Posted on 06/12/2003 5:58:28 AM PDT by Aurelius
Over the years I've heard many rail at the South for seceding from the 'glorious Union.' They claim that Jeff Davis and all Southerners were really nothing but traitors - and some of these people were born and raised in the South and should know better, but don't, thanks to their government school 'education.'
Frank Conner, in his excellent book The South Under Siege 1830-2000 deals in some detail with the question of Davis' alleged 'treason.' In referring to the Northern leaders he noted: "They believed the most logical means of justifying the North's war would be to have the federal government convict Davis of treason against the United States. Such a conviction must presuppose that the Confederate States could not have seceded from the Union; so convicting Davis would validate the war and make it morally legitimate."
Although this was the way the federal government planned to proceed, that prolific South-hater, Thaddeus Stevens, couldn't keep his mouth shut and he let the cat out of the bag. Stevens said: "The Southerners should be treated as a conquered alien enemy...This can be done without violence to the established principles only on the theory that the Southern states were severed from the Union and were an independent government de facto and an alien enemy to be dealt with according to the laws of war...No reform can be effected in the Southern States if they have never left the Union..." And, although he did not plainly say it, what Stevens really desired was that the Christian culture of the Old South be 'reformed' into something more compatible with his beliefs. No matter how you look at it, the feds tried to have it both ways - they claimed the South was in rebellion and had never been out of the Union, but then it had to do certain things to 'get back' into the Union it had never been out of. Strange, is it not, that the 'history' books never seem to pick up on this?
At any rate, the Northern government prepared to try President Davis for treason while it had him in prison. Mr. Conner has observed that: "The War Department presented its evidence for a treason trial against Davis to a famed jurist, Francis Lieber, for his analysis. Lieber pronounced 'Davis will not be found guilty and we shall stand there completely beaten'." According to Mr. Conner, U.S. Attorney General James Speed appointed a renowned attorney, John J. Clifford, as his chief prosecutor. Clifford, after studying the government's evidence against Davis, withdrew from the case. He said he had 'grave doubts' about it. Not to be undone, Speed then appointed Richard Henry Dana, a prominent maritime lawyer, to the case. Mr. Dana also withdrew. He said basically, that as long as the North had won a military victory over the South, they should just be satisfied with that. In other words - "you won the war, boys, so don't push your luck beyond that."
Mr. Conner tells us that: "In 1866 President Johnson appointed a new U.S. attorney general, Henry Stanburg. But Stanburg wouldn't touch the case either. Thus had spoken the North's best and brightest jurists re the legitimacy of the War of Northern Aggression - even though the Jefferson Davis case offered blinding fame to the prosecutor who could prove that the South had seceded unconstitutionally." None of these bright lights from the North would touch this case with a ten-foot pole. It's not that they were dumb, in fact the reverse is true. These men knew a dead horse when they saw it and were not about to climb aboard and attempt to ride it across the treacherous stream of illegal secession. They knew better. In fact, a Northerner from New York, Charles O'Connor, became the legal counsel for Jeff Davis - without charge. That, plus the celebrity jurists from the North that refused to touch the case, told the federal government that they really had no case against Davis or secession and that Davis was merely being held as a political prisoner.
Author Richard Street, writing in The Civil War back in the 1950s said exactly the same thing. Referring to Jeff Davis, Street wrote: "He was imprisoned after the war, was never brought to trial. The North didn't dare give him a trial, knowing that a trial would establish that secession was not unconstitutional, that there had been no 'rebellion' and that the South had got a raw deal." At one point the government intimated that it would be willing to offer Davis a pardon, should he ask for one. Davis refused that and he demanded that the government either give him a pardon or give him a trial, or admit that they had dealt unjustly with him. Mr. Street said: "He died 'unpardoned' by a government that was leery of giving him a public hearing." If Davis was as guilty as they claimed, why no trial???
Had the federal government had any possible chance to convict Davis and therefore declare secession unconstitutional they would have done so in a New York minute. The fact that they diddled around and finally released him without benefit of the trial he wanted proves that the North had no real case against secession. Over 600,000 boys, both North and South, were killed or maimed so the North could fight a war of conquest over something that the South did that was neither illegal or wrong. Yet they claim the moral high ground because the 'freed' the slaves, a farce at best.
Ah, patriots. ha ha
And to which nullifiers was Madison referring to in the quote you provided? Surely not himself!
Ethyl, are you new to this? In order to be a partriot you have to embrace abortion, homosexuality, public education, areligious 'leadership,' etc.
Robert Lincoln was born August 1, 1843.
Robert graduated Harvard in July, 1864. He attended Harvard Law School a very short time and at the end of the year was living at the White House. On January 19, 1865, President Lincoln wrote to Grant, asking him to find a safe staff appointment for Robert: "My son, now in his twenty-second year, having graduated at Harvard, wishes to see something of the war before it ends."
Abe continued, "I do not wish to put him in the ranks, not yet to give him a commission, to which those who have already served long, are better entitled, and better qualified to hold."
Let's see. Not a commission, not in the ranks. He joined Grant's staff as a Captain. He escorted visitors, sort of like a tour guide.
As for the relevance of Robert, the Wlat Brigade oohed and ahhed that the Great Pimp Abraham had obtained a substitute to go in his own place. Why, that positively made me join them in that warm, fuzzy feeling. What greatness it took to pay someone else to join the army.
Robert was stashed away, safe at Harvard, and then living in the White House.
On the other hand, they conscripted Blacks right off the South Carolina plantations. In Missouri they accepted slaves delivered up by Massa.
Conscription was no problem. No problem as long as it was someone else's kid.
Calhoun and some other bums like that, I reckon.
Walt
Calhoun and some other bums like that, I reckon.
Walt
That interpretation has no basis in fact.
Fact is that southerners had controlled the federal government for decades. When free and fair elections threatened that control, they tried to bolt.
Walt
In point of fact, southerners were a drag on progress, a bad one.
Southerners opposed the Homestead Act. They hated free labor. They opposed the college land grant act. They opposed the transcontinental railroad.
The nation's progress leapt ahead once their influence was muted.
Walt
[nc]Most black spokesmen in the North ridiculed Lincoln's proposal and denounced its author. "This is our country as much as it is yours," a Philadelphia Negro told the president, "and we will not leave it." Frederick Douglass accused Lincoln of, "contempt for negroes" and "canting hypocrisy." The president's remarks, said Douglass, would encourage "ignorant and base" white men "to commit all kinds of violence and outrage upon the colored people."
[Walt] Not exactly a revelation. President Lincoln always made clear that his first duty was to save the Union.
So let me get this straight Walt. You are saying that as long as Lincoln thought it would save the Union, you would support the forced expulsion or deportation of Blacks or all non-whites from the United States, including Blacks and non-whites who were citizens of the United States.
Correct me if I have misinterpreted what you just said.
That's cracked. Most people in the south could care less about the neo-confederate fringe crazies.
Walt
No, I have clearly posted concurrence with the prior post of 4CJ that the vast majority of Americans were racist in 1865. There is a group of nimrods who are asserting that this large group of racists fought a war to free the slaves. If you are going to admit that the vast majority were racist, you need to find a different reason for the war.
and that Robert Lincoln was the only son of a powerful politician to ever avoid military service throughout our nations history. That can't be true.
Not just no, but hell no. Even today, we have a government full of former professional students (think Slick Willie) who studied for as long as they felt they needed an academic exemption from the draft.
[n-s 1132] "It is a little known piece of trivia that while Abraham Lincoln was not eligible for conscription, due to age and position as Commander-in-Chief, he still paid a substitute to serve in the army in his place."
[GOP 1134] beyond fascinating!
[hobbes1 1135] Wow...Pretty Cool....
You nimrods were pimping Lincoln for paying some other poor slob to join the Army as a substitute. Well now, isn't that special?
Just exactly what is beyond fascinating and wow, pretty cool, about paying some poor guy to join the army while keeping your own son safely out of the war?
You might want to rephrase that so that it makes sense.
You seem to be suggesting that I apply my 21st century sensibilities to a 19th century situation. You want to entrap me, but you only embarrass yourself. It's silly to put our judgments on those people. We can however, look at what -they- said. They said that secession was treason. They said, many of them, that slavery was wrong. They might have wanted blacks out of the country entirely, but more and more people were coming to the conclusion that slavery was simply wrong and was no longer to be tolerated. President Lincoln was a very eloquent spokesman for this group.
As president Lincoln said over and over and over again, he only wanted to control the expansion of slavery. He likened the presence of slavery in certain states to finding a poisonous snake in your children's bed. Disturbing the snake might cause irreperable harm. But why on earth would you allow another snake into your other children's bed, when you could prevent it? And the Republicans had the votes -to- prevent it. And that is why the rebels tried to bolt. They aimed to follow the lawful outcome of an election they didn't like with bullets to obtain what they couldn't obtain by the rules. Rules, mind you, that THEY insisted on in the first place.
To call the insurgents heroes is grotesque.
Walt
Ok, so then it was only the bad nullifiers... The good nullifiers were still safe in their devices.
Just checking.
Were you drafted yourself and still bitter about it or something? I'm still at a loss as to what the point you are trying to make is.
Why is that? It doesn't take any great stretch to realize that those southerners who were willing to go to war to protect their institution of slavery were not people who believed in equality of the races. Nor does the fact that the North was willing to accept war in order to preserve the Union mean that they believed that blacks were the equal of whites. If you insist on holding people from the 19th century to 21st century definitions of racism then you're going to have your work cut out for you. However, as near as I can tell you seem to feel that only one 19th century individual must be held to those standards.
Even today, we have a government full of former professional students (think Slick Willie) who studied for as long as they felt they needed an academic exemption from the draft.
I realize that being fair may be a foreign concept to you, but you need to add Cheney, Bush, Lott, and Hastert to that list, as well as most of the rest of the leadership in the House and Senate on both sides of the aisle. But does your contempt for them reach the level of your contempt for Robert Lincoln and his father?
You nimrods were pimping Lincoln for paying some other poor slob to join the Army as a substitute. Well now, isn't that special?
I took that to mean that they thought my trivia fact was interesting and nothing more. You seem to be very good and finding meanings that weren't there. But rather than let me speak for them, I'll ask the guys themselves. Were you 'pimping for Abe' as nolu chan said? If you were then stop it! It's upsetting him/her.
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