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Endless complaints. |
Posted on 12/31/2004 2:21:30 PM PST by Caipirabob
What's wrong about this photo? Or if you're a true-born Southerner, what's right?
While scanning through some of the up and coming movies in 2005, I ran across this intriguing title; "CSA: Confederate States of America (2005)". It's an "alternate universe" take on what would the country be like had the South won the civil war.
Stars with bars:
Suffice to say anything from Hollywood on this topic is sure to to bring about all sorts of controversial ideas and discussions. I was surprised that they are approaching such subject matter, and I'm more than a little interested.
Some things are better left dead in the past:
For myself, I was more than pleased with the homage paid to General "Stonewall" Jackson in Turner's "Gods and Generals". Like him, I should have like to believe that the South would have been compelled to end slavery out of Christian dignity rather than continue to enslave their brothers of the freedom that belong equally to all men. Obviously it didn't happen that way.
Would I fight for a South that believed in Slavery today? I have to ask first, would I know any better back then? I don't know. I honestly don't know. My pride for my South and my heritage would have most likely doomed me as it did so many others. I won't skirt the issue, in all likelyhood, slavery may have been an afterthought. Had they been the staple of what I considered property, I possibly would have already been past the point of moral struggle on the point and preparing to kill Northern invaders.
Compelling story or KKK wet dream?:
So what do I feel about this? The photo above nearly brings me to tears, as I highly respect Abraham Lincoln. I don't care if they kick me out of the South. Imagine if GW was in prayer over what to do about a seperatist leftist California. That's how I imagine Lincoln. A great man. I wonder sometimes what my family would have been like today. How many more of us would there be? Would we have held onto the property and prosperity that sustained them before the war? Would I have double the amount of family in the area? How many would I have had to cook for last week for Christmas? Would I have needed to make more "Pate De Fois Gras"?
Well, dunno about that either. Depending on what the previous for this movie are like, I may or may not see it. If they portray it as the United Confederacy of the KKK I won't be attending.
This generation of our clan speaks some 5 languages in addition to English, those being of recent immigrants to this nation. All of them are good Americans. I believe the south would have succombed to the same forces that affected the North. Immigration, war, economics and other huma forces that have changed the map of the world since history began.
Whatever. At least in this alternate universe, it's safe for me to believe that we would have grown to be the benevolent and humane South that I know it is in my heart. I can believe that slavery would have died shortly before or after that lost victory. I can believe that Southern gentlemen would have served the world as the model for behavior. In my alternate universe, it's ok that Spock has a beard. It's my alternate universe after all, it can be what I want.
At any rate, I lived up North for many years. Wonderful people and difficult people. I will always sing their praises as a land full of beautiful Italian girls, maple syrup and Birch beer. My uncle ribbed us once before we left on how we were going up North to live "with all the Yankees". Afterwards I always refered to him as royalty. He is, really. He's "King of the Rednecks". I suppose I'm his court jester.
So what do you think of this movie?
There is more than one problem with your source, Farber.
With Daniel Farber's insight into sovereignty as "an almost metaphysical concept -- some secret essence of legal potency that cannot be detected directly, but only as a kind of normative aura," he provides comic relief, as well as a source of wisdom for desperate Blue State Brigadeers.
FARBER'S WISDOM
In the American context, sovereignty often seems to function as an almost metaphysical concept -- some secret essence of legal potency that cannot be detected directly, but only as a kind of normative aura. One hotly debated question, for example, is whether the populations of the various states existed (or still exist) as separate entities acting together as a conglomeration, or rather as a single entity acting through the agency of multiple subgroups. This is reminiscent of medieval disputes about the nature of the Trinity. It is not in any real sense a question of fact or even one of law.
SOURCE: Lincoln's Constitution, Daniel Farber, 2003, p. 29
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Ideas about sovereignty may also color the understanding of particular constitutional issues. Thus, while it may not be useful to ask who really had sovereignty in 1776 or 1789, it is potentially useful to ask who was believed to have sovereignty then.
SOURCE: Lincoln's Constitution, Daniel Farber, 2003, p. 30
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A contract between the peoples of the separate states might well be termed a compact. The critical question was whether a national social compact arose at some point, binding all Americans together into one people, or whether the only real social compacts were at the state level, with those political societies then forming a second-level compact. The "compact theory" of sovereignty refers to this second-level compact, which is considered to have a less fundamental status than the social compacts establishing each state. If this all seems rather aridly metaphysical, that's because it is.
SOURCE: Lincoln's Constitution, Daniel Farber, 2003, p. 32
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Because of its virtually metaphysical nature, it is hard to answer the theoretical question of whether the state peoples wholly retained their separate identity, or whether adoption of the Constitution signified the existence of unified "People of the United States." To the extent that the Framers had any shared understanding on this point, which is itself somewhat dubious, they probably leaned toward the view that ratification signified the emergence of a national People. On the whole, however, the best conclusion seems to be Madison's -- that the United States was unique and could not be considered either a consolidated nation or a compact of sovereign states.
SOURCE: Lincoln's Constitution, Daniel Farber, 2003, pp. 82-83
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Still, it would be a mistake to view the Framers as purely nationalistic. During ratification, the most direct discussion of the source of the Constitution's legitimacy was in Federalist 39. Inquiring into the formation of the new Constitution, Madison explained that ratification takes place by the authority of the people -- "not as individuals composing one entire nation, but as composing the distinct and independent States to which they respectively belong." Madison went on to call ratification a "federal and not a national act," that is, "the act of the people, as forming so many independent States, not as forming one aggregate nation." This passage seems at odds with Lincoln's theory, but leaves open the possibility that ratification resulted in the creation of a unified American people.
SOURCE: Lincoln's Constitution, Daniel Farber, 2003, p. 38
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Yes they did. But they didn't put him on trial, did they? But for example it's taken California 3 and a half years to start Robert Blake's trial. The wheels of justice grind slowly sometimes, and in the case of Jefferson Davis he should be glad that they do.
But Congress did not. And until they did then the double jeopardy considerations remained. As has been pointed out to you on numerous occasions.
That would be for the Supreme Court to decide, wouldn't it? And they did decide that, in Texas v White.
Not by the government, which freely handed him over to Virginia to try on those bogus treason charges.
Allegedly the Confederate states were in rebellion. Strange that the federal congress, the body charged with declaring war and calling forth the militia, failed to consider the actions of the South as rebellion, and adjourned.
A 'rebellion' is usually defined as 'armed defiance'. When the south turned to armed rebellion in Charleston harbor then the Administration took the appropriate steps and called Congress back into session.
We're told over and over that the South was in rebellion, but I never hear anyone mention that the governors of Connecticut, Rhode Island & Providence Plantations, and Massachusetts refused to provide militia during the War of 1812.
They weren't in rebellion.
That is possible in the long run. So perhaps the Black Republicans inadvertently saved themselves by passing the 14th Amendment.
No, the fact that the Virginia milita were on the way to Harper's Ferry to seize the federal arsenal weeks before the people approved secession is no coincidence at all. They were active participants in the rebellion before the legislature approved secession in the first place. So why should you be complaining about the fact that the government responded?
And you have a source for that of course?
Not if my life depended on it.
Mary Surratt is still dead.
And OJ is still free.
My point remains: Chase's argument was bunk.
In your opinion. Whatever that's worth.
When did I ever say that the people of the United States weren't sovereign? Since you insist that it's the states that are sovereign then I'm simply giving the question the answer it deserves.
As OJ proved, Blake had the right to a speedy trial. Delay was at Blake's request. In Davis the accused announced in court that he was ready to proceed and the government, after more than two years, announced that it was still not ready to proceed. In point of fact, the government was never ready to proceed in the Davis case.
It must be Brigade Commander Wlat. He discovered that a Federal law in conflict with the Constitution moots the Constitution. (And his followers soldier on.)
To: Non-Sequitur[non-seq] section 2 of the Militia Acts provided that the President could call out the militia to supress insurrection and that he didn't need for the state to call for assistance
As always, to support your unconstitutional argument, you must depart from the Constitution and cite something else as being superior to the Constitution.
Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution says, "The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence."
Amendment X of the Constitution says, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
Cite one legal scholar (other than Walt) who supports your position that your interpretation of the Militia Act trumps the Constitution.
An "insurrection" is "a violent uprising on part or all of the people against the government or other authority." Voting to secede is not a "violent" uprising.
Precisely which state do you claim was being protected "against invasion?"
234 posted on 12/23/2003 12:22:22 PM CST by nolu chan
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To: nolu chanCite one legal scholar (other than Walt) who supports your position that your interpretation of the Militia Act trumps the Constitution.
No one says it -trumps- the Constitution. But the laws passed are also the supreme law of the land. This fact actually moots the 10th amendment. The Framers knew that.
Walt
314 posted on 12/25/2003 12:20:11 AM CST by WhiskeyPapa (Virtue is the uncontested prize.)
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"Seize" is such an ugly word -- suggests shooting, and wounding, and dying. No wonder you used it. However, demanding the closure of federal facilities that no longer belong to the United States if the (foreign) host country doesn't want them to, is not a violent act.
I agree that Governor Letcher and his military aides were untimely and previous in their demarche (we can't know about Gosport -- the Navy just up and burned it) and should have waited until after the plebiscite before doing any such thing, just as the Carolinians should have waited out Fort Sumter and Lincoln's attempts to reinforce. (Which, let's not forget, is what he did.)
They were active participants in the rebellion before the legislature approved secession in the first place.
They? Who's "they"? Documentation, please.
And, the legislature didn't approve secession in Virginia, the Convention did -- subject to final ratification by the People in their referendum.
And, there was no rebellion.
So why should you be complaining about the fact that the government responded?
Lincoln didn't respond. As Nicolay shows, he had hostilities in mind as his policy toward the South from the very start -- probably, as I have opined further, from years before.
BS. The court ruled - 9 zip - that the Constitution, applied to all men - including Presidents - at all times - including war - and that NONE of it could be suspended at at time.
Hmmmm. Yankee states fail to abide by law of the land. No rebellion per Non-sequitur.
Confederate states fail to abide by law of the land. Rebellion per Non-sequitur. Hypocrit?
I've cited and quoted The Federalist, Supreme Court opinions, and contemporary scholarship (Madison), as well as modern scholarship (The Antifederalists) on the outcome of the struggle between the Federalists and the Antifederalists on the locus of sovereignty -- a battle the Antifederalists won with the ratification of the Tenth Amendment, which was agreed to informally and politically by all parties even before, and as a necessary precursor to, the ratification of the Constitution itself by the necessary number of States.
I've shown you sovereignty's legal transfer from King George, by his resignation of his effort in the Revolutionary War in the Treaty of Paris, and I've shown you its descent from that Treaty to the Constitution, and its reservation both during the writing and ratification of the Constitution, and the confirmation of the reservation of all sovereignty and liberty, as their original state of grace and power, to the People and no one else, by the Ninth and Tenth Amendments.
Still you will not accept anything I post, and ignoring all the posted documentation and original source material, deride the People's ownership of themselves, their liberty, and their sovereignty as "your opinion -- whatever that's worth".
I've made my case and made my point repeatedly, and still you attempt to fatigue us with resolute intransigence -- slothful induction raised to the degree of contumacy -- and insist that someone else, some other Power or Organ is the true repository of Sovereignty, Liberty and the ultimate Power in the land -- it cannot be the People, because they once did something you dislike, so that you now gloat over their ruin in common cause with their oppressors.
I don't know what else to say to you, except that the only thing worse than a totalitarian, is a totalitarian wannabe who was educated to know better.
[You, replying] Not by the government, which freely handed him over to Virginia to try on those bogus treason charges.
1. Do you believe the charges against John Brown were bogus? Do you think he should have been released?
2. Your demurrer in no way invalidates 4CJ's point about the utter poisonousness of Northern opinion. You can't wish people massacred and then pretend the social compact is still intact. "We wish he'd succeeded, we wish you'd died" really tears it. When will you acknowledge that point? You have studiously avoided commenting on it, except to make that belittling reply to our friend.
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