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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?
The fact that rulers chose to violate the written Constitution no more changed the law of the USSR under Stalin et al, than it changed the law of the USA under Lincoln.
Somewhere in Arkansas a village is missing it's idiot.
Sec. 10. And be it further enacted, That the act, entitled "An act to provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections, and repel invasions," passed the second day of May, one thousand seven hundred and ninety-two, shall be and the same is hereby repealed.
The Militia Act of 1792 was repealed, in its entirety, in 1795. You can stop quoting the Act of 1792 any time now and update your legal knowledge to 1795.
At #620 and #638, Non-Sequitur posted text which has been invalid for 209 years, and wrongly purported it to be the text of the Militia Act of 1795.
The Constitution meant nothing to the Russians since they rejected natural law as found in the Declaration of Independence.
The very law that Calhoun also rejected.
Without the concept of natural law, there are no God given individual rights, only those that the gov't allows.
As you can see from my earlier post, the revision of 1795 actually gave the President more authority.
[ftD] This imposes upon the President the sole responsibility of deciding whether the exigency has arisen which requires the use of military force, and in proportion to the magnitude of that responsibility will be his care not to overstep the limits of his legal and just authority.
Your legal interpretation is manifestly erroneous and without merit. You quoted from the opinion of Buchanan's Attorney General, Jeremiah Black and his opinion holds that your opinion has less merit than an opinion of the 9th Circus.
The Militia Act of 1795 reads as follows:
An Act to provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress insurrection and repel invasions, and to repeal the act now in force for those purposes.
Be it enacted, &c., That whenever the United States shall be invaded, or be in imminent danger of invasion from any foreign nation or Indian tribe, it shall be lawful for the President of the United States to call forth such number of the militia of the State or States most convenient to the place of danger or scene of action, as he may judge necessary to repel such invasion, and to issue his orders for that purpose to such officer or officers of the militia as he shall think proper. And, in case of an insurrection in any State against the Government thereof, it shall be lawful for the President of the United States, on application of the Legislature of such State, or of the Executive, (when the Legislature cannot be convened,) to call forth such number of the militia of any other State or States as may be applied for, as he may judge sufficient to suppress such insurrection.
Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That whenever the laws of the United States shall be opposed, or the execution thereof obstructed in any State, by combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings, or by the powers vested in the Marshals by this act, it shall be lawful for the President of the United States to call forth the militia of such State, or of any other State or States, as may be necessary to suppress such combinations, and to cause the laws to be duly executed; and the use of militia so to be called forth, may be continued, if necessary, until the expiration of thirty days after the commencement of the then next session of Congress.
* * *
Section 1 explicitly addresses invasion and insurrection. Section 2 addresses civil disturbances which interfere with the courts and allows the militia to be used to assist the marshals of the courts to enable the courts to function and the laws to be duly executed. Attorney General Black stated that "to execute the laws of the Union" meant "to aid the federal officers in the performance of their regular duties." As there were no Federal officers in the seceded states, there were none to assist.
From Twenty Years of Congress: From Lincoln to Garfield. With a review of the events which led to the political revolution of 1860, by James G. Blaine. Vol. I, pp. 603-605.
Opinion of Judge Black, November 20, 1860
The Tenth chapter of this volume having been given to the press in advance of formal publication, many inquiries have been received in regard to the text of Judge Black's opinion of November 20, 1860, referred to on pp. 231, 232. The opinion was submitted to the President by Judge Black as Attorney-General. So much of the opinion as includes the points which are specially controverted and criticised is here given — about one-half of the entire document. It is as follows:—
. . . "I come now to the point in your letter which is probably of the greatest practical importance. By the Act of 1807 you may employ such parts of the land and naval forces as you may judge necessary for the purpose of causing the laws to be duly executed, in all cases where it is lawful to use the militia for the same purpose. By the Act of 1795 the militia may be called forth 'whenever the laws of the United States shall be opposed, or the execution thereof obstructed, in any State by combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of Judicial proceedings, or by the power vested in the marshals.' This imposes upon the President the sole responsibility of deciding whether the exigency has arisen which requires the use of military force, and in proportion to the magnitude of that responsibility will be his care not to overstep the limits of his legal and just authority.
"The laws referred to in the Act of 1795 are manifestly those which are administered by the judges, and executed by the ministerial officers of the courts for the punishment of crime against the United States, for the protection of rights claimed under the Federal Constitution and laws, and for the enforcement of such obligations as come within the cognizance of the Federal Judiciary. To compel obedience to these laws, the courts have authority to punish all who obstruct their regular administration, and the marshals and their deputies have the same powers as sheriffs and their deputies in the several States in executing the laws of the States. These are the ordinary means provided for the execution of the laws; and the whole spirit of our system is opposed to the employment of any other, except in cases of extreme necessity arising out of great and unusual combinations against them. Their agency must continue to be used until their incapacity to cope with the power opposed to them shall be plainly demonstrated. It is only upon clear evidence to that effect that a military force can be called into the field. Even then its operations must be purely defensive. It can suppress only such combinations as are found directly opposing the laws and obstructing the execution thereof. It can do no more than what might and ought to be done by a civil posse, if a civil posse could be raised large enough to meet the same opposition. On such occasions, especially, the military power must be kept in strict subordination to the civil authority, since it is only in aid of the latter that the former can act at all.
"But what if the feeling in any State against the United States should become so universal that the Federal officers themselves (including judges, district attorneys, and marshals) would be reached by the same influences, and resign their places? Of course, the first step would be to appoint others in their stead, if others could be got to serve. But in such an event, it is more than probable that great difficulty would be found in filling the offices. We can easily conceive how it might become altogether impossible. We are therefore obliged to consider what can be done in case we have no courts to issue judicial process, and no ministerial officers to execute it. In that event troops would certainly be out of place, and their use wholly illegal. If they are sent to aid the courts and marshals, there must be courts and marshals to be aided. Without the exercise of those functions which belong exclusively to the civil service, the laws cannot be executed in any event, no matter what may be the physical strength which the Government has at its command. Under such circumstances to send a military force into any State, with orders to act against the people, would be simply making war upon them.
"The existing laws put and keep the Federal Government strictly on the defensive. You can use force only to repel an assault on the public property and aid the Courts in the performance of their duty. If the means given you to collect the revenue and execute the other laws be insufficient for that purpose, Congress may extend and make them more effectual to those ends.
"If one of the States should declare her independence, your action cannot depend on the rightfulness of the cause upon which such declaration is based. Whether the retirement of the State from the Union be the exercise of a right reserved in the Constitution, or a revolutionary movement, it is certain that you have not in either case the authority to recognize her independence or to absolve her from her Federal obligations. Congress, or the other States in Convention assembled, must take such measures as may be necessary and proper. In such an event, I see no course for you but to go straight onward in the path you have hitherto trodden — that is, execute the laws to the extent of the defensive means placed in your hands, and act generally upon the assumption that the present constitutional relations between the States and the Federal Gevernment continue to exist, until a new code of things shall be established either by law or force.
"Whether Congress has the constitutionsal right to make war against one or more States, and require the Executive of the Federal Government to carry it on by means of force to be drawn from the other States, is a question for Congress itself to consider. It must be admitted that no such power is expressly given; nor are there any words in the Constitution which imply it. Among the powers enumerated in Article 1, Section 8 is that 'to declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and to make rules concerning captures on land and water.' This certainly means nothing more than the power to commence and carry on hostilities against the foreign enemies of the nation. Another clause in the same section gives Congress the power 'to provide for calling forth the militia,' and to use them within the limits of the State. But this power is so restricted by the words which immediately follow that it can be exercised only for one of the following purposes:
To execute the laws of the Union; that is, to aid the Federal officers in the performance of their regular duties.To suppress insurrections against the State; but this is confined by Article 4, Section 4, to cases in which the State herself shall apply for assistance against her own people.
To repel the invasion of a State by enemies who come from abroad to assail her in her own territory.
All these provisions are made to protect the States, not to authorize an attack by one part of the country upon another; to preserve the peace, and not to plunge them into civil war. Our forefathers do not seem to have thought that war was calculated 'to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.' There was undoubtedly a strong and universal conviction among the men who framed and ratified the Constitution, that military force would not only be useless, but pernicious, as a means of holding the States together.
"If it be true that war cannot be declared, nor a system of general hostilities carried on by the Central Government against a State, then it seems to follow that an attempt to do so would be ipso facto an expulsion of such State from the Union. Being treated as an alien and an enemy, she would be compelled to act accordingly. And if Congress shall break up the present Union by unconstitutionally putting strife and enmity and armed hostility between different sections of the country, instead of the domestic tranquillity which the Constitution was meant to insure, will not all the States be absolved from their Federal obligations? Is any portion of the people bound to contribute their money or their blood to carry on a contest like that?
"The right of the General Government to preserve itself in its whole constitutional vigor by repelling a direct and positive aggression upon its property or its officers cannot by denied. But this is a totally different thing from an offensive war to punish the people for the political misdeeds of their State Government, or to enforce an acknowledgment that the Government of the United States is supreme. The States are colleagues of one another, and if some of them shall conquer the rest, and hold them as subjugated provinces, it would totally destroy the whole theory upon which they are now connected.
"If this view of the subject be correct, as I think it is, then the Union must utterly perish at the moment when Congress shall arm one part of the people against another for any purpose beyond that of merely protecting the General Government in the exercise of its proper constitutional functions.
You know, N-S, we'd do a lot better sticking to the source documents and what they actually say. All this interpolation that you and your partner in crime like to do is well-known to us now as a tactic of obfuscation with intent to mislead. Article IV does not "reserve" to the United States (the States? the Congress? you're so imprecise!) the power to create a State.
Repeatedly in American history, persons of various origins created States that were then admitted -- or not admitted, in the case of Texas -- to the Union. West Floridians created a new State out of formerly British and Spanish territory in 1810; it was annexed by the United States about two months later (its flag, by the way, was the Bonnie Blue -- possibly the earliest use of that flag). California's Bear Flag Republic operated for a period of weeks or months, after separation from Mexico, before being annexed by the United States. And you've previously discussed the example of Vermont, which was formed on territory claimed not by the United States, but by two Colonies, then two States.
You and your friend are dogmatic about federal this and federal that, as if the Union were the veriest Homoousion of God Almighty. But it isn't the be-all and end-all of American life, but mostly a convenience to your own politics of empire, of a triumphant faction squatting on a conquered country.
STATEHOOD IS NOT A GRANT OF CONGRESS. THE STATES ARE NOT CREATURES OF THE CONGRESS OR OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. How many times does this have to be demonstrated, and jammed up your recalcitrant backside, before you desist from claiming Godlike powers of authorship for the damned federal Union?!
It reserves to the United States the power to approve a change in borders, to allow a state to split in two or to combine with another state that removes one state from the Union where before there had been two.
This is flat-out misrepresentation -- what the hell, boy, did you think we wouldn't get out our copies of the Constitution and see that that isn't what Article IV actually says? This is not a Congressional prerogative or power. This is a shared arrangement requiring the "Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress." You've materially misrepresented Article IV.
Implicit in this is that Congress must approve all changes in the status of a state and that includes leaving the Union altogether.
More of your bafflegab, same effect -- material misrepresentation, followed by a stretch, a reach, and a grab. Nice work if you can get it, but you can't get it because we won't let you have it. Your comment about secession is buncombe and utterly unsupported by the governing document -- which is why you don't quote it.
I'll second 4ConservativeJustices' comment about "implicit". My fee for $45,000,000 is implicit in having to straighten you out on this yet again. I'll take your check -- no, wait, make that a good-funds instrument. It's not that I don't trust you -- it's that I just don't like the way you do things.
The 1795 act included the same provisions for calling out the militia that the 1792 act had, with minor exceptions. For example, the requirement in Section 2 that the president be notified by an associate justice or a district judge were stricken. Try again.
You spend your time reading and quoting the Militia Act of 1792 which was repealed in 1795, and then making believe you did not know better.
That is why you are called the Minister of Propaganda.
Crash, boom, next case! Affirmative-dispositive bump.
Non-sequitur needs to quit wasting his time trying to sell the lurkers on theories that aren't true.
If N-S makes you quote John Marshall again on the reservation of powers not granted, charge him $30,000,000 tuition. No, make that a nuisance fee.
Quoting misidentified inaccurate text is a Brigade specialty. You apparently defend the practice.
You're doing all the "impliciting" around here. The Hamiltonians lost. We don't have omnipotent government armed with raison d'etat out to the far horizon, like Hamilton wanted.
Stop it. Your embarrassing everyone. Not to mention breaking yourself with tuition expenses.
Concurring bump. You need to start charging him by the hour. Charge him a lot. Some of it is nuisance fees.
What Constitution adopted natural law?
Where does one go to find out what comprises so-called natural law?
[ftD] Without the concept of natural law, there are no God given individual rights, only those that the gov't allows.
We have courts of law. Under United States law, the viable full-term child with all delivered except the head, does not enjoy the God given natural law right to life, liberty or anything else. Somebody else enjoys the right to have his or her brains vacuumed out, the skull collapsed, and have the tissue mass disposed of.
The Declaration of Independence is not law.
There are at least FOUR cases to consider.
In WHITE v. CANNON, the relevant attorneys were from the firm of Hughes, Denver, and Peck.
The partners were:
At the time that this case arose, Mr. Philip Phillips was barred from the practice of law.
------------------
In TEXAS v. WHITE, WHITE v. HART, and KEITH v. CLARK, the relevant attorney was:
Mr. Phillips was the son of a German Jewish immigrant and he was born in Charleston, SC on December 17, 1807. He attended the Military Academy of one Captain Partridge in Middletown, Connecticut. One of his roommates was (later) Governor Thomas Hart Seymour of Connecticut, cousin of Governor Horatio Seymour of New York. Mr. Phillips is the author of a memoir, "Philip Phillips: Southern Unionist."
Dr. Jacob R. Marcus has written, "Philip Phillips has been called the greatest native-born American of Jewish origin in the Ante-Bellum period." "[H]e became the most successful Supreme Court lawyer of this generation." He appeared before the Supreme Court in over 400 cases.
At age 21, he was secretary of the Reformed Society of Israelites, a liberal religious group. In 1851, Phillips headed a Jewish delegation that asked President Buchanan to redress a claimed injustice imposed on Jews by a commercial treaty with Switzerland in 1855.
In 1836, he married his wife, Eugenia Levy of Charleston, SC, who was then 16 years old.
Practicing law in Mobile, Alabama, Phillips wrote that in 1853, "I suppose that my average annual income was about $8,000. Until 1853, he was the attorney for the bank of Mobile, making $2,000 annual salary.
Phillips served as chairman of the Alabama Democratic Party, served two terms in the Alabama State Legislature, and upon being elected to Congress in 1853 he moved his family to Washington, DC.
Phillips write, "Beyond all doubt, the sympathies of my wife and daughters were strongly on the Southern side, and they were doubless openly expressed and, considering the times, indiscreetly so." Phillips and family were arrested on August 24, 1861. He was confined to his room for a week, and his wife and daughters until September 18, 1861.
Phillips writes, "During my confinement I was visited one night by Mr. Edwin M. Stanton, afterwards so celebrated as secretary of War. He was a friend and at this time a stronger sympathizer with the South [Phillips' italics] than I was. It appears that subsequent events carried him over to the other side. His motives for the change I have no right to question. I am indebted to him for his zeal in aiding the liberation of my family...."
His wife and daughters were released into his custody.
Phillips then writes, "I had previously spoken to Mr. Seward, then Secretary of State, as to the propriety of allowing me to take my family South, as the policy of the government was to change the tone of public sentiment at Washington, which was then strongly Southern."
Phillips also notes, "My departure from Washington was facilitated by the friendly offices of Gen'l Winfield Scott, who gave me written permission to carry out $5,000."
He went to New Orleans where his wife wound up being arrested and confined by order of General Butler. Once she was released, Phillips obtained a passport from military governor General George Foster Shepley and went to La Grange, Georgia. In one case during war, Mr. Phillips obtained a fee of $15,000.
Phillips wrote, "My fees during my four years' residence in La Grange enabled me to support the family abundantly and furnished the means to begin new life with the expenses incident to the changed condition from the economy of war to the extravagances of peace."
At war's end, Phillips relocated to Washington, D.C. again but was barred from the practice of law. He was unable to take the oath that required all officers to swear that they had given "no aid, countenance, counsel, or encouragement to any person" in armed hostility to the government. This oath was eventually declared void by the Supreme Court, and Phillips once again opened an office on July 7, 1867.
As seen, the attorneys in these cases were some of the most connected and highest paid attorneys in the nation.
The TOTAL monetary value at issue in these four cases was $53,845. Without TEXAS v. WHITE, their combined value was $6,520. In the case of TEXAS v. WHITE, total victory by the State resulted in a loss of $17,577 after paying one attorney for one stage of litigation. Any other fees or expenses represent additional financial loss resulting from total victory.
WHITE AND CHILES WERE A PAIR OF NEW YORK INVESTORS
The case went to the supreme court in 1867 following the attempt to cash the bonds with the U.S. Treasury by White and Chiles and other citizens of New York and other states. The bonds in question had been transferred to the New York investors by the "rebel" government of Texas in January 1865.
Curious ethnicity of George W. WHITE, Jr.
WHITE, GEORGE W., JR. (1903-1970). George W. White, painter and sculptor, was born in Cedar Creek, Texas, on September 8, 1903, the son of Lilly (Hodge) and George W. White, Sr. White had a Mexican, Indian, and African-American heritage.
THE OPPONENTS IN TEXAS v. WHITE
WHITE and CHILES represented New York monied interests. They were represented by Philip Phillips, one of the most successful Supreme Court attorneys of his generation. On the other side was the military government of Texas and the governor appointed by the Federal government in Washington, D.C. The people of Texas were not represented.
capitan_refugio would have one believe:
"The States are colleagues of one another, and if some of them shall conquer the rest, and hold them as subjugated provinces, it would totally destroy the whole theory upon which they are now connected."If this view of the subject be correct, as I think it is, then the Union must utterly perish at the moment when Congress shall arm one part of the people against another for any purpose beyond that of merely protecting the General Government in the exercise of its proper constitutional functions."
Worth quoting again because highly illuminating.
Extrapolating, Lincoln's Decree of April 27, 1861, calling for troops to be sent South, could be construed, in Black's theory, as having dissolved the Union in a sense that the South Carolinians never could, nor wanted to -- by destroying its entire basis in law and equity. In this warning, too, Black reiterates the earlier warning of Alexis DeTocqueville about the likely fate of the American republic, in the hands of a self-interested faction of States.
The Southern States left the Union; Lincoln destroyed it to get them back.
Contrast Justice Black's opinion with the wonderful sentiment of Thaddeus Stevens quoted above, concerning the admission of West Virginia whose unconstitutionality Stevens cheerfully conceded, before announcing he'd vote for it with a right good will. Stevens's sentiment casts a clear, if dark, light on Unionist motives and their actual practice of the rule of law that they represented themselves as defending.
Taken together, the two quotations show up the Northern "defense" of the Union and of the operation of federal law to have been a blatant imposture. This perspective illuminates the Northern war to recover the South in rays of dark light, the kind that casts deep shadows on everything it touches.
http://www.wideopenwest.com/~jenkins/ironclads/proclams.htm
By the President of the United States of America.--A Proclamation.
Whereas an insurrection against the Government of the United States has broken out in the States of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, and the laws of the United States for the collection of the revenue can not be effectually executed therein, conformably to that provision of the Constitution which requires duties to be uniform throughout the United States; and
Whereas a combination of persons engaged in such insurrection have threatened to grant pretended letters of marque to authorize the bearers thereof to commit assaults on the lives, vessels, and property of good citizens of the country lawfully engaged in commerce on the high seas and in the waters of the United States; and
Whereas an Executive proclamation has been already issued requiring the persons engaged in these disorderly proceedings to desist therefrom, calling out a militia force for the purpose of repressing the same, and convening Congress in extraordinary session to deliberate and determine thereon:
Now, therefore, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, with a view to the same purposes before mentioned, and to the protection of public peace and the lives and property of quiet and orderly citizens pursuing their lawful occupations until Congress shall have assembled and deliberated on the said unlawful proceedings, or until the same shall have ceased, have further deemed it advisable to set on foot a blockade of the ports within the States aforesaid, in pursuance of the laws of the United States and of the law of nations in such case provided. For this purpose a competent force will be posted so as to prevent entrance and exit of vessels from the ports aforesaid. If, therefore, with a view to violate such blockade a vessel shall approach or shall attempt to leave either of the said ports, she will be duly warned by the commander of one of the blockading vessels, who will endorse on her register the fact and date of such warning, and if the same vessel shall again attempt to enter or leave the blockaded port she will be captured and sent to the nearest convenient port for such proceedings against her and her cargo as prize as may be deemed advisable.
And I hereby proclaim and declare that if any person, under the pretended authority of the said States, or under any other pretense, shall molest a vessel of the United States, or the persons or cargo on board of her, such person will be held amenable to the laws of the United States for the prevention and punishment of piracy.
In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the city of Washington this nineteenth day of April, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-fifth.
[L.S.]
Abraham Lincoln.
By the President:
William H. Seward,
Secretary of State.
Proclamation of the President of the United States regarding extension of blockade to the ports of Virginia and North Carolina, April 27, 1861.
Whereas, for the reasons assigned in my proclamation of the 19th instant, a blockade of the ports of the States of South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas, was ordered to be established; and, whereas, since that date public property of the United States has been seized, the collection of the revenue obstructed, and duly commissioned officers of the United States, while engaged in executing the orders of their superiors, have been arrested and held in custody as prisoners, or have been impeded in the discharge of their official duties without due legal process by persons claiming to act under authority of the States of Virginia and North Carolina, an efficient blockade of the ports of those States will therefore also be established.
In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the city of Washington, this twenty-seventh day of April, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one, and of the independence of the United States the eighty-fifth.
[L.S.]
Abraham Lincoln.
By the President:
William H. Seward,
Secretary of State.
Message to Congress in Special Session
July 4, 1861
Recurring to the action of the government, it may be stated that, at first, a call was made for seventy-five thousand militia; and rapidly following this, a proclamation was issued for closing the ports of the insurrectionary districts by proceedings in the nature of Blockade. So far all was believed to be strictly legal. At this point the insurrectionists announced their purpose to enter upon the practice of privateering. Other calls were made for volunteers, to serve three years, unless sooner discharged; and also for large additions to the regular Army and Navy. These measures, whether strictly legal or not, were ventured upon, under what appeared to be a popular demand, and a public necessity; trusting, then as now, that Congress would readily ratify them. It is believed that nothing has been done beyond the constitutional competency of Congress.
a proclamation was issued for closing the ports of the insurrectionary districts by proceedings in the nature of Blockade
He meant to say that he proclaimed a blockade. He proclaimed a blockade, not a closing of the ports. He did eventually get around to closing the ports -- on April 11, 1865, four days before he died.
Just before the war ended, Lincoln issued an order closing the ports, rather than blockading them.
From Gideon Welles, Lincoln and Johnson, First Paper, Galaxy Magazine, April 1872, p. 523
Mr. Seward, who had been uneasy since his return, [nc: Seward had been thrown from his carriage and injured] read to the Secretary of the Treasury and myself the draft of a proclamation he had prepared for the President to sign, closing the ports of the Southern States. This was a step which I had earnestly pressed at the beginning of the rebellion, as a domestic measure, and more legitimate than a blockade, which was international, and an admission that we were two nations.* * *
The President reached Washington on the evening of Sunday, the 9th of April. When I called on him the next morning he was in excellent spirits, the news of Lee’s surrender, which however was not unanticipated, having been received. While I was with him he signed the proclamation for closing the ports and expressed his gratification that Mr. Seward and myself concurred in the measure, alluding to our former differences.
OFFICIAL RECORDS: Series 3, vol 5, Part 1, page 107
(Union Letters, Orders, Reports)
VII. April 11, 1865.-Closing certain ports.
BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A PROCLAMATION.
Whereas, by my proclamations of the nineteenth and twenty-seventh days of April, one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one the ports of the United States in the State of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas were declared to be subject to blockade; but whereas, the said blockade has, in consequence of actual military occupation by this Government, since been conditionally set aside or relaxed in respect to the ports of Norfolk and Alexandria, in the State of Virginia; Beaufort, in the State of North Carolina; Port Royal, in the State of South Carolina; Pensacola and Fernandina, in the State of Florida, and New Orleans, in the State of Louisiana;
And whereas, by the fourth section of the act of Congress approved on the thirteenth of July, eighteen hundred and sixty- one; entitled "An act further to provide for the collection of duties on imports, and for other purposes," the President, for the reasons therein set forth, is authorized to close certain ports of entry:
Now, therefore, be it known that I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, do hereby proclaim that the ports of Richmond, Tappahannock, Cherrystone, Yorktown, and Petersburg, in Virginia; of Camden (Elizabeth City), Edenton, Plymouth, Washington, New Berne, Ocracoke, and Wilmington, in North Carolina; of Charleston, Georgetown, and Beaufort, in South Carolina; of Savannah, Saint Mary's, and Brunswick (Darien), in Georgia; of Mobile, in Alabama; of Pearl River (Shieldsborough), Natchez, and Vicksburg, in Mississippi; of Saint Augustine, Key West, Saint Mark's (Port Leon), Saint John's (Jacksonville), and Apalachicola, in Florida; of Teche (Franklin), in Louisiana; of Galveston, La Salle, Brazos de Santiago (Point Isabel), and Brownsville, in Texas, are hereby closed, and all right of importation, warehousing, and other privileges shall, in respect to the ports aforesaid, cease, until they shall have again been opened by order of the President; and if, whole said ports are so closed, any ship or vessel from beyond the United States, or having on board any articles subject to duties, furniture, and cargo, shall be forfeited to the United States.
In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the city of Washington this eleventh day of April, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-five, and of the Independence of the United States of America the eighty- ninth.
[L. S.]
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
By the President:
WILLIAM H. SEWARD,
Secretary of State.
Pinging for possible interest in the genesis of Texas vs. White, the case that the Supreme Court and Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase used to declare secession "illegal", "null and void", "without force", and so on and so on.
SOURCE: North & South, Volume 7, Number 3, May 2004, Page 87
Sidebar: Do You Know?
3. This is the only foreign state to officially recognize the Confederacy.
Answer: The duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha
Says who? If God, then I'm all ears.
Besides, have you never heard of a demarche, a volte face? Never heard of a nation that took down a treaty or annulled a contract out of its sovereign power?
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