Posted on 06/28/2017 11:20:43 AM PDT by Sopater
My "Rewriting American History" column of a fortnight ago, about the dismantling of Confederate monuments, generated considerable mail. Some argued there should not be statues honoring traitors such as Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson and Jefferson Davis, who fought against the Union. Victors of wars get to write the history, and the history they write often does not reflect the facts. Let's look at some of the facts and ask: Did the South have a right to secede from the Union? If it did, we can't label Confederate generals as traitors.
Article 1 of the Treaty of Paris (1783), which ended the war between the Colonies and Great Britain, held "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." Representatives of these states came together in Philadelphia in 1787 to write a constitution and form a union.
During the ratification debates, Virginia's delegates said, "The powers granted under the Constitution being derived from the people of the United States may be resumed by them whensoever the same shall be perverted to their injury or oppression." The ratification documents of New York and Rhode Island expressed similar sentiments.
At the Constitutional Convention, a proposal was made to allow the federal government to suppress a seceding state. James Madison, the "Father of the Constitution," rejected it. The minutes from the debate paraphrased his opinion: "A union of the states containing such an ingredient (would) provide for its own destruction. The use of force against a state would look more like a declaration of war than an infliction of punishment and would probably be considered by the party attacked as a dissolution of all previous compacts by which it might be bound."
America's first secessionist movement started in New England after the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. Many were infuriated by what they saw as an unconstitutional act by President Thomas Jefferson. The movement was led by Timothy Pickering of Massachusetts, George Washington's secretary of war and secretary of state. He later became a congressman and senator. "The principles of our Revolution point to the remedy — a separation," Pickering wrote to George Cabot in 1803, for "the people of the East cannot reconcile their habits, views, and interests with those of the South and West." His Senate colleague James Hillhouse of Connecticut agreed, saying, "The Eastern states must and will dissolve the union and form a separate government." This call for secession was shared by other prominent Americans, such as John Quincy Adams, Elbridge Gerry, Fisher Ames, Josiah Quincy III and Joseph Story. The call failed to garner support at the 1814-15 Hartford Convention.
The U.S. Constitution would have never been ratified — and a union never created — if the people of those 13 "free sovereign and Independent States" did not believe that they had the right to secede. Even on the eve of the War of 1861, unionist politicians saw secession as a right that states had. Rep. Jacob M. Kunkel of Maryland said, "Any attempt to preserve the union between the states of this Confederacy by force would be impractical and destructive of republican liberty." The Northern Democratic and Republican parties favored allowing the South to secede in peace.
Northern newspapers editorialized in favor of the South's right to secede. New-York Tribune (Feb. 5, 1860): "If tyranny and despotism justified the Revolution of 1776, then we do not see why it would not justify the secession of Five Millions of Southrons from the Federal Union in 1861." The Detroit Free Press (Feb. 19, 1861): "An attempt to subjugate the seceded States, even if successful, could produce nothing but evil — evil unmitigated in character and appalling in extent." The New-York Times (March 21, 1861): "There is a growing sentiment throughout the North in favor of letting the Gulf States go."
Confederate generals were fighting for independence from the Union just as George Washington and other generals fought for independence from Great Britain. Those who'd label Gen. Robert E. Lee as a traitor might also label George Washington as a traitor. I'm sure Great Britain's King George III would have agreed.
and protect the institution of slavery. Which they did when they enshrined slavery into their Constitution.
How you could ever come to that conclusion is beyond me.
Confederate generals were fighting for independence from the Union just as George Washington and other generals fought for independence from Great Britain.
Washington and his men fought for independence so that they could rule themselves. Davis and his men fought for independence so they could own others.
I love Professor Walter Williams.
That does not surprise me at all.
“Slavery. The answer is slavery.”
If the South was fighting for slavery, who was fighting against slavery?
That is not what Lincoln said. Maybe that's what he intended for you to think after his Gettysburg address.
His documented words include:
“I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races,that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will for ever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.”
Of course they did, Silly. Read the Constitution and quit wishing it doesn’t say what it does.
It doesn't sound like the northern states were very eager to assert their majority status to improve the lot of slaves in the U.S. Perhaps they just wanted to promote the best self interest of their friends in Georgia. Alternatively, maybe they just wanted to promote what they considered their own best self interest.
Remember, it hadn't been that long since New York, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Delaware, and Maryland had voted to enshrine slavery in the U.S. constitution.
I believe the South was standing up for what they considered their own best self interest. I can't think of any other reason to risk being attacked, then having to actually fight, a major war.
“Washington and his men fought for independence so that they could rule themselves. Davis and his men fought for independence so they could own others.”
That is an interesting comment.
Did George Washington own slaves?
Are you saying that's what he fought for? Based on what?
From the Confederate Constitution:
Article I, Section 9, Clause 4
“No bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves shall be passed.”
Article IV, Section 2
“The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States; and shall have the right of transit and sojourn in any State of this Confederacy, with their slaves and other property; and the right of property in said slaves shall not be thereby impaired.”
Article IV, Section 3, Clause 3
“The Confederate States may acquire new territory; and Congress shall have power to legislate and provide governments for the inhabitants of all territory belonging to the Confederate States, lying without the limits of the several States; and may permit them, at such times, and in such manner as it may by law provide, to form States to be admitted into the Confederacy. In all such territory the institution of negro slavery, as it now exists in the Confederate States, shall be recognized and protected by Congress and by the Territorial government; and the inhabitants of the several Confederate States and Territories shall have the right to take to such Territory any slaves lawfully held by them in any of the States or Territories of the Confederate States.”
Sounds to me that no state in the Confederacy could outlaw slavery as the Confederate Constitution was written. So much for states rights.
This paragraph now seems to be your latest nugget of fools gold. You would be wise to read the words of a great man who spoke specifically to this same paragraph in 1922. His name was W.E.B. Dubois and his words can be found here:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/again-lincoln/
Here is a piece of it:
“I do not retail foul gossip about either the living or the dead; but I glory in that crucified humanity that can push itself up out of the mud of a miserable, dirty ancestry; who despite the clinging smirch of low tastes and shifty political methods, rose to be a great and good man and the noblest friend of the slave.”
Do yourself a favor and stop “retailing foul gossip”. Hear what Dubois had to say about that “unfortunate” paragraph.
The aforementioned Confederate-era governor, Zebulon Baird Vance, insisted that North Carolina have it’s own Navy, and so it did to an extent. But, the “Mosquito Fleet” was lost early on, and the earlier privateer blockade runners were experiencing limited success. So, agents of the state went to primarily Scotland in order to procure fast, masted side paddle steamers with a shallow draft to navigate the shifting shoals, in order to get past the Federal blockade to transport cotton and tobacco out of NC, and return with much needed supplies.
There were many blockade runners, but there were four blockade runners in all that were owned by the State, with the Advance being the most successful by far, and one of the most successful if not the most successful blockade runner of the entire Confederate effort. It was a very fast, sleek ship for the time, capable of twenty knots, painted zinc color in order to disappear at sea, an early example of camouflage.
The captains of numerous of these were actually in service to the North Carolina Navy and not the Confederacy. Vance insisted upon State control, fearing that they’d be commandeered in the future and/or cargos seized, and in that he was prescient as attempts did occur.
As a result of these State blockade runners, NC soldiers were the best equipped and best fed in the Confederacy, citizens received much needed supplies and hard cash for their ag products, and other states of the Confederacy received equipment and supplies for their respective armies
Vance was a good governor in an extremely difficult time, he did his absolute best to protect the interests of his people, despite their being riven by disagreement over the war. He was a good man.
Citing an old Marxist fool, even a black one like W. E. B. Du Bois, waxing poetic about Abraham Lincoln does little to bolster your case.
It would seem a good idea to research the individuals whose words you link here on Free Republic of all places, before you hit the send button.
“You would be wise to read the words of a great man who spoke specifically to this same paragraph in 1922. His name was W.E.B. Dubois “
Ha! 16 years ago when my kid was in the 9th grade he had to do a report on W.E.B. Dubois. After he read the book I asked him what he thought of the man and he replied, “The guy was was a raging socialist”.
You are both correct and I am duly chastised. I read more about him after I posted. He was still ok, I guess, in 1922. Please allow me to gracefully retract citing Du Bois. I stand corrected.
Thanks, good info to know.
“Are you saying that’s what he fought for? Based on what?”
Let me ask the question like this: Did George Washington own slaves?
No harm - no foul, especially when we’ve seen no reluctance on the part of lost causers to employ the words of socialists like Dickens, marxists like Lenin, and a garden assortment of yellow journalists - as long as their narrative fits their agenda.
“The Confederate states seceded so they could preserve slavery; the rest of the United States fought to preserve the Union.”
IF what you have written is true, then we can forever dismiss the notion that Lincoln and the North fought for some high moral cause like “freeing the slaves.”
But the North did fight - and for a very important cause: what they considered their economic and political best interests.
In that context it is worth noting that the U.S. constitution before and during the war enshrined slavery and that Lincoln twice swore an oath to defend the pro-slavery constitution of the U.S.
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