I try to speak directly, you misunderstood, my family took up arms after the Civil War began, not before.
There was no violence when we broke the law helping fugitive slaves.
No hand-wringing or self-flagellation, real simple, I try to be completely honest and open. Both sides have their points.
You ask: “why were your ancestors allowed help the Underground Railroad?”
My family acted on their own initiative, based on common decency and faith. Law enforcement efforts were largely irrelevant.
Remember, the Constitution guarantees justice. Fighting slavery was a simple recognition that slaves were people and deserve to be treated as such, not property.
You say “Allowing a small number of discontented slaves to escape”. Who did this allowing? Slaves were worth an average of about $1,000 (1860 dollars). Property owners would not have allowed such valuable property to be lost.
Understood, and that matters if you're in the self-flagellation business.
All you're really saying is they served in the Union army, presumably honorably, nothing to apologize for in that.
gandalftb: "No hand-wringing or self-flagellation, real simple, I try to be completely honest and open.
Both sides have their points."
Well... the points both sides agree on are never discussed here, why bother?
The points we disagree on invariably begin with Lost Causer lies accusing Union leadership, soldiers & voters of endless nefarious nonsense.
Our function here is to correct their lies, and we don't begin by apologizing for telling the truth -- do you follow me so far?
gandalftb: "My family acted on their own initiative, based on common decency and faith.
Law enforcement efforts were largely irrelevant."
No, law enforcement is 100% the point of this discussion, because 1861 secessionists used the lack of law enforcement as their claim of a material breech of contract/constitution legally justifying their declarations of secession.
Why was law enforcement less than adequate when for every year before 1861 Southern Democrats had been in power, or highly influential, in Washington, DC?
I'm suggesting four reasons, beginning with: the numbers were relatively small, so no significant threat to the "peculiar institution".
But I also think Fire Eaters wanted the issue, because without it they had nothing constitutional to complain of.
gandalftb: "Remember, the Constitution guarantees justice.
Fighting slavery was a simple recognition that slaves were people and deserve to be treated as such, not property."
Interesting, the Constitution uses the word "justice" in three places, one of which is:
gandalftb: "You say 'Allowing a small number of discontented slaves to escape'.
Who did this allowing?
Slaves were worth an average of about $1,000 (1860 dollars).
Property owners would not have allowed such valuable property to be lost."
Right, all through the antebellum period the South was an armed camp, with citizen slave patrols and slave-catcher bounty hunters scouring the country for fugitives.
Many operated in Northern states under control of Federal authorities.
And yet small numbers did escape because Federal authority was weak and/or Northern states turned a blind eye to the Underground Railroad.
My point here is that those escapees had to come mainly from such Border States as Missouri and Maryland which were close to free-states and also had large populations of anti-slavery whites to help them.
And, as it turned out, successful Fugitives also provided Deep South secessionists with a convenient constitutional breech to justify declarations of secession.
It was a loud complaint with very little actual cost to those particular slave-holders.
You disagree?