Actually, there were two Union troops killed at Fort Sumter, Privates Hough and Galloway, when ammunition exploded during the surrender ceremony. Four others were seriously wounded. As an accident, and by their own side. I have long wondered whether or not that accidental explosion was a Godsend for Lincoln, because I'm not certain he would have been able to rally the North to the cause were he not able to say any men had died. Bloodshed will move passions faster than damage to property.
First of all, the Brits, not our Founders, started the Revolutionary War, more than a year before our Declaration of Independence. Indeed, it was the British-started war which convinced many colonists that Independence was the only solution.
And that is in some dispute. What the British were doing was perfectly within their legal mandate at the time. Their is no legal or moral difference between the British Marching to Lexington than there was for the garrison at Ft. Sumter to maintain their posts.
The British saw those cities as falling under their legal authority, and the colonists disagreed, and there are reports that the colonists fired first.
Whether or not this is true, it cannot be denied that if the colonists hadn't assembled armed and en masse to confront the British, a war would not have started there.
As you said about the confederates, the colonists were "crusin' for a brusin' ."
In short, the Confederacy presented an existential military threat to the Unite States, which had to be defeated for the USA to survive.
If this were the criteria, then we should have attacked the Canadians long before. They and the British had came down and burned our Capital once already. I dare say they had demonstrated themselves to be as much or more of a threat than had the Confederates.
Finally, all talk about, if the "Union murdered every person in the South," is utterly, patently ridiculous. The fact is that most soldiers on both sides were good Christian men, kept under effective control by their leaders, and so the American Civil War is therefore comparable to none other in all of history. In contrast to most every other war, massacres were few and civilian deaths minimal to non-existent.
That it didn't happen is not the point. That the argument offered above would justify such a result, *IS* the point. I used that example as a way of demonstrating the falsity of such a claim, "that whatever happened, the South deserved it." No, there are limits to what a group of people deserves, and it isn't open ended.
So here's the bottom line: Lincoln waited patiently until the Confederacy had fully provoked, started and declared war on the United States before he sent any Union forces to battle any Confederates anywhere.
That is merely a reiteration of your opinion, and does not constitute objective proof.
No, in this particular case, our alleged "victim" carried a gun, began shooting at and demanding assets from the "perpetrator", and indeed, never stopped shooting for four long years.
You aren't grasping this analogy stuff. If the Union is like a Husband, and the South is like a wife, than a non bloodshed causing attack on Ft. Sumter is the equivalent of the wife throwing a plate at the husband and missing, or perhaps slapping his hand when he touched her. The "injury" to the union is inconsequential and of no real importance, but the Humiliation was grave.
The Union response would be similar to a Husband repeatedly punching and beating the wife to unconsciousness. Again, he wasn't hurt, but for his pride.
You are drawing a conclusion from an array of contrary facts. No one *was* killed. 24 hours of bombardment consisting of something like 4,000 shells, and no one was killed? How do you do that if you are trying to kill someone? A man can easily aim to the side if your intent is to scare, but you cannot miss that many times if your intent is to kill.
Ridiculous, because slavery was lawful in every colony in 1775. So, slavery was not an issue between the states in 1776, though it was already a question within some Northern States, which began moving to outlaw it. Even some Southern leaders, like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, recognized slavery as morally wrong and indefensible.
And yet both continued to own slaves for the rest of their lives. Nothing better illustrates that they had no intention of applying the principles of the Declaration of Independence universally. Their behavior demonstrates conclusively that they intended for those ideas to only apply to the communities of which they were a part, and not to slaves, though they eventually noticed their own hypocrisy in this regard, but their own moral proddings never became sufficient to provoke them to act against their own interests.
Slavery only became an issue between states many years later, when Southern slavery's enormous profitability became clear, and Southern states insisted every measure possible be taken to protect it.
It is entirely consistent with human nature to protect the source of one's income. I'm sure the Northeastern ship building industry would have objected if the manufacture of ships was seriously being considered for prohibition by law. Raising taxes on Imports and Exports would have no doubt been opposed by Boston and New York.
It would appear that many northern states were okay with slavery until it eventually became unprofitable for them, and they could then afford the morality of condemning that which no longer served their interests.
A similar thing is going on nowadays with the Jet Setting rich objecting to the use of carbon fuels by the rest of the population.
Slavery was evil, and it would have been better to have never let it get started on this continent, but having done so, it was not reasonable to object to it after you had reaped the profit from it, merely because others continued to do so, especially since they had fewer still other methods for producing an income.
Indeed, that is the Big Lie perpetrated by all Lost Causers against historical facts & reason. The truth of the matter is the opposite: the issue which caused Civil War was not slavery, was not secession, was not even the forming of a new Confederacy.
The big lie is the constant distraction from the point that by the standards of this nation's founding, the forming of a new government to suit them was well within their rights.
You and others simply want the discussion focused anywhere but on this essential point; That populations have a right to self determination, that in the words of the Declaration of Independence:
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.
Of course you don't want to discuss this point, because you do not have a moral leg to stand on when this point is put forth.
More total b*ll sh*t. The fact is that former Confederate states were in total 100% support of such Liberal "Progressives" as Presidents Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt & Democrat candidate Adlai Stevenson (!).
You are making an ex post facto argument. This is no evidence that an alternative timeline of Southern independence would have been socialistic at all.
That Southern states would try to use the machinery created by Lincoln to benefit their own interests does not surprise me at all. That is just basic human nature. It is just a case of "When in Rome you do as the Roman's do."
And where was "Presidents Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt & Democrat candidate Adlai Stevenson" from? If you guessed New Jersey, New York, and Illinois, then you can go to the head of the class. They were all Northerners pushing Fedzilla policies which Lincoln pioneered.
Three Southern Northern "heros":
Having much of their industry and population wrecked by the civil war, it is no surprise that much of the south saw nothing wrong with getting money from any source they could. That's just human nature.
DiogenesLamp on Union deaths at Fort Sumter:
"As an accident, and by their own side.
I have long wondered whether or not that accidental explosion was a Godsend for Lincoln, because I'm not certain he would have been able to rally the North to the cause were he not able to say any men had died.
Bloodshed will move passions faster than damage to property." In fact, Lincoln's response to Fort Sumter said nothing specific about it, but called for 75,000 troops to
"re-possess the forts, places, and property which have been seized from the Union; and in every event, the utmost care will be observed, consistently with the objects aforesaid, to avoid any devastation, any destruction of, or interference with, property, or any disturbance of peaceful citizens in any part of the country."
This at a time when the entire US Army totaled around 16,000 troops.
The Confederate response to Lincoln was to formally declare war, and increase their Army from 100,000 to 500,000 troops.
DiogenesLamp on 1775 British moves at Lexington: "And that is in some dispute.
What the British were doing was perfectly within their legal mandate at the time.
Their is no legal or moral difference between the British Marching to Lexington than there was for the garrison at Ft. Sumter to maintain their posts."
Sorry, but every British action in Massachusetts became illegal and illegitimate on May 20, 1774, when Parliament unilaterally revoked its 83 year-old, 1691 Massachusetts Charter, and imposed dictatorial government.
At that point Massachusetts citizens had every right to continue governing themselves under their original constitution, including a long-established militia, and so they did.
Similarly, in 1860 the Confederacy unilaterally revoked its 84 year-old compact, the US Constitution, and attempted to impose military rule over Union property.
DiogenesLamp: "The British saw those cities as falling under their legal authority, and the colonists disagreed, and there are reports that the colonists fired first."
Brits lost their legal legitimacy when they unilaterally revoked the 83 year-old compact with Massachusetts colonists.
So their military actions in assaulting Lexington & Concord represented a foreign invasion, which colonists had every duty to resist.
Similarly, Confederates lost their legal legitimacy when they unilaterally revoked the 84 year-old compact with the United States -- the Constitution.
So Confederate military actions in assaulting many Federal forts & other properties represented rebellion, insurrection, domestic violence, etc., which the Union had a duty to resist.
DiogenesLamp: "...it cannot be denied that if the colonists hadn't assembled armed and en masse to confront the British, a war would not have started there."
Of course it can be, because that war began with British military actions against legitimate colonial government & militia, whether colonists chose to resist aggression or not.
Like Confederates in 1861, Brits revoked their compact, and started war with us.
In the same way, Confederates were at war against the Union from the beginning, in December 1860, when they started seizing Federal properties, threatening and firing at Union officials.
The fact that for six months the Union did not respond militarily does not negate the Confederacy's war.
For comparison, consider that WWII did not begin for the US when Congress declared war on Japan, but rather, according to President Roosevelt, when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.
DL quoting BJK: "In short, the Confederacy presented an existential military threat to the Unite States, which had to be defeated for the USA to survive."
DiogenesLamp: "If this were the criteria, then we should have attacked the Canadians long before.
They and the British had came down and burned our Capital once already.
I dare say they had demonstrated themselves to be as much or more of a threat than had the Confederates."
That's more than ridiculous, it's laughable.
In 1812 the United States seriously and officially declared war on Brits, then immediately invaded Canada, wrecking havoc and burning down its capital, Toronto, in 1813.
In response, Brits burned down our capital, Washington DC, and assaulted Baltimore, after which we learned that our Star Spangled Banner still waves, o'r the land of the Free and the home of the Brave!
The end result was a peace treaty which amounted to nothing more than each side saying, "Oh, well, sorry about that, old chap."
Unlike Confederates, friendly Canadians never tried to take states or territories away from us, and that despite our ambitions against them!
Contrast: in 1861 the Confederacy seriously and officially declared war on the United States, sending its forces into Union states & territories, wrecking havoc and even burning down some cities.
In response the United States defeated & destroyed the Confederacy, then allowing those states to again elect representatives to Congress.
DiogenesLamp referring to lack of major atrocities in US Civil War: "That it didn't happen is not the point.
That the argument offered above would justify such a result, *IS* the point.
I used that example as a way of demonstrating the falsity of such a claim, 'that whatever happened, the South deserved it.'
No, there are limits to what a group of people deserves, and it isn't open ended."
Obviously, you're confusing me with someone else.
I never made such a claim, indeed I've never seen such a crude claim made on these threads.
But certainly what the Confederate South did deserve, as the Constitution guarantees them, was total defeat of the military force which first provoked, then started and formally declared war on the United States, sending military aid to Confederates in Union states and territories.
Once the Confederacy was destroyed, those states were again allowed to elect and send representatives to Congress.
DiogenesLamp: "That is merely a reiteration of your opinion, and does not constitute objective proof."
No no, no "opinion" to it, just the facts, sir, which bear repeating:
"Lincoln waited patiently until the Confederacy had fully provoked, started and declared war on the United States before he sent any Union forces to battle any Confederates anywhere."
Of course, you
may not like the facts, but they are facts nonetheless.
DiogenesLamp: "You aren't grasping this analogy stuff.
If the Union is like a Husband, and the South is like a wife, than a non bloodshed causing attack on Ft. Sumter is the equivalent of the wife throwing a plate at the husband and missing, or perhaps slapping his hand when he touched her.
The "injury" to the union is inconsequential and of no real importance, but the Humiliation was grave."
Sorry sir, but it's not me who's confused, it's you.
Your stupid analogy only works if we say the "Husband" one day arrived near home and the "Wife" began shooting at him from a window, taking possession of not just one house, but every house in the neighborhood, and demanding all other common property suddenly belonged to her -- no lawful divorce, no negotiated settlement, what's hers was hers, what's his negotiable.
The "Wife" next rounds up her family and physically assaults every joint property they can reach, including some far removed from her home town (i.e., Missouri, Maryland, Kentucky).
At first, for months, the "Husband" does nothing -- too shocked to respond.
Finally he figures out that he's facing a deadly military threat, too large for normal courts & police to deal with, so he gathers up his family, and retakes what the "Wife" stole.
DiogenesLamp: "The Union response would be similar to a Husband repeatedly punching and beating the wife to unconsciousness.
Again, he wasn't hurt, but for his pride."
Sorry sir, but all that "punching and beating" began with the "Wife's" army assaulting Federal properties, firing on Union officials and formally declaring war on the United States.
You know, we don't do "declarations of war" so much these days, but they used to be pretty serious matters, and when the Confederacy declared war on the United States, on May 6, 1861 they also increased their Army from 100,000 to 500,000 troops.
At the time, the Union Army was a scattered 16,000 requested by Lincoln to increase to 90,000.
So, the Confederacy expected and prepared for a major war, which they intended to win, quickly.
And all this happened before a single Confederate soldier was killed in battle with any Union force, and before any Union Army invaded a single Confederate state.
DiogenesLamp: "You are drawing a conclusion from an array of contrary facts.
No one *was* killed.
24 hours of bombardment consisting of something like 4,000 shells, and no one was killed?
How do you do that if you are trying to kill someone?
A man can easily aim to the side if your intent is to scare, but you cannot miss that many times if your intent is to kill."
Seriously, here you are endlessly making ridiculous arguments without knowing any historical facts, what's up with that?
The reason nobody was killed in Fort Sumter is not that all 4,000 (or whatever) rounds fired at it missed, they didn't.
The reason was that Major Anderson, Sumter's commander, kept his forces well protected, down in the fortress' basement.
And that's the same tactic Confederates in Fort Sumter used for years to prevent Union forces from retaking it.
Really, sir, you need to crack a book or two and learn something before you go around broadcasting blithering nonsense!
DiogenesLamp speaking of Washington & Jefferson: "And yet both continued to own slaves for the rest of their lives.
Nothing better illustrates that they had no intention of applying the principles of the Declaration of Independence universally.
Their behavior demonstrates conclusively that they intended for those ideas to only apply to the communities of which they were a part, and not to slaves, though they eventually noticed their own hypocrisy in this regard, but their own moral proddings never became sufficient to provoke them to act against their own interests."
No, in fact, both Washington and Jefferson acknowledged in word and deed that slavery was incompatible with American ideals.
Washington said that if faced with a choice between slavery and Union, he would chose Union, and did finally free his own slaves.
Jefferson made efforts to find peaceful ways for gradually abolishing slavery in the South, by plans to purchase freedom and support colonies in Africa for them.
He also outlawed future importations of slaves, in 1807.
So, both Virginia-born presidents considered slavery, at best, a necessary evil and one which should be gradually eradicated.
But theirs was the last generation of Southern leaders to feel that way -- after them came generations which believed slavery not only necessary, but morally justifiable, sanctioned by the Bible, and certainly not, under any circumstances to be abolished.
Indeed, it came to be understood that slavery must constantly expand to remain highly profitable, and that was the immediate issue of the 1860 election.
DiogenesLamp: "Raising taxes on Imports and Exports would have no doubt been opposed by Boston and New York."
Again, you don't know your history, sir.
In fact, increased tariffs were not always supported by all Northerners, and not always opposed by all Southerners, and visa versa.
Then as now the US political map was highly complex and not always predictable -- hence, for example, we find Vice President Calhoun from South Carolina sponsoring what came to called, "the tariff of abominations".
DiogenesLamp: "It would appear that many northern states were okay with slavery until it eventually became unprofitable for them, and they could then afford the morality of condemning that which no longer served their interests."
No, that's a false accusation.
In fact, the abolitionist movement in the North began as early 1775 (in Pennsylvania) and slowly, gradually outlawed slavery beginning in 1777 (Vermont), for reasons having nothing to do with economics and everything with moral principles.
Abolition was gradual, and by 1860 there were still a few hundred old slaves in New Jersey, a few dozen in New York, and possibly a few others here or there.
DiogenesLamp: "Slavery was evil, and it would have been better to have never let it get started on this continent, but having done so, it was not reasonable to object to it after you had reaped the profit from it, merely because others continued to do so, especially since they had fewer still other methods for producing an income."
Once again, sir, you don't know your history.
In fact very few Northerners in 1860, and no major politician -- none -- proposed abolishing slavery in the South.
The election issue was whether slavery should be expanded first into western territories and eventually (i.e., Dred Scott) into every state of the Union.
Northerners said, resoundingly, NO!
So Southern Fire Eaters said: We secede!
DiogenesLamp: "The big lie is the constant distraction from the point that by the standards of this nation's founding, the forming of a new government to suit them was well within their rights."
But by no standard, by any people at any time in human history, is a formal declaration of war against the United States to be treated as some kind of "right".
THAT'S the Big Lie you pro-Confederates constantly tell.
Nor does any law anywhere in the known-Universe allow unilateral unprovoked abrogation of national compacts.
Indeed, by definition, compacts which do allow such abrogations are not classified as "nations".
DiogenesLamp: "You and others simply want the discussion focused anywhere but on this essential point; That populations have a right to self determination, that in the words of the Declaration of Independence..."
But that is NOT the point, never was, never will be, all your Big Lies to the contrary notwithstanding.
No, our Founders considered that their national-compact was a contract which could not be unilaterally abrogated unless by "mutual consent" (Congress) or through material breech ("oppression"), and neither condition existed in 1860.
Regardless, I'll repeat the facts that: declarations of secession did not cause Civil War, formation of a Confederacy did not start Civil War, but the Confederacy's military assault of Union military troops at Fort Sumter, followed by Confederates' formal declaration of war on the United States -- those did launch Civil War.
DiogenesLamp: "Of course you don't want to discuss this point, because you do not have a moral leg to stand on when this point is put forth."
But of course I do, because all you're doing is blathering endless nonsense, sir.
DiogenesLamp: "And where was "Presidents Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt & Democrat candidate Adlai Stevenson" from? If you guessed New Jersey, New York, and Illinois..."
Actually, Wilson was a racist-Virginian, but here is the important point: no section of the country -- East, North or West -- ever voted more strongly & consistently for any candidates than the Solid Deep South voted for generations of Progressive-Liberal Democrats, including Wilson, FDR and even Illinoisan Adlai Stevenson!
Southern Democrats didn't care a whit for protecting conservative political values, just so long as they got "their share" from the Federal redistribution trough!
Democrat Wilson (blue) elected in 1912, by county:
Democrat FDR (blue) elected in 1932, by county:
Republican Eisenhower (red) elected in 1952 (Democrat Adlai Stevenson in blue!):
