George Washington and the rest would disagree with you.
Posted on 08/11/2015 1:11:21 PM PDT by iowamark
What caused the Civil War? That seems like the sort of simple, straightforward question that any elementary school child should be able to answer. Yet many Americans—including, mostly, my fellow Southerners—claim that that the cause was economic or state’s rights or just about anything other than slavery.
But slavery was indisputably the primary cause, explains Colonel Ty Seidule, Professor of History at the United States Military Academy at West Point.
The abolition of slavery was the single greatest act of liberty-promotion in the history of America. Because of that fact, it’s natural for people who love freedom, love tradition, and love the South to want to believe that the continued enslavement of our neighbors could not have possibly been the motivation for succession. But we should love truth even more than liberty and heritage, which is why we should not only acknowledge the truth about the cause of the war but be thankful that the Confederacy lost and that freedom won.
(Excerpt) Read more at blog.acton.org ...
Thanks so much for your link to the “Union of Crowns”. Notice the words, such as, “Crown”, “Kingdom”, “Monarch”, “Sovereign”, “King”, “Queen” (well, you get the idea. I hope). Certainly you are not suggesting that our colonies where a sovereign kingdom and an equal partner of the “Union of Crowns”. You insist on making parallels between our declaring independence from a Monarchy (as colonies) to the Southern States seceding from a Union that was formed by the ideas and thoughts of free men. No comparison there, man. And CERTAINLY no comparison between the “Union of Crowns” and the Union of States!
Union law did not obligate anyone to do such a thing.
They were tested by history and lost.
They were tested by an overwhelmingly powerful and intractable Monarch, and they lost. Do you mock the Poles for losing to Hitler? Were they tested by history and lost?
The 13 Colonies was a winning idea. The Confederacy was a losing idea.
They were the same idea, and you are right, but not for the reasons you think. The bludgeoning of the Confederacy was the loss of that Idea put forth in 1776 which was called "Independence" and "Consent of the Governed."
History found the secessionists to be losers and unworthy. It tossed them onto the dungheap and that's where they will remain.
You presume to speak for History, but History speaks eloquently enough for itself. By your standards, the French, the Czechs, the Poles and the Dutch were all "losers and unworthy", because they were defeated by a massively superior military force.
I don't consider the Nazi's claim to power to be a worthy argument.
That the Confederacy may have done something hypocritical does not justify the Union doing something hypocritical, especially when you consider the disparate scale involved.
Was Alabama founded on the principle that Counties have a right to leave the state? I know the Union was.
I and others have long argued what constitutes a "critical mass" sufficient to assert independence. My standard answer is that the population of the 13 colonies is axiomatically enough, else we would not be a nation.
Given that the population of the Southern States was more than three times that number, I deem them as having had sufficient population to subsequently assert the same right as did the original thirteen colonies.
Slaveholders, people who kept children as captives, are scum. They have no rights. ;-)
Yeah, but did you notice the word "Union"? They took their Union seriously too, and the colonies had no legal background in British law to support their contention that they had a God given right to leave.
Once the Colonies had asserted and affirmed that right, one would think the government they created would likewise recognize that same right for others.
Certainly you are not suggesting that our colonies where a sovereign kingdom and an equal partner of the “Union of Crowns”.
No more so than you assert that the Southern States were an equal partner of the "Union of the Colonies." From what has been discussed here and elsewhere, it appears they were paying the lion's share of the Federal revenues. Depending on who you ask, the estimates i've seen range from 50% to 80% of all the money which the Feds collected.
20% of the population contributing 50-80% of the cost? Doesn't sound much like an equal partner sort of deal to me.
You insist on making parallels between our declaring independence from a Monarchy (as colonies) to the Southern States seceding from a Union that was formed by the ideas and thoughts of free men.
Because the two things are an exact match, or would be if King George was a fanatical nutbag willing to kill massive numbers of his own people just to force subjugation upon the colonies.
In 1776, 13 slave holding colonies asserted a right to Independence from the British Union. Their armies were led by a slave owning General from Virginia. The Union forces offered freedom to any slave that would fight against the Rebels.
Yeah, that's completely different from what happened in 1861.
Half the South seceded because Abraham Lincoln was elected President of the United States. Is there something “noble” about that?..... or something? If they had stuck it out, a lot of issues could have been worked out. But they were mia, even while Buchanan, as a lame duck, tried to negotiate.
Assign their case to Judge Judy.
George Washington and the rest would disagree with you.
When you exercise your freedom of speech, must you always do it for noble reasons? Do you have any rights that don't require "nobility"? What difference does it make regarding the exercising of your rights? If you can only use them for "noble" purposes, then they are hardly rights, are they?
If they had stuck it out, a lot of issues could have been worked out. But they were mia, even while Buchanan, as a lame duck, tried to negotiate.
Negotiating is exactly the right approach given the constraints that men of principle recognized as binding our government at that time. If you accept the Principle asserted in the Declaration of Independence as true, then you must recognize the right of others to leave if they so choose, and all that is left to you is persuasion to entice them away from it.
Of course, Lincoln Rebelled against the principle outlined in the Declaration of Independence.
Washington didn’t have slaves. The people working at Mt. Vernon were employees of Martha. It’s true that they let other people and history books refer to the help as slaves, but that was just for tax reasons.
So then his will freeing them after his death was just an attempt to continue the deception? Man oh man was that guy dedicated to the last!
Item Upon the decease my wife, it is my Will & desire that all the Slaves which I hold in own right, shall receive their freedom.
Some guys will do anything to get out of a little taxation.
Yes he did. A brief search of the Mount Vernon Foundation would educate you:
"At the time of George Washington’s death, the Mount Vernon estate’s enslaved population consisted of 318 people. Washington himself had been a slave owner for fifty-six years, beginning at eleven years of age when he inherited ten slaves from his deceased father. "
"Of the 318 slaves at Mount Vernon in 1799, 123 individuals were owned by George Washington and were stipulated in Washington's will to be freed upon his wife's death."
http://www.mountvernon.org/george-washington/slavery/washingtons-1799-will/
"At the time of George Washington’s death, the Mount Vernon estate’s enslaved population consisted of 318 people. Washington himself had been a slave owner for fifty-six years, beginning at eleven years of age when he inherited ten slaves from his deceased father. "
"Of the 318 slaves at Mount Vernon in 1799, 123 individuals were owned by George Washington and were stipulated in Washington's will to be freed upon his wife's death."
http://www.mountvernon.org/george-washington/slavery/washingtons-1799-will/
Ya see what I gotta argue with? :)
It's been an American tradition ever since.
It's been an American tradition ever since.
:)
Only 415 posts?
YES.
You’d think he would at least do the basic research. It took all of about 10 seconds to find the data from a reputable source.
I haven’t followed his posts but it’s usually South haters who try to rewrite the history of the founding generation. As the 1860 crowd well knew slavery was a very common institution and the vast majority of Presidents before Lincoln had been slave owners at some time in their life. The notable exceptions that I know of being the Adams family and Franklin Pierce.
In 1776, 13 slave holding colonies asserted a right to Independence from the British Union. Their armies were led by a slave owning General from Virginia. The Union forces offered freedom to any slave that would fight against the Rebels.
Since you have decided to create an entity and call it the "British Union" that fought "rebels" during the Revolutionary War, I am having trouble keeping up with you. When I google "British Union"......... Well, let's just say don't select "images". BTW, how many Frenchmen did Georgie kill? Not to mention the many other military conflicts during his reign?
Let me guess, your next argument will be that the Colonies broke away from the British Kingdom in order to preserve their "peculiar institution".
And you really should stop defending King Georgie. He didn't consider the matter settled, he just took a break to defeat Napoleon at Waterloo. Unfortunately for the United Kingdom of the British Empire, when they did have time to send the Greatest Navy in The History Of The World to finish up the pesky little matter of those uncouth american rabble-rousers, they ran into Old Hickory. Come to think of it, now I am not even sure if Old Hickory considered himself a northerner, a southerner, or just plain an American.
PeaRidge: “It is well documented that Lincoln rebuffed every Davis-Confederate effort at peace.”
It is well documented that Jefferson Davis sent no emissaries to Congress to negotiate matters which the US Constitution assigns to Congress’s responsibility.
Nor did he make any other serious efforts at peace before launching his assault on Fort Sumter and formally declaring war on the United States, May 6, 1861.
PeaRidge: “You cannot rationalize your misrepresentation with another one just like it.
Lying is not cleverness.”
You cannot rationalize your misrepresentation with another one just like it.
Lying is not cleverness, FRiend.
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