Posted on 10/12/2018 7:13:42 PM PDT by yesthatjallen
President Trump praised Confederate Geader Robert E. Lee as "a great general" on Friday during a campaign rally in Lebanon, Ohio.
"So Robert E. Lee was a great general. And Abraham Lincoln developed a phobia. He couldn’t beat Robert E. Lee," Trump said before launching into a monologue about Lee, Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant.
"He was going crazy. I don’t know if you know this story. But Robert E. Lee was winning battle after battle after battle. And Abraham Lincoln came home, he said, 'I can’t beat Robert E. Lee,'" Trump said.
"And he had all of his generals, they looked great, they were the top of their class at West Point. They were the greatest people. There’s only one problem — they didn’t know how the hell to win. They didn’t know how to fight. They didn’t know how," he continued.
Trump went on to say, multiple times, that Grant had a drinking problem, saying that the former president "knocked the hell out of everyone" as a Union general.
"Man was he a good general. And he’s finally being recognized as a great general," Trump added.
— NBC News (@NBCNews) October 13, 2018 Trump has drawn criticism for his defense of Confederate statues, including those of Robert E. Lee.
He drew widespread condemnation last year following a deadly rally in Charlottesville, Va., saying that white nationalist protesters were there to oppose the removal of a "very, very important" statue.
"They were there to protest the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee,” Trump said at the time. “This week it's Robert E. Lee. I noticed that Stonewall Jackson is coming down. I wonder, is it George Washington next week and is it Thomas Jefferson the week after? You know, you really do have to ask yourself, where does it stop?”
Trump, speaking at another rally in Ohio last year, said that he can be one of the “most presidential” presidents to hold office. "…With the exception of the late, great Abraham Lincoln, I can be more presidential than any president that’s ever held this office,” he said to a crowd in Youngstown.
Went back to look at it again. Got this far and stopped reading.
Second, and to your point: so also Franklin Roosevelt's advisers in 1940 told FDR that sending the US Pacific "war fleet" from San Diego to Pearl Harbor would provoke the Japanese and start war.
If you want me to take you seriously, you are going to have to avoid trying to get me to buy into your crazy comparisons.
Southerners certainly didn't see existential threats to slavery in the 1840s when Fire Eaters first began campaigning for secession.
And they didn't in 1850 when Fire Eater activity reached a peak before the 1850 Compromise.
And they still didn't in 1856 when Democrats united to elect Doughfaced Northerner James Buchanan President.
So in 1860 Fire Eaters tried a different strategy.
First they split apart their national Democrat party, North vs. South, based on what?
Split over tariffs?
No, they split apart, North vs. South, over slavery.
With Democrats now guaranteed defeat in 1860 Fire Eaters next announced that if "Black Republicans" won, Fire Eaters would declare secession on that account alone.
Secession over tariffs? No.
Secession over "Northeastern power brokers"? No.
Secession over "European money flows"? No.
No, in 1860 Fire Eaters announced they'd declare secession if "Black Republicans" won, secession to protect slavery, period.
And that's just what they did.
DiogenesLamp: "I have read others allege and I lean toward's the view that agitation to secede because of slavery was just a means to cover up their real reasons for leaving, which were financial gain. "
And right here is where your lust for historical fantasies overcomes all semblance of good judgment -- because even a smidgen of common sense would tell you that even if the "top 1%" were motivated by power and money, the vast 90%+ were motivated by just what they said -- slavery -- and that's what made it happen.
I'm saying the unique motives of those "top 1%" are irrelevant if they differed from the other 90+% because without the majority support no secession could happen.
So what's important here is not that some in the "top 1%" may have cynically taken advantage of the slavery issue for their own financial advantage.
Rather, the important point is that the vast majority of Deep South voters did believe slavery was threatened in 1860 by "Black Republicans".
If your argument is that he had the right to confiscate anything used in the war effort, why didn't he confiscate their horses, or their cattle, or their homes, or whatever else was used? If the purpose is to confiscate in defiance of due process, why is this one so narrow?
Sounds to me like it wasn't about military purposes at all, it was simply what he preferred to do, and is therefore not a legitimate use of that power.
Making it discretionary makes it dictatorial.
Certainly, it "rigidly" enumerates powers:
The Confederacy also had confiscatory policies, if I am not mistaken.
"Unilateral"??
Such an odd word, not used back then.
"Due Process" was certainly used then, and laws of Congress provided as much "process" as considered "due".
During times of war or rebellion, etc., the amount of "process" considered "due" enemy combatants was certainly less than in normal peacetime.
It was in fact neither one, but because this power could not be used if it was called what it really was, the order went out to continuously call it an "insurrection" or a "rebellion."
Rebellion is a master/slave relationship. It does not apply to members of equal status. It does not apply to states leaving an organization of which they no longer wished to be a part, and doing so in a democratic and orderly fashion.
But Lincoln could do nothing about it unless he could put forth some sort of figleaf to justify the power he would have to claim to stop them.
Beyond that, Article IV, Section 2 still says slaves have to be returned so long as they are held by the laws of any state.
It specifically says no state law can prevent this, and because it is in the main body of the US Constitution, no congressional law or executive action can override it either.
He did in fact confiscate their houses, their horses, their mules, their cotton, their cattle, hogs, chickens, their wheat and their corn. Read what Phil Sheridan did in the Shenandoah valley or Sherman through Georgia in 1864. They destroyed or confiscated anything of use to the Confederate cause. Not selectively or optionally, all was destroyed or confiscated. The term for it now days is total war.
Why? Do they contain a constitutional amendment in there that has somehow been overlooked by history?
If the constitution says you *WILL* do something, I cannot grasp how congress can do anything about it short of an amendment.
The Confederacy also had confiscatory policies, if I am not mistaken.
Who cares? The USA was not bound by the laws of the Confederacy. It is bound by the laws of the US Constitution. Except when Lincoln chose to ignore them, of course.
The term "due process" is a well known legal term of art, and it means a court hearing.
No, congress cannot overturn the 5th amendment without passing another amendment and sending it to the states for ratification.
During times of war or rebellion, etc., the amount of "process" considered "due" enemy combatants was certainly less than in normal peacetime.
If you could simply declare someone an "enemy" and therefore not entitled to "due process", then every right can be destroyed by this loop hole.
The burden of proof is on the state. That is as it should be.
Which Supreme Court ruling found these laws unconstitutional
I've never said, "conquered & occupied", I've never even used "conquered" except in the sense of defeated and reduced in size & population.
So you are battling furiously against a straw man of your own creation.
I've also noted that in 1861 70% of the battles fought were in Union states & territories.
Can you explain to me how that was not an existential threat?
Well that's hard to believe, because somehow they managed to survive without all that. Or did they? Did these people starve to death? I've read that some say they did.
So Lincoln's army seized all the houses, horses, mules, cotton, cattle, hogs, chickens, wheat and corn in the confederacy?
Hard to believe.
Ask that question to the 120,000 Japanese American citizens sent to concentration camps by an Executive order. The Supreme Court upheld that action.
I'll tell you that right after you tell me how the right to abortion and homosexual marriage got into the constitution.
If you respond that these are fabrications, then I will tell you so is the court rulings that allowed them to do what they did.
Why put forth an "appeal to authority"? Can we not read and understand the law for ourselves?
Nor did Lincoln’s armies seize all the slaves in the Confederacy.
Yes, you send an invading army into another country, and it was completely unreasonable for them to invade you back.
Claiming that an invasion caused by *YOUR* attacking them is an "existential threat" is like killing your parents and then asking mercy from the court because you are an orphan.
You did not answer the question. Which Supreme Court ruling found these laws unconstitutional. Answer the question or say that you cannot. either is acceptable. For the purpose of this discussion, I am not the least interested in the current courts ruling on other issues. If you do not like their ruling, amend the Constitution.
This is another reason I have such contempt for claiming the Supreme Court is an "ex Cathedra" body. Nope, they are pretty much a political body that will bend with the prevailing wins, depending upon who gets put upon it.
The days of interpreting the law as it was originally intended have long been over, and often time the "law" depends upon which side of the bed one of the Judges woke up on.
As someone said when California Prop 8 went to the Supreme court, "Why don't we save a lot of time and just ask Justice Kennedy what he thinks?"
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