Posted on 01/13/2004 9:01:35 AM PST by Aurelius
Dust jackets for most books about the American Civil War depict generals, politicians, battle scenes, cavalry charges, cannons[sic] firing, photographs or fields of dead soldiers, or perhaps a battle between ironclads. In contrast our book {[url=http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?userid=2XGHOEK4JT&isbn=0842029613&itm=7]Tariffs, Blockades, and Inflation: The Economics of the Civil War Mark Thornton, Steven E. Woodworth (Editor), Robert B. Ekelund[/url]features a painting by Edgar Degas entitled the "Cotton Exchange" which depicts several calm businessmen and clerks, some of them Degas’s relatives, going about the business of buying and selling cotton at the New Orleans Cotton Exchange. The focus of this book is thus on the economic rationality of seemingly senseless events of the Civil War – a critical period in American history.
What caused the war? Why did the Union defeat the Confederacy? What were the consequences of the War? The premise of the book is that historians have a comparative advantage in describing such events, but economists have the tools to help explain these events.
We use traditional economic analysis, some of it of the Austrian and Public Choice variety, to address these principal questions and our conclusions generally run counter to the interpretations of historians. In contrast to historians who emphasize the land war and military strategy, we show that the most important battle took place at sea. One side, the blockade runners, did not wear uniforms or fire weapons at their opponents. The other side, the blockading fleet, was composed of sailors who had weapons and guns but they rarely fired their cannons in hopes of damaging their opponents. Their pay was based on the valued of captured ships. Historians often have argued that the Confederacy lost because it was overly reluctant to use government power and economic controls, but we show the exact opposite. Big Confederate government brought the Confederacy to its knees.
Some now teach that slavery was the sole cause of the Civil War – an explanation that historians have developed in the twentieth century. However, this analysis does not explain why the war started in 1861 (rather than 1851 or 1841) and it fails to explain why slavery was abolished elsewhere without such horrendous carnage.
We emphasize economics and politics as major factors leading to war. The Republicans who came to power in 1860 supported a mercantilist economic agenda of protectionism, inflation, public works, and big government. High tariffs would have been a boon to manufacturing and mining in the north, but would have been paid largely by those in the export-oriented agriculture economy.
Southern economic interests understood the effects of these policies and decided to leave the union. The war was clearly related to slavery, but mainly in the sense that Republican tariffs would have squeezed the profitability out of the slave-based cotton plantation economy to the benefit of Northern industry (especially Yankee textiles and iron manufacturing). Southerners would also have lost out in terms of public works projects, government land giveaways, and inflation.
The real truth about wars is that they are not started over principle, but over power. Wars however, are not won by power on the battlefield, but by the workings and incentives of men who go to work in fields and factories, to those who transport, store and sell consumer goods, and most especially to the entrepreneurs and middlemen who make markets work and adapt to change. This emphasis and this economic account of tariffs, blockade and inflation, like the focus of Degas’s "Cotton Exchange" reveals the most important and least understood aspect of war.
Using that standard, Chase's opinion on secession was obiter dicta. So the matter is still open.
But unilateral secession, on the other hand, was settled by the Supreme Court in 1869. They ruled is was illegal, and so it remains.
And the court has reversed itself, and been overturned by the people.
But I will digress, in order to refute the inane ruling. Chase wrote, 'The Constitution, in all its provisions, looks to an indestructible Union, composed of indestructible States.
Bravo Sierra. Article IV § 3 states in part, that the no state 'be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or parts of States.' Those states aren't indestructible. He made up the indestuctible Union part as well. The Articles of Confederation are not incorporated into the Constitution, the Constitution omits the 5 references to perpetuity that the AoC contained.
Bravo Sierra. The defendants case was based on the argument that since Texas was not a part of the United States then the state could not take the case in question to the Supreme Court. The validity of the acts of secession was a central issue before the court, and the court ruled that Texas was never out of the Union at any time.
And the court has reversed itself, and been overturned by the people.
And when did this occur?
And yet the government of these people endures.
What could be more permanent than a perpetual Union made more perfect?
Walt
Where?
Time keeps slipping into the future.
Where did Justice Grier write there were two separate nations involved?
Walt
In an earlier Supreme court case, The Santissima Trinidad, 7 Wheat. 283 (1822) [decided 12 Mar 1822], the court held that with the US declaration of neutrality 'each party is therefore deemed by us a belligerent nation.' A point reiterated by Grier when he wrote the 'parties belligerent in a public war are independent nations.'
It's not written in Greek.
It's got nothing to do with the Rebellion.
You lied; you got caught.
Walt
Justice Robert Grier: 'parties belligerent in a public war are independent nations.'
You calling Grier a liar?
"The parties belligerent in a public war are independent nations. But it is not necessary, to constitute war, that both parties should be acknowledged as independent nations or sovereign States. A war may exist where one of the belligerents claims sovereign rights as against the other."
--Justice Grier, Majority Opinion in the Prize Cases
You're the liar. Grier did not say that the USA and the so-called CSA were both independent nations.
Walt
I wonder if you really are to dumb to understand this, or if you're just pretending.
The US Supreme Court, in an earlier Supreme court case, The Santissima Trinidad, 7 Wheat. 283 (1822) the court held that with the US declaration of neutrality 'each party is therefore deemed by us a belligerent nation.'
Got that? 'The condition of neutrality cannot exist unless there be two belligerent parties.' A declaration of neutrality issued by a country - including the US - recognizes two parties. In the above case, the US recognized the parties involved as nations, even though it was considered a civil war.
Grier writes, 'the parties to a civil war usually concede to each other belligerent rights. They exchange prisoners, and adopt the other courtesies and rules common to public or national wars.' Which did occur. That is beyond dispute.
Next Grier writes, '[b]y the Constitution, Congress alone has the power to declare a national or foreign war', which did occur, 'when in 1861, we find Congress "ex majore cautela" and in anticipation of such astute objections, passing an act approving, legalizing, and making valid all the acts, proclamations, and orders of the President, &c., as if they had been issued and done under the previous express authority and direction of the Congress of the United States.' The blockade proclaimed by the President is an act of war under international law. The power institute a blockade is congressional ('To declare War ... make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water' and 'regulate Commerce with foreign Nations').
Next, Grier states, that '[w]e have shown that a civil war such as that now waged between the Northern and Southern States is properly conducted according to the humane regulations of public law [international] as regards capture on the ocean.' The independent status of the belligerents as nations was recognized by Grier's statement, the 'parties belligerent in a public war are independent nations.'
It's not rocket science.
If the state had never left the union, the the state legislature's action regarding the sale of the bonds would have been legal. The decision is a most ludicrous absurity. Chase's decision is Bravo Sierra.
And when did this occur?
Surely you jest! Have you nver heard of a Supreme Court reversing itself, or of an Amendment that overturned a Supreme Court decision? Or of one Amendment overturning another earlier one? Think about it.
Your opinion on the Supreme Court's decision does not invalidate it. Unilateral secession as practiced by the southern states was illegal and not sanctioned by the Constitution.
Surely you jest! Have you nver heard of a Supreme Court reversing itself, or of an Amendment that overturned a Supreme Court decision? Or of one Amendment overturning another earlier one? Think about it.
Sure I have. And none of those things have happened where unilateral secession is concerned.
Nowhere in the Supremacy clause does it state that judicial decisions are supreme. Seccession WAS not illegal, the was no prohibition against it, the federal government has not been delegated the power to prohibit secession, either via legislation or by court judgements.
The TvW was a specious piece of bovine excrement, the holding that a Texas was still a state negated the decision on the bonds.
The supremecy clause makes the Constitution the supreme law of the land, trumping state constitutions and laws made under them when they conflict with the Constitution. And the Constitution gives the Supreme Court original jurisdiction over cases where states may be a party. The Supreme Court was well within its authority to rule on the Texas acts of secession and to determine if they conflicted with the Constitution. And that is what they did.
Seccession WAS not illegal...
Unilateral secession as practiced by the southern states most certainly was, as the Supreme Court ruled in 1869.
The TvW was a specious piece of bovine excrement, the holding that a Texas was still a state negated the decision on the bonds.
The Texas v White is a valid Supreme Court decision, your opinion to the contrary notwithstanting. And it remains as such unless overturned by a future court or invalidated by Constitutional amendment. Regardless of what you may think of it.
This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.
Article VI § 2
One problem. The Constitution does not grant the courts any power over the people of the state in their sovereign capacity, the acts that resumed delegated powers were not laws, nor was it anything within the state constitutions. It was a solemn act of the people of each state, via their representatives in convention assembled - meeting the guarantee of republican government – that resumed the powers that the state had previously 'delegated' to the federal government.
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
Amendment X
Delegated, meaning that the people can choose a replacement 'delegate', or simply resume the powers transferred to their representative.
Furthermore, the Court failed to recognize the validity of the secession acts, as required by the Constitution:
Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State.It's not, 'may be given', or only on Thursdays, it reads 'shall be given'. The decision has no legal basis, Chase made it up.
Article IV § 1
The acts of secession were legislation passed by the Texas legislature, and which violated the Constitution.
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
Approval of actions concerning the status of states was a power delegated to the United States Congress by Article IV of the Constitution.
Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State.
When those public Acts do not violate the Constitution, yes.
Where do you find this stuff? From some 'moderated' forum? The state of Texas elected delegates to the convention 8 Jan 1861, with the convention meeting in Austin on 28 Jan 1861.
John R. Baylor was a delegate - he was not a member of the legislature. Neither was delegate Albert C. Horton. And judge John Gregg, judge John Ireland, M. T. Johnson, William B. Ochiltree, Williamson S. Oldham, L. A. Abercrombie, Joseph H. Dunham, J. L. McCall etc. It was not the legislature that met.
After opening with prayer, the convention elected Texas Supreme Court Justice Oran M. Roberts as president, who declared, '[a]ll political power is inherent in the people. That power, I assert, you now represent.' On 1 Feb 1861 the convention voted 166-8 to secede. The convention also allowed the people to vote on secession, which passed 44,317 to 13,020 on 23 Feb 1861.
John McQueen, special commissioner to the convention from South Carolina, addressed it 2 Feb 1861:
Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Convention, I have been honored with a commission by the Convention of the State of South Carolina to repair to your State and lay before your Convention an ordinance of the State of South Carolina ...
You can read about the convention in Journal of the Secession Convention of Texas edited by E. W. Winkler, and published in 1912.
Approval of actions concerning the status of states was a power delegated to the United States Congress by Article IV of the Constitution.
No. Only the admission of NEW states was regulated.
When those public Acts do not violate the Constitution, yes.
No. Please re-read the Supremacy clause.
What do you mean? The Constitution is god, pre-existing, and that it delegated powers to the states? ROFTLM*O!!!!! The preamble states that the people of the several states 'do ordain and establish this Constitution'. The people of the respective states, in convention, ratified and delegated (not transferred permanently) powers to the new federal government.
A power-of-attorney delegates authority from an individual or corporation to an agent. The power-of-attorney cannot rescind or transfer power, it's simply a document. The rescinding/transferring is effected by the person/corporation delegating power to begin with.
For the sake of argument, where does it state that the Constitution undelegates powers? Per Amendment X, the powers 'not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.'
Not an ordinance of the legislature of the state, an act by the people of their state in their sovereign capacity. Again note that the people of the several states are not bound by the Supremacy clause.
It doesn't say how the laws are enacted.
Article I § 7 states 'Every Bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate, shall, before it become a Law...'
A state law(ordinance) can not trump the constitution.
The several states ratified unilaterally - no state could ratify for another. Their ratifications were the act of the people of each state - not their legislatures. The act is not their state constitution, or a law passed by a legislature. In Federalist No. 48, James Madison stated that the 'convention which passed the ordinance of government, laid its foundation on this basis, that the legislative, executive, and judiciary departments should be separate and distinct.' It wasn't a law.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.