How Libertarians Ought To Think About The U.S. Civil War

Reason Papers ^ | Spring 2006 | TIMOTHY SANDEFUR

[Delacon]

How Libertarians Ought To Think About The U.S. Civil War

By Timothy Sandefur

[Reason Papers vol. 28, pp. 61-83, Spring 2006]

I. Introduction

For decades, outspoken libertarians have seen the Civil War not only as a

historical calamity, but as a political calamity as well. According to many libertarians,

the Union victory in the Civil War, and the presidency of Abraham Lincoln in general,

represented a betrayal of American Constitution and of the fundamental principles of

American political philosophy.

This interpretation rests on two major arguments as well as a variety of more

minor concerns. The more minor concerns include specific critiques of the policies of the

Lincoln Administration, or of the conduct of the War by Union forces. For example,

many libertarians condemn the Union for instituting a military draft, or for suspending

the writ of habeas corpus. There are many of these specific criticisms, which deserve

detailed discussion which cannot be provided here.1 Suffice to say that some of these

criticisms are well-founded; indeed, libertarians deplore war precisely because it tends to

give rise to such evils.

Understanding the Civil War as a matter of political philosophy, however,

requires a systematic, two-step analysis: first, does a state have the legal authority under

the United States Constitution, to secede unilaterally? If the answer to this question is

yes, then the analysis is at an end: if states have the right to secede, the Union was in the

wrong to put down the Confederacy. If, however, the answer is no, then we must proceed

to a second step: even illegal acts, like the American Revolution, are justified by the right

1 For example, it ought to be noted that the Confederacy instituted a military draft as well, and did so before

the Union did. J. McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom (New York: Ballantine, 1988) p. 427.

of revolution, so even if the Constitution does prohibit secession, the people of the

southern states had the right to rebel against the Union, if their act was a legitimate act of

revolution. It is essential to keep in mind the distinction between secession and

revolution. As Lincoln wrote, “It might seem, at first thought, to be of little difference

whether the present movement at the South be called ‘secession’ or ‘rebellion.’ The

movers, however, well understand the [*62] difference.”2 Was, then, the Confederate

rebellion a legitimate act of revolution?

The prevailing libertarian answers to these questions are, first, that states have the

constitutional right to secede, and that Abraham Lincoln violated the Constitution by

leading the nation into war against the seceding states. This argument is based on the

“compact theory” of the Constitution. Second, the prevailing argument holds that the

rebellion represented a legitimate act of revolution. This argument is based on the

concept of “self-determination.”3 These premises, however, are invalid, as are the

prevailing libertarian conclusions. In fact, states have no constitutional authority to

secede from the union unilaterally; nor were southern states engaged in a legitimate act of

revolution, because they initiated force, rather than acting in defense of individual rights.

II. Do States Have The Legal Right to Secede?

A. Three Interpretations of Union

2 R. Basler, ed., Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln 8 vols. (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press,

1953) 4:432.

3 See, e.g., J. Livingston, “A Moral Accounting of The Union And The Confederacy.” Journal of

Libertarian Studies. 16:2 pp. 57-101 (2002).

There are at least three ways of looking at the nature of the federal union under

the Constitution. First, the “compact theory” of the Constitution holds that it is much like

a treaty between essentially independent states. This theory found its first major

expression in the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions, drafted by Thomas Jefferson and

James Madison, respectively, as a protest to the Alien and Sedition laws in 1798.4 In the

1830s, South Carolina Senator John C. Calhoun based his theory of nullification on these

resolutions—despite Madison’s repudiation of nullification—and thereby laid the

intellectual foundation for secession thirty years later.5 According to the compact theory,

each state is a sovereign entity which is bound to the other states only by a compact

which it may break whenever the compact imposes unbearable burdens on the state—just

as a country may decide to break a treaty. Under the compact theory, the federal union

contains no inherent element of sovereignty—it is a league of sovereign states. In

Calhoun’s view, [*63] the Constitution “is the government of States united in a political

union, in contradistinction to a government of individuals socially united…the

government of a community of States, and not the government of a single State or

nation.”6

Opposed to the compact theory are two theories that we may call the “weak

union” and the “strong union” views. According to these views, the federal Constitution

is not a treaty, but a law, and the federal union contains at least some element of

4 D. Mayer, The Constitutional Thought of Thomas Jefferson. (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia,

1994) p. 201.

5 D. McCoy, The Last of The Fathers: James Madison And The Republican Legacy (New York: Cambridge

University Press, 1989) pp. 132-62; L. Banning, The Sacred Fire of Liberty. (Ithaca: Cornell University

Press, 1995) pp. 387-95.

6 C. Post, ed., A Disquisition on Government And Selections from The Discourses by John C. Calhoun.

(Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1953) p. 86.

sovereignty; the federal union is not seen as a league of sovereigns, but as the government

of a single State or nation.

The strong-union view, most famously espoused by Daniel Webster, and later

adopted by Abraham Lincoln, Charles Sumner, and even Lysander Spooner,7 the union of

states predates the Constitution itself: it was created by the Declaration of Independence,

and the sovereignty of the states was itself a consequence or product of national

sovereignty. This view has much to commend it; the Declaration of Independence, for

instance, was issued in the name of the “thirteen united States of America,” who, as “one

people” were breaking their former political bonds, and declaring that “these united

colonies are free and independent states.” It then goes on to describe what “free and

independent states may of right do”—things like carrying on foreign policy—none of

which were actually done by the states. In fact, at the 1787 Philadelphia Convention,

Delegate Rufus King explained that

The states were not “sovereigns” in the sense contended for by some.

They did not possess the peculiar features of sovereignty,—they could not

make war, nor peace, nor alliances, nor treaties. Considering them as

political beings, they were dumb, for they could not speak to any foreign

sovereign whatever. They were deaf, for they could not hear any

propositions from such sovereign. They had not even the organs or

faculties of defence or offence, for they could not of themselves raise

troops, or equip vessels, for war.... If the states, therefore, retained some

portion of their sovereignty [after declaring independence], they had

certainly divested themselves of essential portions of it.8

7 L. Spooner, The Unconstitutionality of Slavery (Boston: Bela Marsh, 1860) pp. 56, 78-79.

8 J. Elliott, ed., Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution. 5

vols. (Washington: Elliott, 1836) 5:212-213. This argument formed a central point in Justice Sutherland’s

interpretation of federal foreign policy power in United States v. Curtiss-Wright Export Corp., 299 U.S.

304 (1936). See J. Eastman and H. V. Jaffa, “Understanding Justice Sutherland As He Understood

Himself,” University of Chicago Law Review 63:1347. 1352 n. 17 (1996).

[*64] James Wilson (a signer of the Declaration) agreed, saying that he “could not

admit the doctrine that when the colonies became independent of Great Britain, they

became independent also of each other. He read the Declaration of Independence,

observing thereon, that the United Colonies were declared free and independent states,

and inferring, that they were independent, not individually, but unitedly, and that they

were confederated, as they were independent states.”9 Consequently, the Constitution of

1787 did not purport to create the union, only to make it “more perfect.” Jefferson and

Madison called the Declaration of Independence “the fundamental act of union of these

States,”10 and even at the South Carolina Ratification Convention, when one delegate

claimed that “[t]he [1783] treaty of peace expressly agreed to acknowledge us as free,

sovereign, and independent states...[b]ut this new Constitution at once swept those

privileges away, being sovereign over all,” Charles Cotesworth Pinckney answered that

“[t]he separate independence and individual sovereignty of the several states were never

thought of by the enlightened band of patriots who framed this Declaration; the several

states are not even mentioned by name in any part of it,—as if it was intended to impress

this maxim on America, that our freedom and independence arose from our union, and

that without it we could neither be free nor independent.”11

There are ambiguities, however, which undermine the strong union view. Section

two of the Articles of Confederation, for example, did acknowledge the separate

sovereignty of the American states: “Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and

independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this

Confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.” This

9 Elliott (1836) 5:213.

10 M. Peterson, ed., Jefferson: Writings (New York: Library of America, 1984) p. 479.

11 Elliott (1836) 4:287, 301.

seems inconsistent with the view that the union was created by the Declaration.

And the fact that the Continental Congress carried out foreign policy only shows that the

federative power,12 which is only part of the national [*65] sovereignty, was vested in the

national government. The nature of federal sovereignty at the time of the American

founding was at least ambiguous13—surely one reason that the union needed to be made

more perfect eleven years later.

The “weak-union” view was most famously espoused by James Madison.

According to it, the Articles of Confederation did indeed acknowledge the separate

sovereignty of the American states—and that was exactly the problem. Alexander

Hamilton put it well in a sentence which is the theme of the entire Federalist: “The great

and radical vice in the construction of the existing Confederation is in the principle of

LEGISLATION for STATES or GOVERNMENTS, in their CORPORATE or

COLLECTIVE CAPACITIES, and as contradistinguished from the INDIVIDUALS of

which they consist.”14 The new Constitution would solve this problem by creating a new

kind of government—one of “divided sovereignty,” partly national and partly federal, in

which all of the people of America would vest the national government with a part—

limited and enumerated—of their sovereignty. The national sovereignty would therefore

be totally separate from the sovereignty of the states. This is why Madison insisted that

the Constitution be ratified, not by state legislatures, but by special ratification

conventions: to make clear that the states were not parties to the Constitution—thus it

12 In his Second Treatise, Locke explains that the “federative power” is that part of the executive power

which deals with foreign relations. P. Laslett, ed., John Locke’s Two Treatises of Government (Oxford:

Oxford University Press, rev ed. 1963) pp. 409-412.

13 Justice Chase pointed out some ambiguities in his opinion in Ware v. Hylton, 3 U.S. (3 Dall.) 199, 224-

225, 231-232 (1796).

14 C. Rossiter, ed., The Federalist (New York: Signet, 1961) p. 108; see also J. Rakove, ed., Madison:

Writings (New York: Library of America, 1999) p. 69.

would “be then a government established by the thirteen States of America, not through

the intervention of the Legislatures, but by the people at large...[a] distinction...[which] is

very material.”15 Thus, contrary to the strong-union view, the sovereignty of the states

did not depend on the creation of the federal authority; they were two wholly independent

systems, in which the federal power was supreme within its limited sphere—and

nonexistent outside of that sphere. One might analogize divided sovereignty to a

homeowner who receives separate bills from the electric company and the gas company.

An American citizen is separately a citizen of the state and of the federal union, and

neither of these types of citizenship is superior to or inferior to the other.

[*66] Under either the weak-union view or the strong-union view, states have no

unilateral power to secede. Thus, in addressing whether the Confederacy had the

constitutional authority to secede, it is unnecessary to resolve the question of whether the

union was created by the Declaration of Independence or not, because ratification

resolved the fundamental point: the federal union was an agreement between the people,

not the states. The Constitution’s fundamental premise of divided sovereignty—

respected by both the weak-union and strong-union views, means that the people of

America are bound together as one people for certain purposes—and therefore a state

may not unilaterally secede.

B. What Divided Sovereignty Means16

15 B. Bailyn, ed., Debate On The Constitution (New York: Library of America, 1993) 2:619.

16 Obviously, in the following, I refer only to the Constitution as it existed before the Fourteenth

Amendment, which changed the nature of state and federal sovereignty.

Because the sovereignty of a state is distinct from that of the union, a state can no

more absolve its people of their allegiance to the federal government than the gas

company can absolve a customer from paying her electric bill. The people, who adopted

the Constitution, may decide to allow the people of a state to leave the union—through

Congressional action (according to the weak-union view), or by adopting a Constitutional

Amendment (according to the strong-union view). But unilateral secession is

unconstitutional.

“In the compound republic of America,” said Madison, “the power surrendered by

the people is first divided between two distinct governments....”17 But “[t]he main

[fallacy] of nullification,” he later explained,

is the assumption that sovereignty is a unit, at once indivisible and

unalienable; that the states therefore individually retain it entire as they

originally held it, and, consequently, that no portion of it can belong to the

U.S.... [W]here does the sovereignty which makes such a Constitution

reside[?] It resides not in a single state but in the people of each of the

several states, uniting with those of the others in the express & solemn

compact which forms the Constitution. To the extent of that compact or

Constitution, therefore, the people of the several States must be a

sovereign as they are a united people.... That a sovereignty should have

even been denied to the States in their united character, may well excite

wonder, when it is recollected that the Constitution which now unites

them, was announced by the convention which formed it, as dividing

sovereignty between the Union & the States; that it was presented under

that view, by contemporary expositions recommending it to the ratifying

[*66] authorities; that it has proved to have been so understood by the

language which has been applied to it constantly….18

Divided sovereignty (also called “dual sovereignty”), was the principal innovation

of the Constitution. While the strong-union view saw ratification as simply an

overhauling of the union, to the weak-union view, ratification reformed the sovereignty

17 Rossiter (1961) p. 323.

18 M. Meyers, ed., The Mind of The Founder: Sources of the Political Thought of James Madison (Hanover:

University Press of New England, rev. ed. 1981) pp. 436-38.

of the states as well as of the federal government. But according to both views, federal

sovereignty is independent of the sovereignty of the states.

Even Anti-Federalists acknowledged that ratifying the Constitution meant

redefining American sovereignty. “Cincinnatus,” for instance, complained that “[s]uch is

the anxiety manifested by the framers of the proposed constitution, for the utter extinction

of the state sovereignties, that they were not content with taking from them every

attribute of sovereignty, but would not leave them even the name.—Therefore, in the very

commencement they prescribe this remarkable declaration—We the People of the United

States.”19 The “Federal Farmer” wrote that “when the people [of each state] shall adopt

the proposed…it will be adopted not by the people of New Hampshire, Massachusetts,

&c., but by the people of the United States….”20 Robert Yates opposed ratification of the

Constitution precisely on these grounds: he admitted that “if it is ratified, [it] will not be a

compact entered into by the States, in their corporate capacities, but an agreement of the

people of the United States as one great body politic.... It is to be observed, it is not a

union of states or bodies corporate; had this been the case the existence of the state

governments might have been secured. But it is a union of the people of the United

States considered as one body, who are to ratify this constitution, if it is adopted.”21

Indeed, at the Virginia Ratification Convention, Patrick Henry challenged James Madison

on this point: “Who authorized [the Constitutional Convention] to speak the language of

We the people, instead of We, the States? States are the characteristics, and the soul of a

confederation.”22 Madison replied that the authority of the Articles of [*67]

19 Bailyn (1993), 1:118-119.

20 Bailyn (1993) 1: 275

21 P. Kurland and R. Lerner, eds., The Founders’ Constitution (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund 1987) 4:237.

22 Bailyn (1993) 2:596-597.

Confederation had been “derived from the dependent derivative authority of the

legislatures of the states; whereas this [Constitution] is derived from the superior power

of the people.”23 The Constitution did not consolidate the states entirely, but “[s]hould 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.”24

Opponents of the Constitution, therefore, were well aware that the Constitution

would create, not a league of essentially independent sovereignties, but a new nation,

retaining its own sovereignty for certain limited purposes. The Federalists explicitly

defended this fact: for most purposes, they explained, the people of the states would find

their state citizenship unchanged, but for a specified list of other purposes, the whole

people of America would now agree, as a single political unit, to invest the union with

sovereignty directly, not through any intermediary step of state authorities. The federal

and the state sovereignty travel, as it were, on parallel rails: state sovereignty connecting

the sovereignty of the people of a state to their state capitol; federal sovereignty joining

all the people through its national network, to arrive at Washington, D.C. James Wilson,

signer of both the Constitution and the Declaration, told the Pennsylvania Ratification

Convention that

the sovereignty resides in the people, they have not parted with it; they

have only dispensed such portions of power as were conceived necessary

for the public welfare…. In order to recognize this leading principle, the

proposed system sets out with a declaration, that its existence depends

upon the supreme authority of the people alone…. When the principle is

once settled, that the people are the source of authority, the consequence

23 Bailyn (1993) 2:619.

24 Id.

is, that they may take from the subordinate governments with which they

have hitherto trusted them, and place those powers in the general

government, if it is thought that they will be productive of more good…. I

have no idea, that a safe system of power, in the government, sufficient to

manage the general interest of the United States, could be drawn from any

other source, or rested in any other authority than that of the people at

large, and I consider this authority as the rock on which this structure will

stand.25

[*68] So while the states would, for the most part, retain their sovereignty,

ratification meant that the whole People of the United States would now agree to vest

their inchoate power to engage in, for example, foreign policy, exclusively in the federal

government, which would be supreme for the limited, enumerated purposes of the federal

union; otherwise, wrote Hamilton, the Constitution would “be a mere treaty, dependent

on the good faith of the parties, and not a government, which is only another word for

POLITICAL POWER AND SUPREMACY.”26 For Hamilton, the reason for a new

Constitution was precisely to end the notion that the union was a league of sovereigns:

one of the “infirmities” of the Articles of Confederation, he wrote, was

that it never had a ratification by the PEOPLE. Resting on no better

foundation than the consent of the several legislatures, it has been exposed

to frequent and intricate questions concerning the validity of its powers,

and has, in some instances, given birth to the enormous doctrine of a right

of legislative repeal. Owing its ratification to the law of a State, it has been

contended that the same authority might repeal the law by which it was

ratified. However gross a heresy it may be to maintain that a party to a

compact has a right to revoke that compact, the doctrine itself has had

respectable advocates. The possibility of a question of this nature proves

the necessity of laying the foundations of our national government deeper

than in the mere sanction of delegated authority. The fabric of American

empire ought to rest on the solid basis of THE CONSENT OF THE

PEOPLE. The streams of national power ought to flow immediately from

that pure, original fountain of all legitimate authority.27

25 Bailyn (1993) 1:820-21.

26 Rossiter (1961) 204.

27 Rossiter (1961) 152.

One argument against the principle of divided sovereignty is that the Constitution was

adopted by the members of distinct states, rather than by a national referendum. But

Chief Justice John Marshall (who had been a delegate to the Virginia Ratification

Convention) answered that in McColloch v. Maryland:

[The Constitution] was submitted to the people. They acted upon it in the

only manner in which they can act safely, effectively, and wisely, on such

a subject, by assembling in Convention. It is true, they assembled in their

several States—and where else should they have [*69] assembled? No

political dreamer was ever wild enough to think of breaking down the

lines which separate the States, and of compounding the American people

into one common mass. Of consequence, when they act, they act in their

States. But the measures they adopt do not, on that account, cease to be the

measures of the people themselves, or become the measures of the State

governments.28

This was not only the opinion of High Federalists like Marshall. As Madison explained

(long after his break with the Federalists), the Constitution was formed

by the people in each of the States, acting in their highest sovereign

capacity.... Being thus derived from the same source as the Constitutions

of the States, it...is as much a Constitution, in the strict sense of the term,

within its prescribed sphere, as the Constitutions of the States are within

their respective spheres; but with this obvious & essential difference, that

being a compact among the States in their highest sovereign capacity, and

constituting the people thereof one people for certain purposes, it cannot

be altered or annulled at the will of the States individually, as the

Constitution of a State may be at its individual will.29

28 17 U.S. (4 Wheat.) 316, 403 (1819). See also Chisolm v. Georgia, 2 U.S. (2 Dall.) 419, 435 (1793) (“The

powers of the general Government…do for the most part (if not wholly) affect individuals, and not States:

They require no aid from any State authority. This is the great leading distinction between the old articles

of confederation, and the present constitution”); id. at 470 (Jay, C.J.) (“the people, in their collective and

national capacity, established the present Constitution”); Respublica v. Corbbet, 3 U.S. (3 Dall.) 467

(1798); Hylton v. United States, 3 U.S. (3 Dall.) 171, 178 (1796) (per Paterson, J.,); id. at 181 (per Iredell,

J.); Ware v. Hylton, 3 U.S. (3 Dall.) 199, 236 (1796) (per Chase, J.); Banks v. Greenleaf, 10 Va. 271, 277-

78 (1799) (“the general government derives its existence and power from the people, and not from the

states, yet each state government derives its powers from the people of that particular state. Their forms of

government are different, being derived from different sources; and their laws are different.”)

29 Rakove (1999), p. 843.

These sources reveal how well understood was the central fact that the Constitution was a

government of the whole people of the United States, not a league or treaty of states in

their corporate capacities, as the compact theory would have it. Contrary to Calhoun’s

later claim that “the States, when they formed and ratified the Constitution, were distinct,

independent, and [*70] sovereign communities,”30 the reality is that, in Marshall’s words,

federal sovereignty

proceeds directly from the people; is ‘ordained and established’ in the

name of the people.... It required not the affirmance, and could not be

negatived, by the State governments. The constitution, when thus adopted,

was of complete obligation, and bound the State sovereignties.... The

government of the Union, then…is, emphatically, and truly, a government

of the people. In form and in substance it emanates from them. Its powers

are granted by them, and are to be exercised directly on them, and for their

benefit.... [T]he government of the Union, though limited in its powers, is

supreme within its sphere of action.31

As Justice Anthony Kennedy recently put it, “The Framers split the atom of sovereignty.

It was the genius of their idea that our citizens would have two political capacities, one

state and one federal, each protected from incursion by the other…with its own direct

relationship, its own privity, its own set of mutual rights and obligations to the people

who sustain it and are governed by it.... [T]he National Government, the mark of its

legitimacy, is that it owes its existence to the act of the whole people who created it.”32

The federal government is directly vested with sovereignty of the whole People of the

United States. Secession is not, therefore, like a person who chooses to cancel his

membership in a club—because the states are not in the “club” to begin with. Only “We

the People” are members of the federal club, and only the “people” which created it can

30 Post (1953) p. 91.

31 M’Colloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. (4 Wheat.) 316, 403-405 (1819).

32 U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton, 514 U.S. 779, 838-39 (1995).

change it, by altering the contours of that “people” through amendment, or a new

Constitutional Convention. So, while the whole people may allow a state out of the

union, or may even dissolve the Constitution entirely, a state cannot claim on its own the

authority to withdraw from the union. Lincoln put it with dry understatement when he

noted that advocates of secession were “not partial to that power which made the

Constitution, and speaks from the preamble, calling itself ‘We, the People.’”33

These sources reveal that in 1787, both the federalists and anti-federalists

recognized that the United States Constitution was just that—a constitution [*71] for a

nation, not a league of sovereign states. And, if these sources are not enough, as Akhil

Reed Amar points out, “no major proponent of the Constitution sought to win over states’

rightists by conceding that states could unilaterally nullify or secede in the event of

perceived national abuses. The Federalists’ silence is especially impressive because such

a concession might have dramatically improved the document’s ratification prospects in

several states.”34 “[I]f a more explicit guard against misconstruction was not provided,”

wrote Madison in 1831, “it is explained…by the entire absence of apprehension that it

could be necessary.”35

Some of those who defend the constitutionality of secession claim that it was

foreseen, and that several states ratified the constitution did so with explicit reservations

of the right to secede.36 This claim, however, is seriously exaggerated. The only state

which passed such a “reservation” while ratifying, and which later seceded, was Virginia.

That state’s “reservation” read: “The powers granted under the Constitution being

33 Basler (1953) 4:437.

34 A. Amar, “Of Sovereignty and Federalism,” Yale Law Journal 96:1425, 1462 n.162.

35 Rakove (1999) p. 853.

36 T. DiLorezno, The Real Lincoln : A New Look at Abraham Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary

War (Roseville: Prima Publishing, 2002) p. 91.

derived from the People of the United States may be resumed by them whenever the same

shall be perverted to their injury or oppression.”37 These phrases nowhere mention any

right to unilateral secession, nor to any unconditional right to revolt for any reason the

state sees fit. Instead, the “reservation” is simply a restatement of the right to revolution,

which we will consider below. Moreover, it is made in the name, not of the people of

Virginia, but of “the People of the United States,” and it makes the unremarkable

assertion that they have the right to change their government.

It is also frequently argued that another set of Resolutions, the Virginia and

Kentucky Resolutions, reveal the true nature of the Constitution as a league of sovereign

states, and that Madison’s later repudiation of the compact theory was an instance of

intellectual dishonesty. The facts, as usual, are more complicated. Jefferson, whose

Kentucky Resolutions unequivocally endorsed the compact theory, sent a draft to

Madison for his review. Madison was somewhat startled by Jefferson’s argument, and he

replied, “Have you ever considered thoroughly the distinction between the power of the

State, & that of the Legislature, on questions relating to the federal pact[?] On the

supposition that the former is clearly the ultimate Judge of infractions, it does [*72] not

follow that the latter is the legitimate organ especially as a convention was the organ by

which the Compact was made.”38 Madison’s Virginia Resolutions were somewhat more

guarded, and, he insisted, never endorsed the compact theory of the Constitution.

Decades later, writing furiously to oppose Calhoun’s doctrine of nullification, Madison

explained, just as he had at the Philadelphia and Richmond conventions, that the

37 Emphasis added.

38 Rakove (1999) p. 392.

Constitution was binding on the people, not on the states, and the states had no right to

nullify the laws:

[T]he characteristic peculiarities of the Constitution are 1. The mode of its

formation, 2. The division of the supreme powers of Govt between the

States in their united capacity and the States in their individual capacities.

1. It was formed, not by the Governments of the component States, as the

Federal Govt. for which it was substituted [i.e., the Articles of

Confederation] was formed; nor was it formed by a majority of the people

of the U.S. as a single community in the manner of a consolidated

Government. It was formed by the States—that is by the people in each of

the States, acting in their highest sovereign capacity; and formed,

consequently, by the same authority which formed the State Constitutions.

Being thus derived from the same source as the Constitutions of the States,

it has within each State, the same authority as the Constitution of the State,

and is as much a Constitution, in the strict sense of the term, within its

prescribed sphere, as the Constitutions of the States are within their

respective spheres, but with this obvious & essential difference, that being

a compact among the States in their highest sovereign capacity, and

constituting the people thereof one people for certain purposes, it cannot

be altered or annulled at the will of the States individually, as the

Constitution of a State may be at its individual will.39

In any case, what Jefferson and Madison wrote in 1798, in a series of resolutions

adopted by two state legislatures, cannot change the nature of the federal Constitution as

adopted in 1787: it is a binding government of the whole people of the United States. No

state may unilaterally leave the union.

C. Other Constitutional Provisions Barring Unilateral Secession

We have seen that the nature of federal sovereignty under the Constitution makes

unilateral secession illegal. Since the Constitution is a [*73] law binding the People, and

39 Rakove (1999) pp. 842-843.

not a league of states, states have no authority to intervene between the people and the

national government. If the people of a state wish to leave the union, they may not do so

unilaterally, but must obtain the agreement of their fellow citizens—or they must rebel in

a legitimate act of revolution.

Several other clauses of the Constitution are consistent with this view, and would

be inconsistent with any interpretation allowing a state to leave the union unilaterally.

The Constitution guarantees to every state a republican form of government (Art. IV § 4),

prohibits states from entering into any compact with other states without Congressional

permission (Art. I § 10), guarantees the privileges and immunities of citizens when they

travel interstate (Art. IV §2), prohibits states from entering into any “Treaty, Alliance, or

Confederation,” even with Congressional approval (Art. I § 10), preserves every state’s

right to two senators (Art. V), is the supreme law of the land (Art. VI § 2), and requires

state officeholders to take an oath to support the Constitution of the United States (Art.

VI § 3). These clauses are inconsistent with the theory that secession is a constitutional

prerogative of state government. Consider, for example, the republican guarantee clause:

if a state could unilaterally secede, then any group of criminals might declare themselves

the “rightful” government of a state, issue a proclamation of secession—and then leave

the federal government unable to enforce the guarantee. Likewise, if states could leave

the union at any time, it would make little sense to require state officials to take an oath

to support the United States Constitution, since their allegiance to the federal union

would depend wholly on whether their state decided to remain in the union or not.

One common argument is that the Tenth Amendment reserves to the states the

power to secede from the union. But this claim begs the question, in two ways. The

Amendment says that “[t]he 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.”40 First, since the Constitution does prohibit secession, that power cannot

be reserved to the states. And, second, the Amendment refers explicitly to “the people.”

To what “people” does this refer? Not to the people of each state separately, but to a

single people: that is, “We the People” who ratified the Constitution.41 [*74] Under the

compact theory, this clause would be surplusage, since no mere league of sovereigns has

the authority to reserve nondelegated powers directly to the people of separate

sovereignties, any more than the United Nations can “reserve” any rights to the people of

the United States.

III. Was The South Engaged In Revolution?

The fact that states have no Constitutional right to unilaterally secede does not

end the inquiry, because people retain the right of revolution regardless. If the

Confederacy represented a legitimate act of revolution, then the Union was still in the

wrong to put down the rebellion. Madison never denied that all people retain the right to

revolution. Nor did Abraham Lincoln. Even in his First Inaugural Address, Lincoln

40 Emphasis added.

41 Believers in the “strong-union” view would argue that this is the same “one people” who dissolved their

political bands with England. Also, according to one adherent of the strong-union view, one of the more

sophisticated manifestations of the pre-constitutional origin of the union is found in the fact that the

Constitution itself limits the degree to which the Constitution can be amended. No amendment, for

instance, was permitted to change the date of the Importation Clause, and no amendment can deprive a state

of its two senators. If the states had created the federal union, then these clauses would be selfcontradictory,

since there could be no higher sovereignty which could institute, let alone enforce, such a

restriction on the power to amend. “A sovereign is by definition a source and not a subject of law,” so a

compact between sovereigns can never be made unamendable. But, according to either the strong- or

weak-union views, since the whole people of the union created the Constitution only to make that union

more perfect, they could place limits on the degree to which the Constitution itself could be altered. H.V.

Jaffa, The Conditions of Freedom (Claremont: Claremont Institute Press, 2000 (1975)) pp. 161, 172.

acknowledged that “[i]f, by the mere force of numbers, a majority should deprive a

minority of any clearly written constitutional right, it might, in a moral point of view,

justify revolution—certainly would, if such right were a vital one. But such is not our

case.”42 Even though the Constitution is a compact between the whole people of the

United States, and thus is alterable by the whole people only, any individual or group

retains an inalienable right to fight against tyranny.

Many libertarians defend the Confederate states’ secession on the grounds that it

was engaged in a revolution consistent with the principles of the Declaration of

Independence. Writing in 1920, H.L. Mencken claimed that “The Union

soldiers…actually fought against self-determination; it was the Confederates who fought

for the right of their people to govern themselves.”43 More recently, Jeffrey Rogers

Hummel has written that “as a revolutionary right, the legitimacy of secession is

universal and unconditional. That at least is how the Declaration of Independence

reads.”44

The problem with this argument is that this is not how the Declaration of

Independence reads. In fact, the libertarian principles of [*75] revolution enunciated in

the Declaration do not justify the Confederacy’s acts at all.

According to libertarianism, as espoused by John Locke, Thomas Jefferson, and

others, the individual’s right to own himself puts him on a par with all other individuals

in a state of nature. Before government exists, each person has the equal right to run his

own life as every other person, and this includes the right to self-defense. Since selfdefense

is difficult in the state of nature, however, people agree to join a social compact

42 Basler (1953) 4:267.

43 H.L. Mencken, A Mencken Chrestomathy (New York: Vintage 1982 (1948)) p. 223.

44 J.R. Hummel, Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men (Peru, Ill.: Open Court, 1996) p. 351.

by delegating part of that right to the government, which is entrusted with the power to

protect their lives, liberties, and estates. But government has no authority to violate their

rights, because no individual in the state of nature has the right to violate another person’s

rights, and therefore cannot confer such a right to the government. “[T]he Legislat[ur]e,”

wrote Locke, “is not, nor can possibly be, absolutely Arbitrary over the Lives and

Fortunes of the People. For it being but the joynt power of every Member of the Society

given up to that Person or Assembly which is Legislator, it can be no more than those

persons had in a State of Nature before they enter’d into Society…. For no Body can

transfer to another more power than he has in himself; and no Body has an absolute

Arbitrary Power...[to] take away the Life or Property of another.”45 Thus, if those

appointed to govern “endeavour to take away and destroy the Property of the People, or

to reduce them to Slavery under Arbitrary Power…and…endeavour to grasp themselves,

or put into the hands of any other an Absolute Power over the Lives, Liberties, and

Estates of the People; By this breach of Trust they forfeit the Power, the People had put

into their hands, for quite contrary ends, and it devolves to the People, who have a Right

to resume their original Liberty….”46 The right to revolution, therefore, is an expression

of the right to self-defense.

The right to self-ownership allows individuals to agree to a social compact, and

the right of self-defense gives that compact its legitimacy. Any society which contradicts

these fundamental premises—such as a society based on inequality and slavery—is

therefore not a legitimate government; it is instead a criminal gang, and it cannot justify

its robbery or enslavement by claiming that the people voted for these things, because the

45 Laslett (1963) p. 402.

46 Laslett (1963) p. 461.

people no right to enslave others in the first place.47 Such a “government” lacks

legitimacy and may rightly be overthrown. As Lincoln summarized it, “no man is good

enough to govern another man, without that other’s consent. I [*76] say this is the

leading principle—the sheet anchor of American republicanism.”48

The Declaration of Independence enunciates these principles in what is almost a

syllogism: “all men are created equal... endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable

Rights... among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness... to secure these

rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the

consent of the governed... whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of

these ends... it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government....” This right

and duty, however, may only be exercised after “a long train of abuses and usurpations,

pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce [the people] under

absolute Despotism.”

The Declaration of Independence, therefore, far from recognizing any

“unconditional” right of people to overthrow their government, places several important

limits on rebellion: it is justified only by a collective act of self-defense, and even then,

only after “a long train of abuses and usurpations.” And a rebellion which institutes a

new government based not on securing individual rights, but on violating them (such as a

revolution that consists of stealing people’s property), is not a legitimate revolution at all

in the eyes of the Declaration’s libertarian theory; it would be merely a massive criminal

act or coup.

47 A. Rand, “Man’s Rights,” The Virtue of Selfishness, (New York: Signet, 1964).

48 Basler (1953) 2:266.

These arguments are all essentially rewordings of libertarianism’s famous maxim

against the initiation of force. Libertarian theory holds that political institutions are

justified only insofar as they protect the freedom of the individuals who make up that

society. A political society’s “right to self-determination,” therefore, is not a

fundamental principle according to libertarianism, but is a consequence and function of

the self-determination of individuals who make up that society.

The non-initiation of force principle means that the distinction between a

revolutionary act and a crime is that the former is a kind of self-defense, undertaken to

protect individual rights, while the latter is an initiation of force, to violate the rights of

others, or protect the proceeds of some robbery. In the former case, libertarianism holds

that it is legitimate to commit acts of physical force in retaliation against those who have

initiated its use; the American Revolution, for instance, while illegal, was a legitimate act

of revolution because Parliament had declared its right to “bind [the American colonies]

in all cases whatsoever,” and had engaged in “a long train of abuses and usurpations.”

Americans had the right to defend themselves by throwing off such government, even if

doing so cost many lives.

[*77] Analyzing the alleged “revolution” of 1861 also requires understanding the

purposes behind the act: why did the Confederacy fired on Fort Sumter, and thus violate

the supreme law of the land? Although several writers have tried to claim that the Civil

War was not fought over slavery, but over issues of domestic economic policy,49 these

49 See e.g., Livingston (2002) pp. 72-76.

claims are highly exaggerated.50 Mississippi’s declaration of secession, for example,

stated unequivocally:

In the momentous step which our State has taken…it is but just

that we should declare the prominent reasons which have induced our

course.

Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of

slavery—the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the

product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of

commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging

on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the

black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun…. [A] blow at slavery is

a blow at commerce and civilization…. There was no choice left us but

submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union,

whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin.

Domestic economic policy (other than that relating to slavery) is nowhere

mentioned in this document, or in South Carolina’s declaration of secession, which

focused only on “The right of property in slaves,” and complained that other sates “have

denied the rights of property established…have denounced as sinful the institution of

slavery…[and] have encouraged and assisted thousands of our slaves to leave their

homes.” Georgia’s declaration reiterated its “numerous and serious causes of complaint

against [the] non-slave-holding…States with reference to the subject of African slavery,”

and although it complained of the fact that Northern economic interests had received

federal protection (“they have succeeded in throwing the cost of light-houses, buoys, and

the maintenance of their seamen upon the Treasury”), it did so only to protest that federal

protection of slavery was inadequate. Texas’ declaration of secession complained that

“In all the non-slave-holding States…the people have formed themselves into a great

sectional party…based upon an unnatural feeling of hostility to these [*78] Southern

50 E. Volokh, “More on Secession And Slavery.” The Volokh Conspiracy.

http://volokh.com/2002_04_28_volokh_archive.html#76098962 (2002)

States and their beneficent and patriarchal system of African slavery, proclaiming the

debasing doctrine of equality of all men, irrespective of race or color—a doctrine at war

with nature, in opposition to the experience of mankind, and in violation of the plainest

revelations of Divine Law.”51

These documents could hardly be clearer. The Confederate states, whatever their

other reasons for seceding, were primarily moved by the desire to preserve their slave

property from interference by the federal government. Or, more accurately, in reaction

against the election of a President who had pledged himself to halt the spread of slavery

into the western territories.52 Although the Confederates phrased their arguments in

terms of “freedom,” it was the “freedom to enslave” that they were defending. Indeed,

the Constitution of the Confederate States of America, section IX clause 4,

unambiguously declared that “No...law denying or impairing the right of property in

negro slaves shall be passed.” This clause demonstrates just how off the mark

Mencken’s criticism of Lincoln really was. It was not true that “the

Confederates…fought for the right of their people to govern themselves.”53 The

Confederates fought for the (literally absolute) right of white people to govern black

people, without the black people’s consent.

Unlike present-day defenders of the South, the leaders of the Southern cause

realized that their cause could find no support in the Declaration of Independence. Thus

51 These declarations are available at http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/csa/csapage.htm.

52 The Constitution, of course, barred the federal government from depriving southerners of their slaves,

except possibly through condemnation in exchange for just compensation. But it did permit the Congress

to bar slavery from the western territories, which would become states eventually. If admitted as free

states, this would mean that southerners would eventually find themselves outvoted in Congress, which

could lead to the ultimate extinction of slavery. It was Lincoln’s insistence on forbidding slavery in the

west—as enunciated in his Cooper Union speech, for example—that served as the proximate cause of the

war. McPherson (1988) pp. 51-72.

53 Mencken (1982) p. 223.

they rarely based their arguments on the Declaration, and in fact explicitly denounced it.

“There is not a word of truth in it,” said John C. Calhoun.54 The principle that all men are

created equal, he said was “inserted into our Declaration of Independence without any

necessity. It made no necessary part of our justification for separating from the parent

country, and declaring ourselves independent.” Others went [*79] farther. Senator Pettit

of Indiana declared it a “self-evident lie.”55 Governor Hammond of South Carolina—

who had once said “Slavery is…the greatest of all the great blessings which a kind

Providence has ever bestowed upon our glorious region”56—denounced the “muchlauded

but nowhere accredited dogma of Mr. Jefferson that all men are created equal.”57

Contrary, then, to the oft-repeated claim that the Civil War was not about slavery,

the question of slavery answers the essential question which determines whether

secession in 1860 was an act of revolution on one hand, or a criminal conspiracy, in the

other. The secession of 1861 was not a legitimate revolution because its “cornerstone”

rested on the “the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery—

subordination to the superior race—is his natural and normal condition.”58 As Lincoln

had said before the war,

We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean

the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do

as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others

the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other

men, and the product of other men’s labor. Here are two, not only

different, but incompatible things, called by the same name—liberty. And

it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two

different and incompatible names—liberty and tyranny. The shepherd

54 Cong. Globe, 30th Cong. 1st Sess., p. 875 (1848)

55 Cong. Globe, 33rd Cong., 1st Sess. p. 214 (1854)

56 W. L. Miller, Arguing About Slavery. (New York: Knopf, 1988) p. 134.

57 C. Merriam, History of American Political Theories (New York: Kelly 1969 (1903)) p. 230; see further

C. Oliver, “Southern Nationalism” Reason, Aug.-Sep. 2001.

58 A. Stephens, “Cornerstone Speech” http://www.pointsouth.com/csanet/greatmen/stephens/stephenscorner.

html (1861).

drives the wolf from the sheep’s throat, for which the sheep thanks the

shepherd as a liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as

the destroyer of liberty, especially as the sheep was a black one. Plainly

the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of the word

liberty.59

The Confederacy, built upon the wolf’s definition of liberty, was an illegitimate

government by the libertarian standards of the Declaration of Independence. When the

Confederacy initiated force by firing on Fort [*80] Sumter, therefore, it became the

responsibility of the President to “take Care that the Laws [including the supreme law of

the land] be faithfully executed,”60 by putting down the rebellion by force if necessary.

IV. Why Libertarians Defend The South

Among the reasons that so many libertarians argue that the Confederacy was in

the right in the Civil War is their perception that Union victory ushered in an era of

federal expansion and control over the economy. It is certainly true that in the late

nineteenth century, the federal government intervened more and more in national

economic policy. But blaming this on Union victory is problematic at best. For one

thing, the argument partakes of the post hoc fallacy. While it is true that government

manipulation of the economy increased in the years following the war, this had many

causes, especially the rise of the Populist, and later Progressive, political movements.

These can be only distantly connected to the Union cause. Moreover, while there was

much to deplore in the culture of Yankee political economy, there was at least as much to

deplore about the culture of the antebellum south.

59 Basler (1953) 7:301-302.

60 U.S. Const. Art. II § 3.

More specifically, some libertarians argue that the Union victory caused an

expansion of federal authority by destroying the political will of states to resist the

expansionism of the federal government.61 After such a bloody experience, states were

less willing to say no when the federal government proposed to step on state prerogatives.

Although there is some truth to this argument, there are two mitigating thoughts that must

be kept in mind. First, it did not entirely destroy the will of states to resist federal

encroachment: as the Civil Rights era of the 1950s and 1960s revealed, southern states

were still quite willing to resist what they perceived as federal encroachment, through the

policy of “massive resistance” to integregation. But, secondly, that experience shows

that state resistance to federal authority is just as likely to be inimical to individual liberty

as it is to redound to the benefit of individual liberty. State resistance, after all, is usually

predicated not on protecting individuals from oppression, but on protecting the official

dignity of state governments. For libertarians to venerate state government is therefore a

risky enterprise. As Madison explained in the Federalist, the legitimacy of state

governments is only valid so long as the states protect the freedom of Americans: “is it

not preposterous,” he asked,

to urge as an objection to [the Constitution]…that such a government may

derogate from the importance of the governments [*81] of the individual

States? Was, then, the American Revolution effected, was the American

Confederacy formed, was the precious blood of thousands spilt, and the

hard-earned substance of millions lavished, not that the people of America

should enjoy peace, liberty, and safety, but that the government of the

individual States…might enjoy a certain extent of power, and be arrayed

with certain dignities and attributes of sovereignty? We have heard of the

impious doctrine in the Old World, that the people were made for kings,

not kings for the people. Is the same doctrine to be revived in the New…?

[T]he public good, the real welfare of the great body of the people, is the

supreme object to be pursued; and…no form of government whatever has

61 See e.g., W. Williams, “The Civil War’s Tragic Legacy,” Ideas on Liberty, Jan.1999.

any other value than as it may be fitted for the attainment of this object.

[A]s far as the sovereignty of the States cannot be reconciled to the

happiness of the people, the voice of every good citizen must be, Let the

former be sacrificed to the latter.62

While state resistance to federal expansion may be helpful for protecting

individual liberty, it has also often been inimical, and this was never more true than in the

case of the Civil War.

Finally, I suspect one reason libertarians are misled into embracing the

Confederate cause is because of the formative event in the lives of many libertarians, as

well as the Libertarian Political Party: The Vietnam War. The lessons that many

Vietnam protestors drew from that experience were that war is never justified, and that it

is simply “none of our business” what another country’s rulers do to the people of that

country. If the Vietnamese “choose” to live under communism, other nations must not

interfere. Likewise, this argument goes, if southerners in the 1860s chose to enslave

blacks, that may have been wrong, but it was none of the Union’s business. Seeing the

Confederacy through the lens of the Vietnam experience, however, is misleading. First,

it ignores the fact that, unlike in foreign policy, where a nation may choose whether or

not to intervene in a conflict, the Constitution requires the president to faithfully execute

the law, including the Constitution itself. Second, such a view obscures the ultimate

values of libertarian political philosophy. Although it is true that Americans do not owe a

duty to intervene when other nations’ rulers oppress their peoples, it is not true that other

nations have the right to oppress their people. To say that another nation’s oppression of

its people is “none of our business” is similar to what Lincoln described as the perverse

62 Rossiter (1961) p. 289.

notion “that ‘if one man would [*82] enslave another, no third man should object.’”63

The United States, and every other nation, does have the right, though not the duty, to

liberate oppressed peoples held captive by dictatorships. The federal government had the

right, and the duty, to put down the Confederate rebellion.

War is a terrible thing. But libertarianism holds that it is justified at times, when

undertaken in defense of individual liberty. As Jefferson said, “all men know that war is

a losing game to both parties. But they know also that if they do not resist encroachment

at some point, all will be taken from them.... It is the melancholy law of human societies

to be compelled sometimes to choose a great evil in order to ward off a greater….”64 The

Civil War was an awful conflict, costing hundreds of thousands of lives. But the right

side did prevail in that war, and libertarians should stop doing themselves the great

disservice of defending a cruel and oppressive slave society.

References

Ames, H., ed. 1911. State Documents on Federal Relations (Philadelphia: University of

Pennsylvania).

Anastaplo, G. 2000. “John Quincy Adams Revisited.” Oklahoma City University Law

Review 25:119.

Fehrenbacher, D. 1989. Constitutions and Constitutionalism in the Slave-Holding South.

(Atlanta: University of Georgia Press).

Lence, R., ed. 1992. Union and Liberty: The Political Philosophy of John C. Calhoun

(Indianapolis: Liberty Fund).

63 Basler (1953), 3:538.

64 Peterson (1984) p. 356.

[wardaddy]

What you said...nice post.

[ejonesie22]

YES! I like it!

[x]

I'll also tell you, as I've said often here before, that I would rather have been Thomas Jefferson's slave than a coal miner. This doesn't cause slavery to be something I would choose over the life I do have, but my guess is that more than one percent of the world's population would prefer Southern slavery to their current lot.

So much for "Live Free or Die!"

Of course, the strange thing is that it's always somebody else who would be better off as a slave. Those who recommended slavery for others would take up arms at even the slightest infringement of their rights -- particularly the "right" to enslave others. There's a major contradiction in libertarian arguments that minimize the evils of slavery and exaggerate the evils of government or taxation.

But the thing about being Jefferson's slave is -- you wouldn't be his student or his friend or his protege, you'd be his slave. You wouldn't learn much from him. And chances are you'd actually be the slave of some overseer or other. You wouldn't have much say over whether you worked in the house or in the field, and you wouldn't be sure whether you or your loved ones would be sold off.

And the whole comparison's a little silly. You're probably a middle class person who recoils at the dangers of coal mining, but you'd be willing to sign on to a life as a field hand as a better alternative! That's plausible. But other people made the opposite choice. For all the disadvantages of their way of life as seen from a middle class suburban point of view, coal miners probably did have more freedom and opportunities than slaves did.

[Ditto]

In a recent book I read, southerners in northern prisons wrote home about their fears that they would be “exchanged” for a black Union soldier.

Racial attitude. They went into the war thinking they were worth any ten Yankees. Just imagine what they thought they were worth compared to Black Yankees.

[x]

I don't understand why the enslavement of Africans in North America seems to trump all other slavery and for that matter all unsavory things relative to their time in history in the eyes of many young folks today except to say the revisionists kicked my generations ass in the brainwashing department.

There's a false assumption there. Just about anybody would agree that the Nazis "trump" other outrages -- if you want to put it that way -- though some would say that about the Communists. But if you're talking about American history, slavery is pretty darned important. And the more some people say it isn't, the more others will talk about it.

I would like to see the high and mighty on black race issues attack thug culture or abortion or inner city crime or black hatred of whites with the same vigor they do the Confederate Battle Flag or Dixie.

That's a matter of context. If you're talking about history, people are going to emphasize past things, not present ones. If you're looking at the whole history of the country, rappers and drive-bys aren't going to be that important.

Probably we should be talking more about those things, but human nature's involved here: when there are people who apparently think slavery was less of an imposition than high tariffs or federal voting rights laws, is it surprising that other people stress slavery and ignore other, more current concerns?

[SergeiRachmaninov]

The more I learn about libertarians the more I think it is just another way of spelling anarchy.

I am with you, although, sure, I have fond feeling for an independent family living a self-sufficient rural life and being free of government restraints.

But that fantasy has very little relevance to modern America.

Most of us live -- and will continue to live -- in urban areas. And, in addition to population density, we are bound together in our lives by specialization and technology. When masses of people live closely together, there must be a mechanism to harmonize the rough edges. Else, I am likely to shoot my neighbor who believes that it is his sacred right to go screaming out of his driveway on his Harley at midnight, etc.

The garden of Eden is gone; the garden of government is with us. Best that we try to manage it.

[wardaddy]

My issue is that slavery which is now 8 generations old in some quarters is trotted out as an explanation for everything while current cultural decline is hardly mentioned and even celebrated by some.

Slavery was not presented as much of an excuse till post Jim Crow ironically....and that’s nationwide not just in the south. It was taught as a fact and a custom of the human condition till it largely ended in the late 1800s

What it boils down to for me is that some folks think that the black man’s demise was historically simply at the hands of the white race and ultimately so is his redemption.

I think that is no less bigoted than racial supremacy arguments and in a backhanded way, it’s still racial supremacy. The white man can make or break you philosophy.

Nearly all democrats buy into this and a fair number of race sensitive republicans as well.

Further I think ignoring the fact that a majority of black culture is broken and affects all of us yet meanwhile droning on and on about the evil white man and chasing down CSA battle flags, schoolhouse names, and sports team mascots rather than a chilling self reflection into the soul of that majority broken culture is simply wrong, hypocritical, weakminded and will ultimately do us all harm.

I'm amazed every day about the sort of cultural depravity that is celebrated today....it is astounding.

I just took a bath and read that they have made a comedy movie about the black woman who hit and killed the white man in Texas and left him to die in her windshield for days while some of her homeys laughed about the cracker in the windshield. The movie did not have the balls to show it real to life, instead they put a white woman with cornrows as the star...Mena Suvari. And it’s a damn comedy.

Can you imagine a comedy about James Byrd?

This is sort of stuff is a sickness to me and so many fall for it because the average white man or woman would rather undergo chemotherapy than be called bigoted or racist and it infects everything we deal with from domestic entitlements to war with Islam to immigration.

Angry old white guys like me are fading away slowly no doubt but we weren’t always angry...far from it in my case.

it's a sad damned state of what might have been and sure doesn't reflect what I once hoped for

btw...that was a rant....not directed to you personally....you've been here a long time and are reasonable while others have come and gone ...on both sides

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

And it’s a damn comedy.

The trailer is available online. It ain't a comedy.

[Ditto]

Nearly all democrats buy into this and a fair number of race sensitive republicans as well.

Buy into it, or simply play it for all it's worth?

The Democrat party has relied on race pandering and fear mongering since before the Civil War. It's just that 160 years ago, they dealt the race card from the other side of the deck, but the tactics are no damn different today.

It is a fact that you can gain and maintain power by dividing the people via fear and guilt. The Democrat party are masters of the tactic.

[wardaddy]

I just read a review here where it is described as a black comedy by someone who saw it and reviewed it. A critic I know oddly enough.

Here is the link:

http://www.nashvillescene.com/Stories/Arts/Film/2007/09/20/One_Week_Seven_Days_33_Films/

[wardaddy]

I doubt I need to say that from my perspective the Radical Republicans were the social engineers of their day not unlike the Democrats of today.

I do agree though that you can divide folks via fear and guilt.

[Celtman]

So who were the members of the Klu KLux Klan? From your analysis, it seems that the Democrats were behind that racist abomination right up to the Civil Rights wars of the 1960's till today.

Generally true, except that a few klansmen, notably Grand Wizard David Duke, have wormed into the Republican party.

[Ditto]

I doubt I need to say that from my perspective the Radical Republicans were the social engineers of their day...

Aside from opposing slavery, how so?

[puroresu]

That’s pathetic, though typical, that a film would change the race of the perp. Recall that in THE SUM OF ALL FEARS the terrorists miraculously were changed from Muslims (in the novel) to white supremacists.

[Doc91678]

I forgot which, but either Moveon.org, or the DailyKos depicted Senator Liberman in blackface.
I noticed that neither the NAACP, Sharpton, nor Jackson made a peep about that one. Racists all.

[wardaddy]

they do that all the time....especially with Clancy

I could be wrong but wasn’t the James Earl Jones character white?

I know Ryan’s Annapolis mate was black.

As much as I love James Dickey, I blame him for starting all this cracker stereotyping...Deliverance...dadgummit...though I’m not sure the redneck white as buggerers is in the book

I for one would like to testify that rednecks are the last sort of men to want another man’s booty..

Shawshank too....I have friends in prison...the incidence of involuntary buggery amongst whites is far far less than amongst other groups but not the way Shawshank projected it...was that in the book?

American History X white buggery...in the book ...I don’t know. I do know this. Homosexuality amongst Aryan Brotherhood prison gang members will result in a death sentence by the gang. They intimidate by killing, not by raping. Another Hollywood tale.

Grisham’s Time to Kill book.....true to the book like most of his but the scenario completely defies the reality. How many white males are on record abducting and raping black girls.....it’s like minuscule compared to the other way around but Hollywood would have us feeling like white men roam about looking for black girls to rape.....

all this stuff....and this is only the tip...is not by accident.

[wardaddy]

Radical Republicans were like I said the social engineers of their day much like the Dems are today.

And much like today it cloaks their real agenda which is pure political power.

Modern day Dems wish to use black bloc political power and exploit it and they do.

Radical Republicans were simply extending a rift they had with the Southern states from inception over congressional representation of black population counts in the south even though blacks did not vote....course plenty of others did not vote till the 1850s(?) in both the north and south....there were many other issues too

The more slavery spread, the more diminished northern political power became with slave state whites outweighing them disproportionately due to things like the 3/5ths compromise etc

and so it goes....now instead of Republicans from states with tiny black populations demanding how the South should act, we have Democrats from northern states with smaller black populations telling us with large black populations how to act.

and of course the Republicans were not much on States Rights same as the Dems today

I could go on and on but you knew all this already, you’re not stupid Ditto...you just prefer to frame your views by your perspective same as I and from probably the same facts

I have never bought the notion that both parties are comparable over a long timeline....very inaccurate to me.

The white south is not GOP today because we changed but rather because the parties did.

[Ditto]

The white south is not GOP today because we changed but rather because the parties did.

The largest factor (aside from the Democrat party lurch to the far left on military and foreign affairs issues in the late 1960s) is likely the population shifts that occurred during the decades after WWII when white Republican professionals from Norther States began relocating to the South. (Thanks to air conditioning and the Cold War growth of the military and areospace industry in that region.) Guys with names like Gingrich, Barr and Bush. I have a number of friends and family members who are among those imported "Southern Republicans" and trust me, they have absolutely no relationship with the FDR New Deal segregationist Democrats who ran the "Solid South" of my youth.

The more slavery spread, the more diminished northern political power became with slave state whites outweighing them disproportionately due to things like the 3/5ths compromise etc

Kind on a confusing argument since the 3/5ths compromise only really mattered in congressional apportionment. Slaves, be they in Alabama or some new State, counted exactly the same in terms of congressional seats. How would spreading that slave population out over additional states effect the balance of power in Congress?

[x]

Hollywood comes up with a lot of garbage and most of it sinks like a stone and isn't heard from again.

I guess where I'm coming from is: when there are people who obsess about the Civil War, or Sherman's March, or Reconstruction, or the evil Yankee, it's hard to argue that other people should just forget about slavery.

If it's a matter of going on and on about "what you did to us" some people are going to come out ahead.

I'm not saying everything's for the best now or that some trends aren't a little frightening, but it does pay to have some perspective.

[wardaddy]

Ditto, you are dreaming my friend if you do not realize the white Democrat voters of the South moved from Eastland and Stennis to Lott and Cochran.

I remember being with my daddy and talking to Jamie Whitten and Sonny Montgomery about the massive switch and yes....at least in Mississippi it was largely due to Lott and Bill Waller as governor in the 70s.

The Yankee migration south first hit Texas oil patch in the early 80s and the later Yankee migrations were later and have done the exact opposite of what you claim.

They have enhanced the Democrat party here today...primarily in metro Atlanta, Piedmont North Carolina and here in Metro Nashville and of course Florida that used to be reliably Republican.

The rest of Dixie is not terribly affected by Yankee migration and the white voters are more GOP than anywhere this side of Utah.

Dang Ditto....you must be younger than I thought.

We are mostly whites for GOP now because we are more socially conservative and the Dems left us. It has nothing to do with Yankee migrations south which paled compared to the reverse until very recently...1980s on. Gingrich, Barr and Bush represent a few Yankee descended politicians not a migration wave.

If you can't see how the 3/5ths rule and more slave states would further diminish Yankee political power than I'm not sure how I can explain the obvious. Don't tell me you think they did all that because of Christian charity.