New York and voted Democrat. They were one important group the party could count on for contributions and talent.
Wilson's Secretary of the Navy, Josephus Daniels, was from North Carolina. His Postmaster General, Albert Sidney Burleson, was from Texas He was the son of a Confederate officer and was named after a Confederate General. Wilson's Secretary of Agriculture, David F. Houston, another Texan, was born in North Carolina and educated in South Carolina. He established his academic credentials by writing A Critical Study of Nullification in South Carolina (1896). Wilson's closest associate -- for a time (he seemed to fall out with all his friends) was yet another Texan, Edward M. House.
If what you're arguing about is whether Southerners and Southerners alone, Democrats and Democrats alone, were behind the development of modern American liberalism or progressivism, the answer is no. There were enough Northern Democrats as well as Progressive Northern Republicans. Even among Wilson's appointees and supporters, Southerners probably weren't a majority. And among the progressives of his day, plenty had Northern or Republican roots.
If you're arguing about whether Northerners and only Northerners were responsible for today's liberalism or progressivism the answer is also no. There were enough Southerners and Border Staters like Wilson, Truman, Johnson, and Clinton who made contributions to the liberal side in American politics.
The answer is bound to be more complicated. But since many people today tend to believe that Southerners or Confederates or former Confederates or the sons of Confederate veterans were always conservative, it doesn't hurt to point out that this wasn't always the case.
Even in the 1950s and 60s, the absolute biggest porkers in congress were the New Deal Southern Democrats. The supported every big government program that came down the pike, especially if the could get a piece of the action.
Southern Democrat committee chairmen really brought home the pork for their states. Bob Byrd was a survivor of that era.
FWIW, I may have been too cautious in my last post. In the three-way race of 1912 Wilson got 60, 70, 80, 90 percent in the Deep South states and 30 or 40 percent in the Northern states he carried. In 1916 he lost most of the North and carried all the South. Northern states had more people in those days, but it's entirely possible that a majority of Wilson's vote in 1912 came from Southerners. Of course many of the Northerners who voted against him were progressives themselves, but there were reasons why many considered the Virginia-born Wilson a Southern President.
This thread is about Lincoln personally, not the civil war in its entirety. Of the three Civil War Amendments Lincoln was only involved with the 13th, which he guided through Congress. He was assassinated during the ratification process.
‘The United States Congress proposed the Fourteenth Amendment on June 13, 1866’-wiki, so Lincoln had nothing to do with it or the 15th Amendment. Criticism of the 14th and 15th Amendments would be off topic on a Lincoln thread.
Well, that’s a feeble retort, since the thread had morphed into much more than just a referendum on Lincoln long before I joined the fray. But nice try.
Others made reference to some of Mr. Lincoln’s more questionable attributes and motives elsewhere in the thread - you might want to go back and read those posts if Mr. Lincoln, isolated from the sweep of history all around him, is your interest.
Sorry, my application for membership in the John Wilkes Booth society was declined.
Well some of the answers you were looking for are already answered before I could respond but I’ll add a little anyway.
The People’s Populist party origniated with the ‘Farmers Alliance’ (a Confederate democrat movement) and swept largely through the Confederate South and was not conservative at all. They held many views that democrats still hold today.
Just as the Confederate democrats needed enemies based upon class warfare to define their political ideology so did the People’s party and do the Progressives. The system is always unfair to all three groups of malcontents.
It was in large part the popularity of the People’s party and populism that helped get Wilson elected. They then of course combined with the democrat progressive movement.
To try and hang your hat on the fact that these movements had influence over both parties when beginning is very weak because it is well known which party championed the progressive movement and the socialist mindset of todays democrat party. That was my claim and it is correct. It was the democrats and Woodrow Wilson which was the face of this movement. The first Southern democrat President since the Civil War.
Woodrow (Tommy) Wilson’s father (Joseph) served in the Confederate Army. Woodrow’s allegiance to the Confederacy was also what fixed his allegiance to the democrat party. (pg 24) Wilson while schooling in Virginia wrote an essay titled ‘Stray thoughts from the South’ whereas he condemned Reconstruction (just as all Lost Causers do) and lamented the South not fulfilling its natural destiny. (pg 37) When beginning his law practice in Atlanta, at a time when Atlanta was unofficially considered the capital of the ‘New South’ Wilson is quoted as identifying himself as a member of “that younger generation of Southern men who are just now coming to years of influence … [who are] full of the progressive spirit. (pg 38)
There are many articles that can be found that talk about Wilson’s southern Confederate democrat appointments. Here is one that even mentions how thrilled the South Confederate demcorats were. They celebrated and even played Dixie. And as is mentioned above he won all of the Confederate states.
http://reason.com/archives/2002/12/18/dixiecrats-triumphant
Wilson even with his northern stay used to speak at the Southern Society of New York (expatriates of the South where Wilson often spoke)and had his alliegances to the Confederate South.
Here is a Quotation from Woodrow Wilson’s History of the American People as reproduced in the film The Birth of a Nation.
“The white men were roused by a mere instinct of self-preservation ... until at last there had sprung into existence a great Ku Klux Klan, a veritable empire of the South, to protect the Southern country.”
Notice it does not say the North but the South. “The Southern Country” even. Woodrow Wilson showed this film in the White House.
To try and claim that it was the Republican pary of the time that ushered in the Progressive movement is either pure ignorance or pure propaganda.
Wilson was a Confederate at heart. He was also of the same party. He was also supported by the Confederate democrats. And the Confederates were always malcontents just as the democrat progresives are today and history shows that. He also was the grandfather of the Progressive movement as we know it.
And I know I need to learn to format better. I had a picture to post even but it was playing games with the format of my post. My spelling and typing could use some work as well. Sorry to all. Hopefully I get the time to read through the ‘html’ threads and tidy up my future posts abit.
Yep. Back in those day, every committee in congress was controlled by democrats, and most of them congresscritters for life from southern states. They had the seniority. There was no competition in the south then. It was 'The Solid South" a one-party state --- solid Democrats and FDRs backbone through the 30s and 40s. They paved the way from the Wilson era all the way to the 1960s in putting an ever bigger federal machine in place --- as long as they got their piece of the action, and they got plenty of it.
They ran the show. If you wanted anything done, you had to bribe them, and they were always willing to accept the right offer. The Constitution??? They really didn't give a s***, unless it came to a supposed 'state right' to treat blacks like they were still slaves.
No doubt. The deep South put the SOB in office.
1912 Election
Results by county explicitly indicating the percentage of the winning candidate in each county. Shades of blue are for Woodrow Wilson, shades of red are for William Taft, shades of green are for Theodore Roosevelt, and shades of yellow are for Eugene Debs. Grey indicates counties with no information or results.
1916 Election
Results by county explicitly indicating the percentage of the winning candidate in each county. Shades of blue are for Woodrow Wilson, shades of red are for Charles Hughes, and shades of green are for no candidate. Grey indicates counties with no information or results.
“‘Farmers Alliance’ (a Confederate democrat movement)”
You have zero evidence that the Farmer’s Alliance, founded had any connection to the Confederacy. Because there is no such evidence. It was an agrarian movement like the Grange, which formed in the same era, as did the Colored Farmer’s Alliance.
You just keep parroting your theory that anything organized in the south after the Civil War was “Confederate Democrat”, a case of post hoc ergo propter hoc stupidity.
“because it is well known which party championed the progressive movement and the socialist mindset of todays democrat party. That was my claim and it is correct. It was the democrats and Woodrow Wilson which was the face of this movement. “
Apparently it isn’t well known by you, which is why you keep repeating the same misinformation. Of course you do have an agenda, and facts inconvenient to your story have a way of getting ignored.
The Progressive Party ran a candidate in 1912, the same year that Woodrow Wilson first ran for President. The face of the movement was its Presidential candidate, Teddy Roosevelt, the former Republican President.
” It was the democrats and Woodrow Wilson which was the face of this movement. The first Southern democrat President since the Civil War.”
I like the how you have modified your story now so that Wilson is the “first ‘Southern Democrat’ President since the Civil War”. I guess it didn’t work out so well when you had him being the “first ‘Democrat’ President since the Civil War”. That’s a good start for you; eventually you may just modify your entire story to fit the evidence, after the facts have bludgeoned you sufficiently.
“Woodrow (Tommy) Wilson’s father (Joseph) served in the Confederate Army. Woodrow’s allegiance to the Confederacy was also what fixed his allegiance to the democrat party.”
Whereas Teddy Roosevelt’s mother, Mitty Bulloch, was raised in Roswell Georgia, and both of Teddy’s maternal uncles fought in the Confederate Army.
Funny how family influence is determinate in the one case but not in other, isn’t it? It’s just more of your special pleading and sloppy logic. And you somehow omit Woodrow Wilson’s career as the President of Princeton University and Governor of New Jersey. Because that information doesn’t fit the tale you want to tell.
“There are many articles that can be found that talk about Wilson’s southern Confederate democrat appointments”
And yet despite those many articles, you haven’t managed to name even one. Whereas I found names for five of Wilson’s Cabinet appointees. And it turns out that not even one was from the South. Why do you suppose you can’t turn up the names of those ‘southern Confederate Democrat’ appointments? Maybe they were too old to have names? The Civil War had ended 47 years before Wilson took office.
“To try and claim that it was the Republican pary of the time that ushered in the Progressive movement is either pure ignorance or pure propaganda.”
Teddy Roosevelt. Thomas Kearns. Hiram Johnson. Robert La Follete. Republicans all, a President, a California Governor, and two US Senators. How’s that pure ignorance working out for you, BigOaf?
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