Lincoln was the aggressor and self-appointed dictator.
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>>Kalamata wrote: "Foreign nations are not subject to the laws of Congress; but the President and the Congress are subject to the Constitution, and their refusal to allow the states to exercise their retained power of secession constitutes tyranny."
>>DoodleDawg wrote: "We're talking about transferring ownership of Sumter from the U.S. to the Confederacy. Your comment is irrelevant to that."
You are pretending the Constitution actually existed at the time of the secession. It didn't. Otherwise, the legacy of Lincoln, his merry gang of thugs, and the rubber-stamp Congress, would have been: "They hung by ropes until dead." A survivor would have been Chief Justice Taney, who ruled against Lincoln's tyranny regarding habeas corpus.
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>>DoodleDawg wrote: "Even had the Confederacy sent a delegation to negotiate rather than one to deliver an ultimatum, it would still have required Congressional approval to transfer ownership of Sumter to the Davis regime. But the South was not interested in a peaceful settlement."
Historians claim otherwise. The South sought to negotiate financial settlements for the reclaimed property, before the attack on Fort Sumter; but Lincoln refused to either see or acknowledge them. Rather, he schemed behind the scenes to provoke an attack on the Fort. Lincoln was for war. War was the only way he could break the chains of the Constitution and make permanent the crony-capitalist system we are plagued with today.
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>>Kalamata wrote: "Lincoln believed it was a big deal. He threatened war over the collection of tariffs."
>>DoodleDawg wrote: "Or over the delivery of the mail, if you're going to take parts of the First Inaugural out of context. But again you offer nothing but editorials and cherry-picked quotes instead of hard facts. Why would the loss of approximately 5% of tariff revenue cause the war? Especially since three years later tariff revenue was well over twice what it had been in 1860? Loss of revenue from Southern imports just were not that great of a blow economically."
You are misleading the readers. This is Lincoln:
"[T]here needs to be no bloodshed or violence; and there shall be none, unless it be forced upon the national authority. The power confided to me will be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the government, and to collect the duties and imposts; but beyond what may be necessary for these objects, there will be no invasion—no using of force against or among the people anywhere."
[First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861, in Roy P. Basler, "Abraham Lincoln: His Speeches and Writings." The World Publishing Company, 1946]
He said nothing about mail in that warning.
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>>Kalamata wrote: "Practically everything Lincoln did was unconstitutional, and he committed treason against at least some of the remaining states by making war against them."
>>DoodleDawg wrote: "Absolute nonsense. Unlike Davis, everything Lincoln did was subject to judicial review."
Nothing Lincoln did was subject to judicial review. He was a loose cannon -- a self-appointed dictator. He ignored Justice Haney's opinion about his abuse of habeas corpus, and he even had his Congress pass a banana republic "law" to place Lincoln above the law, which included making it a criminal act for state judges to prosecute federal authorities (Lincoln's thugs) who made arbitrary arrests. You certainly don't want to hear what happened at the ballot boxes.
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>>DoodleDawg wrote: "And suppressing rebellion is allowed; Article I, Section 8."
Secession is not rebellion; and as long as you insist on lying about it, we may as well drop the subject.
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>>Kalamata wrote: "Davis relied on the Congress for authorization to suspend habeas corpus. Where are your sources for your claims against Davis?"
>>DoodleDawg wrote: "His own actions and that of his government. No Supreme Court. Offering to end slavery in exchange for foreign recognition when he had no power to do so. Policies he enacted which were found unconstitutional in the U.S. - income tax, declaring martial law in areas nowhere near the war. Policies like nationalizing industries that would have been found unconstitutional had Lincoln tried them."
That is not a source. This is a source:
"[U]nlike Lincoln, who suspended the writ on his own authority, Davis acted only when Congress authorized him to do so—for a total of seventeen months on three different occasions during the war. '"
[James M. McPherson, "Embattled Rebel: Jefferson Davis as Commander in Chief." Penguin Press, 2014, Chap.2]
This is another source:
"It is true that in January, 1862, the Confederate Congress did pass a law forbidding the publication of unauthorized news of troop movements, but even this slight regulation was bitterly protested and flagrantly ignored. No Southern newspaper was ever suppressed by the Confederate government for its opinions, however critical or demoralizing. The ardent wish of Secretary of War George W. Randolph was realized: that "this revolution may be... closed without suppression of one single newspaper in the Confederate States." More significant militarily was the Confederacy 's insistence upon maintaining the cherished legal rights of freedom from arbitrary arrest and upon preserving due process of law. This sentiment was so strong that, though the Confederacy was invaded and Richmond was actually endangered, President Davis did not dare institute martial law until he had received the permission of his Congress. While General George B. McClellan was about to assault the Confederate capital in 1862, the Southern Congress debated the question and concluded that their President was "subject to the Constitution and to the laws enacted by Congress in pursuance of the Constitution. He can exert no power inconsistent with law, and, therefore, he cannot declare martial law." Grudgingly Congress permitted Davis to suspend the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus for three brief periods—once when McClellan was within sight of Richmond, again during the Fredericksburg- Chancellorsville threat, and once more when Grant was pushing through the Wilderness. Even then he was allowed to suspend the writ only in limited areas, not throughout the Confederacy. When he came to Congress for a renewal of his authority during the grim winter of 1864-1865, he was refused, lest too much power in the hands of a dictatorial president curb the democratic rights of the people."
"Yet, in comparison with the Confederacy, the Union government did curtail civil liberties. As soon as the fighting started, President Lincoln, without delaying to consult Congress, suspended the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus, at first for a small area in the East, later for the entire nation. At a subsequent date he reported his fait accompli to Congress: "These measures, whether strictly legal or not, were ventured upon, under what appeared to be a popular demand, and a popular necessity; trusting then, as now that Congress would readily ratify them." Congress had little choice but to ratify, and the disloyal citizen no alternative but to acquiesce. At least 15,000 civilians were imprisoned in the North for alleged disloyalty or sedition. They were arrested upon a presidential warrant and were kept incarcerated without due process of law. It did the disaffected citizen no good to go to court for a writ of habeas corpus to end his arbitrary arrest. On orders from President Lincoln himself, the military guard imprisoning him refused to recognize a judicial writ even when it came from Chief Justice Roger B. Taney."
[David Herbert Donald, "Why the North Won the Civil War." Collier Books, 1962, p.85-87]
From what I have read, Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee were traditional Southern gentlemen.
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>>Kalamata wrote: "Cotton growers in the South exported raw cotton to Britain, and they were opposed to any tariff that would restrict the sales of their British customers to the United States. They worried about both loss of sales and further losses due to possible British retaliation."
>>DoodleDawg wrote: "Fair enough. Was any retaliation ever enacted in form of tariffs on goods imported from the southern states? If you stop and think about it, doing so would have made no sense. Taxing an import that your own domestic industries needed for their product and which was not easily replaced?"
Let's try this one more time:
1) The Southern exporters relied on income from their exports.
2) Southerners used that income to purchase goods and services.
3) Protective tariffs made the price of goods and services higher, thus effectively reducing the income of the exporters.
Let's try it another way:
Amazon has an item for $70 that you MUST have for your business. Walmart sells the same item for $90. Both offer free shipping. Obviously Amazon has by far the better deal.
But suppose the Government places a 50% protective shipping tax on all Amazon's products just before you purchase the product. Walmart items are exempt from the shipping tax. The new price at Amazon is $70 * 1.5 = $105.
Therefore, Amazon's item is now more expensive than Walmart's; and you are out 20 bucks on an item that "you must have" due to the protective tax placed against Amazon products. To make it worse, just before you buy, Walmart decides to increase its price to $100, to take advantage of the situation. So, now you are out $30.
That was the economic situation that plagued the Southern exporters. Raw cotton is a nice product, but it is not fabric, woolen goods, wagon wheels, and other items the Southern farmers needed, but did not produce themselves.
Mr. Kalamata
Nonsense on both counts.
You are pretending the Constitution actually existed at the time of the secession. It didn't. Otherwise, the legacy of Lincoln, his merry gang of thugs, and the rubber-stamp Congress, would have been: "They hung by ropes until dead." A survivor would have been Chief Justice Taney, who ruled against Lincoln's tyranny regarding habeas corpus.
And when pinned down you resort to more nonsense. The Constitution did indeed exist throughout the war and Lincoln did abide by it throughout his administration, unlike Jefferson Davis.
Historians claim otherwise.
Not really, no.
The South sought to negotiate financial settlements for the reclaimed property, before the attack on Fort Sumter; but Lincoln refused to either see or acknowledge them.
Not really, no. If you read Jefferson Davis's letter to Lincoln there is no offer to pay for anything. Just a call that Lincoln surrender to Confederate demands on recognizing independence, and a vague offer to negotiate but only if the subject was of interest to Davis.
You are misleading the readers. This is Lincoln:
So is this: ". Where hostility to the United States in any interior locality shall be so great and universal as to prevent competent resident citizens from holding the Federal offices, there will be no attempt to force obnoxious strangers among the people for that object. While the strict legal right may exist in the Government to enforce the exercise of these offices, the attempt to do so would be so irritating and so nearly impracticable withal that I deem it better to forego for the time the uses of such offices. The mails, unless repelled, will continue to be furnished in all parts of the Union."
He said nothing about mail in that warning.
Well maybe if you had read the next paragraph you would have seen it.
Nothing Lincoln did was subject to judicial review.
You really need to read up on the history of the rebellion some time. The Supreme Court operated openly throughout and numerous Lincoln decisions were reviewed by the court. In most cased those decisions were upheld. In other cases the court struck them down. Unlike the Confederacy.
He ignored Justice Haney's opinion about his abuse of habeas corpus...
Issued from the circuit court bench and not the Supreme Court.
...and he even had his Congress pass a banana republic "law" to place Lincoln above the law, which included making it a criminal act for state judges to prosecute federal authorities (Lincoln's thugs) who made arbitrary arrests.
Now you're just being silly.
You certainly don't want to hear what happened at the ballot boxes.
Oh go ahead. This should be funny.
Secession is not rebellion; and as long as you insist on lying about it, we may as well drop the subject.
Well yes it is when done illegally. But let's keep the subject going so you can lie about the legality some more.
That is not a source. This is a source:
That's a single instance. But since you chose that one I'll point out that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the government could not suspend habeas corpus in areas that were not threatened by the war, striking down the governments decision to do so. Jefferson Davis also suspended habeas corpus throughout the Confederacy even in areas hundreds of miles from the fighting, and there was no supreme court to tell him he was wrong.
No Southern newspaper was ever suppressed by the Confederate government for its opinions, however critical or demoralizing.
LOL! As Mark Neely details in "Southern Rights: Political Prisoners and the Myth of Confederate Constitutionalism" the first political prisoner arrested in the war was a newspaper reporter who printed something that Braxton Bragg didn't like. In Brayton Harris's "Blue & Gray in Black & White: Newspapers in the Civil War" he notes "Censorship was more easily implemented in the South, and more readily accepted. A censorship of sorts had been in place in some Southern states, where the press was forbidden to publish, for example, any material advocating the abolition of slavery." He went on to detail the threat to their independence printed in the Richmond Whig: "We beg to suggest to all Southern papers the propriety of omitting all mention of troops within our borders. A word to the wise." Harris does note that there were little need to suppress papers in the Confederacy because there were few papers who opposed the Southern rebellion. Those who did had their editors fired (Richmond Whig), their owners forced to sell(Alabama Beacon, Athena Union Banner, Galveston Union), or were just shut down by the Davis regime and their owner jailed (Knoxville Whig). Even with all that, the press was threatened. The Richmond Examiner was threatened with shut down for printing something General Winder didn't like in 1862. In "Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era" James McPherson quotes a Richmond diarist who noted that several newspaper editors "have confessed a fear of having their offices closed, if they the sentiments struggling for utterance. It is, indeed, a reign of terror."
Let's try this one more time:
Let's do. I am not talking about tariffs making imports more expensive for consumers, North and South. I'm not talking about tariffs impacting Northerners to a much greater extent since the vast majority of imports were consumed by Northerners. I'm talking about your claim in Reply 594 and elsewhere: "They worried about both loss of sales and further losses due to possible British retaliation."
Was there any British retaliation against their cotton imports as a result of the U.S. tariffs, in 1861 or in the years prior? It's a simple question and one you should be able to answer. Assuming you're not making this stuff up as you go along, of course.
Ms. DoodleDawg
That is not a source. This is a source:
Trying to switch the subject to what Davis did is another of those "Oh Yeah? Well this guy did far worse!" arguments. (Tu Quoque.)
It is an attempt to deflect from the point of Lincoln's abuses. Whether or not Jefferson Davis did anything wrong, has no bearing on the wrong that Lincoln did.
Jefferson Davis doing wrong things does not make Lincoln's wrong things into "right" things. It is not a contest to see who is the lesser evil between the two men. It is supposed to be an objective standard that applies to everyone, not a relative standard that applies between Lincoln and Davis.
Lincoln did objectively do wrong things. Maybe Davis did too, but again, these do not justify the wrong things that Lincoln did.
Lincoln's iniquity must be judged separately from Davis' iniquity.
But suppose the Government places a 50% protective shipping tax on all Amazon's products just before you purchase the product. Walmart items are exempt from the shipping tax. The new price at Amazon is $70 * 1.5 = $105.
Therefore, Amazon's item is now more expensive than Walmart's; and you are out 20 bucks on an item that "you must have" due to the protective tax placed against Amazon products. To make it worse, just before you buy, Walmart decides to increase its price to $100, to take advantage of the situation. So, now you are out $30.
Very well explained, except for the part where most of the tax money gets spent on your competitors to build infrastructure that disproportionately benefits your competitors, and which *YOU* are indirectly paying for.
Amazon has an item for $70 that you MUST have for your business. Walmart sells the same item for $90. Both offer free shipping. Obviously Amazon has by far the better deal.
But suppose the Government places a 50% protective shipping tax on all Amazon's products just before you purchase the product. Walmart items are exempt from the shipping tax. The new price at Amazon is $70 * 1.5 = $105.
Therefore, Amazon's item is now more expensive than Walmart's; and you are out 20 bucks on an item that "you must have" due to the protective tax placed against Amazon products. To make it worse, just before you buy, Walmart decides to increase its price to $100, to take advantage of the situation. So, now you are out $30.
I suppose congratulations are in order; you have discovered the basic unfairness of protective tariffs. Well done for a rare, accurate summary of what was going on at the time.
Now, can you go the next step and explain for us how the same tariffs that were applied to all consumers, north and south, somehow hit the south the hardest?
That was the economic situation that plagued the Southern exporters. Raw cotton is a nice product, but it is not fabric, woolen goods, wagon wheels, and other items the Southern farmers needed, but did not produce themselves.
No, that is the economic situation that hit Southern consumers. And Northern consumers and consumers in the Great Lakes states and the Midwest. Southern exporters were not dependent on imports to do their business. There were no import duties on slaves that were illegally imported. Cotton seed was not imported. Cotton gins were not manufactured overseas. Southern states imported little, northern states consumed the bulk of imports. So tariffs had no impact on southern exports. Your claim to the contrary is ridiculous.