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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?
You have self-government now.
What your ancestors fought for was the right to deny self-government to others.
And I think you've stolen a projector, all the while subconciously aware of your own condition. I suppose you will call me whatever you like, but one thing is certain. You are the one who would not even admit that 38,000 exceeds 4,000 by almost tenfold.
Again, you are assuming the suspension of the Writ was always wrong.
Just as you are assuming that the suspension of the writ is justified in a broad range of circumstances.
Then you knew that Farber's work is considered in low esteem among the scholarly community...and yet you used it anyway.
Your quote mining to downplay his criticism of Farber aside, why don't you try reading what he said:
Here, Farber assumes much of what was at issue during Lincoln's presidency: that the Union was simply a territorial unit, not a group of sovereign states voluntarily joined; that the Constitution was what Lincoln said it was, not what his opponents to the south held it to be. Farber's assumptions on these scores shape most of the rest of his book. In sum, LINCOLN'S CONSTITUTION is a partisan work, more a lawyer's brief for the Lincoln administration to be argued before a contemporary American court or group of academics than an exercise in historiography. It is none the less interesting for that.
In case you didn't know, that's a polite way of saying it was an unscholarly hack job posing as history.
Your quote mining to downplay his criticism of Farber aside, why don't you try reading what he said:
Here, Farber assumes much of what was at issue during Lincoln's presidency: that the Union was simply a territorial unit, not a group of sovereign states voluntarily joined; that the Constitution was what Lincoln said it was, not what his opponents to the south held it to be. Farber's assumptions on these scores shape most of the rest of his book. In sum, LINCOLN'S CONSTITUTION is a partisan work, more a lawyer's brief for the Lincoln administration to be argued before a contemporary American court or group of academics than an exercise in historiography. It is none the less interesting for that.
In case you didn't know, that's a polite way of saying it was an unscholarly hack job posing as history.
That just about sums up your entire posting attitude around here, ftD. You hurl speculation and unfounded assumptions as if they were concrete arguments while simultaneously dismissing documented factual information that inconveniences your preconceived position. At least you admit it though, which cannot be said of your friends...
Well, then we need to look at the circumstances themselves and see if they dictated the suspension or not.
Ofcourse, it is always easier to do so with the benefit of hindsight.
Considering that he's never worn a uniform or stood a single watch in defense of this country from commuinism, you have to wonder how he got to be an expert on who is or isn't a commie.
First, where do you get the idea that it is held in low esteem by the 'scholarly community'.
You cited one pro-Southern reviewer as evidence.
Second, based on the quotes that I gave you, the work seems pretty creditable in what I was pointing out, the context of the circumstances Lincoln found himself in.
So, I did not know that Farber's work is considered in low esteem by scholars nor do I know that now.
Here is a favoritable review of the work,
An antidote to Perret's unsatisfactory treatment of the constitutional issues arising from the war is Daniel Farber's Lincoln's Constitution. As Farber, the Sho Sato Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley, and the McKnight Presidential Professor of Public Law at the University of Minnesota, observes, "to call the Civil War a constitutional crisis is almost a misuse of words, like calling Pearl Harbor a military setback. In the Civil War, the Constitution was placed under pressure that it had never seen before and has not seen since.... [T]he Civil War experience illuminates the deepest, most critical constitutional issues," including the "nature of the Union and the states, the breadth of the president's independent power to pursue the national interest, the scope of civil liberties during national emergencies, and the collision between the imperatives of national survival and the rule of law."
The first half of Lincoln's Constitution deals with the rights and wrongs of secession, a subject that Perret does not treat at all. Looking back to James Madison and earlier debates about the relationship between the states and the Union, Farber vindicates Lincoln's theory of the Union: there was no constitutional right to secession.
Of course, the most controversial element of Lincoln's war presidency is his treatment of civil liberties. Even many defenders of Lincoln argue that he overstepped constitutional bounds by declaring martial law, arbitrarily arresting civilians and trying them by military tribunal, and shutting down opposition newspapers. After the war, the Supreme Court criticized many of these measures in Ex parte Milligan.
Farber rejects this view. Indeed, he is sympathetic to Lincoln's response to some War Democrats in 1863. In a letter to Erastus Corning, Lincoln observed that the Constitution is a remarkable document, but it is not the same document during war that it is during peace.
I can no more be persuaded that the Government can constitutionally take no strong measures in time of rebellion, because it can be shown that the same could not lawfully be taken in time of peace, than I can be persuaded that a particular drug is not good medicine for a sick man, because it can be shown not to be good for a well one. Nor am I able to appreciate the danger apprehended by the meeting [of the New York Democrats] that the American people will, by means of military arrest during the Rebellion, lose the right of Public Discussion, the Liberty of Speech and the Press, the Law of Evidence, Trial by Jury, and Habeas Corpus, throughout the indefinite peaceful future, which I trust lies before them, any more than I am able to believe that a man could contract so strong an appetite for emetics during temporary illness as to persist in feeding upon them during the remainder of his healthful life.
What can we conclude about Abraham Lincoln as a war president? First and foremost, that he saved the Union. It is hard to imagine that anyone else among his contemporaries could have done what he did. Many were willing to let the Union go to pieces. Who knows how many "confederacies" there would now be on the North American continent had the view of James Buchanan or the Peace Democrats prevailed? Who knows when slavery would have ended? Who knows what would have become of a world without a United States to oppose both the Nazis and the Communists?
Many others, spurred by the fiery purity of the abolitionists, would have pursued policies that lacked any element of consent. As Lincoln remarked on numerous occasions, public sentiment is critically important in a republic. In the absence of public sentiment, legislators cannot pass laws and presidents cannot execute them. Lincoln could have avoided war by making another of the base concessions that politicians had been making for several decades. But that would only have postponed the day of decision, making it unlikely that republican government could survive in North America; and insofar as the United States was the "last, best hope of earth," making it unlikely that republican government could survive anywhere.
Lincoln set a high standard for leadership in time of war. He called forth the resources of the nation, he appointed the agents of victory, both civilian and military, he set the strategy, he took the necessary steps to restrain those who would cooperate with the disunionists, and he provided a rhetoric that stirred the people. Yet he did these things within a constitutional framework.
At a time when the United States once again faces an adversary intent on nothing less than its destruction, President Bush may correctly take his bearings from Lincoln, whose war presidency teaches us how much may be required of the statesman whose duty is "to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States."
http://www.claremont.org/writings/crb/winter2004/owens.html
No, the reviewer may not like some of the sources that were used, but the work nevertheless is worth reading.
As for being pro-southern, I read some of his opinions and they were clearly pro-Southern.
Nevertheless, he still does not represent a community of scholars
Why don't you complete what I said?
I said I had not need to prove anything since the right to suspend the Writ is in the Constitution.
You have a nasty habit of leaving things out.
As for documentation, I have given you plenty.
You just reject the sources as soon as they go against your own bias.
Here is another favorable review of the work.
Did Lincoln Violate the Constitution?:
A Review of Daniel Farber's Lincoln's Constitution
By RODGER D. CITRON
----
Friday, July 18, 2003
Daniel Farber, Lincoln's Constitution (University of Chicago Press 2003)
For students of constitutional law and history, Abraham Lincoln is perhaps our most compelling president - for he wrestled, and forces us to wrestle, with some of the most fundamental, and momentous questions of constitutional law.
In his slender volume Lincoln's Constitution, Daniel Farber, a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of Minnesota, takes on these very questions.
Did the Southern States, like the Founding Fathers, have the right to secede? Farber says no, though he also contends that the case for secession was not frivolous.
Did Lincoln violate the Constitution when, in his efforts to preserve the Union, he suspended habeas corpus, and in taking certain actions without Congressional authorization? Farber argues that nearly all of Lincoln's actions were permissible under the Constitution. Moreover, when he did infringe the Constitution, his trespasses were, at least, not egregious.
In Lincoln's Constitution, Farber offers a concise synthesis of the pertinent history, extended discussion of Lincoln's reasons for his actions, and elegant analysis of the relevant issues. For these reasons alone, the book is worth reading.
But Farber also goes further, to address the potential contemporary relevance of some of the issues that Lincoln face. Thus, he gracefully integrates into his discussion recent cases raising similar questions concerning civil liberties, federalism, and separation of powers.
Especially with civil liberties issues repeatedly arising, now that the war on terrorism is in progress, it may be instructive to look back at the constitutional questions Lincoln confronted so long ago.
The Unpersuasive Case For Secession - and the "Compact Theory"
In evaluating the case for secession, Farber traces the debate over state sovereignty back to the Framers' era. Although the Framers did not have a "clear consensus" about "the status of the states before the Constitution," the author shows that it nevertheless is clear that they sought to enhance federal power, and in fact curtailed state autonomy.
The most interesting part of this account is Farber's discussion of the 1995 Supreme Court decision in U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton - which invalidated an amendment to the Arkansas Constitution establishing term limits for Arkansas Congresspersons. In Term Limits, the Supreme Court continued to debate the nature of state sovereignty.
In his opinion for the majority, Justice Stevens contended that since the Constitution limited state sovereignty, states could not interfere with the "direct link" that representation in Congress provided "between the National Government and the people of the United States."
In dissent, Justice Thomas - joined by Justices Rehnquist, Scalia, and O'Connor -insisted that, on the contrary, the term limits amendment was a permissible exercise of power reserved to the states. After all, "the people of each State retained their separate political identities" under the Constitution, and thus they could choose to regulate the terms for which their Congresspersons served.
Farber parallels the dissenters' argument with the case for secession presented by Jefferson Davis in the Civil War - noting that both embrace the "compact theory" of states' rights. This theory holds that the Union was a treaty-like compact among the states that joined it - one that any state could leave, in the same way that a nation might withdraw from a multinational treaty.
Farber himself takes strong issue with the "compact theory." He points out that the Constitution replaced "a regime of multilateral negotiation with the democratic rule of law." In the new regime, federal legislation was "'the supreme law of the land[,]'" and the new system featured "nationwide democratic institutions and authoritative dispute resolution by the federal courts." Given these features, Farber contends, the Constitution must be seen as far more than a treaty among the states.
Farber also makes a more specific case against the legality of secession, citing the structure of the Constitution and arguments made by James Madison in the Federalist Papers. He concludes, based on these sources, that once bound by the Constitution, individual states did not enjoy the unilateral right to withdraw from the Union.
Accordingly, on the legal merits (as well as on the battlefield), Farber makes clear that the correct party prevailed on the secession issue in the Civil War.
The Case For the Constitutionality of Lincoln's Conduct Of The War
Due to the unprecedented nature of the crisis caused by the Civil War, Lincoln was compelled to exercise executive authority in a remarkably broad manner. Inevitably, his actions led to clashes with other branches of government over the assertion of his authority.
Farber reviews a number of actions taken by Lincoln in response to the military crisis - such as "calling up the militia, deploying the military, and imposing a blockade." In each case, he concludes that Lincoln either acted in accord with his authority under Article II of the Constitution, or soon (albeit subsequently) obtained authorization from Congress after acting - rendering his constitutional infringement comparatively slight.
Farber also examines Lincoln's record with respect to civil liberties. Again, he is supportive of many of the president's contested actions. And he concludes that "[m]any of the acts denounced as dictatorial - the suspension of habeas at the beginning of the war, emancipation, military trials of civilians in contested or occupied territory - seem in retrospect to have reasonably good constitutional justifications under the war power."
Farber does acknowledges that, on occasion, the actions of Lincoln or the military were excessive. As examples, he cites measures to suppress free speech - and in particular, a case in which a gentleman opposed to the Civil War was convicted and sentenced to death for what may have been no more than associating with another individual who wanted to take armed action against the Union. After the war, in Ex Parte Milligan, the Supreme Court granted the gentleman's habeas corpus petition.
Learning From Lincoln: How to Wage War And Still Respect the Constitution
Lincoln's Constitution concludes with a brief discussion of the current relevance of the constitutional questions surrounding Lincoln's Presidency.
Farber believes that Lincoln's conduct of the war demonstrates the need for a strong federal government in wartime. But he also contends that it is strong evidence that we need not circumvent the rule of law, or ignore constitutional protections, in dealing with such a crisis.
During our greatest constitutional crisis, Farber demonstrates, the nation was extremely fortunate to have Lincoln as its leader. He recognized the significance of the challenge posed by secession; acted decisively in responding to it; and nevertheless maintained a sense of perspective about the proper institutional role of the presidency.
In the midst of the war on terrorism, at least one disputed issue in the Civil War - how to balance individuals' constitutional rights against governmental claims of national security - remains quite germane. Regardless of one's political affiliation, it is undisputed that Lincoln set the bar rather high for his successors.
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/books/reviews/20030718_citron.html#bio
Some more pro-reviews of the work.
famous historian visited my undergraduate university half a century ago and announced that, except for a minor item or two such as a history of the quartermaster corps, the major work on the Civil War was completed. Since then several significant books have been published. Daniel Farber's Lincoln's Constitution is one of them.
Reviewed by: Donald K. Pickens, Department of History, University of North Texas.
Published by: H-USA (December, 2003)
http://www.h-net.msu.edu/reviews/showrev.cgi?path=103401078008870
Farber's Lincoln's Constitution deserves a place in this roster of important legal-constitutional history titles. Farber both restates the complex issues facing the bifurcating Union, 1861–65, and connects some, including federalism, judicial review, and presidents' crisis powers, to their prewar evolutions, wartime uses, and post-9/11 reappearances, thereby offering readers many useful insights. For example, he concludes correctly that "In practical terms ... the key issue [in the southern states' decisions for secession] was not sovereignty but power" (44).
Harold M. Hyman
Rice University
http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/lhr/22.3/br_10.html
You must mean a pass not a passport.
Under no circumstances was the slaughter of unarmed civilians the policy of the United States military. Had you actually read General Orders No. 100 (Lieber Code) you would have seen the policy on Insurrection - Civil War - Rebellion in Section 10, Articles 149 to 157, inclusive.
First, no resident in a rebellious, "seceded" state was entitled to any Constitutional protections. Those states had thrown off the Constitution and were in rebellion. As such, they were subject to the Laws of War. The "Instructions for the Government of Armies of the United States in the Field" - Lieber Codes of April 1863 - sought to compile and explain the rules of war as applied to the rebellion.
Article 155 talks specifically about the policy regarding civilians:
All enemies in regular war are divided into two general classes - that is to say, into combatants and noncombatants, or unarmed citizen of the hostile government.The military commander of the legitimate government, in a war of rebellion, distinguishes between the loyal citizen in the revolted portion of the country and the disloyal citizen. The disloyal citizen may further be classified into those citizens known to sympathize with the rebellion without positively aiding it, and those who, without taking up arms, give positive aid and comfort to the rebellious enemy being bodily forced thereto.
Article 156 continues:
Common justice and plain expediency require that the military commander protect manifestly loyal citizens, in revolted territories, against the hardships of the war ad much as the common misfortune of all war admitsThe commander will throw the burden of the war, as much as lies within his power, on the disloyal citizens, of the revolted portion or province, subjecting them to a stricter police than the noncombatant enemies have to suffer in regular war; and if he deems it appropriate, or if his government demands of him that every citizen shall, by oath of allegiance, or by some other manifest act, declare his fidelity to the legitimate government, he may expel, transfer, imprison, or fine the revolted citizens who refuse to pledge themselves anew as citizens obedient to the law and loyal to the government.
Whether it is expedient to do so, and whether reliance can be placed upon such oaths, the commander or his government have the right to decide..
Article 157 states:
Armed or unarmed resistance by citizens of the United States against the lawful movement of their troops is levying war against the United States, and is therefore treason.
"Per Lincoln's Lieber Code, the attempted assassination of President Jefferson Davis and cabinet was illegal, yet such was attempted."
Assassination is addressed in Section IX, Article 148:
The law of war does not allow proclaiming either an individual belonging to the hostile army, or a citizen, or a subject of the hostile government, an outlaw, who may be slain without trial by any captor, any more than the modern law of peace allows such intentional outlawry; on the contrary, it abhors such outrage. The sternest retaliation should follow the murder committed in consequence of such proclamation, made by whatever authority. Civilized nations look with horror upon offers of rewards for the assassination of enemies as relapses into barbarism.
With regard to the failed raid led by Col. Dahlgren, you have yet to show that Dahlgren was under "orders" to assassinate Jefferson Davis and his cabinet. His "orders," as can best be derived from the prepared speech to the raiders, was to free Union prisoners, to burn Richmond, and disrupt the confederate war effort - which is a reasonable and lawful military goal. From the "speech": "We hope to release the prisoners from Belle Island first, and having seen them fairly started, we will cross the James River into Richmond, destroying the bridges after us and exhorting the released prisoners to destroy and burn the hateful city; and do not allow the rebel leader Davis and his traitorous crew to escape."
I tend to believe that the existing papers are not faked, but given that they are real, they only show what Col. Dahlgren had in mind. This does not represent any policy or plan of the government of the United States, but only the exuberance of a young colonel.
I would like to know which Article of the Lieber Codes you cite as authority for retaliation.
Without saying so, explicitly, you seem to be justifying Lincoln's assassination by a civilian conspiracy (led by John Wilkes Booth, after Lee's surrender and the flight of the confederate government), as a "retaliatory measure" for a wholly military raid made during hostilities.
Possibly, if you have the cajones, you could explain yourself more fully.
You should now expect a Whopper to go with that Mr. Fibb.
To paraphrase Jaffa, it is not as important where the authority is located in the constitution, but why it is there in the first place. Of course, the Rockwellian cultists will never "get it."
Unilateral secession was never a "conservative" principle. It was thoroughly radical.
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