...that power can be exercised by them only under the tie of conscience, binding them to the retributive justice of Heaven...the indissoluble link of union between the people of the several states of this confederated nation, is after all, not in the right, but in the heart.It appears as if he considers the State of the Union to consist of all members and if Ringo wants out, or - heaven forbid Harrison - let alone merely Lennon (or least of all Paul), the Beatles would no more be a group; likewise, even the least of the States, e.g., CA, or NY secession (not even contemplating the horrors of R.I. departing) would require the individual States to confederate, attack Britain, and after its re-defeat reseat delegates for the Second Constitutional Convention to reform a new-improved perfect Union. Mind you, a more perfect Union is one thing, but that was the 19th century after all, so a more-prefect more perfect-Union was definitely called for.
If one believes the concept this nation was formed by the grace of God, the onus of God's wrath respecting its dissolution falls squarely upon seccionists heads. Its one thing to revolt against tyranny, but do the principle reasons for seccessoin rise to the degree of egregiousness whereby that which was forged with the blood of patriots is warranted to be discarded so easily as yesterday's sodden fish wrap?
While I admire the Southern soldier's priciples of standing up for their convictions to defend their way of life, I find it abhorhent that the status quo being defended was predicated upon an egregiously inconsistant philosophy as that of the abomination of slavery in contrast to the principles set forth in the Declaration of Independence as being 'self evident' and unalienable rights of Man.
...far better will it be for the people of the disunited states, to part in friendship from each other...In one of the Federalist Papers it is mentioned about the quality of men necessary to be leaders of the Republic being formed and something about angels being governed by men due to their fundamental untrustworthyness and what not. The fact that the Southern secionists chose violance over more peacable alternative speaks volumes about how wicked the angels being governed actually are (and the strength of government necesary to keep 'em in check -lest they run amok causing havok everywhere).
Who's to say if the wife of a philandering husband is ethical by her throwing out all his possession on the front lawn and setting the whole gasoline sodden heap alight? Maybe, but the moral question is moot considering the possibility she meet her husbands friends, Smith, Wesson or Colt if his pristine Honus Wagner baseball card was consumed in said pyre.
You know, I don't condone spousal abuse, but I do understand what turns Mr. Hand into Mr. Fist.
John Quincy Adams, while delivering his eulogy for former President James Madison, talked about Jeffersonian principles and secession:
Concurring in the doctrines that the separate States have a right to interpose in cases of palpable infraction of the constitution by the government of the United States, and that the alien and sedition acts presented a case of such infraction, Mr. Jefferson considered them as absolutely null and void, and thought the State legislatures competent, not only to declare, but to make them so, to resist their execution within their respective borders by physical force, and to secede from the Union, rather than to submit to them, if attempted to be carried into execution by force.
If one believes the concept this nation was formed by the grace of God, the onus of God's wrath respecting its dissolution falls squarely upon seccionists heads. Its one thing to revolt against tyranny, but do the principle reasons for seccessoin rise to the degree of egregiousness whereby that which was forged with the blood of patriots is warranted to be discarded so easily as yesterday's sodden fish wrap?
I think you're confused. It was the Federal Government that rebelled against what confined it, the Constitution. The South simply wanted out. They entered the Union with a stroke of the pen and they left with that same stroke. The Constitutional compact was broken, the agreement was dead. As one Confederate General said:
The causes of the war will be found at the foundation of our political fabric, in our complex organism, in the fundamental law, in the Constitution itself, in the conflicting constructions which it invited, and in the institution of slavery which it recognized and was intended to protect. If asked what was the real issue involved in our unparalleled conflict, the average American citizen will reply, "The negro"; and it is fair to say that had there been no slavery there would have been no war. But there would have been no slavery if the South's protests could have availed when it was first introduced; and now that it is gone, although its sudden and violent abolition entailed upon the South directly and incidentally a series of woes which no pen can describe, yet it is true that in no section would its reestablishment be more strongly and universally resisted. The South steadfastly maintains that responsibility for the presence of this political Pandora's box in this Western world cannot be laid at her door. When the Constitution was adopted and the Union formed, slavery existed in practically all the States; and it is claimed by the Southern people that its disappearance from the Northern and its development in the Southern States is due to climatic conditions and industrial exigencies rather than to the existence or absence of great moral ideas. Slavery was undoubtedly the immediate fomenting cause of the woeful American conflict. It was the great political factor around which the passions of the sections had long been gathered--the tallest pine in the political forest around whose top the fiercest lightnings were to blaze and whose trunk was destined to be shivered in the earthquake shocks of war. But slavery was far from being the sole cause of the prolonged conflict. Neither its destruction on the one hand, nor its defence on the other, was the energizing force that held the contending armies to four years of bloody work. I apprehend that if all living Union soldiers were summoned to the witness stand, every one of them would testify that it was the preservation of the American Union and not the destruction of Southern slavery that induced him to volunteer at the call of his country. As for the South, it is enough to say that perhaps eighty per cent. of her armies were neither slave-holders, nor had the remotest interest in the institution. No other proof, however, is needed than the undeniable fact that at any period of the war from its beginning to near its close the South could have saved slavery by simply laying down its arms and returning to the Union.
It appears as if he considers the State of the Union to consist of all members and if Ringo wants out, or - heaven forbid Harrison - let alone merely Lennon (or least of all Paul), the Beatles would no more be a group; likewise, even the least of the States, e.g., CA, or NY secession (not even contemplating the horrors of R.I. departing) would require the individual States to confederate, attack Britain, and after its re-defeat reseat delegates for the Second Constitutional Convention to reform a new-improved perfect Union. Mind you, a more perfect Union is one thing, but that was the 19th century after all, so a more-prefect more perfect-Union was definitely called for.
Call it a war of terminologies. I say "mine", you say "yours". Daniel Webster believed as you do, and as Lincoln did. It was that whole terminology thing again. What is a State? Is it not the people that reside in it? Then there's that whole Federal vs National Government issue that needs attention. Solving the first issue of who or what is a State there was this letter that James Madison wrote to Webster correcting him over his "one people" theory:
It is fortunate when disputed theories, can be decided by undisputed facts. And here the undisputed fact is, that the Constitution was made by the people, but as embodied into the several States, who were parties to it; and therefore made by the States in their highest authoritative capacity.
And the Virginia Report:
The constitution of the United States was formed by the sanction of the states, given by each in its sovereign capacity. It adds to the stability and dignity, as well as to the authority, of the constitution, that it rests upon this legitimate and solid foundation. The states, then, being the parties to the constitutional compact, and in their sovereign capacity, it follows of necessity that there can be no tribunal above their authority to decide, in the last resort, whether the compact made by them be violated and consequently that, as the parties to it, they must themselves decide, in the last resort, such questions as may be of sufficient magnitude to require their interposition.