Posted on 09/09/2019 9:42:11 AM PDT by NKP_Vet
Nearly all modern historians agree with Professor James McPherson’s conclusion that the Civil War was caused by Southern objections to the 1860 Republican Party’s resolve to prohibit slavery’s extension into any of the federal territories that had not yet been organized as states. The resolution originated with the Wilmot Proviso fourteen years earlier before the infant GOP had even been formed. In 1846 Pennsylvania Congressman David Wilmot introduced a rider to a $2 million appropriation intended for use in a negotiated settlement to end the Mexican War. The rider stipulated that the money could not be used to purchase land that might be acquired in the treaty if slavery was allowed in such territories. After considerable wrangling, the bill passed without the rider.
Contrary to first impressions, the Proviso had little to do with sympathy for black slaves. Its purpose was to keep blacks out of the new territories so that the lands might be reserved for free whites. As Wilmot put it, “The negro race already occupy enough of this fair continent . . . I would preserve for free white labor a fair country . . . where the sons of toil, of my own race and color, can live without the disgrace which association with negro slavery brings upon free labor.”
The same attitude prevailed during the Civil War. Abraham Lincoln readily admitted that his September 1862 Emancipation Proclamation was a necessity of war. Major General George McClellan, who then commanded the North’s biggest army and would become Lincoln’s opponent in the 1864 presidential elections, believed it was a deliberate attempt to incite Southern slave rebellions. Lincoln was himself aware that such uprisings might result.
(Excerpt) Read more at civilwarchat.wordpress.com ...
There was no insurrection.
Yes there was. It was in all the papers.
The states are sovereign. The colonies were not. The states’ sovereignty was explicitly recognized and they never agreed to give it up. In fact, every state understood itself to have the right of unilateral secession explicitly reserved by New York and Virginia ie”the right to resume the powers of government delegated to the federal government” at the time the constitution was ratified.
Nope. Even Chase admitted it. Secession is not treason nor is it rebellion. It is the right of each sovereign state.
I never said that it was. But insurrection is insurrection and that is what the southern rebels practiced. And got their asses kicked for their trouble.
It was not insurrection. The federal government had no authority over them after they seceded.
History proves otherwise...
The Constitution requires an adoption in toto, and for ever." -- James Madison to Alexander Hamilton, July 20, 1788
Can you show me in the constitution the process for a state to leave?
James Madison, the father of the constitution, thought differently.
The Constitution requires an adoption in toto, and for ever.” — James Madison to Alexander Hamilton, July 20, 1788
Into new territory they acquired. They had their eyes on Cuba and parts of Mexico and Central America.
Ignoring the facts is claiming expansion of slavery was the motivation when they were content to leave with no claim upon the western territories and claiming they were leaving to protect something that wasn’t threatened anyway. Your arguments just don’t stand up.
They stand up for anyone who has done any reading on the subject.
She was sent by Buchanan not Lincoln.
Which Cuba has abrogated. Sumter was sovereign U.S. territory held under act of the South Carolina legislature.
It’s also not in Havana harbor in a position to interdict all shipping entering or exiting Havana harbor.
It's in Guantanamo City harbor, an important Cuban port for sugar and wool exports, and can easily block ships from entering and exiting there.
I doubt that. Here is what Supreme Court justice chase said in the Texas bs White case that states secession was illegal.
“The union between Texas and the other states was as complete, as perpetual, and as indissoluble as the union between the original states. There was no place for reconsideration or revocation, except through revolution or through consent of the States.”
Here is what Chief Justice Chase thought about the rights of the soverign State of Texas in 1869
When, therefore, Texas became one of the United States, she entered into an indissoluble relation. All the obligations of perpetual union, and all the guaranties of republican government in the Union, attached at once to the State. The act which consummated her admission into the Union was something more than a compact; it was the incorporation of a new member into the political body. And it was final. The union between Texas and the other States was as complete, as perpetual, and as indissoluble as the union between the original States. There was no place for reconsideration or revocation, except through revolution or through consent of the States
When, therefore, Texas became one of the United States, she entered into an indissoluble relation. All the obligations of perpetual union, and all the guaranties of republican government in the Union, attached at once to the State.
In 1815 some people in New England wanted to secede because of their unhappiness over the War of 1812. Jackson's victory at New Orleans made them look foolish, but obviously they believed in the right to secede.
During the battle over ratification in New York state, some wanted to ratify provisionally hoping to force the addition of a bill of rights and other modifications they favored. James Madison wrote a letter to one of the New York delegates basically saying that ratification was permanent and could not be rescinded. But that was his personal opinion in 1788.
No it doesn’t. Might does not make Right.
Can you show me in the constitution where it says a state may not leave?
Madison’s views expressed decades after the constitution was written and ratified are irrelevant. What is relevant is what the parties ie the states agreed to at the time of ratification. Given 3 states made express reservations of their right to secede at the time of ratification, given nobody said this was inconsistent with the constitution, given Madison’s writings in the federalist papers trying to convince states to ratify the constitution - writings in which he went to great pains to say the federal government’s powers were specifically listed and few while the state’s powers were unlimited, the evidence all points to the conclusion that states are sovereign and are only bound by their voluntary act in ratifying the constitution. In fact, Madison used those words in the federalist papers.
You say they “had their eyes on” foreign territory. So what? Are you seriously trying to argue they seceded for the opportunity to spread slavery to Cuba where it already existed? Mexico where the climate for tobacco and cotton production was unsuitable? Don’t make me laugh.
The facts do indeed stand up for anybody who has read up on the subject. Slavery was not threatened in the US. Nobody fought for or against it. Both sides in this war like most wars fought over money.
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