Evidence Builds for DeLorenzo's Lincoln

October 16, 2002 | Dr. Paul Craig Roberts

[l8pilot]

Evidence Builds for DiLorenzo’s Lincoln by Paul Craig Roberts

In an excellent piece of historical research and economic exposition, two economics professors, Robert A. McGuire of the University of Akron and T. Norman Van Cott of Ball State University, have provided independent evidence for Thomas J. Dilorenzo’s thesis that tariffs played a bigger role in causing the Civil War than slavery.

In The Real Lincoln, DiLorenzo argues that President Lincoln invaded the secessionist South in order to hold on to the tariff revenues with which to subsidize Northern industry and build an American Empire. In "The Confederate Constitution, Tariffs, and the Laffer Relationship" (Economic Inquiry, Vol. 40, No. 3, July 2002), McGuire and Van Cott show that the Confederate Constitution explicitly prohibits tariff revenues from being used "to promote or foster any branch of industry." By prohibiting subsidies to industries and tariffs high enough to be protective, the Confederates located their tax on the lower end of the "Laffer curve."

The Confederate Constitution reflected the argument of John C. Calhoun against the 1828 Tariff of Abominations. Calhoun argued that the U.S. Constitution granted the tariff "as a tax power for the sole purpose of revenue – a power in its nature essentially different from that of imposing protective or prohibitory duties."

McGuire and Van Cott conclude that the tariff issue was a major factor in North-South tensions. Higher tariffs were "a key plank in the August 1860 Republican party platform. . . . northern politicians overall wanted dramatically higher tariff rates; Southern politicians did not."

"The handwriting was on the wall for the South," which clearly understood that remaining in the union meant certain tax exploitation for the benefit of the north.

October 16, 2002

Dr. Roberts [send him mail] is John M. Olin Fellow at the Institute for Political Economy and Senior Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He is a former associate editor of the Wall Street Journal and a former assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury. He is the co-author of The Tyranny of Good Intentions Evidence Builds for DiLorenzo’s Lincoln by Paul Craig Roberts

In an excellent piece of historical research and economic exposition, two economics professors, Robert A. McGuire of the University of Akron and T. Norman Van Cott of Ball State University, have provided independent evidence for Thomas J. Dilorenzo’s thesis that tariffs played a bigger role in causing the Civil War than slavery.

In The Real Lincoln, DiLorenzo argues that President Lincoln invaded the secessionist South in order to hold on to the tariff revenues with which to subsidize Northern industry and build an American Empire. In "The Confederate Constitution, Tariffs, and the Laffer Relationship" (Economic Inquiry, Vol. 40, No. 3, July 2002), McGuire and Van Cott show that the Confederate Constitution explicitly prohibits tariff revenues from being used "to promote or foster any branch of industry." By prohibiting subsidies to industries and tariffs high enough to be protective, the Confederates located their tax on the lower end of the "Laffer curve."

The Confederate Constitution reflected the argument of John C. Calhoun against the 1828 Tariff of Abominations. Calhoun argued that the U.S. Constitution granted the tariff "as a tax power for the sole purpose of revenue – a power in its nature essentially different from that of imposing protective or prohibitory duties."

McGuire and Van Cott conclude that the tariff issue was a major factor in North-South tensions. Higher tariffs were "a key plank in the August 1860 Republican party platform. . . . northern politicians overall wanted dramatically higher tariff rates; Southern politicians did not."

"The handwriting was on the wall for the South," which clearly understood that remaining in the union meant certain tax exploitation for the benefit of the north.

October 16, 2002

Dr. Roberts [send him mail] is John M. Olin Fellow at the Institute for Political Economy and Senior Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He is a former associate editor of the Wall Street Journal and a former assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury. He is the co-author of The Tyranny of Good Intentions

[GOPcapitalist]

Oh wait, the court has never ruled on the power of the president to suspend the privilege of Habeas Corpus.

Yes it has, Walt. We've been over this before and you dishonestly ignore it every time.

"The decision that the individual shall be imprisoned must always precede the application for a writ of habeas corpus, and this writ must always be for the purpose of revision that decision, and therefore appellate in its nature. But this point also is decided in Hamilton's case and in Burford's case. If at any time the public safety should require the suspension of the powers vested by this act in the courts of the United States, it is for the legislature to say so. That question depends on political considerations, on which the legislature is to decide. Until the legislative will be expressed, this court can only see its duty, and must obey the laws." - John Marshall for the majority, Ex Parte Bollman & Swartwout (1807)

Maybe ol' Roger made one too.

No, not really. Considered on its own merits, Taney's ruling in Merryman is thoroughly backed by sound constitutional reasoning and extensive court precedent. But that doesn't seem to be of interest to you. You'd rather attack Taney personally than consider the merits of his ruling.

[bjs1779]

"The decision that the individual shall be imprisoned must always precede the application for a writ of habeas corpus, and this writ must always be for the purpose of revision that decision, and therefore appellate in its nature. But this point also is decided in Hamilton's case and in Burford's case. If at any time the public safety should require the suspension of the powers vested by this act in the courts of the United States, it is for the legislature to say so. That question depends on political considerations, on which the legislature is to decide. Until the legislative will be expressed, this court can only see its duty, and must obey the laws." - John Marshall for the majority, Ex Parte Bollman & Swartwout (1807)

Those damm courts! Always trying to tarnish our noble hero lawbreakers like Andrew Jackson and Linclon.

[4CJ]

So where is the right to prevent secession delegated to the federal government?

[4CJ]

Washington wanted a stronger government and he got one.,

"I cannot but hope then, that the States which may be disposed to make a secession will think often and seriously on the consequences."
George Washington, "Letter to Henry Knox", 17 Jun 1788, The Writings of George Washington from the Original Manuscript Sources, 1745-1799, John C. Fitzpatrick, Editor, V. 29

Washington understood that some states might refuse to join the new government, but he certainly didn't opine that they be conquered by military force. Reducing a government from 13 to 9 members is not introducing a stronger goverment.

[4CJ]

Secession cannot be a reserved power because the Constitutition delegates to the Congress the power to provide for the common defense and general welfare. Unialteral state secession would be inimical to those interests.

How does secession constitute an attack? The states delegated to the federal government certain powers, among them to provide for the common defense - meaning ALL states. If the Executive is charged with the common defense of the states - and held that the seceding states were still states - then he violated the Constitution (besides exercising non-delegated judicial powers) by not protecting them from invasion from the federal government. The federal government has no authority over Cuba, Canada or Mexico, nor over a seceded state.

Besides, no act, ordinance, resolution or statement of secession can have validity in law because it is a "thing" in the laws of a state that the Constitution clearly states cannot withstand the powers of the federal government.

You write some of the most idiotic statements. See Article IV. The Constitutution explicitly requires that "Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State."

[4CJ]

You can't carp at President Lincoln unless you carp at the framers.

"Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it."
Abrahm Lincoln, "Letter To Henry L. Pierce and Others", 6 Apr 1859, Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, (Roy P. Basler, ed.), New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1953-1955, Vol. III., p. 376.

Lincoln condemned them I guess.

[4CJ]

So you are putting U.S. law (slavery being legal in the U.S. at the time) over natural or God's law. That seems odd.

You deny the right of self-government. That seems odd.

But can you show in the record that anyone ever held the EP to be illegal?

This is too easy:

"I felt that measures [the Emancipation Proclamation], otherwise unconstitutional, might become lawful [ex post facto], by becoming indispensable to the preservation of the constitution, through the preservation of the nation."
Abrahm Lincoln, "Letter To To Albert G. Hodges", 4 Apr 1864, Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, (Roy P. Basler, ed.), New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1953-1955, Vol. VII., p. 241.

[4CJ]

I've taken an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution.

So? So did Lincoln and William J. Clinton.

[4CJ]

Sherman obtained his objectives after capturing Atlanta without facing any important opposition at all.

Rather than face a military force, Sherman (Spit!) finally chose to attack cilvilian targets, old men, women and children. What a coward.

[WhiskeyPapa]

Rather than face a military force, Sherman (Spit!) finally chose to attack cilvilian targets, old men, women and children. What a coward.

I read recently that Hood's army camped near Cedartown, Georgia -- my mother's home town -- before He swooped off to do the same to Ohio.

But he met Thomas instead.

Nothing Hood did after he left the Atlanta, and little prior, would have met with Sun Tzu's approval.

Walt

[4CJ]

Hard to run a country without money. The states didn't reserve that right. Ooops.

Per the 10th Amendment (still part of the Constitution), the right of controlling secession was NOT delegated to the federal goverment.

"What is a Constitution? It is the form of government, delineated by the mighty hand of the people, in which certain first principles of fundamental laws are established. The constitution is certain and fixed; it contains the permanent will of the people, and is the supreme law of the land; it is paramount to the power of the legislature, and can be revoked or altered only by the authority that made it. The life-giving principle and the death-doing stroke must proceed from the same hand. What are legislatures? Creatures of the constitution; they owe their existence to the constitution: they derive their powers from the constitution: it is their commission; and therefore, all their acts must be conformable to it, or else they will be void. The constitution is the work or will of the people themselves, in their original, sovereign and unlimited capacity."
Justice Paterson, Vanhorne's Lessee v. Dorrance, 2 Dall. 304, (1795)

[GOPcapitalist]

So did Lincoln and William J. Clinton.

For some reason, I don't think Walt will take that as the insult it is.

Remember, he worships one and voted for the other.

[GOPcapitalist]

and little prior, would have met with Sun Tzu's approval.

...and we all know, Walt's got his "Art of War" copy on the rack by the toilet right next to "Battle Cry of Freedom."

[WhiskeyPapa]

and little prior, would have met with Sun Tzu's approval.

...and we all know, Walt's got his "Art of War" copy on the rack by the toilet right next to "Battle Cry of Freedom."

Sun Tzu gets a good press for a Chinese guy who's been dead for 2500 years. You'll note that means his writings were extant when Hood was living -- as well as when Grant and Sherman were living. But Grant and Sherman applied concepts that would have been familiar to Sun Tzu. In fact, President Lincoln applied very good concepts also -- right from the start of the war. He had a very good strategy from the very start of the war. For their part, the so-called CSA eschewed strategy, as such. The so-called CSA put their faith in a vague idea that Europeans would fight their battles for them, but it didn't happen that way.

Walt

[WhiskeyPapa]

I've taken an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution.

So? So did Lincoln and William J. Clinton.

So did Robert E. Lee.

A lot of people have supported the Constitution so you can post freely to destroy everything good about it, and America.

I don't suppose you ever felt compelled to serve the country -- just live in it.

Walt

[GOPcapitalist]

Sun Tzu gets a good press for a Chinese guy who's been dead for 2500 years.

I have no issue with his book per se, Walt. I simply find it amusing that the Dale Gribbles of the world out there tend to buy themselves a copy and almost immediately come to think of themselves as great military experts who throw out lines from it at every opportunity. You seem to fall into that category.

[4CJ]

I don't suppose you ever felt compelled to serve the country -- just live in it.

Nonsense, I am a military brat, and have brothers that served as well - my biggest regret in life is NOT enlisting - there wasn't an active war going on, and I wanted combat experience. So I decided to get a degree and join as an officer, but marriage changed a few things.

[4CJ]

A lot of people have supported the Constitution so you can post freely to destroy everything good about it, and America

Posting the truth about Lincoln and his unconstitutional actions, his white-supremacist attitude destroys America? ROTF!

[Ditto]

Harry Blackmun, our own Roger Taney

by PAUL GREENBERG, The Houston Chronicle, April 9, 1994. This article is part of no violence period.

INDULGE me in a momentary historical fantasy. Suppose that Roger Brooke Taney had not gone down in American history as the principal author of what is now almost universally acknowledged as the worst decision in the history of American jurisprudence, Dred Scott vs. Sandford in 1857.

Suppose the country had been shaped in the image of Chief Justice Taney's decision, which decreed that slaves could be carried anywhere in the union, and that Negroes could not be citizens under the Constitution, for they were ""regarded as being of an inferior order and altogether unfit to associate with the white race ... and so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect. '' These were not persons, according to the high court, but property.

Stay with me, this may take some imagination. Now suppose that, instead of these words exciting contempt and derision, and moral horror, they were thought to represent a bulwark of American rights, a new birth of freedom.

In that case, there might still have been those Americans who did not approve of slavery, and perhaps even demonstrated against it, but suppose they were outnumbered by far? Not by fervent disciples of human slavery, but by the mass of citizens who felt uneasy when the subject came up, and who themselves would never own a slave, but who did not feel they should interfere with another's right to own one. Such a delicate question, they felt, should be left to individual conscience -- not dictated by the state.

And finally, suppose that Roger B. Taney, full of years and honors, were to announce that he would retire at the end of the Supreme Court's current term. What would some forgettable mediocrity of a president have said on that occasion? Would he have identified himself with the decision in Dred Scott? And would the departing chief justice have been hailed as the conscience of the court? Would the grand old man have explained at one point that, while not in favor of slavery personally, he had acted to protect the rights of others?

Too rich a fantasy?

Not if one listens to what is being said on the retirement of Justice Harry Blackmun, author of Roe vs. Wade, the Dred Scott decision of our time. Roe made it clear that the unborn child -- fetus, if that term is more comfortable -- has no rights that the state is bound to respect.

And like Dred Scott, Roe was handed down in the name of an individual right. Roger Taney's decision in Dred Scott was based on the Fifth Amendment's guarantee that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law. Justice Blackmun based Roe on a vague right of privacy nowhere spelled out in the Constitution but ""broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy. ''

Of course Roe does not condemn millions to a lifetime of slavery, but rather to no life at all -- or, if one prefers, termination. (Euphemism is the first sign that an advocate feels queasy about what he's really advocating.) At his press conference with Justice Blackmun this week, President Clinton repeated his support for Roe in his own forgettable way: ""I -- you know, of course, that I agree with the decision and I think it's an important one in a very difficult and complex area of our nation's life. ''

It might be noted that James Buchanan, the forgettable president in 1857, was all for the decision in Dred Scott, too, exulting that it would make Kansas ""as much a slave state as Georgia or South Carolina. '' At last the slavery question was resolved and the agitation over it would end -- just as Harry Blackmun's opinion in Roe was supposed to end any dispute about abortion.

Speaking of his decision in Roe, Justice Blackmun once explained: ""People misunderstand. I am not for abortion. I hope my family never has to face such a decision. '' Roger Taney's defenders in the more poisonous groves of academe explain that the chief justice wasn't ruling for slavery, but only interpreting the Constitution. People misunderstood.

By all reports, Mr. Justice Blackmun is a nice man, and a baseball fan to boot. Chief Justice Taney doubtless led an exemplary private life and had his hobbies, too. And both handed down other, better decisions besides the single one that history will indelibly link to their names. Perhaps that is the essence of this fantasy: In a society that has lost its moral bearings, strange and terrible decisions can be made, and can come to seem quite ordinary, even praiseworthy.

Greenberg is a Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist and editorial page editor of the Little Rock, Ark., Democrat-Gazette.

Copyright 1994 The Houston Chronicle Publishing Company

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[Ditto]

Harry Blackmun, our own Roger Taney

by PAUL GREENBERG, The Houston Chronicle, April 9, 1994. This article is part of no violence period.

INDULGE me in a momentary historical fantasy. Suppose that Roger Brooke Taney had not gone down in American history as the principal author of what is now almost universally acknowledged as the worst decision in the history of American jurisprudence, Dred Scott vs. Sandford in 1857.

Suppose the country had been shaped in the image of Chief Justice Taney's decision, which decreed that slaves could be carried anywhere in the union, and that Negroes could not be citizens under the Constitution, for they were ""regarded as being of an inferior order and altogether unfit to associate with the white race ... and so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect. '' These were not persons, according to the high court, but property.

Stay with me, this may take some imagination. Now suppose that, instead of these words exciting contempt and derision, and moral horror, they were thought to represent a bulwark of American rights, a new birth of freedom.

In that case, there might still have been those Americans who did not approve of slavery, and perhaps even demonstrated against it, but suppose they were outnumbered by far? Not by fervent disciples of human slavery, but by the mass of citizens who felt uneasy when the subject came up, and who themselves would never own a slave, but who did not feel they should interfere with another's right to own one. Such a delicate question, they felt, should be left to individual conscience -- not dictated by the state.

And finally, suppose that Roger B. Taney, full of years and honors, were to announce that he would retire at the end of the Supreme Court's current term. What would some forgettable mediocrity of a president have said on that occasion? Would he have identified himself with the decision in Dred Scott? And would the departing chief justice have been hailed as the conscience of the court? Would the grand old man have explained at one point that, while not in favor of slavery personally, he had acted to protect the rights of others?

Too rich a fantasy?

Not if one listens to what is being said on the retirement of Justice Harry Blackmun, author of Roe vs. Wade, the Dred Scott decision of our time. Roe made it clear that the unborn child -- fetus, if that term is more comfortable -- has no rights that the state is bound to respect.

And like Dred Scott, Roe was handed down in the name of an individual right. Roger Taney's decision in Dred Scott was based on the Fifth Amendment's guarantee that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law. Justice Blackmun based Roe on a vague right of privacy nowhere spelled out in the Constitution but ""broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy. ''

Of course Roe does not condemn millions to a lifetime of slavery, but rather to no life at all -- or, if one prefers, termination. (Euphemism is the first sign that an advocate feels queasy about what he's really advocating.) At his press conference with Justice Blackmun this week, President Clinton repeated his support for Roe in his own forgettable way: ""I -- you know, of course, that I agree with the decision and I think it's an important one in a very difficult and complex area of our nation's life. ''

It might be noted that James Buchanan, the forgettable president in 1857, was all for the decision in Dred Scott, too, exulting that it would make Kansas ""as much a slave state as Georgia or South Carolina. '' At last the slavery question was resolved and the agitation over it would end -- just as Harry Blackmun's opinion in Roe was supposed to end any dispute about abortion.

Speaking of his decision in Roe, Justice Blackmun once explained: ""People misunderstand. I am not for abortion. I hope my family never has to face such a decision. '' Roger Taney's defenders in the more poisonous groves of academe explain that the chief justice wasn't ruling for slavery, but only interpreting the Constitution. People misunderstood.

By all reports, Mr. Justice Blackmun is a nice man, and a baseball fan to boot. Chief Justice Taney doubtless led an exemplary private life and had his hobbies, too. And both handed down other, better decisions besides the single one that history will indelibly link to their names. Perhaps that is the essence of this fantasy: In a society that has lost its moral bearings, strange and terrible decisions can be made, and can come to seem quite ordinary, even praiseworthy.

Greenberg is a Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist and editorial page editor of the Little Rock, Ark., Democrat-Gazette.

Copyright 1994 The Houston Chronicle Publishing Company

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