“Yo, Judge. Unless I’m mistaken, the Brits took a dim view of the colonies ‘secession’ and actually took steps to try and prevent it.”
That has nothing to do with the point at hand.
“If secession was a right in 1776 then why did they have to fight for it?”
Is that an honest question? You could just as easily say natural/human rights don’t exist because throughout most of history governments have failed to recognized them. They don’t have to be recognized for them to exist. Maybe the colonists had no God-given right to declare their independence from Britain, but the reaction of the British leadership could not possibly settle the matter.
Maybe it was a matter of “might makes right” when the colonists won independence. Then again, maybe the British were attempting to use “might makes right” when they fought to keep us under their authority. We tend to think the latter. Maybe we’re wrong. But if you believe in the colonies’ right to revolution, I don’t see why you don’t believe in the Southern states’ right to succession.
You may disagree with the rationale (preserving slavery), or its practicality (no world-striding great, old USA if the South leaves; then again, maybe we’d all be richer and more powerful if we’d stayed with the British all along). But that does not address succession as such. I believe in my right to revolt if a Stalin were to rise to power in America, but I don’t at all think Obama qualifies.
Well, yes it does. Napolitano takes Lincoln to task for opposing the Southern acts of secession, and compares them to the colonists. He claims that "the right of secession followed from the American Revolution as the colonists separated from the British Empire and declared their independence..." and forgets to mention that the colonists had to fight for that independence. So if he wants to make the comparison with the colonists then why is he so surprised that the Southern acts of 'secession' were opposed as well? Or that they had to fight for their independence?
Maybe it was a matter of “might makes right” when the colonists won independence.
But might was against the colonists. They were fighting one of the strongest countries on earh and they beat them. The confederates couldn't accomplish that.
You may disagree with the rationale (preserving slavery)...
Not at all. What I disagree with is the way the confederate supportes seem embarassed by slavery and are willing to go to any lengths to avoid admitting it was about slavery.
...or its practicality (no world-striding great, old USA if the South leaves; then again, maybe we’d all be richer and more powerful if we’d stayed with the British all along).
No, I'm glad that the United States remained whole and unbroken because that is how our Founding Father's had left it to us.
But that does not address succession as such. I believe in my right to revolt if a Stalin were to rise to power in America, but I don’t at all think Obama qualifies.
And I am not going to disagree with you. But tell me where it says that you have the right to revolt and Stalin or Obama or whoever is not supposed to oppose you.
The war was basically fought over political power or the right of some to impose their will on others. That is what the Missouri Compromise was about, proportioning representation in Congress and consequently the number of electors in the Electoral College.
The buildup to the war involved several issues. Representation, although supposedly settled was not a satisfactory settlement to many; slavery, an emotional issue drummed up and ignited by northern activists such as Harriet Beecher Stowe but not of much interest to most other than for the previously mentioned representation issue; and economic, the heavy tariff imposed by the Congressional majority from northern industrial states on imported machinery,imported mostly by southern states, which competed with the northern industrial base.
Each of those areas can be vastly expanded but that was basically it in a nutshell - political power.
The kicker is that barely sixty years earlier the states agreed to join the union only on the caveat that were such a situation to arise that each collectively or individually could withdraw from the new union, The United States of America. Lincoln’s desire to protect and maintain said union was in direct contradiction to the agreement made.