Posted on 06/14/2004 5:16:34 AM PDT by Theodore R.
They Aren’t What They Used to Be
May 27, 2004
If I had to sum up American history in one sentence, I’d put it this way: The United States aren’t what they used to be.
That’s not nostalgia. That’s literal fact. Before the Civil War, the United States was a plural noun. The U.S. Constitution uses the plural form when, for example, it refers to enemies of the United States as “their” enemies. And this was the usage of everyone who understood that the union was a voluntary federation of sovereign states, delegating only a few specified powers, and not the monolithic, “consolidated,” all-powerful government it has since become.
Maybe Americans prefer the present megastate to the one the Constitution describes. But they ought to know the difference. They shouldn’t assume that the plural United States were essentially the same thing as today’s United State, or that the one naturally “evolved” into the other.
The change was violent, not natural. Lincoln waged war on states that tried to withdraw from the Union, denying their right to do so. This was a denial of the Declaration of Independence, which called the 13 former colonies “Free and Independent States.”
Washington and Jefferson at times expressed their fear that some states might secede, but they took for granted that this was the right of any free and independent state. They advised against exercising that right except under serious provocation, but they assumed it was a legitimate option against the threat of a centralized government that exceeded its constitutional powers.
Before the Civil War, several states considered leaving the Union, and abolitionists urged Northern states to do so in order to end their association with slave states. Congressman John Quincy Adams, a former president, wanted Massachusetts to secede if Texas was admitted to the Union. Nobody suggested that Adams didn’t understand the Constitution he was sworn to uphold.
But the danger to the states’ independence was already growing. Andrew Jackson had threatened to invade South Carolina if it seceded, shocking even so ardent a Unionist as Daniel Webster. Jackson didn’t explain where he got the power to prevent secession, a power not assigned to the president in the Constitution. Why not? For the simple reason that the Constitution doesn’t forbid secession; it presupposes that the United States are, each of them, free and independent.
Still, Lincoln used Jackson’s threat as a precedent for equating secession with “rebellion” and using force to crush it. This required him to do violence to the Constitution in several ways. He destroyed the freedoms of speech and press in the North; he arbitrarily arrested thousands, including elected officials who opposed him; he not only invaded the seceding states, but deposed their governments and imposed military dictatorships in their place.
In essence, Lincoln made it a crime — “treason,” in fact — to agree with Jefferson. Northerners who held that free and independent states had the right to leave the Union — and who therefore thought Lincoln’s war was wrong — became, in Lincoln’s mind, the enemy within. In order to win the war, and reelection, he had to shut them up. But his reign of terror in the North has received little attention.
He may have “saved the Union,” after a fashion, but the Union he saved was radically different from the one described in the Constitution. Even his defenders admit that when they praise him for creating “a new Constitution” and forging “a second American Revolution.” Lincoln would have been embarrassed by these compliments: He always insisted he was only enforcing and conserving the Constitution as it was written, though the U.S. Supreme Court, including his own appointees, later ruled many of his acts unconstitutional.
The Civil War completely changed the basic relation between the states, including the Northern states, and the Federal Government. For all practical purposes, the states ceased to be free and independent.
Sentimental myths about Lincoln and the war still obscure the nature of the fundamental rupture they brought to American history. The old federal Union was transformed into the kind of “consolidated” system the Constitution was meant to avoid. The former plurality of states became a single unit. Even our grammar reflects the change.
So the United States were no longer a “they”; they’d become an “it.” Few Americans realize the immense cost in blood, liberty, and even logic that lies behind this simple change of pronouns.
Joseph Sobran
While DiLorenzo specifically names only southern planters, wouldn't his arguement be true of anyone producing any sort of fungible product, regardless of whether it was exported or not? The Illinois farmer or the New Hampshire fisherman was no more able to pass along increases in his costs due to tariffs in the local markets than was the southern cotton exporter. He was paid market price regardless. If he consumed imported goods, and paid a tariff, and his neighbor did not then that was just too bad for him. His wheat or fish was no different than his neighbors, and his product demanded no premium over his neighbors. Likewise the Northern laborer. He couldn't demand any more for his work than the guy down the street, regardless of his consumer habits. So DiLorenzo's claim that tariffs his exporters alone makes no sense.
DiLorenzo also ignores the fact that the same tariffs he condemns so loudly also protected those southern exporters. There were tariffs on tobacco products, raw cotton, naval stores and the like. All southern exports. But I guess those were OK, huh?
You argue like a Democrat. Try decaf, and/or clue.
Hardly that, Pea.
Well, hell, Pearidge. First you jump on me and deny that anyone ever claimed that the south paid 75% of all tariff and then you go and make the same bullshit claim. So which is it?
I'll ask again, how can any producer of any highly fungible item pass on his costs in the form of higher prices? Regardless of whether you are a cotton exporter or a wheat farmer, you are at the mercy of the market and the price that you can command is always a function of supply and demand and not your own costs. So your claim that the tariff somehow fell solely on the backs of southern exporters is ridiculous. It fell equally on those who produced any fungible product, be it cotton or wheat or fish or whatever, and who consumed any imported item that was protected by a tariff. (And those protected items, by the way, included raw cotton, tobacco products, sugar, naval stores, and other items produced in the south.) So the indirect costs of the tariff that you claim fell solely on the south would seem to have been a nationwide problem and not a local issue. And your's and Kettell's claim that the south paid 75% of the tariff doesn't add up.
No, I'll concede the last post to you. There isn't any hope of any future post from you making sense so I'll let it drop. Game, set, match to DorisKearnsDickwad.
Your diatribe:
"Oh wow, I'm thrilled. I'm sure my ggggrandfather that was killed in battle; and his wife that was left to raise 3 children alone; and all the other men and women that were killed in battle or murdered; and the women and children that were raped; and the southerners that starved thanks to the union army destroying their crops and slaughtering their livestock; and those left homeless when towns, convents and churches were leveled by union armies; and the preachers forced to pray for Lincoln; and all those that had their gold, silver, money, jewels and other valuable property stolen by union soldiers; and those that lost their land after the war - I'm sure they will all be forever warmed and encouraged by you words. I'm sure that they all are comforted by your concern, and gladly welcome the sacrifices made in the effort to preserve a union they wanted no part of."
Go cry me a river Oh Sussanah.
If you don't like this country, buh bye.
Possibly your misplaced anger should be placed on the Southern aristocracy and just maybe the question was why were average Southern boys fighting for those with plantations and slaves.
We already tried that - the yankees fought to supress our right "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".
We will never forget.
Nah, you already know the answer. Domestic exporters feel the effect of the tariff. Manufacturers are protected by the tariffs - they're not exporting their products to foreign countries.
You understand it perfectly.
Bravo Sierra. That's like saying you're fighting for John F'n Kerry's mansions and yatchs.
Producers in perfectly competitive industries are generally price takers, non-seq. What you think yourself to have discovered is nothing new to the economist.
The Illinois farmer or the New Hampshire fisherman was no more able to pass along increases in his costs due to tariffs in the local markets than was the southern cotton exporter.
In the cases where such markets were perfectly competitive, yes. In fact one of the strongest anti-tariff warriors of the 1861 senate, Robert M.T. Hunter of Virginia, gave a lengthy speech on the eve of secession detailing how the Morrill act would also hurt the north's exporters in addition to his own region. That's the nature of protective tariffs - very little good ever comes from them for the entire nation.
While that observation remains true and consistent throughout our history, it does not address the greater intricacies at hand. We know that tariffs harm the nation in general, but does it harm some persons in that nation more than others? The answer is yes. It harms, as has been repeatedly noted, price takers more than those who can pass on their burdens. So where are the price takers then? Well, as a rule of thumb they are normally found in agricultural industries, export industries, and especially in agriculture-for-export industries. So if you are from one of those industries, north or south, chances are you're gonna suffer more than the steel industry robber barons who are among the select few that actually benefit from protection, all at a greater harm to a greater number of others of course. But let's take 1860 to see where the price takers were.
First, we know that almost the entirity of the southern economy was in agriculture and the majority of that in agriculture for export. Thus, using our rule of thumb, they were virtually all in price taker industries. We also know that the south had a disproportionately large advantage over the north in exports for the nation as a whole - some three fourths of them came from the south compared to barely a quarter from the north. While it remains true that price takers existed in the north as well, they were substantially fewer and of substantially less importance to the national economy than their counterparts in the south. Northern fisheries did not make up 75% or 60% or even half of the yankee economy nor even a fifth of the nation's exports - they were but a small fraction. Compare that to a region where virtually all industries are agricultural price takers and one product alone - cotton - makes up somewhere in the two thirds range of the entire nation's exports. So, holding that tariffs hurt ALL price takers north and south, it STILL remains the overwhelming majority of price-taking production in 1860's was southern. From that we arrive at the inescapable reality of the Morrill tariff - it would have disproportionately harmed the southern economy.
Likewise the Northern laborer. He couldn't demand any more for his work than the guy down the street, regardless of his consumer habits.
Actually he did during the continuous emergence of trade unions in the mid to late 19th century.
So DiLorenzo's claim that tariffs his exporters alone makes no sense.
That conclusion does not follow from anything you stated, thus making it a non-sequitur.
DiLorenzo also ignores the fact that the same tariffs he condemns so loudly also protected those southern exporters. There were tariffs on tobacco products, raw cotton, naval stores and the like.
It's hard not to ignore what is statistically negligible and largely nonexistant despite your unsourced claims otherwise. The only substantial protective tariff on a southern good was sugar, and it was geographically isolated and tiny in scope compared to northern products like steel.
All southern exports. But I guess those were OK, huh?
If what you claim were true, and it is not, common sense dictates that we should have seen the southerners jumping on the Morrill bandwagon and spending the 1860's clamoring for protection of their own like their northern counterparts. They did not and the overwhelming majority of their speeches, votes, and literature on the subject advocates free trade of the strongest forms known in the day. Your Lincolnomics renderings are as pitiful as ever, non-seq, yet you seemingly cannot resist making a continuous fool of yourself on this issue. Strange and sad.
Producers in perfectly competitive industries are generally price takers, non-seq. What you think yourself to have discovered is nothing new to the economist.
But apparently new to DiLusional. He seems to believe, as you do, that only exporters were price takers. Yet anyone who produces agricultural products, export or otherwise because neither has control over their prices.
First, we know that almost the entirity of the southern economy was in agriculture and the majority of that in agriculture for export. Thus, using our rule of thumb, they were virtually all in price taker industries.
Look at the North and you would find that the majority of the population was also in agriculture, and therefore were price takers as well. So the tariff would fall on them to the same extent that it fell on the southern planters. They paid the same premium on goods protected by tariff as the southern planter did. They were at the mercy of the markets. There were more of them than there were planters down south so it stands to reason that a considerable percentage of the indirect cost of the tariff would be borne by Northern farmers.
So, holding that tariffs hurt ALL price takers north and south, it STILL remains the overwhelming majority of price-taking production in 1860's was southern.
How does it remain that way? The large part of all exports originated in the south but you make it sound like the entire economy was made up of the cotton crop. What percentage of the GNP was produced by Northern farmers, industries not protected by tariffs and yes, Northern fishermen? One would think that, considering the disparity in population alone, the bulk of the economic output of all type was produced in the North. And that would include agricultural output, the price-taking kind of industry.
It's hard not to ignore what is statistically negligible and largely nonexistant despite your unsourced claims otherwise.
Unsourced claims? I thought that you had actually read the legislation for the 'Morrill Tariff'. Guess I was wrong.
Sounds a bit like the origins of the first American Revolution
You have an odd way of responding to your defeat in argument, non-seq. Evasion and namecalling - your two favorite tools. I suppose that next you'll call me a "big meanie" and, when that doesn't work, perhaps a "poo poo head"
But apparently new to DiLusional. He seems to believe, as you do, that only exporters were price takers.
Quote me exactly where either he or I said anything of the sort or denied that others were not price takers. Seeing as you cannot, I will take your silence as a concession of your erronious claim.
Look at the North and you would find that the majority of the population was also in agriculture, and therefore were price takers as well.
That's debatable and also depends on what you define as "north." While true of perhaps Iowa, it certainly was not true of New York City where industry outnumbered agriculture severely. It also remains true that industry comprised a larger ammount of the northern economy than agriculture.
So the tariff would fall on them to the same extent that it fell on the southern planters.
A similar extent, at least. But that begs the next question: so what's your point? That tariffs hurt price takers? Yes, but we already knew that.
They paid the same premium on goods protected by tariff as the southern planter did.
A similar premium, at least. But that begs the next question: so what's your point? That tariffs hurt price takers? Yes, but we already knew that.
They were at the mercy of the markets.
A similar mercy, at least. But that begs the next question: so what's your point? That tariffs hurt price takers? Yes, but we already knew that.
There were more of them than there were planters down south
Not in relation to their comparitive economies. The southern economy was over half cotton, probably around 90% agricultural, and almost entirely export. That means they were virtually all price takers. The majority of the northern economy, by contrast, was NOT a price taker economy (though it did have a sizable minority segment of agricultural price takers).
so it stands to reason that a considerable percentage of the indirect cost of the tariff would be borne by Northern farmers.
Some tariff incidence, at least. But that begs the next question: so what's your point? That tariffs hurt price takers? Yes, but we already knew that.
How does it remain that way?
Because the southern economy was virtually ALL composed of price-takers and the northern economy was not.
The large part of all exports originated in the south but you make it sound like the entire economy was made up of the cotton crop.
Well, the majority of the southern economy in any given year was cotton. Tobacco made up the next large segment. Though composed they are not the "entirity," they are a strong majority.
What percentage of the GNP was produced by Northern farmers, industries not protected by tariffs and yes, Northern fishermen
Most likely the economic data required to calculate those requests are either not existant or not reliable enough to produce anything beyond an extremely rough estimate. We do know, however, some generally reliable export figures and they show that cotton is by far the largest US commodity, exceeding the entire export production of the north by twofold in some years. As for your beloved fisheries, you should also note that they were one of the earliest US recipients of protection and subsidy dating back to the immediate post 1812 war period and thus cannot be included accurately among the "price takers" in the same sense as agriculture.
One would think that, considering the disparity in population alone, the bulk of the economic output of all type was produced in the North. And that would include agricultural output, the price-taking kind of industry.
...yet then we look at the figures and see conclusively that on the international markets, the south outproduced the north in exports by over three to one. Go figure.
I thought that you had actually read the legislation for the 'Morrill Tariff'.
So the south was supposed to be happy with the tariff they unanimously opposed because it pretended to throw them a bone that they did not want and did not ask for? Your reasoning is as convoluted as ever, non-seq.
(Enterprise, Alabama-AP) -- In stories about the May 31st death and June 12th burial of Civil War widow Alberta Martin, The Associated Press erroneously described her as being the last widow of a Confederate or Union veteran of the war.
After Martin's death, 89-year-old Maudie Celia Hopkins of Lexa, Arkansas, made public that she was married in 1934 to a Confederate veteran who died in 1937.
Her claim is recognized by the United Daughters of the Confederacy. And it's supported by Confederate historians, who researched Hopkins' story through the U-D-C Research Library in Richmond, Virginia, Arkansas pension records and data from the U-S Census Bureau.
Susan Railsback, president of the Arkansas Division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, says the organization has sufficient proof to support Hopkins' claim, and that there may be others like her.
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