NEWS FROM WASHINGTON: How the President’s Message is Received; MAILS TO THE SOUTH PACIFIC (3/8/1862)

New York Times - Times Machine ^ | 3/8/1862

[Homer_J_Simpson]

WASHINGTON, Friday, March 7.

The more the President's Message is discussed the more difficult is it to define the position of parties in regard to it. One great point, however, is gained the subject is universally discussed with more calmness than has ever before characterized a question about Slavery.

DEPARTURE OF GOV. JOHNSON FOR TENNESEE.

Gov. ANDREW JOHNSON, accompanied by his son, Col. ROBERT JOHNSON, WILLIAM A. BROWNING, Secretary, &c., Hon. HORACE MAYNARD, and Hon. EMERSON ETHERIDGE, Clerk of the House, left Washington this afternoon for Nashville, via Harrisburgh, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati and Louisville.

THE MAILS TO THE SOUTH PACIFIC, VIA PANAMA.

The Senate Committee on Post-offices, at their meeting to-day, authorized Mr. COLLAMER to report Mr. SUMNER's bill to provide for the carrying the mails from the United States to foreign ports, with a recommendation that immediate action be had, so as to provide for carrying the mails to the South Pacific before the 21st inst., after which date Commodore VANDERBILT has notified the Postmaster-General he will refuse to take the mails. The bill, as reported, provider that any vessels clearing from a foreign port shall take and receive any mail matter placed on board said vessel by the United States Consul or by the port officers of such foreign port or place, for the United States, and shall deliver the same to the Post-office of the place aforesaid in the United States.

ALLOTMENTS OF THE NEW-YORK SOLDIERS.

The Allotment Commissioners from New-York to-day closed up the object of their mission, having visited upwards of 70 regiments, and handed over to the Paymaster-General all the certificates, so that that officer can complete what remains to be done. They have been eminently successful.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "The thing that you and others cannot seem to grasp is that secession does not require justification."

And yet... and yet, most seceding states did issue "Reasons for Secession" documents, justifying their "whereas's" and "wherefore's".
Nearly all of these documents focused on slavery, none mentioned the endless nonsense our Lost Causers have since concocted.

DiogenesLamp: "The Declaration of Independence is quite explicit in saying people can have independence for any reason they see fit."

That is a pure figment of yout overactive imagination.
In fact it neither says nor implies any such thing.

DiogenesLamp: "What is moral about a forced coerced relationship? Sounds like slavery to me."

No Founder ever proposed or supported an unlimited "right of secession" at pleasure, meaning without serious reasons such as those spelled out in their Declaration of Independence.

[DiogenesLamp]

That is a pure figment of your overactive imagination. In fact it neither says nor implies any such thing.

I've seen commentary between you and another Freeper in which you were asserted to be or have been a college professor.

It take it that this means you understand English and can diagram sentences?

You go parse the words in the Declaration of Independence and get back to me.

If you are honest, you will respond that it means exactly what I have said it means; That people can have independence for any reason or no reason. They only have to want it.

The List of grievances is specifically mentioned as being a courtesy out of "a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind ".

Respecting the opinions of mankind is not a requirement, it is a courtesy, nothing more.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "If you are honest, you will respond that it means exactly what I have said it means; That people can have independence for any reason or no reason. They only have to want it."

The Declaration of Independence can never possibly mean what you claim,
It can only ever mean what our Founders said, and none of them ever said it justified an unlimited "right of secession" at pleasure.

You "liberal" Democrats are constantly trying to redefine our Founding Documents as if they were "living" to be interpreted according to your latest whims.

You need to stop that. ;-)

[DiogenesLamp]

The Declaration of Independence can never possibly mean what you claim, It can only ever mean what our Founders said, and none of them ever said it justified an unlimited "right of secession" at pleasure.

They said exactly that. Again, diagram the sentences.

You may not like it, but that is exactly what the Declaration of Independence says. It isn't even murky about it, it comes right out and says that people can abolish their government for any reason they see fit.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "Foreigner fighting for the oppressor against people wanting independence."

They weren't by then foreigners, they were land owning farmers, and citizens.
They did continue to speak their native language at home, just as many citizens do today.

[DiogenesLamp]

They weren't by then foreigners, they were land owning farmers, and citizens. They did continue to speak their native language at home, just as many citizens do today.

Something doesn't jive. About your grandfather you initially said this:

"One of my Great Grandfathers was fresh off the boat from Europe, spoke little or no English, in 1862 volunteered for an Illinois regiment out of Quincy. They served until August 1865."

That doesn't comport with what you said up above.

Is he "fresh off the boat" or isn't he?

[BroJoeK]

:"it comes right out and says that people can abolish their government for any reason they see fit."

They said nothing of the sort, either in the Declaration or subsequently.
You are simply a typical "liberal" Democrat hoping to redefine the terms according to your own wishes.

[DiogenesLamp]

They said nothing of the sort, either in the Declaration or subsequently.

It says exactly that very thing. Read it again.

"That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

The people get to decide when their government becomes "destructive of these ends." Nobody else, just the people who object to their treatment under the government.

Just as every individual has a right to be free of his master, so too do people collectively have a right to be free of theirs.

[jmacusa]

No. It wasn't a ‘’disaster’’ Reb. It was the Confederacy having been made to surrender because it had been defeated on the battlefield .

It had been roundly defeated in a war it had every intention of winning.

“Disaster’’? So thanks for revealing your real self.

You're no more a patriotic American conservative than an Antifa goon is a Buddhist monk.

[jmacusa]

Slaves WERE money stupid, at the time $4 billion dollars.

[DiogenesLamp]

Slaves WERE money stupid, at the time $4 billion dollars.

Which is exactly why the Northern powers wanted them to keep working to stream money into their pockets. The South leaving takes that labor force out of the control of the Northern power brokers.

The South did 500 million in trade with the North, and 200 million in trade with Europe.

That was almost all slave produced money.

The corrupt evil Northerners who enriched themselves off of slave money wanted to keep that gravy train going.

[jeffersondem]

“Disaster’’? So thanks for revealing your real self.”

Yes, Appomattox was a disaster, for several reasons. One I have spoken of often is the ill-compounded and hastily enacted abortion amendment (number 14).

You may know the 14th amendment as the homosexual marriage amendment; or you may know it as the current argument to prevent President Trump from running for office again (the plan is to strip him of his rights like the Confederates).

Whatever you call it, the 14th was written in a manner permitting the killing of at least 50 million innocent Americans, an estimated 25 million of which were the descendants of former slaves.

That is one unfavorable result of an all powerful federal government which takes away rights and remedies of the states.

[jeffersondem]

“No Founder ever proposed or supported an unlimited “right of secession” at pleasure, meaning without serious reasons such as those spelled out in their Declaration of Independence.”

Serious, serious reasons are required for open rebellion against government authorities; like taxing three pence for a pound of tea.

[Pelham]

Find a copy of Charles Francis Adams Jr’s essay “Shall Cromwell Have a Statue”?

It’s really about Robert E Lee. And secession. And whether it was legal.

Adams’ conclusion is that it was ambiguous, the Constitution is silent about it. Not to forget that the government is older than the Constitution by more than a decade and its nature preceded it.

Adams said that it depended on how you looked at the nature of the Union. The South was using the older view where the Union was created by independent States and the States retained rights... this is reflected in the 9th and 10th Amendments. Lincoln adhered to the view that the States lost their rights when they joined in the perpetual union of the Articles of Confederation.

It’s interesting to note that when the Constitution was ratified and Washington took the Presidency there were only 11 States in the Union. NC and Rhode Island were outside independent States... this caused a good deal of consternation among their former “perpetual union” bretheren... apparently Abe the lawyer ignored this inconvenience in his version of history.

I’m sure that the usual cult will denounce Adams as a Southern apologist. He was an historian, a Union Army combat officer, and the grandson & g-grandson of the two Presidents from Massachusetts.

[DiogenesLamp]

Adams’ conclusion is that it was ambiguous, the Constitution is silent about it.

People who claim it is "ambiguous" don't think it through. The reason the US Constitution is silent about it is because a similar assembly had just written that independence is a right a mere 11 years earlier, and in 1787 no one had forgotten it.

The constitution didn't need to say anything on the matter because everything necessary had been said 11 years earlier.

[Pelham]

You’d think that a nation born in secession from the United Kingdom would have taken that right as a given. Lincoln, like George III, turned an army on those who decided to leave.

If you compare King George III’s Speech to Parliament October 26, 1775 to Lincoln’s April 15, 1861 Proclamation raising an army to use against the states the difference is mainly George’s archaic and flowery verbiage. The content is the same.

[woodpusher]

“No Founder ever proposed or supported an unlimited “right of secession” at pleasure, meaning without serious reasons such as those spelled out in their Declaration of Independence.”

Serious, serious reasons are required for open rebellion against government authorities; like taxing three pence for a pound of tea.

Vermont left New York and the Union, establishing her independence in 1777. Vermont was admitted to the constitutional union in 1790 as an independent state with self-constituted boundaries.

With ratification of the Constitution, and the inauguration of George Washington, and the formation of a new government, eleven of the states left the old union of the Articles of Confederation behind. For six months to a year, North Carolina and Rhode Island were not part of the new union, having not ratified the Constitution.

https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/ratny.asp

The ratification of New York, third and fourth paragraphs:

That the enjoyment of Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness are essential rights which every Government ought to respect and preserve.

That the Powers of Government may be reassumed by the People, whensoever it shall become necessary to their Happiness; that every Power, Jurisdiction and right, which is not by the said Constitution clearly delegated to the Congress of the United States, or the departments of the Government thereof, remains to the People of the several States, or to their respective State Governments to whom they may have granted the same; And that those Clauses in the said Constitution, which declare, that Congress shall not have or exercise certain Powers, do not imply that Congress is entitled to any Powers not given by the said Constitution; but such Clauses are to be construed either as exceptions to certain specified Powers, or as inserted merely for greater Caution.

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/ratva.asp

Ratification of the Constitution by the State of Virginia; June 26, 1788. (1)

We the Delegates of the People of Virginia duly elected in pursuance of a recommendation from the General Assembly and now met in Convention having fully and freely investigated and discussed the proceedings of the Federal Convention and being prepared as well as the most mature deliberation hath enabled us to decide thereon Do in the name and in behalf of the People of Virginia declare and make known that 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 and that every power not granted thereby remains with them and at their will: that therefore no right of any denomination can be cancelled abridged restrained or modified by the Congress by the Senate or House of Representatives acting in any Capacity by the President or any Department or Officer of the United States except in those instances in which power is given by the Constitution for those purposes: & that among other essential rights the liberty of Conscience and of the Press cannot be cancelled abridged restrained or modified by any authority of the United States. With these impressions with a solemn appeal to the Searcher of hearts for the purity of our intentions and under the conviction that whatsoever imperfections may exist in the Constitution ought rather to be examined in the mode prescribed therein than to bring the Union into danger by a delay with a hope of obtaining Amendments previous to the Ratification, We the said Delegates in the name and in behalf of the People of Virginia do by these presents assent to and ratify the Constitution recommended on the seventeenth day of September one thousand seven hundred and eighty seven by the Federal Convention for the Government of the United States hereby announcing to all those whom it may concern that the said Constitution is binding upon the said People according to an authentic Copy hereto annexed in the Words following;

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp (referring to my ggfather): "Is he "fresh off the boat" or isn't he?"

We think that by the time their elder son enlisted, in October 1862, his family had been here several years -- I'm calling that "fresh off the boat", as opposed to other ancestors who arrived in New York around 1700.
There were two sons and the story is their family escaped the "old country" in order to dodge its draft into one of Europe's endless wars.

The elder son, my great grandfather, enlisted in the Illinois voluntary infantry.
The younger son, some people claim, though we have found no records of it, joined the Confederate cavalry, ended up in Texas, near San Antonio...

And yes, there is a plausible explanation as to how & why that happened, but we can't prove it.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "exactly what the Declaration of Independence says.
It isn't even murky about it, it comes right out and says that people can abolish their government for any reason they see fit."

But no Founder ever claimed that's what they intended.
Rather, Founders like Madison explained their Declaration idea as: when a legal contract is broken that relieves the parties from their legal obligations to honor it.
And "broken" refers to such major events as spelled out in their Declaration of Independence.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp (quoting DOI): "..whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it..."

Your own quote confirms my argument: the right to "alter or to abolish" is dependent on government becoming "destructive of these Ends."
So FIRST the government must break the contract -- or "compact" as Madison called it -- THEN there is a "right to alter or abolish".
As to what Founders meant by "destructive", they spelled out what "destructive" meant in their Declaration, including such major items as:

"He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people."

That's what our Founders intended by "destructive", regardless of what you "liberal" Democrats wish to redefine their words to mean.