Posted on 06/26/2020 7:35:34 AM PDT by Pelham
Historians today speak of the “proslavery Constitution” and “antislavery constitutionalism”; they almost never speak of the “antislavery Constitution” or of “proslavery constitutionalism.” This fact is a testament to the profound success of the critique of the Constitution leveled by abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison. In his condemnation of the Constitution as proslavery, his resort to Madison’s “Notes from the Constitutional Convention” to demonstrate this case, and his rejection of the Constitution’s authority—all punctuated by his dramatic burning of that document during a Fourth of July address—Garrison has set the terms within which subsequent historical debate on the relationship between the Constitution and slavery has been carried out.
Even historians who disdain Garrison’s caustic critique of the Constitution, who question his partial readings of the Convention’s debates, and who emphasize the development of constitutional arguments that culminated in the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments concede at some level Garrison’s premise that the Constitution was intended to be proslavery. Thus, it is sad, but not surprising, to see that the mob rounded up by the New York Times’s “1619 Project” is setting fire to the project of antislavery constitutionalism. Garrison’s belief that the Constitution was intended to be proslavery is an unquenchable fire that will eventually consume all it touches.
(Excerpt) Read more at lawliberty.org ...
” New Left historian Staughton Lynd read causation into this coincidence, claiming that Garrison and his followers seized on James Madison’s “Notes” “to show in detail what they had long suspected: that the revered Constitution was a sordid sectional compromise, in Garrison’s words ‘a covenant with death and an agreement with hell.’”
‘Historians today speak of the “proslavery Constitution” and “antislavery constitutionalism”; they almost never speak of the “antislavery Constitution” or of “proslavery constitutionalism.”’
Good grief. Can’t they do something more useful, like debate how many angels can dance on the head of pin? I guess these academic debates still mean something, but it’s still trying to have an honest discussion with a dishonest person.
Here's the deal. Any constitution that did not recognize existing slavery rights was not going to get passed. Your choice was this, or nothing. The debates on the Constitution say this very thing.
If they had preferred dissolution, the British would have quickly scooped up the dissident colonies, and that would be that.
“Good grief. Can’t they do something more useful, like debate how many angels can dance on the head of pin? “
This is a debate that was started by William Lloyd Garrison in the war of words that led up to the Civil War. Garrison was arguably America’s premier Abolitionist, publisher of The Liberator newspaper. He showed his opinion of the Constitution by burning a copy of it.
Garrison’s condemnation of the Constitution remains popular in Marxist circles, which today includes the majority of academia.
It is called The Constitution.
It is always the Constitution.
Add ten amendments and it still the Constitution.
Add seventeenth more amendments and it is still the Constitution.
At any given time there is only One Constitution.
“If they had preferred dissolution, the British would have quickly scooped up the dissident colonies, and that would be that.”
Or dissident States. Hartford Convention nearly gave Britain that chance during the War of 1812.
New England states opposed to “Mr Madison’s War” were considering secession and an alliance with Great Britain.
Garrison and some other Abolitionists considered the Constitution to be pro-slavery and they condemned it. Garrison once burned a copy of it to emphasize the point.
Not “legend”, but “myth”. Nothing in the original texts of either the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution of the United States ever enshrined slavery as any kind of national policy or a protected right. It did take several amendments to the Constitution to spell out the actual prohibition of human bondage, but the roots of slavery were never in what was to become the United States.
Slavery was a condition of mankind from times immemorial, before there was recorded history, and is mentioned time and again in the earliest records of history, from ancient texts that have survived and been translated into today’s language. Outlawed today in virtually every country except for some of Muslim-majority rule, and practiced clandestinely yet today, there is no moral code that elevates slavery in any way to a virtue, or conversely even necessary as an evil.
Slavery in ancient Rome was a necessary part of both their culture and their economy, as the slaves were the task force that supplied the wants and needs of the “free” people and the upper ruling class. Human bondage was used to procure status, both by those who willingly signed into indentured service, and by those who imposed involuntary servitude upon others.
Slaves and indentured servants were delegated the jobs of doing all the scut work, that kept the power of the Roman Empire at the forefront of the civilized world in its time. The idea of a free people undertaking these tasks was not even considered.
“Garrison’s condemnation of the Constitution remains popular in Marxist circles, which today includes the majority of academia.”
I know, and Garrison’s condemnation of the Constitution is going to remain popular in Marxist circles for as long as there are Marxist circles. His view has been around for almost as long as the Constitution, itself, and longer than Marx.
“Not “legend”, but “myth”. Nothing in the original texts of either the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution of the United States ever enshrined slavery as any kind of national policy or a protected right.”
Garrison was a powerful voice in spreading that myth in the runup to the Civil War. And it still echoes in history departments that like his version of history.
Frederick Douglas read the Constitution and after he read the 3/5 clause regarding representation and taxation he declared the Constitution an Anti-Slavery document, which of course it is.
However, my point remains, there is but one Constitution.
Whether it was or not, I’d still like to emphasize a principle about all this alleged BLM complaints about our American society:
Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.
You got rid of legal discrimination, don’t condemn the rest of it as even well past, this country has been pretty damn good.
this ought to bring JeffersonDem out
Which must be emphasized for all these Unionist sympathizers who insist there is no right to secession. In fact there was no complaint about NE seceding as “illegal”, though maybe some that they would do it.
We need to strongly consider that now. Or, at least the true traitors in this country should. I’d prefer they just leave, but splitting up would be ok.
This is exactly correct, but many of the Confederacy bashers refuse to take any note of this fact.
There is a lot of evidence to support secession being regarded as accepted in 1787, and very little which shows otherwise.
This is incorrect. Article IV, section 2 makes it clear that slavery is protected, though it goes to some effort to avoid using the word "slave" or "slavery."
Also the section that allows congress to stop the slave imports after 1807 is a tacit indication that slavery was accepted under the constitution.
“Should all the states adopt it, it will be then a government established by the thirteen states of America, not through the intervention of the legislatures, but by the people at large.” — James Madison, VA state ratifying convention, June 6, 1788
“The Constitution requires an adoption in toto, and for ever.” — James Madison to Alexander Hamilton, July 20, 1788
Do you know of any other proof?
Also, are you honest enough to admit I have more proof to the contrary than you do in favor?
“There is a lot of evidence to support secession being regarded as accepted in 1787, and very little which shows otherwise.”
If you have never read Charles Francis Adams Jr’s speech “Shall Cromwell Have a Statue?” you should try to find it on the internet. It’s hard to find, someone ought to reprint it, in html if nothing else.
Anyway you’ll see Adams conclude that the Confederacy had a case for secession, based upon “the old understanding” of the nature of the federal union. Lincoln chose to pretend that “the new understanding” of the federal union was the only view that existed. And nowhere was that new understanding enshrined in law. Lincoln simply imposed the new view via bayonet.
Confederacy bashers don’t like Adams’ essay at all, I suspect that is the reason it’s so hard to find. He’s inconvenient because in addition to having been a Union combat officer he’s the grandson and g-grandson of the two Massachusetts Presidents. Instead of dismissing him as a Lost Causer from Dixie they have to actually deal with his research and reasoning in the matter of secession. So they don’t.
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