Banned sign riles heritage group

A Confederate heritage group says its free-speech rights were violated when a landowner removed a billboard promoting Southern history near the famed Darlington Raceway.

The Sons of Confederate Veterans plans to demonstrate at the State House next month and buy radio advertisements to complain about losing its billboard on U.S. 52, about two miles from the racetrack.

“This is the most chilling thing I’ve seen against freedom of speech,” spokesman Don Gordon said.

The Sons of Confederate Veterans bought the billboard this spring in response to remarks by a NASCAR executive about the rebel flag.

The billboard featured a Confederate flag and a checkered race flag. The message said, “Victory is Great, but Honor is Greater. Defend your Southern heritage.”

The billboard, taken down briefly in May, also listed the group’s phone number and name.

Officials of the S.C. Central Railroad, which owns the land where the billboard stood, said the message was “controversial” and needed to come down.

“It is not in our commercial interests to have billboards on our property displaying messages that might be controversial in the local community, whatever the substance of the messages,” a company spokeswoman said in a prepared statement.

“We made no judgment as to the content of the billboard, but we did understand it to be controversial and therefore asked that it be removed.”

An outdoor advertising company, hired by the Sons of Confederate Veterans, installed the sign just before Darlington’s annual Mother’s Day race. It was removed permanently June 16, according to a July 11 letter from the S.C. Sons of Confederate Veterans commander, Randall Burbage, to fellow members.

The Sons of Confederate Veterans says it is an international, nonprofit historical society. The group, which says it has 30,000 members nationally, has taken positions in defense of the Confederate flag in South Carolina.

In October, NASCAR’s chief executive, Brian France, told the CBS television show “60 Minutes” the Confederate flag was “not a flag that I look at with anything favorable. That’s for sure.”

As it branches away from its traditional Southern fan base, NASCAR has tried to shed its rebel-flag-waving image. The nation’s largest stock car racing organization has started diversity programs and tried to appeal to black and Hispanic fans. The Darlington Raceway, in business for more than 50 years, has served as a pillar of NASCAR.

“A member of the France family said some uncomplimentary things, so we put that billboard up to make a statement and to stimulate new members,” the confederate veterans’ Gordon said. “We really didn’t expect anything like this to occur.”

Attempts to reach NASCAR spokesman Jim Hunter were unsuccessful. However, Hunter said last spring that NASCAR did not seek to have the sign removed.

“If we find out NASCAR is involved, you can expect airplanes towing Confederate banners over every NASCAR race anywhere in this nation — forever,” Gordon said.

Mac Josey, vice president at the Darlington Raceway, said he knew nothing about the billboard and did not ask that it be removed. He said the track does not fly Confederate flags, although some fans do.

Wesley Blackwell, chairman of the Darlington County Council, said he heard about the billboard during a social gathering at the Darlington speedway in May. Blackwell said the county did not ask that the sign be removed.

The Confederate veterans group paid Palmetto Outdoor Media more than $5,000 to put up the advertisement, Gordon said. Most of the money was refunded when the sign was removed.

“What if it was a sign trying to bring new members to the NAACP? We all know not a word would be said,” Gordon said.

Palmetto Outdoor Media co-owner Rodney Monroe said his company’s land-lease agreement with S.C. Central Railroad has a section that called for the removal of offensive advertisements.

“We lease the property from the company and we, obviously, crossed the line as far as what was acceptable to them ... and were asked to remove the sign,” Monroe said. “We are not in the business to cause or create controversy.”

Gordon said his group had a contract with Palmetto Outdoor for the sign to stay up through part of next year.

The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees every American the right to free speech. However, the sign was on private property, and the property’s owner ordered it down.

Bill Rogers, director of the S.C. Press Association, said that removal violated the principle of free speech, if nothing else. The sign did not appear to be inflammatory, he said.

“I can see why they would feel their rights are violated, that if someone doesn’t like the message, they take it down,” Rogers said.

You know what he did, we discussed the unconstitutional admissions of both Nevada (insufficient population)...

I'm not aware of any constitutional population requirement for statehood.

...and West Virginia (part of an existing State, no consent of same to partition)....

Consent was obtained from the Virginia legislature not participating in the rebellion.

and we went 15 rounds each on his suppression of the People in Missouri and Maryland -- and their governments in both States, using a cabal of Wide Awakes in Missouri and the Army in Maryland to impose direct military rule in both.

Then admit that in both cases you have presented your opinons, calling them fact, and that I disputed those opinions. But the matter is far from settled.

Already demonstrated in abundance by nolu chan's documentation of Lincoln's interference with the Judiciary Branch and suppression of civil rights in arresting citizens, legislators, newspapermen, Rep. Vallandigham, and his issue of a warrant for Chief Justice Taney...

Oh give me a freakin' break. Trot out the 'Taney arrest' story all you want, the fact is that there is no more that speculation and innuendo to support it. Suppression of civil rights occured on both sides, as even you admit, but were done within the guidlines laid out by Congress and you can't point to a single, deliberate Constitutional infraction. You claim and you harp and you condemn Lincoln for everything up to and including a rainy day, and give a free pass to worse infractions on the part of Davis. Lincoln's actions were done with a single objective, to put down the illegal and unconstitutional southern rebellion and not, as you claim, "to conquer the South".

He didn't have to open hostilities ...

Which is even more BS. Lincoln did not open hostilities, Davis did. You can blather all you want about how Lincoln forced Davis to, and it's all ridiculous. Davis didn't do a single damned thing that he wasn't eager to. He wanted the war, he needed the war, he got his war and had his ass kicked in the bargain.

Or do I have to document the fact that Lincoln used the Army?!

No, but documenting the rest of your BS would be nice,

what you don't UNDERSTAND is that wars MUST be fought for JUST reasons, rather than UNJUST & UNNECESSARY ones (as the WBTS was BOTH unjust & unnecessary, as it was fought because the TYRANT, lincoln CHOSE war for "political advantage", for his HUGE EGO & for $$$$$$$$$$.)

NOTHING you "unionist coven" members can trump the FACT that lincoln CHOSE war and a MILLION PEOPLE died for NO GOOD REASON.

btw, had the union NOT committed TENS of THOUSANDS of WAR CRIMES against innocent, unarmed women & children and tortured & MURDERED TENS of THOUSANDS of helpless CSA prisoners of war, at their concentration camps, there wouldn't be so much hard feelings a century & a half later.

families like mine will NEVER forget that:

1. 92 members of our family (mostly women & young children!) were assaulted/robbed/tortured/raped/MURDERED by "the filth that flowed down from the north", just because NOBODY in the DY high-command CARED to prevent it OR

2. FOUR CSA POWs from my family were MURDERED in coldblood at Point Lookout DEATH CAMP, just because they were NOT white people.

face it, "blam" you're defending those, who committed TENS of THOUSANDS of CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY!

free dixie,sw

Any economist will tell you that a tariff like the Morrill tariff is protectionist and is not designed to enhance revenue. Instead, it should discourage imports by making domestic products more cost effective. Revenue should remain about the same or go down because of it, not increase by a factor of 20.

Perhaps you forgot about inflation. Here are some figures on net imports in 1860 dollars from an old post of mine.

Tariff rates are from Table 1 of Taussig's The Tariff History of the United States, 1910 edition: Taussig.

Yearly customs income is from Table 3 of Taussig. Same link as above. Actually, income from collected import duties was a bit lower than Customs income, but I'll use the higher figures.

Inflation rate was from Inflation Rates. I've seen higher rates than these posted for the period, but I'll be conservative and use these.

After applying the tariff rates to the revenue to determine the value of the imports, I then adjusted the number by the inflation figure. I find that the value of imports to the North relative to the total 1860 import value was:

1860: 1.00
1861: 0.82
1862: 0.50
1863: 0.52
1864: 0.54
1865: 0.38

Thomas Prentice Kettell published Southern Wealth and Northern Profits in 1860. It broke down the distribution of imports to regions by consumption. For 1859, it calculates Southern consumption of imports as $106,000,000, Western consumption as $63,000,000, and Northern consumption of imports as $149,000,000. Kettell bases the split among regions on Treasury figures from 1856.

By his figures the North and West (i.e., Michigan, Illinois, etc.) were consuming 67% of the imports in 1860. The inflation adjusted tariff income above suggests that the high tariff might have indeed reduced the imports to those regions.

Incidentally, Kettell also estimates that the North sent $240,000,000 in domestic goods (whose prices were higher because of the tariff no doubt) to the South in 1859, and that the South paid to the North some $63,000,000 in interest and brokerage.

And your figures make sense if one accepts, as Taussig details, that the non-Southern states accounted for the majority of imports and paid the majority of the tariff. But we are constantly told how the opposite was true, that the South accounted for upwards of 90% of imports. If one starts from that assumption then there is no way the numbers can be made to work.

And in his speech to the Georgia legislature Alexander Stephens, quoting unnamed government documents, put the figure at three-quarters. But by either account, it's clear that the North did generate the large percentage of tariff receipts.

Incidentally, Kettell also estimates that the North sent $240,000,000 in domestic goods (whose prices were higher because of the tariff no doubt) to the South in 1859...

Does Kettell estimate the amount of domestic goods sold outside of the South? Not all goods had their prices inflated by tariffs, of course, but those tariffs fell on all consumers and not just those in the South. If the North consumed proportionate amount pf those protected goods, as they consumed the bulk of imports, then it could be said that the tariff hit all regions equally could it not?

...and that the South paid to the North some $63,000,000 in interest and brokerage.

Was that interest and brokerage costs relating to their primary industry, plantation agriculture? Or was that on the goods purchased from the North. If the former then it was the cost of a service provided by Northern businesses, and the cost of which would have been paid by the ultimate consumer of the cotton or what have you, would it not? If the latter then it would be interesting to see what the similar costs were to Northern and Mid-Western consumers.

But we are constantly told how the opposite was true, that the South accounted for upwards of 90% of imports.

A huge proportion of exports maybe.

Not all goods had their prices inflated by tariffs, of course, but those tariffs fell on all consumers and not just those in the South. If the North consumed proportionate amount pf those protected goods, as they consumed the bulk of imports, then it could be said that the tariff hit all regions equally could it not?

Hardly. The North consumed goods it produced providing jobs for its own masses. The South was in effect paying tariff on that portion of the imports from the North whose prices were higher because of the tariff. As the Daily Chicago Times reportedly put it at the time:

The South has furnished near three-fourths of the entire exports of the country. Last year she furnished seventy-two percent of the whole . . . We have a tariff [the Morrill Tariff] that protects our manufacturers from thirty to fifty percent, and enables us to consume large quantities of Southern cotton, and to compete in our whole home market with the skilled labor of Europe. This operates to compel the South to pay an indirect bounty to our skilled labor, of millions annually.

I've got to go back to work, so I'll be off line for a while. Catch you later.

A huge proportion of exports maybe.

And I certainly do not dispute that. Everything I've read supports the fact that Southern cotton, tobacco, etc. made up the large majority of U.S. exports.

The North consumed goods it produced providing jobs for its own masses. The South was in effect paying tariff on that portion of the imports from the North whose prices were higher because of the tariff.

I cannot see how that can be true. Say I sell a cotton gin, and the tariff allows me to sell it for 30% more than I could without it, then I would agree that the tariff placed an unfair burden on the south. It was, after all, a regional product. But say I manufacture an item that can be imported and sold for $10. The tariff is placed on the item so the import costs $15 and I can now sell mine for $14 and clean up. But I sell that item for $14 regardless of where they are. And if one third of my goods are sold in the South and two thirds sold in the rest of the country then the tariff cannot be said to fall disproportionately on the South. The tariff screwed consumers equally. Both regions were faced with the same choice, pay more for import or an inflated price for domestic.

Sorry, but you seem to have missed the whole point of the exercise.

In the fiscal year 1860, U.S.tariff income was $53,188,000 (on $286,000,000 worth of imports), not $60.

I'll accept that. The $60 million was from past estimates I've seen bandied about.

That is a false conclusion, in obvious error, and intentionally misleading. Import/Export value does not give consumption data.

That figure came from another thread here which gave a value for Southern imports some 10 times greater than Northern imports. Also if you read the works of Charles Adams, Thomas DiLorenzo, the Kennedy Brothers, and other great southron thinkers, they all claim that the South accounted for anywhere from 80% to over 90% of all tariff revenue. If total revenue was $53 million then the North only generated between $5 million and $10 million of that.

The source of that quote may be shown, but the US Treasury data for 1863 shows tariff income was $64 million (on 195,000,000 of imported goods).

In his December 6, 1864 annual message to Congress, Lincoln gave the total revenue collected from customs for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1864. And in checking, I discovered that the figure he quoted was $102,316,152.99 and not the $110 million I stated earler. Sorry for the mistake, but still a substantial increase over 1860, wouldn't you agree?

Since very little precious metals were being shipped out of the United States to pay for imported goods, the exports were the "currency" being used to buy foreign goods to be imported. Depending on the year, this "currency" (cotton, tobacco, hemp, foodstuffs) constituted 75-80% of the value of exports.

If true then what was the United States exporting in FY 1864? The source of its exports in prior years was cut off. Any cotton, tobacco, or hemp exported was a trickle of pre-rebellion years. If exports were cut, perhaps by 75-80%, but imports were way up then how were those imports paid for? And if they could be paid for in gold, silver, letters of credit, or what have you then doesn't the same apply to 1860 as well?

The data makes the above appear for what it is...BS.

No, it is valid if you accept the original premise which was that the South accounted for the overwhelming majority of tariff income. If one concludes, from your post and from rustbuckets, that the reverse was true and that the bulk of the tariff revenue did not come from the south, and add in the fact that the connection between imports and exports seem to be far less than some would have us believe, then it's easy to account for the difference in revenue collections between 1860 and 1864 without the Southern import or export market. That was the whole point from the beginning.

Really? The contemporary New York Post seems not to have agreed with you:

That either the revenue from duties must be collected in the ports of the rebel states, or the port must be closed to importations from abroad, is generally admitted. If neither of these things be done, our revenue laws are substantially repealed; the sources, which supply our treasury, will be dried up; we shall have no money to carry on the government; the nation will become bankrupt before the next crop of corn is ripe.
There will be nothing to furnish means of subsistence to the army; nothing to keep our navy afloat; nothing to pay the salaries of public officers; the present order of things must come to a dead stop.
-- New York Post, Mar. 2, 1861

And The New York Times summed up the call to arms this way:

With the loss of our foreign trade, what is to become of our public works, conducted at the cost of many hundred millions of dollars, to turn into our harbor the products of the interior? They share in the common ruin. So do our manufacturers...Once at New Orleans, goods may be distributed over the whole country duty-free. The process is perfectly simple... The commercial bearing of the question has acted upon the North...We now see clearly whither we are tending, and the policy we must adopt. With us it is no longer an abstract question---one of Constitutional construction, or of the reserved or delegated powers of the State or Federal government, but of material existence and moral position both at home and abroad.....We were divided and confused till our pockets were touched." [Emphasis supplied.]
---New York Times March 30, 1861

So, how about this one, Non-Sequitur? It was about the Benjamins. It was about tariffs, and the tariffs were about business. It was all about business.

The Times editorialist threw in that little adjective, "moral", as an afterthought -- the statement was too raw, otherwise. Business came first. I would argue that business came first, second, and third -- with The New York Times, everyone in New York, and everyone in the North who participated in the real decision-making -- the decision to go to war to conquer the South, and make her behave. These editorials that trumpet this call to war (not merely secession, like the document you introduced) don't mention slavery once.

With federal legislation -- legislation favoring the New England shipbuilding industry, that forbade American coastal trade to be carried in foreign bottoms, that subsidized American ships by imposing penalties on exporters who shipped in foreign-flagged vessels, and other legislation like the Warehousing Act, which postponed import duties on goods stored in (New York's abundant) warehouses until they were sold -- the Yankee merchants captured the entire export trade of the South and the West for their own ports and profited mightily off that trade.

That was the real deal, your real cause of the Civil War. It was the tariffs, and sectionally advantageous federal legislation, and the businesses they favored.

So, how about this one, Non-Sequitur? It was about the Benjamins. It was about tariffs, and the tariffs were about business. It was all about business.

My goodness, two newspaper editorials and the case is closed. No need for statistics or documentation. Never mind the fact that far from drying up, tariff revenue expanded greatly. And the fact that the Post was a Democrat paper probably doesn't enter into it either. And if you get right down to it, much of it doesn't make a lick of sense. If New Orleans is in an independent confederacy, a foreign nation, then how can goods come into New Orleans and be distributed nationwide duty free? At some point they travel from the confederacy to the U.S. and at that point then doesn't it make sense that the U.S. duty would be levied? So confederacy or no confederacy, the tariff would be collected regardless of whether the goods come in at New York or at New Madrid, Mo. The Benjamins would still come rolling in.

You make less and less sense as you go along. Millions of bales of cotton were exported from southern ports each year leading up to the rebellion, somewhere over 90% of the total. The largest cotton exporting Northern port was New York with the 1/7th the total imports of New Orleans alone. So all those ships arriving and leaving full of cotton. But they were apparently arriving empty since upwards of 94% of all tariffs were collected in Northern ports. So if the south imported such an enormous amount of goods from overseas, as you would have us believe, then why didn't they come directly to the southern ports? Why the roundabout way? Why drop off in New York, pay tariff, and then ship it south? And drop that "Warehousing Act" crap. The act was designed to allow goods destined for customers elsewhere to be warehoused under bond without paying duties. In otherwords, a New York merchant could by goods in London, get them in New York, and then ship them to a customer in Cuba or where ever without having to worry about customers. What other use for the law was there? You talk about merchants storing stuff in New York for later sale. Well how stupid is that? Why import something to begin with if you don't have a customer for it? Why put your money up to buy it, go through the expense of shipping it, then pay for storing it, and then look for a buyer? Just how dumb do you think they were?

That was the real deal, your real cause of the Civil War. It was the tariffs, and sectionally advantageous federal legislation, and the businesses they favored.

Which is, of course, why every compromise proposal floated in the Senate concerned tariffs and tariffs alone. Why Jefferson Davis, Robert Toombs, Robert Hindmann all proposed Constitutional Amendments on tariffs. Why Robert Crittenden headed the Committee of Thirteen to discuss tariffs. Why all the Declarations of the Causes of Secession mention tariffs and the Southern Tariff-Paying states to the exception of all else. Oops. Wait a second! Every one of those proposals, regardless of author, concerned slavery and nothing else. Every declaration mention slavery most of all, and describe the south as slave-owning states. And when the south started the war at Sumter they started it over slavery, and not tariffs.

Again, you are making the (intentional?) mistake of confusing tariff revenue with consumption data. They are unrelated.

No intentional mistake about it, at least on my part. If you look at the writings of the authors I mentioned in my earlier post, all claim that the South was directly responsible for 80-90% of all tariff revenue. If they are correct, and it's a southron rule of faith that then are, then simple mathematics to determine that prior to the rebellion the North accounted for at most less than $11 million dollars. Their logic, not mine. No error on my part, just lack of careful reading on yours.

No, I wouldn't. If you do some checking, you will see that every State of the Union document of the period gave tariff revenue totals, which unfortunately for your contention, contained re-export collections. Those duties inflated the true collection number.

Lincoln says that the $102 million was derived from customs, which should mean tariffs if my understanding of the term is correct. What revenue results from re-export? Items placed in bond destined for other overseas customers don't pay duties. Items brought in as raw materials will still pay duties, even if they are made into an item later exported. So how could Lincoln's figures be inflated?

The actual net tariff revenue for fiscal year 1863 was $64 million. That from the US Treasury department. See Rustbucket's data from Taussig above for confirmation

And again, I said Lincoln was stating figures for fiscal year 1864. Please read what I posted.

The data makes the above appear for what it is...BS.

It appears more like you simply don't read what people posted.

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