Your here with us now :) God love ya for it.
Posted on 03/10/2010 6:35:02 PM PST by Idabilly
Over the course of American history, there has been no greater conflict of visions than that between Thomas Jefferson’s voluntary republic, founded on the natural right of peaceful secession, and Abraham Lincoln’s permanent empire, founded on the violent denial of that same right.
That these two men somehow shared a common commitment to liberty is a lie so monstrous and so absurd that its pervasiveness in popular culture utterly defies logic.
After all, Jefferson stated unequivocally in the Declaration of Independence that, at any point, it may become necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them…
And, having done so, he said, it is the people’s right to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Contrast that clear articulation of natural law with Abraham Lincoln’s first inaugural address, where he flatly rejected the notion that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed.
Instead, Lincoln claimed that, despite the clear wording of the Tenth Amendment, no State upon its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the Union; [and] resolves and ordinances [such as the Declaration of Independence] to that effect are legally void…
King George III agreed.
(Excerpt) Read more at southernheritage411.com ...
Whenever y'all feel froggy,punk.
Well, what are you waiting for? Go issue a demand that a US Army base be turned over to you and then start shelling it.
Bootless means not cogent, or it may mean that the idea doesn't parse: the freedom of fish to breathe nitrous oxide and get silly, something like that.
This is the argument of Marxists such as Lenin and Mao who premised there revolution on (inter alia) the denial of the right to own property; or the Taliban who intend to compel allegiance to their version of the Koran.
Aside from the fact that occasionally Marxists have been known to tell time correctly, what exactly does this have to do with anything, other than an attempt to lodge an argumentum ad hominem by means of "bracketing" me with Marxists and Taliban?
If Marxist revolutionaries premised their revolution on a proposition such as the renunciation of private property, then was that the real premise, or was it a tool for achieving the real goal in view, i.e. human happiness? Their program may or may not be productive of same, but after some sort of trial of their ideas as by the New Harmony experiment or the Paris Commune, one can form an opinion of its likelihood to produce the desired end.
I think you've loaded your argument with too much freight, frankly. Happiness doesn't necessarily consist of being a scold from Massachusetts who, as in the letter just cited, goes sword in hand to plunder another part of the country and burn and slay whatever he cannot profitably carry away.
That's a substantial part of my take on the Civil War, and I argue that people like Non-Sequitur who live to gloat over that historical abuse because they don't like the South and Southerners and wish that all those ills could be visited on the South again, are part of the damage to the larger community that needs to be rectified -- such as by their hygienic quarantining, or removal from polite society and permanent exile to some savage society that still practices on newcomers what Massachusetts soldiers --as in the passage cited above -- practiced on Georgians and Carolinians.
That done, the historical damage inflicted on the American idea and American exceptionalism because their side prevailed needs also to be repaired: all those Supreme Court decisions that turned the Commerce Clause into an all-purpose handle for expanding Congress's warrant into a claim of totalitarian omnipotence and omnicompetence, for example.
By the way, the protection of the property rights of American loyalists (Tories) provided for in the Treaty of Paris did not necessarily make the Tories whole. I would invoke that experience as probative of my statement. The separation of America and Great Britain did not provide fully for the property rights of either Americans or Loyalists, as both sides continued to have "issues" for years after the conclusion of the peace treaty.
Which treaty, by the way, fell under some suspicion in 1812, when the British came calling again.
No, it was minuscule because in the early 1850's the Irish who came to New Orleans and lived next to the short drainage canal in the lower Garden District next to Adele Street, called ever since then the Irish Channel, couldn't compete with yellowjack, cholera, and malaria.
The word got out: stay away from New Orleans, it's a death trap for Irishmen.
Other Irish who emigrated to Georgia instead flew their green regimental flag at Fredericksburg, and found themselves confronting and shooting down the charge of the New York Irish Brigade and its famous "Fighting Sixty-Ninth" regiment.
So were all of mine, by the way, from Galway and Kerry and Roscommon.
Only I didn't grow up to go around telling my Southern neighbors, "Nyaaah, nyaaah, nyaaah, our Indiana regiments burned down your worthless state ha ha ha!"
Your here with us now :) God love ya for it.
I thought I had controverted that idea, by pointing out that both ratification and un-ratification, i.e. secession, are within the sovereign power of the People.
As for "light and transient causes", nobody was concerned about that with respect to ratification by the 13 original States.
Washington, Madison, Franklin, and others all inveighed against "disunion" as a political posture: it was unwise, in the face of continuing European interest in North America, for the States, any or all of them, to have gone it alone. That is a political proposition just like the Declaration, but as we have argued exhaustively but apparently to no effect on people prepared to resist elenchus, the idea of a threshold consent to irrevocable Union was not enshrined in the Constitution, and in fact it was explicitly rejected, as shown by our friend.
Not only was nonsecession language rejected in the Philadelphia convention, but likewise amalgamation was rejected, as shown in convention notes brought in by our friend 4CJ years ago, in which the idea of submitting the Constitution to a mass, 13-State ratification convention or plebiscite was proposed but failed to attract a second.
That silence should deafen us today and remind us who The People really are -- the People of the several States, not a lumpen mass that the big-state lawyers have always wanted, to enable their political games further. Games they've been playing, by the way, since Hamilton walked into the hall in Philadelphia.
Lastly, in case anyone wasn't paying attention, the Antifederalists successfully impetrated the addition of the Ninth and Tenth Amendments that explicitly stated what Hamilton insisted would always be understood to be implicit in the Constitution, that powers not delegated to the Union and the federal government, would be reserved to the States, or to the People.
Unmaking of the Union and of the Constitution was one of those reserved powers. It still is.
All the arguments about legal secession or secession at discretion, are just Yankee lawyer-talk. What it really means is, "our political combination to take the federal government into permanent receivership is almost ready -- and you are not going to get away! You will be our meat and drink, and we will kill you if you resist our asset-stripping! Not exactly the sort of proposition most of the Framers had in mind (Hamilton probably did, he was repping for the other New York City businessmen), but it's been the debased basis of our Republic ever since the Civil War.
Nor did I. It wasn't until I found large contingent of folks who seem to think that my ancestors who fought under the United States flag were the raping, pillaging, duped horde of a proto-fascist dictator at whose feet every ill in American history since can be laid that I began to respond.
While the Irish get all the attention, they were far outnumbered in the United States Army by German-born and second generation German (my other Civil War ancestor). Germans weren’t nearly as common in the south, and those that were there were mostly Unionist in their sympathies.
No. It’s fagphobia. Go away.
LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT OF D.G. BROWN, 1866
I have made several wills heretofore, when I had considerable property to give to my wife and children, but since the Yankees have stolen all negroes and robbed me of a great deal of my personal property, pillaging my houses, breaking open all the doors and stealing all the clothing they wanted, I have very little to will. They stole a gold watch from me, worth about three hundred dollars, which was a bridal present to me from my wife when we were married nearly half a century ago. They threatened to shoot me if I did not deliver my watch to them and burn down my dwelling house, presenting their pistols at me frequently. I am an old man of seventy six that was too weak and feeble to defend myself. I therefore make this my last will and testament in manner and form following viz:
1ST: I give and bequeath to my children and grandchildren and their decendants throughout all generations, the bitter hatred and everlasting malignity of my heart and soul against the Yankees, including all the people North of the Mason Dixon line, and I do hereby exhort and entreat my children and grandchildren if they have any love or veneration for me, to instill into the hearts of their children, this bitter hatred and these malignant feelings against the foresaid people and their decendants throughout all future time and generations.
Signed and sealed by me and written wholly with my own hand this 22nd day of November, in the year, one thousand Eight hundred Sixty-six.
D. G. Brown
This will was recorded and witnessed to on June 25th 1867
R. O. Doswell, Clerk, Hanover County Courthouse
Yup. Demonstrating that I’m not a dumbass like you. You don’t win points by NOT doing what you tell others to do. You lose. A-Gain. LOL!
This never gets old.
For another thing, there doesn't seem to be any trace of a Lt. Thomas J. Myers in any Massachusetts roster, or in the roster of the Regular Army.
Maybe it's real, maybe it's not. The original may or may not exist. Looting certainly happened, especially in South Carolina which was seen as the heart of the rebellion, the place most responsible for starting the trouble. But I seriously doubt that Sherman was personally dragging around 250 watches.
Are you gonna get all whiny now?
Dispute this,Bubba
Letter of Private Frank Bailey, 34th New York Infantry Regiment to his brother in Middleville, New York: -
“West Point, Virginia, 12 May 1862 - I hear that the Rebels sent out a Regt. of niggers to fight our men and that they were as naked as when they were born, except the brogues on their feet, and they incited to all sorts of cruelty. It is said that they cut the throats of our wounded and then rob them of every article of any value. The soldiers are death on niggers now. If they catch a nigger in the woods, and there is no officer near, they hang them without any ceremony. Now if this is true that the Southern chivalry as they style themselves put these niggers up to such deeds as this, may the curse of good light on them. It is worse than the English were in the Revolution to hire the Indians, but their race is about run when the stoop to such barbarism as that. Yesterday there was two niggers hung close by here by our men. One of them had $20.00 government note in his pocket. There is no mistake but the Rebels have black soldiers for I have seen them brought in as prisoners of war. I saw one who had the stripes of an orderly sergeant on his coat. I don't beleive in taking them prisoner, but kill them where ever they find them, that they may never more curse the land with their hateful presence.”
http://www.genealogyforum.com/gfaol/resource/Military/BlackConfederates.htm
Study the German migration to Texas in the 1850’s. Not miniscule...Texas has a mixture of towns named New Braunfels right next San Marcos. German-Mexican kind of thing...
Why did you post a link to an edited version? Because actual history does match the revisionist version? Note that the actual declaration makes no mention of tariffs or of “states rights” or of the size of government. It was entirely about slavery.
http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_scarsec.asp
“”Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union”
The people of the State of South Carolina, in Convention assembled, on the 26th day of April, A.D., 1852, declared that the frequent violations of the Constitution of the United States, by the Federal Government, and its encroachments upon the reserved rights of the States, fully justified this State in then withdrawing from the Federal Union; but in deference to the opinions and wishes of the other slaveholding States, she forbore at that time to exercise this right. Since that time, these encroachments have continued to increase, and further forbearance ceases to be a virtue.
And now the State of South Carolina having resumed her separate and equal place among nations, deems it due to herself, to the remaining United States of America, and to the nations of the world, that she should declare the immediate causes which have led to this act.
In the year 1765, that portion of the British Empire embracing Great Britain, undertook to make laws for the government of that portion composed of the thirteen American Colonies. A struggle for the right of self-government ensued, which resulted, on the 4th of July, 1776, in a Declaration, by the Colonies, “that they are, and of right ought to be, FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES; and that, as free and independent States, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent States may of right do.”
They further solemnly declared that whenever any “form of government becomes destructive of the ends for which it was established, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government.” Deeming the Government of Great Britain to have become destructive of these ends, they declared that the Colonies “are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.”
In pursuance of this Declaration of Independence, each of the thirteen States proceeded to exercise its separate sovereignty; adopted for itself a Constitution, and appointed officers for the administration of government in all its departments— Legislative, Executive and Judicial. For purposes of defense, they united their arms and their counsels; and, in 1778, they entered into a League known as the Articles of Confederation, whereby they agreed to entrust the administration of their external relations to a common agent, known as the Congress of the United States, expressly declaring, in the first Article “that each State retains its sovereignty, freedom and independence, and every power, jurisdiction and right which is not, by this Confederation, expressly delegated to the United States in Congress assembled.”
Under this Confederation the war of the Revolution was carried on, and on the 3rd of September, 1783, the contest ended, and a definite Treaty was signed by Great Britain, in which she acknowledged the independence of the Colonies in the following terms: “ARTICLE 1— His Britannic Majesty acknowledges the said United States, viz: New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, to be FREE, SOVEREIGN AND INDEPENDENT STATES; that he treats with them as such; and for himself, his heirs and successors, relinquishes all claims to the government, propriety and territorial rights of the same and every part thereof.”
Thus were established the two great principles asserted by the Colonies, namely: the right of a State to govern itself; and the right of a people to abolish a Government when it becomes destructive of the ends for which it was instituted. And concurrent with the establishment of these principles, was the fact, that each Colony became and was recognized by the mother Country a FREE, SOVEREIGN AND INDEPENDENT STATE.
In 1787, Deputies were appointed by the States to revise the Articles of Confederation, and on 17th September, 1787, these Deputies recommended for the adoption of the States, the Articles of Union, known as the Constitution of the United States.
The parties to whom this Constitution was submitted, were the several sovereign States; they were to agree or disagree, and when nine of them agreed the compact was to take effect among those concurring; and the General Government, as the common agent, was then invested with their authority.
If only nine of the thirteen States had concurred, the other four would have remained as they then were— separate, sovereign States, independent of any of the provisions of the Constitution. In fact, two of the States did not accede to the Constitution until long after it had gone into operation among the other eleven; and during that interval, they each exercised the functions of an independent nation.
By this Constitution, certain duties were imposed upon the several States, and the exercise of certain of their powers was restrained, which necessarily implied their continued existence as sovereign States. But to remove all doubt, an amendment was added, which declared that 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. On the 23d May , 1788, South Carolina, by a Convention of her People, passed an Ordinance assenting to this Constitution, and afterwards altered her own Constitution, to conform herself to the obligations she had undertaken.
Thus was established, by compact between the States, a Government with definite objects and powers, limited to the express words of the grant. This limitation left the whole remaining mass of power subject to the clause reserving it to the States or to the people, and rendered unnecessary any specification of reserved rights.
We hold that the Government thus established is subject to the two great principles asserted in the Declaration of Independence; and we hold further, that the mode of its formation subjects it to a third fundamental principle, namely: the law of compact. We maintain that in every compact between two or more parties, the obligation is mutual; that the failure of one of the contracting parties to perform a material part of the agreement, entirely releases the obligation of the other; and that where no arbiter is provided, each party is remitted to his own judgment to determine the fact of failure, with all its consequences.
In the present case, that fact is established with certainty. We assert that fourteen of the States have deliberately refused, for years past, to fulfill their constitutional obligations, and we refer to their own Statutes for the proof.
The Constitution of the United States, in its fourth Article, provides as follows: “No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.”
This stipulation was so material to the compact, that without it that compact would not have been made. The greater number of the contracting parties held slaves, and they had previously evinced their estimate of the value of such a stipulation by making it a condition in the Ordinance for the government of the territory ceded by Virginia, which now composes the States north of the Ohio River.
The same article of the Constitution stipulates also for rendition by the several States of fugitives from justice from the other States.
The General Government, as the common agent, passed laws to carry into effect these stipulations of the States. For many years these laws were executed. But an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery, has led to a disregard of their obligations, and the laws of the General Government have ceased to effect the objects of the Constitution. The States of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa, have enacted laws which either nullify the Acts of Congress or render useless any attempt to execute them. In many of these States the fugitive is discharged from service or labor claimed, and in none of them has the State Government complied with the stipulation made in the Constitution. The State of New Jersey, at an early day, passed a law in conformity with her constitutional obligation; but the current of anti-slavery feeling has led her more recently to enact laws which render inoperative the remedies provided by her own law and by the laws of Congress. In the State of New York even the right of transit for a slave has been denied by her tribunals; and the States of Ohio and Iowa have refused to surrender to justice fugitives charged with murder, and with inciting servile insurrection in the State of Virginia. Thus the constituted compact has been deliberately broken and disregarded by the non-slaveholding States, and the consequence follows that South Carolina is released from her obligation.
The ends for which the Constitution was framed are declared by itself to be “to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.”
These ends it endeavored to accomplish by a Federal Government, in which each State was recognized as an equal, and had separate control over its own institutions. The right of property in slaves was recognized by giving to free persons distinct political rights, by giving them the right to represent, and burthening them with direct taxes for three-fifths of their slaves; by authorizing the importation of slaves for twenty years; and by stipulating for the rendition of fugitives from labor.
We affirm that these ends for which this Government was instituted have been defeated, and the Government itself has been made destructive of them by the action of the non-slaveholding States. Those States have assume the right of deciding upon the propriety of our domestic institutions; and have denied the rights of property established in fifteen of the States and recognized by the Constitution; they have denounced as sinful the institution of slavery; they have permitted open establishment among them of societies, whose avowed object is to disturb the peace and to eloign the property of the citizens of other States. They have encouraged and assisted thousands of our slaves to leave their homes; and those who remain, have been incited by emissaries, books and pictures to servile insurrection.
For twenty-five years this agitation has been steadily increasing, until it has now secured to its aid the power of the common Government. Observing the forms of the Constitution, a sectional party has found within that Article establishing the Executive Department, the means of subverting the Constitution itself. A geographical line has been drawn across the Union, and all the States north of that line have united in the election of a man to the high office of President of the United States, whose opinions and purposes are hostile to slavery. He is to be entrusted with the administration of the common Government, because he has declared that that “Government cannot endure permanently half slave, half free,” and that the public mind must rest in the belief that slavery is in the course of ultimate extinction.
This sectional combination for the submersion of the Constitution, has been aided in some of the States by elevating to citizenship, persons who, by the supreme law of the land, are incapable of becoming citizens; and their votes have been used to inaugurate a new policy, hostile to the South, and destructive of its beliefs and safety.
On the 4th day of March next, this party will take possession of the Government. It has announced that the South shall be excluded from the common territory, that the judicial tribunals shall be made sectional, and that a war must be waged against slavery until it shall cease throughout the United States.
The guaranties of the Constitution will then no longer exist; the equal rights of the States will be lost. The slaveholding States will no longer have the power of self-government, or self-protection, and the Federal Government will have become their enemy.
Sectional interest and animosity will deepen the irritation, and all hope of remedy is rendered vain, by the fact that public opinion at the North has invested a great political error with the sanction of more erroneous religious belief.
We, therefore, the People of South Carolina, by our delegates in Convention assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, have solemnly declared that the Union heretofore existing between this State and the other States of North America, is dissolved, and that the State of South Carolina has resumed her position among the nations of the world, as a separate and independent State; with full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent States may of right do.
Adopted December 24, 1860””
What are you waiting for?
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