Posted on 12/03/2010 4:39:40 AM PST by Colonel Kangaroo
Event marks war's anniversary
CHARLESTON -- The shots are solely verbal -- and expected to remain that way -- but at least one Civil War Sesquicentennial event is triggering conflict.
The Sons of Confederate Veterans plan to hold a $100-per-person "Secession Ball" on Dec. 20 in Gaillard Municipal Auditorium. It will feature a play highlighting key moments from the signing of South Carolina's Ordinance of Secession 150 years ago, an act that severed the state's ties to the Union and put the nation on the path to the Civil War.
Jeff Antley, who is organizing the event, said the Secession Ball honors the men who stood up for their rights.
"To say that we are commemorating and celebrating the signers of the ordinance and the act of South Carolina going that route is an accurate statement," Antley said. "The secession movement in South Carolina was a demonstration of freedom."
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People plans to protest the event, said Charleston branch President Dot Scott. She deferred further comment to Lonnie Randolph, president of the state NAACP.
"It's amazing to me how history can be rewritten to be what you wanted it to be rather than what happened," Randolph said. "You couldn't pay the folks in Charleston to hold a Holocaust gala, could you? But you know, these are nothing but black people, so nobody pays them any attention."
When Southerners refer to states' rights, he said, "they are really talking about their idea of one right -- to buy and sell human beings."
Antley said that's not so.
"It has nothing to do with slavery as far as I'm concerned," he said. "What I'm doing is honoring the men from this state who stood up for their self-government and their rights under law -- the right to secede was understood."
Antley said, "Slavery is an abomination, but slavery is not just a Southern problem. It's an American problem. To lay the fault and the institution of slavery on the South is just ignorance of history."
Antley said about 500 people are expected to attend the ball, which begins with a 45-minute play and concludes with a dinner and dancing. S.C. Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell, an ardent Civil War re-enactor, is among the actors in the play. The actual ordinance of secession document also will be on display.
Randolph said the state NAACP is consulting with its national office in Baltimore regarding the format of the protests, which also could extend to other 150th anniversary events. "There is not one event that's off the table," he said.
Asked whether there could be good Sesquicentennial events, Randolph said, "If there were a dialogue to sit down and discuss that event 150 years ago and how it still negatively impacts the lives of so many people in this state and around the country, that would be a good discussion, but not an event to sit down and tell lies about what happened and glamorize those people who thought America was so sorry and so bad that they wanted to blow it to hell. That's what they did -- that's what they attempted to do, and we want to make that honorable?"
Charleston is receiving increased national attention as the nation's plans for the Sesquicentennial move forward. This was where it began, with the state becoming the first to secede on Dec. 20, 1860, and firing the first shot on April 12, 1861.
Most of the Lowcountry's Sesquicentennial events have been announced with little controversy -- many involve lectures by respected historians and scholars.
In its vision statement for the observance, the National Park Service said it "will address the institution of slavery as the principal cause of the Civil War, as well as the transition from slavery to freedom -- after the war -- for the 4 million previously enslaved African Americans."
Michael Allen of the National Park Service said he is aware of plans for the Secession Ball but noted that most Sesquicentennial events have found common ground among those with differing viewpoints.
"Now some people might be upset with some pieces of the pie. I understand that," he said. "I think that's the growth of me, as a person of African decent, is to realize that people view this in different ways."
Allen said other Sesquicentennial commemorations being planned will mark events that have a strong black history component, such as Robert Smalls' theft of the Confederate ship Planter and the 54th Massachusetts' assault on Battery Wagener.
"At least what's being pulled together by various groups, be they black or white or whatever, will at least be more broad based and diverse than what was done in 1961," Allen said. "Hopefully, at the end of the day, all Carolinians can benefit from this four-year journey."
Tom O'Rourke, director of the Charleston County Park and Recreation Commission, said Sesquicentennial organizers were fooling themselves if they thought the Confederate side of the story was going to be buried in the observances.
"I think there will be controversy, I think there will be hurt feelings, and I think that as this anniversary passes, we will question what else we could have done to tell the whole story," he said. "But I am OK with all of that. ... I think all discussion is progress."
Read more: http://www.thesunnews.com/2010/12/03/1847335/secession-ball-stirs-controversy.html#ixzz1737LSVRv
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Your a F'ing idiot on so many levels...
First of all, calling what has happened to this union of states over the last few decades "adverse election results" is like saying the jews of socialist Germany had a bit of a problem.
Second.. The founders encouraged, empowered and implored their posterity to throw off government tyranny as quickly as possible by WHATEVER MEANS. The founders also understood that the right of people to break an association with others is a natural right that can not be mitigated by any law created by man. In other words, Secession is a natural right of men. If we come to the conclusion that our government is subjecting us to absolute and miserable tyranny, then we have the right and duty to disassociate ourselves from those who wish to make us slaves to their will, and the founders of this union would stand up and F'ing applaud the day we do...
Slavery is still a Muslim problem.
My GGGF was a slave owner and a corporal in the US Cavalry. Sure, he was fighting for slavery.
Revolution is a right of man. Thomas Jefferson, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln all believed that. But secession, a narrower constitutional concept is not revolution. The secessionists wanted to reap the fruits of revolution without having recourse to the long list of abuses that overcomes the proper adherence to established government as spoken of in the Declaration of Independence:
"Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes"
I believe that the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 is the perfect example of a light and transient cause that the Declaration speaks of.
Ewww. That's got to sting a little. Better put some ice on it.
I believe that too. I had a GGG uncle who set his slaves free and gave them a generous amount of land years before the war when he volunteered in the rebel army. But that has very little to do with the secessionists, a whole different group, seceding over slavery.
“There were a lot of reasons for Southern states’ secession; some legitimate; some completely immoral.”
For that matter, there are a lot of reasons for our present Government’s functions - some legitimate and some completely immoral.
Such is the condition of institutions of man.
” I say this as a lifelong Yankee.”
As you obviously know, “Yankee” is a state of mind more than it is a geographical matter.
So who do you think voted those “elites” into power to represent them at the State legislatures? I’ll grant you that some of them had motives for seccession that were based on a desire to protect slavery due to personal fortunes made in the slave trade but you can’t claim that all Southern State legislaters were slavery proponents just because some of them were. It’s the same as saying that all Republicans today are corrupt just because we have RINOs.
There is always a trigger. There is always a spark. Secession occurred in 1860, and you see Lincoln as the cause. I say he was simply a spark.
From at least 1807 to 1860 there was a constant struggle between northern and southern interests. This was the major political issue for 3 generations. Congress was constantly seeking compromises and a balance of power was constantly negotiated. Meanwhile, presidents were elected either as supporters of southern interests or as neutral figures who did not want to rock the boat. From Jackson through Buchanan, no president supported northern interests in preference to southern interests.
Lincoln became a spark simply because he was the first northern sympathizer to hold the office of president since JQ Adams. The political situation was hardly "light and transient". It was, in fact, intractable. States rights had been a bone of contention for our entire history and with the election of Lincoln, it appeared likely that the northern interests would become permanently dominant.
It was time to change the government. The union of the several states had changed, and the imposition of northern will had proceeded to an intolerable point. It seems clear to me that this is very analogous to the situation that caused Jefferson to write the Declaration of Independence in the first place.
A free people should be free to decide if they wish to participate in a particular political entity. The people of SC voted, and decided to leave. There is nothing in the Constitution which says this was improper. Lincoln, however, decided that their vote was worth nothing, and he ended up raising an army to invade his own country and impose his will on sovereign states. There is nothing in the Constitution which allowed him to do that.
Agreed. What’s more, there were several States that only pressed for secession after Lincoln went after SC. My home State (Commonwealth actually) of VA, for example, didn’t vote for secession until after Lincoln started demanding troops to invade SC.
My SCV camp, the William T. Sherman Camp of the SCV, did not get an invitation.
I think the SCV would have taken a lot of heat if they invited the Sherman camp.....
Are you sure about that? After all, while the richer Southerners may have owned slaves, the vast majority of Southerners did not own slaves. Those majorities made up the armies that the North eventually crushed when they invaded the South. I’m sorry, but men don’t fight and die for something that doesn’t concern them, and slavery didn’t concern the majority of the South despite the efforts to revise our history. Their fight was over the rights of the States to determine their own future.
Unlike the North, the South had men of all classes (rich and poor) fighting for their side. The North allowed the wealthy to buy their way out of the draft ($300). This caused riots in the North, as only poor males were being conscripted (America’s nastiest riot ever was the NYC draft riots in 1863)
It’s not really about 1860. You can go back to 1812 and see that the north wanted commerce and the south wanted tariffs
Actually..that would be the reverse. The North preferred tariffs to protect their growing manufacturing infrastructure....while the South wanted “Free Trade” to find markets for their agricultural products (mainly cotton)
If any one thing cost the South the Civil War was their insistence of Free Trade. As we can see in modern times....Free Trade does not allow for a strong manufacturing base...and the South did not have the manufacturing to build the materiel and weapons to fight the North. The help from the South’s trading partners (mainly the British) did not come forth. The North had the materiel, weapons, and the transport to fight an expansive war.
The South was correct in their interpretation of the Constitution and laws....but got burned by the economics.
Lincoln's defenders want the ACW to be 100% about slavery, but that is too simplistic. There were important economic factors, foreign policy factors and also important factors relating to constitutional interpretation.
It was not a simple matter and I would argue that the eventual outcome (a powerful central government, with a greatly diminished role for state governments) was the wrong road to go down.
I thought secessionists didn’t have balls. Wait a minute...that didn’t come out right.
Don't feel poorly about the snub, the First Alabama Cavalry didn't get invited either.
Yea, it's called the EXPANSION of slavery into free states and free territories yet to become states.
Thanks. After I posted that I saw that I had screwed up the details — but, as you appear to recognize, the overall point stands.
Lincoln’s defenders want the ACW to be 100% about slavery, but that is too simplistic. There were important economic factors, foreign policy factors and also important factors relating to constitutional interpretation.
It was not a simple matter and I would argue that the eventual outcome (a powerful central government, with a greatly diminished role for state governments) was the wrong road to go down.
The worst aspect of the whole Civil War was the expansion of a central Federal Government. The South was 100% correct on this issue....and it was the main issue of the whole war
Few realize that many in the North did not want the war, either. The NYC riots are a perfect example.
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