[BroJoeK]

MamaTexan: "Fair enough. No Confederate soldier had been killed by any Union force prior to the Declaration of War.
Since the subject was the constitutionality of secession and not battle casualties, I really don't see what it has to do with the subject."

My argument in post #100 included 10 items, of which items 1 - 4 dealt with the constitutionality of secession.

Items 5 - 10 covered the Confederacy's insurrections and formal declaration of war on the United States.

Item 9 simply pointed out that there was no physical war -- and no Confederate soldiers had been killed -- before the Confederacy decided to start, wage and formally declare war on the United States.

The real truth of the matter is that Confederates wanted war, because they expected to win, and believed war was by far simpler than waging many years of compromising legal battles in the Supreme Court, in Congress or in elections necessary to achieve a constitutionally authorized secession by mutual consent.

[MamaTexan]

My argument in post #100 included 10 items, of which items 1 - 4 dealt with the constitutionality of secession. Items 5 - 10 covered the Confederacy's insurrections and formal declaration of war on the United States.

All of which were sourced and refuted in post#106.

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Item 9 simply pointed out that there was no physical war -- and no Confederate soldiers had been killed -- before the Confederacy decided to start, wage and formally declare war on the United States.

To which I agreed.

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The real truth of the matter is that Confederates wanted war, because they expected to win, and believed war was by far simpler than waging many years of compromising legal battles in the Supreme Court, in Congress or in elections necessary to achieve a constitutionally authorized secession by mutual consent.

The REAL truth is the South had two choices: leave or have their agrarian based economy obliterated....all because a 250 year old institution acknowledged by the Constitution had become unpopular.

Had the Union not decided free association could be kept by force of arms, they would have then have had the legitimate ability to change the Constitution to prohibit slavery, and could have rightfully protected every slave that managed to make it across the border....but I guess THAT would have been too easy.

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I've given sources to support the constitutionality of secession, yet you ignore them and rattle on as if your conjecture is fact.

And I'm STILL waiting for you to show me the Unions Constitutionally required Declaration of War.

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Allow the president to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such a purpose—and you allow him to make war at pleasure.
Abraham Lincoln ~ Letter to William Herndon Feb. 15, 1848