Confederate Flag In Pickup Prompts Battle At Fla. Company

local6 ^ | May 2, 2008

[stainlessbanner]

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- A Central Florida man's Confederate flag prompted a free-speech battle with his employer, who doesn't want it displayed on company property.

The flag is attached to Bobby Tillett's pickup truck, which he drives to work every day, WJXT reported. Because his employer has banned the flag from his parking lot, Tillett is forced to park far from his job.

"If I take it down, that means you know the politically correct people would have won, and that's wrong," Bobby Tillett said. "If you believe in something that strong (you) should have no problem whatsoever to fly it."

Tillett said the flag flap began when he showed up for work at BJ's Wholesale off Pritchard Road.

"Management confronts me and tells me, politely, if I would take my flag off my truck," Tillett said. "I said, 'No, I will not.'"

Tillett said his managers told him if he did not remove the flag, he couldn't park in the employee lot.

"I'm a firm believer it's not about winning or losing, it's about right and wrong," Tillett told WJXT's Dan Leveton.

So Tillett decided to park on public property about a half-mile away and walk to work.

He says it takes him about 10 minutes to walk to the job, but it's worth it.

"It's about heritage; it's about pride," Tillett said. "I don't look at it much different than the American flag. There's been a lot of blood spilled over that flag, too, and I love that flag, and I'll fly it 'till the day I die."

No one at BJ's would comment about the controversy, but they did issue a statement saying it is about the rights of other employees:

"Like all employers, we have guidelines of appropriate personal behavior and expression at work. While the policy does not identify any specific type of expression, it generally prohibits expression that is rude, abusive, hostile or intimidating. Under these guidelines, we asked this team member to not display the confederate flag in our parking lot. We are confident that we have struck the right balance for all of our team members and their work environment."

Tillett said none of his co-workers has told him they dislike the flag. He said most people support him and he plans to keep on flying his Confederate flag, even if it costs him the job.

"I'm standing by my guns ... or my flag," Tillett said.

[rustbucket]

Davis called for 100,000 volunteers on March 6, at a time when the US Army stood at 16,000.

My understanding is that on March 6 in response to Lincoln's first inaugural speech (widely interpreted to mean a declaration of war) the Confederate Congress authorized Davis to call up to 100,000 troops if needed. Davis did not call for that many until after Sumter as I remember.

We had a discussion of this once before. See: Link. Subsequent posts on that thread summarize what I know of troop buildups on both sides. Lincoln had met with several Northern governors before Sumter to get mobilization of Northern state troops underway.

If you are aware of a time sequence of troop buildups on both sides, I'd be interested in it. Thanks.

[x]

I too think that your posts are not what they once were. You used to put more thought into them, or so it seemed.

If you liked my old posts, they're all still there. Go back to them, read them, savor them, learn from them. But if I didn't convince you then, why put in the effort to do so now?

See my old posts from a thread you participated in ...

That would be the thread where I posted a cartoon, googled "Jefferson Davis Confederate President" and "Abraham Lincoln United States President," and commented on one guy's posting style and swattie's sanity. What makes you think I was interested in rehashing 1861 all over again?

Davis didn't grab land; he didn't drag states into the Confederacy.

Firing on Sumter started the war, and the war precipated four states into the Confederacy. Davis was encouraging legislators and militias in those states and also Kentucky and Missouri. Probably Maryland as well.

Notice too that I said "Davis and his supporters." I should have said Davis and his regime. What accounts for Confederate army ventures into Kentucky and Missouri?

Davis didn't want the free states, but he was going to do what he could to get ahold of the Upper South and the Border States.

I notice that in the weeks leading up to secession, Confederate forces seized US mints in Louisiana and Georgia. What was that all about? The sticky-fingered CSA couldn't resist, I guess ...

It wasn't only Davis who thought slaveowning was threatened. The book, "Tariffs, Blockades, and Inflation, The Economics of the Civil War" by Thornton and Eklund argues that Lincoln's election and the protectionist tariff that Lincoln and the Republicans espoused would result in a loss to slaveholders equivalent to the escape of one-third of the slave population. The authors cite a source that said there was an "immediate $700 million drop" in the present value of slaves. (I've not seen this figure elsewhere.)

Ask an economist and it's always all about dollar values. But you don't disprove my point. Davis thought slavery was threatened and he was looking for a regime to preserve it. If that regime didn't include the Upper South, its options would be more limited.

Why wait until almost the last minute to contradict your previous communications to the governor, if Lincoln were a man of peace?

From what I can gather, Lincoln gave the order to reprovision the fort on April 4th. He sent notification to the Governor of South Carolina two days later on the 6th. That notification may have taken two days to get there, I'm not sure. The Confederate regime decided to attack the fort on the 9th and did so on the 12th. The fleet had left New York on the 10th and began to arrive outside Charleston shortly before the attack.

Lincoln may have decided on a reprovisioning expedition a week before the final order -- one source says March 28th or March 29th. But it would have taken time to sort out what could be done. The secession conventions was meeting in Virginia and he may have wanted to see how things would go with that. I don't see anything especially "last-minute" about Lincoln's notification of the Governor. Understand that he'd only taken office on March 4, so he may not have been sure of himself and of the situation.

On April 11, 1861, the Southern Commissioners in Washington called the misinformation put forth by the Lincoln administration concerning the promised evacuation of Sumter "gross perfidy."

The Davis regime decided on that day to attack the fort. They most likely couldn't have communicated the decision to their commissioners on the same day, but this comment, looks a little like the Japanese diplomats on the eve of Pearl Harbor looking for an excuse to get out of town and accusing the US of not bargaining in good faith.

I don't know the exact circumstances the quote refers to, but Seward was trying to conduct his own policy in this matter. There were contradictions between what Seward said and what Lincoln intended. Throw in what the wretched Buchanan and his officials had said and it complicates things further. If you're an enemy of the country and are not paying attention to who says what and what the authority of each offer it might look like "perfidy" to you, but that's not the last word on what happened.

Did the South have more government officials? A bigger budget? Did they even have a navy? Was their army ever larger than that of the Union?

I said, "But the Confederacy was a government, and a government bigger and more powerful than anything the continent had seen before 1860." The key phrase is "before 1860." Maybe I was wrong about "bigger," but the Confederacy was more powerful than any government that we had before 1860. If you want to cry about the Old Republic, remember that it was the secessionists who killed it. Dividing the country into two hostile nations meant an end to the way things had been.

In the 20th century almost every president had to do with military-diplomatic crises. It seemed like there was always a ship, a gunboat, a plane, an embassy or legation, a border crossing or a US citizen under attack: the Maine, the Boxer Rebellion, the Perdicaris incident, Pancho Villa in Arizona, the Panay, the Greer, North Korea's invasion of the South, U-2, the Berlin Wall, the Tonkin Gulf incident, the Pueblo, the Mayaguez, the Iranian hostage crisis, KAL 007, Lockerbie, the recent confrontations with Iran in the Gulf, and so forth.

Rather than say, "Why didn't they just give us what we wanted?" try looking at Sumter in the context of those other crises and confrontations. One thing we learn is that Americans don't like their presidents backing down, folding up, and saying, "Take what you want, we won't stop you." Granted the Confederates didn't have that experience, but the idea that the US would simply let the rebels have their way dictate terms to us was wildly mistaken.

Looking all this up all over again isn't that interesting to me and doesn't bring pleasure. It's like rolling a large boulder up a hill only to watch it fall down again ...

[rustbucket]

What makes you think I was interested in rehashing 1861 all over again?

Your presence on these history threads over the years? My mistake apparently.

Davis was encouraging legislators and militias in those states and also Kentucky and Missouri.

Talking with them and encouraging them is grabbing land and dragging states into the Confederacy? Davis did send some cannon to the Missouri militia in April or May, 1861, prior to the May St. Louis riot where troops that favored the Union killed a number of civilians including children.

What accounts for Confederate army ventures into Kentucky and Missouri?

Are you talking about the 1862 invasion of Kentucky by Confederates? It was a military objective by that point. Here's an 1861 New York Times article that lays out the strategic importance of Kentucky to both parties: [Link].

The NYT article also addresses the importance of Missouri, whose elected government voted to secede and the Confederate government accepted them as the twelfth Confederate state and gave them representation in the Confederate legislature.

Scroll down this link to see Missouri's Ordinance of Secession: [Link 2]. And here is a bill passed by the Confederacy entitled, An Act to aid the State of Missouri in repelling invasion by the United States, and to authorize the admission of said State as a member of the Confederate States of America, and for other purposes. Missouri was accorded representation in the Confederate Congress.

I guess it depends on whose version of history you read.

I notice that in the weeks leading up to secession, Confederate forces seized US mints in Louisiana and Georgia. What was that all about? The sticky-fingered CSA couldn't resist, I guess ...

Leading up to? Louisiana seceded on January 26, 1861, and the New Orleans mint was seized January 31. After secession. Georgia seceded on January 19, 1861. The Dahlonega mint was seized on April 8, 1861. After secession. Federal claims to their former facilities in the middle of Confederate territory didn't hold much practical weight, particularly when the president wouldn't entertain any proffered discussion with Confederates about remuneration for their part of the Federal debt and Federal facilities.

Oh yeah, the New Orleans mint. Mumford took down a Union flag from it before the city was captured by the Union. For this terrible offense, Beast Butler hanged him at the mint. Who knew that taking down a flag of your enemy before they captured a city was a hanging offense?

But you don't disprove my point. Davis thought slavery was threatened and he was looking for a regime to preserve it. If that regime didn't include the Upper South, its options would be more limited.

Davis could have looked to the Lincoln regime to protect slavery, I guess. Lincoln favored the Corwin Amendment which protected slavery from Federal interference. But Northern attempts to mollify the South came too late and besides the Corwin amendment might well have been repealed or amended in the future despite what it said. The die was already cast; the South had left the building.

Lincoln may have decided on a reprovisioning expedition a week before the final order -- one source says March 28th or March 29th.

Perhaps you are referring to Lincoln's March 29 order that attached March 28 plans that I just linked to you in post 119 above (my post 66 from the Official Records).

I don't know the exact circumstances the quote refers to [the "gross perfidy" quote], but Seward was trying to conduct his own policy in this matter. There were contradictions between what Seward said and what Lincoln intended.

Apparently, Lincoln instructed Ward Hill Lamon to tell the Governor of South Carolina that Sumter would be evacuated, the same basic message that Seward was conveying to the Southern Commissioners. From Recollections of Abraham Lincoln by Ward Hill Lamon [Link, my bold]:

My interview with Governor Pickens was, to me, a memorable one. After saying to him what President Lincoln had directed me to say, ...

Of course, Lincoln may have changed his mind between the time he sent Lamon to South Carolina and when he issued the fleet order on March 29.

According to Lamon, the governor had told Lamon:

Let your President attempt to reinforce Sumter and the tocsin of war will be sounded from every hill-top and valley in the South.

Lincoln surely knew from this that he would likely provoke a shooting war by sending an armed fleet down to South Carolina waters. His cabinet had warned him that would be the likely outcome.

Could the South trust Lincoln to keep his word and only send in food and supplies to the fort? Judging by how Lincoln had renegged on his promise to evacuate the fort, my guess is that he could have injected the reinforcements into the fort despite his promises not to. Winfield Scott's orders to those preparing for the expedition said the purpose of the expedition was to reinforce Sumter. I guess Lincoln wasn't making himself clear to Scott either.

Looking all this up all over again isn't that interesting to me and doesn't bring pleasure.

Sorry. Didn't mean to upset you. Please go back to posting cartoons if it's easier for you.

[wardaddy]

Wonder where BJ’s wholesale is from.

What sorta employer gets into this much private shite anyhow....I sure don’t.

I could see me trying to ban Obama stickers...lol....I just don’t hire em to start with

[wardaddy]

As a resident of Georgia,

Yep....you pretty much summed up why you have a rollover view on Southern flags and stuff by saying "resident" instead of "native born Georgian"

Let's just shite on the US flag too by your logic Enstein

[wardaddy]

Amen Mother....damn well said.

It’s this sorta brainwashing of the under 40 crowd of educated folks that has given a freak like Obama what looks like the nomination of the Dems.

A completely socialist looney black nationalist is now poised to run for President and it’s educated well off whites that are responsible.

I prefer folks like the fellow in the picture with his flag. Real folks you can count on.

[rockrr]

"Rather than say, "Why didn't they just give us what we wanted?" try looking at Sumter in the context of those other crises and confrontations. One thing we learn is that Americans don't like their presidents backing down, folding up, and saying, "Take what you want, we won't stop you." Granted the Confederates didn't have that experience, but the idea that the US would simply let the rebels have their way dictate terms to us was wildly mistaken."

Ah, but there's the rub-icon X. For them to do so would be to concede their argument.

In all of these WBTS threads there is a core dichotomy - was it a secession (orderly or otherwise) or was it a rebellion? Without agreement on this very fundamental point all the rest about justification, blame, and loss is just boo-bait for bubbas.

So, how can we find agreement? The "Secessionists" (for lack of a more specific term) claim the exercise of the "right to secession". When challenged to provide evidence of this so-called right, they invariably (non-responsively) respond, "Show me where in the Constitution it is prohibited?!" They point to the Tenth Amendment and say, "well!" "Fill in the blanks!"

The plain truth is that for whatever reasons, it wasn't codified.

How can there be a secession if no such process is defined within the law? Now I'll admit that my history is a little sparse so I'm not rock-solid on how this secession was performed. Did they follow the same path they followed to get into the union? Did the states approach Congress and ask them to vote to allow them to leave? Did they sign a form? Did they spin around three times and say, "I break with thee; I break with thee; I break with thee"?!

The unionists (again for lack of proper terminology) Poo-Pooed that notion saying that. "We don't know how to define our agreement, but we'll know it when we see it". The Unionists instinctively knew that our security and indeed our lives depended upon strengthening the union, not shredding it. Some wiseguy said, "We must all hang together, gentlemen...else, we shall most assuredly hang separately" and many folks in the northern states took it to heart.

Where the north viewed our republic as "One nation, indivisible" the south saw it not unlike a magazine subscription - "Oh, no thanks...we changed our minds".

I just don't think you're going to find common ground with denizens of the LCL X...

[x]

The NYT article also addresses the importance of Missouri, whose elected government voted to secede and the Confederate government accepted them as the twelfth Confederate state and gave them representation in the Confederate legislature.

I don't know how much of the legislature moved to Neosho and voted on that measure. Wikipedia does say this:

The Neosho Secession Ordinance has long been a source of mystery for historians due to the unusual circumstances surrounding it. Ironically, the authority to secede had been vested by the legislature in the State convention. It is unclear whether the legislature had the authority to secede without the direction of the convention. Questions remain unresolved to this day as to whether Jackson's secessionist government or Gamble's provisional government was the legitimate government of Missouri. Jackson supporters claimed their status as the popularly elected government of Missouri to bolster their legitimacy, whereas Gamble had control of the old state capitol and had also been placed in office by a body elected by the state to determine the state's place in the Union.

Perhaps the biggest mystery of Neosho is whether or not Jackson's legislature had a quorum to permit it to convene — a mystery that has prompted many historians to dismiss the Neosho government as a "rump" legislature, though the evidence required to make a conclusive determination is scant.

The controversy exists for two reasons. First, surviving letters from earlier in the fall indicate that the vote was delayed until the end of October to obtain a quorum, which had been lacking. Second, the journals of the legislature that would contain that information disappeared sometime during the war. The Senate journal was rediscovered in recent years among artifacts at the Wilson's Creek National Battlefield, but the House journal has never been found.

The situation was a lot more complicated than you let on.

Leading up to? Louisiana seceded on January 26, 1861, and the New Orleans mint was seized January 31. After secession. Georgia seceded on January 19, 1861. The Dahlonega mint was seized on April 8, 1861. After secession. Federal claims to their former facilities in the middle of Confederate territory didn't hold much practical weight, particularly when the president wouldn't entertain any proffered discussion with Confederates about remuneration for their part of the Federal debt and Federal facilities.

Remuneration for their part of the federal debt? Bondholders would be paid wherever they lived. Rather the Southern states would have to assume their share of paying off the federal debt. Whether they were willing to do this I don't know, but seizing federal facilities to pay off what you owe doesn't make much sense.

And the idea that you get the Mint in New Orleans because you "give up" the one in Philadelphia or San Francisco doesn't make complete sense either. As they say in the banking industry there are "substantial penalties for early withdrawal." You don't get to write your own terms for leaving.

I also read that in New Orleans those who took over the mind coined an awful lot of money with the metal they took. That is also theft, and possibly counterfeiting.

Anyway, this is just another indication of just how pointless these discussions are. If after all this time, you think that secession meant that a state could help itself to federal property, you're incurable. What's there to talk about?

We've been in conflict with Cuba for almost fifty years in large part because Castro expropriated US property without compensation. After the revolution. Like that mattered.

If you declare yourself an outlaw and rob me after declaring yourself to be a bandit and outside the laws, you've still robbed me. What's so hard to fathom in this?

According to Lamon, the governor had told Lamon:

Let your President attempt to reinforce Sumter and the tocsin of war will be sounded from every hill-top and valley in the South.

In this as in other things, I don't know how reliable a witness Lamon is. I get the impression from a quick search that nothing is known for certain about what Lincoln's message was and what message Lamon delivered.

In The War for the Union, Allan Nevins calls Lamon" a big loquacious bumbler of more self-assurance than discretion" and writes "It was under Seward's influence that [Lamon] actually told Governor Pickens that he had come to arrange for the withdrawal of the garrison, and that after his return he wrote to the governor that he would be back in a few days to assist in the evacuation!"

Good luck getting to the bottom of this. Maybe Howard Odell's 1971 article "Lincoln Takes the Pulse of the Confederacy at Charleston in March, 1861," would be a good place to start.

Here's that speech you cite:

"Nothing," said he, "can prevent war except the acquiescence of the President of the United States in secession, and his unalterable resolve not to attempt any reinforcement of the Southern forts. To think of longer remaining in the Union is simply preposterous. We have five thousand well-armed soldiers around this city; all the States are arming with great rapidity; and this means war with all its consequences.

Let your President attempt to reinforce Sumter, and the tocsin of war will be sounded from every hill-top and valley in the South."

Read it again -- and let's assume for a minute that Pickens actually said it. It's anything but the humble, "Please, please Mr. Lincoln, don't hurt us; we only want to leave in peace," that some people think was the secessionists' attitude.

A governor of a state doesn't talk that way to the President of the United States. What would Washington or Jackson have done confronted with such an ultimatum?

Could the South trust Lincoln to keep his word and only send in food and supplies to the fort? Judging by how Lincoln had renegged on his promise to evacuate the fort, my guess is that he could have injected the reinforcements into the fort despite his promises not to.

I don't know how these things are done. If they met the ships they could establish whether or not there were troops on them. But instead the Confederacy chose war.

Please go back to posting cartoons if it's easier for you.

Thank you. It seems like a better use of my time.

The caption reads:

The Situation
OFFICER LINCOLN; "I guess I've got you now, JEFF.
JEFF DAVIS. "Guess you have -- well now, let us Compromise."

And no, that sign "Queer Street" probably doesn't have anything to do with the rumors about these guys.

[x]

So, how can we find agreement? The "Secessionists" (for lack of a more specific term) claim the exercise of the "right to secession". When challenged to provide evidence of this so-called right, they invariably (non-responsively) respond, "Show me where in the Constitution it is prohibited?!" They point to the Tenth Amendment and say, "well!" "Fill in the blanks!"

The plain truth is that for whatever reasons, it wasn't codified.

How can there be a secession if no such process is defined within the law? Now I'll admit that my history is a little sparse so I'm not rock-solid on how this secession was performed. Did they follow the same path they followed to get into the union? Did the states approach Congress and ask them to vote to allow them to leave? Did they sign a form? Did they spin around three times and say, "I break with thee; I break with thee; I break with thee"?!

You make an agreement. You agree that federal laws are superior to state laws. What we do at the federal level outranks what states do.

So if you want to dissolve the Union, you have to do it at the federal level -- in Congress, by federal law, maybe by constititional amendment, though that's less likely. Of course the states and their citizens would have a say in the process. But a state convention or legislature can't just say "We've had it, we're leaving" any more than a city or town could.

That's my take on the question anyway.

Things were complicated because of the original ratification process. If the people meeting in a state convention needed to ratify the Constititution it was easy to assume that the state had assented to it in the convention. And if the state had chosen in a convention to join the union, could it decide in convention to separate? I'd say that new federal channels had been opened up and had to be used, so long as the government was responsive and legitimate.

The other problem was the passage of time. If North Carolina ratified in 1789 and had second thoughts in 1790, what would have happened? If Rhode Island and Vermont stayed out of the union and New Hampshire decided to join them during Washington's administration what would have been the upshot?

I don't know, but it wouldn't have been as bad as what happened in the 1860s, because the country hadn't had much experience yet as an independent nation. It hadn't built up those things that go with a federal government and a national existence. Things would be different as time passed and the national debt grew. Different especially if a state that the nation had acquired territorially and done a lot to settle decided to leave, like Louisiana or Florida.

Anger and testosterone or adrenaline were the other problems. When parts of the country come into conflict a lot can be done to arrange things. But if people get angry and impatient, coming to an agreement may look cowardly to them. Their sense of victimization is too strong. Only immediate action, whatever the consequences, would settle things for them.

Intellectually, you can say that if South Carolina severed its relations with the rest of the country it would have to respect federal property within the state. Emotionally, it was hard for South Carolinians to do so. There was a revolutionary side to secession that didn't enter into Jefferson Davis's dry pages or today's theoretical defenses of the Confederacy.

North and South, there was a panic that overturned rational or logical explanations and pushed the country towards chaos. When a lot of people look at Lincoln now, they see his actions in light of the Union victory and the generations of Republican rule that followed and conclude that there had to be a plan or conspiracy involved. But I suspect he was playing things by ear and trying to do what looked like it might work.

When you look back at what Clay and Webster were saying in 1850 about disunion it's amazing how clearly they saw what would come out of secession. It was the fear that secession meant war that led to so many compromises in Congress. But when South Carolinians and others got so angry at the rest of the country, they really weren't thinking about the possible consequences of their actions. In a time of crisis, prudence looked like cowardice to a lot of people.

[PLMerite]

“If you bring these leaders to trial, it will condemn the North, for by the Constitution, secession is not rebellion.” - Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase, 1865

[Non-Sequitur]

“If you bring these leaders to trial, it will condemn the North, for by the Constitution, secession is not rebellion.” - Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase, 1865

"When, therefore, Texas became one of the United States, she entered into an indissoluble relation. All the obligations of perpetual union, and all the guaranties of republican government in the Union, attached at once to the State. The act which consummated her admission into the Union was something more than a compact; it was the incorporation of a new member into the political body. And it was final. The union between Texas and the other States was as complete, as perpetual, and as indissoluble as the union between the original States. There was no place for reconsideration, or revocation, except through revolution, or through consent of the States." - Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase, 1868

[PLMerite]

I guess someone must have shown him the part of the Constitution that said you couldn’t leave. Can you point me to that passage?

[Non-Sequitur]

I guess someone must have shown him the part of the Constitution that said you couldn’t leave. Can you point me to that passage?

Didn't you bother to read the quote? Chief Justice Chase didn't say that a state couldn't leave. He said that a state could not leave unilaterally, without the consent of a majority of the other states.

I can point out several places in the Constitution where the need for the consent of the other states in implied, primarily in Article IV, Section 3 and Article I, Section 10.

Now, can you tell me where the Constitution allows a state to take federal property without compensation, repudiate their share of the federal debt built up by the country while they were a part, and walk away from treaty obligations entered into by the country while they were a part? Article and Section if you don't mind, or amendment if that's where you found it.

[PLMerite]

“He said that a state could not leave unilaterally, without the consent of a majority of the other states.”

I do not have to ask permission to leave a room. I doubt that the colonies/territories would have ratified the Constitution if they thought they couldn’t get out.

But, machts nichts. The North won so they get to write the history and make it all nice and legal.

“Now, can you tell me where the Constitution allows a state to take federal property without compensation, repudiate their share of the federal debt built up by the country while they were a part, and walk away from treaty obligations entered into by the country while they were a part? Article and Section if you don’t mind, or amendment if that’s where you found it.”

I wonder what the balance sheet was regarding how much Southern states contributed to the Union versus how much they received. Was there even a Federal Debt back then, and how much, I wonder, would it have cost the South to ransom its freedom?

In the end it was [most probably] better that the Union was kept together, but I give my ancestors a lot of credit for having the guts to do what they did.

[Non-Sequitur]

I do not have to ask permission to leave a room.

You do, if the circumstances require it. For example if you're serving on a jury or are a student in a class.

I doubt that the colonies/territories would have ratified the Constitution if they thought they couldn’t get out.

There is no reason why they can't get out. They just can't walk out unilaterally.

The North won so they get to write the history and make it all nice and legal.

And the South lost, so they get to write all the myths explaining why the lost and why they rebelled in the first place.

I wonder what the balance sheet was regarding how much Southern states contributed to the Union versus how much they received. Was there even a Federal Debt back then, and how much, I wonder, would it have cost the South to ransom its freedom?

There was a balance sheet, and there was a federal debt. What the South's share of both is unknown because they just took whatever they could get their hands on and walked away from the debt. Now, what part of the Constitution gave them that right?

In the end it was [most probably] better that the Union was kept together, but I give my ancestors a lot of credit for having the guts to do what they did.

And their ancestors have been whining about losing ever since.

[PLMerite]

“And their ancestors have been whining about losing ever since.”

And the “winners” ancestors can’t get over that the “losers” ancestors aren’t contrite at all.

:)

[rockrr]

I would argue that, as American citizens, we’re all winners...

[rustbucket]

Remuneration for their part of the federal debt? Bondholders would be paid wherever they lived. Rather the Southern states would have to assume their share of paying off the federal debt. Whether they were willing to do this I don't know, but seizing federal facilities to pay off what you owe doesn't make much sense.

From South Carolina to Buchanan [emphasis mine]:

WASHINGTON, 28th DECEMBER, 1860.

Sir: We have the honor to transmit to you a copy of the full powers from the Convention of the People of South Carolina, under which we are "authorized and empowered to treat with the Government of the United States for the delivery of the forts, magazines, light houses and other real estate, with their appurtenances, within the limits of South Carolina, and also for an apportionment of the public debt and for a division of all other property held by the Government of the United States as agent of the confederated States, of which South Carolina was recently a member; and generally to negotiate as to all other measures and arrangements proper to be made and adopted in the existing relation of the parties, and for the continuance of peace and amity between this commonwealth and the Government at Washington."

The Confederate Congress' instruction to the Southern Commissioners [emphasis mine]:

Resolved, etc., That said commissioners be further instructed to present to the Government of the United States assurances of the sincere wish on the part of this Government to preserve the most friendly relations between the two Governments and the States comprising the same, and to settle, by peaceful negotiations all matters connected with the public property and the indebtedness of the Government of the United States existing before the withdrawal of any of the States of this Confederacy; and to this end said commissioners are hereby fully empowered to negotiate with the Government of the United States in reference to said matters, and to adjust the same upon principles of justice, equality, and right.

And the idea that you get the Mint in New Orleans because you "give up" the one in Philadelphia or San Francisco doesn't make complete sense either. As they say in the banking industry there are "substantial penalties for early withdrawal." You don't get to write your own terms for leaving.

You don't get to dictate terms to those leaving either if the property is within their boundaries and you don't wish to peacefully negotiate a fair settlement. Unless you force your will at the point of a bayonet.

Lincoln essentially said in his inaugural speech that he was going to occupy the South by putting soldiers in the Southern forts and collecting tariff from ships coming into the South. Perhaps the best summary of Lincoln's inaugural was given by the New York Day Book newspaper:

In other words, though you do not recognize me as President, I shall not molest you if you will pay taxes for the support of my government. We must have your money, that we cannot bring ourselves to decline, and if you do not let us have it peacefully, why, we shall be compelled to take it from you by force; in which case you, not we, will be the aggressors. This means coercion and civil war and nothing else.

We've been in conflict with Cuba for almost fifty years in large part because Castro expropriated US property without compensation. After the revolution. Like that mattered.

Saudi Arabia expropriated far more US property than Cuba, yet we pragmatically deal with them all the time. Lincoln could have negotiated with the South for the forts, mints, public debt, etc. and let the South go peacefully, but he didn't.

In this as in other things, I don't know how reliable a witness Lamon is. I get the impression from a quick search that nothing is known for certain about what Lincoln's message was and what message Lamon delivered

The message that Lamon delivered was reported by the governor. I'll be happy to report the governor's words about it if you wish. The day after Lamon met with the governor, Beauregard communicated to Anderson what Lamon had said to the governor. Lamon also met with Anderson. Anderson expressed frustration a few days later:

Having been in daily expectation, since the return of Colonel Lamon to Washington, of receiving orders to vacate this post, I have kept these men here as long as I could ...

Lamon's message seems clear. Was Lamon lying about the message coming from Lincoln? If Seward and Lamon were conducting critical negotiations on their own behind Lincoln's back misrepresenting Lincoln's intentions in a matter likely to end in war, it seems logical that Lincoln would have fired them. Yet he didn't. Why not?

So we have Lamon and Seward basically communicating the same message, said by Lamon to be what Lincoln told him to say. Then we have Lincoln trying to dissociate himself from the misleading the South over the evacuation of Sumter, but taking no action against the people that did the misleading? I smell a politician at work.

Lamon, of course, is the guy who said Lincoln issued an order to arrest Chief Justice Taney, something that Taney and others (one of the other justices I believe) were aware of at the time. It is no surprise that Lincoln apologists would like to discredit Lamon.

Read it again -- and let's assume for a minute that Pickens actually said it. It's anything but the humble, "Please, please Mr. Lincoln, don't hurt us; we only want to leave in peace," that some people think was the secessionists' attitude.

Read Jefferson Davis' address to the Senate of January 10, 1861, sometime. He gives a 'let us leave in peace' speech. But Davis also said if you want to fight about it, we'll fight.

A governor of a state doesn't talk that way to the President of the United States. What would Washington or Jackson have done confronted with such an ultimatum?

South Carolina was no longer in the Union. Pickens could say what he liked. Washington acknowledged that North Carolina was no longer a member of the present union when they delayed ratifying the Constitution. The Constitution didn't apply to North Carolina at that point, the other states having left the perpetual union. Washington would have been aware of what the New York, Virginia, and Rhode Island ratifiers of the Constitution said that it meant to them. For example, from New York:

We, the delegates of the people of the state of New York, duly elected and met in Convention, having maturely considered the Constitution for the United States of America, agreed to on the 17th day of September, in the year 1787, by the Convention then assembled at Philadelphia, in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, (a copy whereof precedes these presents,) and having also seriously and deliberately considered the present situation of the United States, — Do declare and make known, —

... That the powers of government may be reassumed by the people whensoever it shall become necessary to their happiness ...

... Under these impressions, and declaring that the rights aforesaid cannot be abridged or violated, and that the explanations aforesaid are consistent with the said Constitution, and in confidence that the amendments which shall have been proposed to the said Constitution will receive an early and mature consideration, — We, the said delegates, in the name and in the behalf of the people of the state of New York, do, by these presents, assent to and ratify the said Constitution.

The 1860-61 secession wasn't a Whiskey Rebellion situation. In the earlier instance Washington met with the governor of Pennsylvania. No governor or legislature appealed to Lincoln for aid in suppressing a rebellion. In 1860-61 the seceding states resumed their own governance and powers previously delegated to the United States, consistent with the New York, Virginia, and Rhode Island ratifications.

Jackson? As a general, Jackson tossed a judge in jail in 1814 or 15 for ruling against him in a habeas corpus case, and he ignored a Supreme Court ruling, so he sounds very much like Lincoln.

[Non-Sequitur]

...instruction to the Southern Commissioners...

Why didn't they settle debt before they walked out on it, and paid for federal property before they seized it?

You don't get to dictate terms to those leaving either if the property is within their boundaries...

But it wasn't their property. It was, at best, partly their property. But they took it anyway.

...and you don't wish to peacefully negotiate a fair settlement.

No chance was available to negotiate a fair settlement before the South stole the property and repudiated the debt. And having taken what they wanted, what incentive was there for the South to negotiate a fair settlement in good faith?

Lincoln essentially said in his inaugural speech that he was going to occupy the South by putting soldiers in the Southern forts and collecting tariff from ships coming into the South.

What Lincoln specifically said that he was going to retain posession of that federal property not already stolen and that he was going to uphold the laws, which included collecting tariffs, delivering the mail, and running the courts. What is provocative about that?

Lincoln could have negotiated with the South for the forts, mints, public debt, etc. and let the South go peacefully, but he didn't.

The South could have negotiated a fair settlement on all questions of possible disagreement before they left, but they didn't.

[rustbucket]

But it wasn't their property. It was, at best, partly their property. But they took it anyway.

And they left behind all those federal facilities in the North and most of the territories that had been purchased in part with Southern blood and money. Was their share of what they gave up equal to what they took? Fair is fair.

What Lincoln specifically said that he was going to retain posession of that federal property not already stolen and that he was going to uphold the laws, which included collecting tariffs, delivering the mail, and running the courts. What is provocative about that?

What gives Lincoln the right to collect tariffs on foreign ships entering another country's harbors? That is an act of war. And we'll deliver our own mail and run our own courts, thank you all the same. Where was Donald Trump when you needed him to tell them they'd been fired?

Leave the courts under Lincoln? We all know how Lincoln treated courts and judges and citizens who spoke or wrote against his actions.

Lincoln was so trustworthy that we should accept his word that he was just going to deliver supplies to the fort? Lincoln's agent Fox lied to the governor about his visit to the fort being for peaceful purposes. Lincoln's agent Lamon told the governor Sumter would be evacuated. Lincoln's cabinet minister Seward misled the Southern Commissioners. Lincoln planned a secret expedition into South Carolina territorial waters after he had given the message that the fort would be evacuated. Lincoln told the Senate he had nothing of importance to tell them before they adjourned, but the next day issued orders that would probably cause war. What is the common element to all these deceptions?

The South could have negotiated a fair settlement on all questions of possible disagreement before they left, but they didn't.

There was no requirement that they do so, just as there was no requirement that they stay in the Union despite assertions that they had to get permission to do so.