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I Pledge allegiance to the Confederate Flag
Dixienews.com ^ | December 24, 2001 | Lake E. High, Jr.

Posted on 12/24/2001 4:25:26 AM PST by WhiskeyPapa

I Pledge allegiance to the Confederate Flag, and to the Southern People and the Culture for which it stands

by Lake E. High, Jr.

The Confederate flag is again under attack, as it has always been, and as it always will be. It is under attack because of what it symbolizes. The problem is that to many Southerners have forgotten just what it does symbolize.

The Confederate Nation of 1860 - 1865 was the intellectual, as well as the spiritual, continuation of the United States of America as founded, planned, and formed by Southerners. It was the stated, and often repeated, position of almost all Southerners in the 1860’s that they, and the South, were the heirs of the original political theory embodied in the U. S. Constitution of 1789. In 1860 their attempted to separate from the rest of the states and form their own nation since that was the only way the South could preserve the philosophy and the virtues that had made the United States the magnificent nation it had become.

In both of these contentions, that is, the South was the true repository of the original political theory that made the United States great, and the South was the true home of the people who took the necessary actions to found, make, and preserve the original United States, Southerners have been proven by the passage of time to be correct.

The Southern colonies of Virginia, North and South Carolina and Maryland were where the majority of the original American population resided until the 1700’s despite the fact Massachusetts was settled only 13 years after Virginia and New York was settled 18 years before South Carolina. As the population of the colonies grew, the New England States and the middle Atlantic states, gained population so that by the time of the American Revolutionary War the two general areas of the north and the South were generally equal in size with a small population advantage being shown by Virginia. This slight difference in population by a southern state was to have a profound effect on the development of the United States.

First of all, the New England states managed to start a war with England, which they verbalized as "taxation without representation." In truth the problem from their point of view was the taxes on their trade. Having started the war they then promptly managed to lose it. The British, after conquering the entire north from Maine (then part of Massachusetts) to Boston, to Providence, to New York, to the new nation’s capital, Philadelphia, shifted their military forces to move against the Southern colonies. They secured their foothold in the South by capturing Savannah and Charleston and then proceeded to move inland to subdue the Southern population. They planed to catch the Virginia forces under General Washington in a coordinated attack moving down from the north, which they held, and up from the South that they thought they would also conquer.

The British army that had mastered the north found they could not defeat the Southern people. Once in the backwoods of the South they found themselves to be the beaten Army. The British defeats at Kings Mountain and Cowpens were absolute. Their Pyrrhic victories at Camden and Guilford Courthouse were tantamount to defeat. In both North Carolina and South Carolina they were so weakened they had to retreat from the area of their few "victories" within days. Their defeats at those well-known sites among others, along with their defeat at Yorktown in Virginia, led directly to their surrender.

Having secured the political freedom from England for all the colonists, Southerners then mistakenly sat back and took a smaller role in forming the new American government that operated under an "Articles of Confederation." That first attempt at forming a government fell to the firebrands of New England who has started the war and who still asserted their moral position of leadership despite their poor showing on the field of battle. These Articles of Confederation, the product of the Yankee political mind, gave too much economic self determination to the separate colonies (as the Northern colonies had demanded in an attempt to protect their shipping, trade and manufacturing) and too little power of enforcement to a central government.

After a period of six difficult years, when the Articles of Confederation failed as a form of government, another convention was called and a new form of government was drawn up. This time the convention was under the leadership of Southerners and they brought forth the document we all refer to as the U.S. Constitution. Even northern historians do not try to pretend the Constitution and the ideas embodied therein are anything other than a product of the Southern political mind. (Yankee historians cannot deny it, but they do choose to ignore it so their students grow up ignorant of the fact that the Constitution is Southern.) So, as it turns out, when the new nation found itself in political trouble it was the South which, once again, came to the rescue just as it had when the nation found itself previously in military trouble.

With the slight population advantage it enjoyed over other states, Virginia was able to give to the new nation politicians who are nothing short of demigods. Their names are revered in all areas of the civilized world wherever political theorists converge. Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Randolph, Henry, Taylor and Monroe are just a few, there are many more. These men along with the leading political minds of South Carolina, Rutledge, Heyward, and, most importantly, Pinckney, saw their new nation through its birth and establishment.

The military leadership, as well as the political leadership, of the South saw the nation through its expansion. Under Southern leadership the British were defeated a second time in 1814. Under Southerners, most obviously John Tyler and Andrew Jackson, Florida was added as a state. The defeat of Mexico in 1846, under the Southern leadership of James Polk and numerous Southern military officers, established of the United States as a force to be feared. That was an astonishing accomplishment for so small and so young a nation

Thomas Jefferson, who added the Louisiana Purchase, barely escaped impeachment for his efforts. The north argued continuously against the war with Mexico that added the area from Texas to California just as they had argued against the Louisiana Purchase. One Congressman from Illinois, Abraham Lincoln, was particularly vehement against Texas being made a state. Northerners, having seen Mexico defeated and the United States enlarged all the way to the Pacific Ocean, then objected to the methods and motives of the acquisition of the Washington and Oregon territories in the northwest. Polk, who had added that vast area from Louisiana to California to Colorado to the pacific northwest, served only one term as President due to the constant attacks he sufferer in the Northern press. Left to the people of the north, the French would still control from Minnesota to Louisiana and Mexico would control from Texas to the Pacific while Canada would still include Washington, Oregon Idaho and Montana.

Every square inch of soil that now comprises the continental United States was added under a Southern president, and they did it over the strenuous political objections of the north. The provincial and mercenary Yankee people fought every effort to expand the United States. The expansion of the United States became a regional political disagreement that spread ill feeling north and South. Its accomplishment by Southerners was no small feat. It was accomplished under Southern military leadership and with much Southern blood. (Which is why Tennessee is called "The Volunteer State" and the names of Southerners are almost exclusively the only ones found on memorial tablets and monuments from Texas to California.). The expansion of the original colonies into the continental power it became was completely the results of the Southern mind and Southern leadership.

Having secured the freedom of the United States from England and then having formed and led the successful government into a new political age under a written constitution that is still the envy of the whole world, the South gave the entire military and political leadership that formed the United States into the boundaries it now enjoys. But these magnificent accomplishments were soon to be overshadowed by population shifts and the ensuing results that brings in a representative government. By the early 1820s the north had finally secured just enough additional population that it had achieved enough political clout to start protecting its first love, its money. The unfair and punitive tariffs that were passed in 1828 led to the South’s first half-hearted attempt to form its own separate government with the Nullification movement of 1832. The threat of war that South Carolina held out in 1832 then caused a negotiated modification of those laws to where the South could live with them. For the time being, the political question was settled by compromise.

While those changes pacified the political leaders of the South for the time being, some statesmen could see, even then, that if the North ever became totally dominant politically, the South would be destroyed, not just economically, but philosophically and spiritually as well. Those statesmen, with Calhoun in the lead, then started planting the intellectual seeds that led to the South’s second attempt at political freedom in 1860.

Unfortunately, in the 1840’s Yankee abolitionist introduced the new poison of the "voluntary end" of slavery as a political issue. There were attempts by many Southerners to defuse this situation by offering an economic solution. That is, Southerners offered to end slavery in the South just as England had ended it in the West Indies, by having the slave-holders paid for their losses when the slaves were freed. The abolitionist Yankees would have none of that. Their position was simple, the South could give up it slaves for free and each farmer could absorb the loss personally. There was to be no payment. To the Yankee abolitionists it was either their way or war.

The fact that the abolitionist movement became a dominant presence in the northern part of the United States from the 1840’s on is primarily because a liberal can politicize any subject and enrage any body of people regardless of the level of preexisting good will. (As current liberals have turned the simple good sense argument that one should not litter one’s own environment into the political upheaval of "the ecology movement." The effectiveness of liberal methods can currently be seen in the simple instance that most people believe such nonsense as the chemical cause of "ozone depletion" and "the greenhouse effect" despite any evidence of either. Liberals are absolutely capable, by their strident, activist natures of raising any question to harmful emotional heights.)

Unfortunately, the loss of the War for Southern Independence in 1865 caused the very thing that Southern statesmen had foreseen in the 1830’s; that is, the north became dominant and the cultural, spiritual, and economic base of the South was decimated. The loss of the war was most severely felt in the South, of course, but it has also had political repercussions in the north as well.

Without the South in a position of dominance, the leadership of the United States has gone from Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Tyler and Polk to the inept, or leftist, Grant, Harding, Arthur, Harrison and Roosevelt, among others. Plus, the ascendancy of the leftist north to national prominence has also caused the rise of leaders in the South who had to be acceptable to the north. Such spectacularly immoral or totally incompetent Southern politicians as Lyndon Johnson, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton are examples of the quality of the men that the South must now produce to garner northern votes. When these modern day jackals are contrasted with the demigods the South produced when unfettered by the northern voter, that in itself should be enough to make all people reject northern philosophy and northern politics and embrace all things Southern.

As the forces of the left have gained ascendancy in the United States, the pressure intensifies to completely obliterate anything that remains between them and complete leftist victory. That means that the traditional enemy of leftists, the South, must be erased in its every form. That is why leftists always demand that even symbols of the South be eradicated.

We, therefore, now have a coalition of people who want the Southern flag taken down and hidden from public view. This coalition is composed of three main groups. First of all are African-Americans, whose emotional position is totally unmitigated by any knowledge of history. Secondly, there are Yankees who have moved to the South and who, despite their remarkable political failures in their own states, have learned nothing and continue to vote leftist here too. Or either these northern imports have been transferred here to run the newspapers that are owned by the people who live outside the South. And, thirdly, there are leftist Southerners, or Southerners of "politically correct" leaning, who have apparently learned their history from the television and movies and who feel the South is a bad place because it is not egalitarian enough.

But the demands of this coalition of political thinkers need to be put in proper perspective. Before anyone starts to tell someone else how to act and how to think, it is incumbent on him to demonstrate the success of his own ideas and actions. So far the introduction and enforcement of leftist ideas in our world has led to nothing but sorrow and degeneration. The force necessary to make people live under a leftist government has been the direct cause of the murder of over one hundred million people in this century alone. Leftist political theory has enslaved and impoverished billions of people worldwide. Its introduction has weakened even such great nations as England and France and reduced them to the status of third rate nations. Socialism in Scandinavia has reduced it to an economic level even less than that of England. In the United States leftist ideas have turned our country into the increasingly sick society it has become.

So until this coalition of leftist can point to a single successful instance of where their leftist philosophy has improved a country, or a people, rather than to the spectacular political failures the left has precipitated in any place into which its poisonous philosophy has been introduced, they have no right to demand anything of anybody. Leftist, the most spectacular political failures in all of history, have no standing to demand that Southerners accept anything that flows from their false philosophy. And of all people, leftist have the least demand on Southerners, the people who formed, guided, expanded and gave them a great country.

The Confederate flag is a symbol. It stands for the people who had the spirit, the courage, and the intelligence to give the world its greatest governmental entity. As long as the Confederate flag flies there is hope that the terrible scourge leftists have placed on the world will pass. It represents the culture that produced the most wished for, the most just, and the finest political system on earth. And as long as the Confederate flies there is hope that the greatness that was once ours may someday be reestablished.


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To: Who is John Galt?
Ah, yes - your tired old cicular argument: you insist that the court determines what the Constitution means because the court says it determines what the Constitution means.

Don't pay your income taxes on that basis and see what happens.

Drop me a card from the federal prison farm.

The secesionists didn't go before the court because they knew they no case. Your 'argment' will always fall to that simple fact.

The secessionists were damn'd traitors, every one.

Walt

321 posted on 01/01/2002 1:23:32 PM PST by WhiskeyPapa
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To: arly
Deo Vindice!

God vindicated Abraham Lincoln and the brave men who came forward to preserve the union established by the framers.

Walt

322 posted on 01/01/2002 1:25:19 PM PST by WhiskeyPapa
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To: Who is John Galt?
I quote the ratification debates, the Federalist Papers, the ratification documents of the States, the words of Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Madison, the early history of the Republic, the most prominent legal references of the era, the Constitution itself, and judicial opinions consistent with the foregoing - in other words, “the whole record.”

Well, that's just another damn'd lie, isn't it?

Walt

323 posted on 01/01/2002 1:26:59 PM PST by WhiskeyPapa
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To: WhiskeyPapa
Don't pay your income taxes on that basis and see what happens.

Drop me a card from the federal prison farm.

As always, you have confused two completely different concepts: the power to do something, and the constitutional right to do something.

The secesionists didn't go before the court because they knew they no case. Your 'argment' will always fall to that simple fact.

Really? History suggests that the secessionists “didn't go before the court” because they did not believe the court had jurisdiction. And once again – ‘as always’ – your 'argment' fails because you have substituted assumptions for historical fact.

The secessionists were damn'd traitors, every one.

Are you referring to the people of the several States who seceded from the so-called ‘perpetual union’ formed under the Articles of Confederation? Or to the people of the several States who seceded from the not-so-called ‘perpetual union’ formed under the Constitution, invoking their Tenth Amendment reservation of rights as they did so?

;>)

Well, that's just another damn'd lie, isn't it?

Actually, it is anything but a “lie:” shall I quote Mr. Jefferson’s Kentucky Resolutions yet again? And shall I quote Mr. Madison’s Virginia Resolutions, and his Report of 1800, yet again? Shall I quote the New York State ratification debates, wherein the dissolution of the so-called ‘perpetual union’ is discussed at length, as is a potential confederation outside the constitutional union, yet again? Shall I quote Tucker’s Blackstones and Rawle’s A View of the Constitution, specifically regarding the right of secession, yet again? Shall I quote Mr. Justice Taney or Mr. Justice Storey regarding the suspension of the writ yet again? Shall I quote Article VII and the original Preamble yet again? Shall I quote the ratification documents of Virginia, New York, and Rhode Island yet again? (As you know, I have posted links to all of these, and more, at my FR homepage... ;>)

I suspect it wouldn’t do any good: you have an obvious aversion to historical fact. Speaking of which, would you care to discuss the secession of the ratifying States from the so-called ‘perpetual union’ formed under the Articles of Confederation? No? How about the palpably unconstitutional Alien and Sedition Acts – which were enforced by federal judges? I thought not. What was it, again, that you were saying about "the whole record?"

(LOL! ;>)

324 posted on 01/01/2002 2:27:18 PM PST by Who is John Galt?
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To: WhiskeyPapa
God vindicated Abraham Lincoln and the brave men who came forward to preserve the union established by the framers.

'Might makes right,' eh? Or is it 'Might - and a compliant judiciary - makes right?'

;>)

325 posted on 01/01/2002 2:31:29 PM PST by Who is John Galt?
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To: WhiskeyPapa
How on earth did the image of George Washington get on the Great Seal of the CSA?"

A Tory like you, Walt, will never understand.

326 posted on 01/01/2002 3:00:10 PM PST by H.Akston
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To: WhiskeyPapa
If you don't like my cut and paste record, you need to show it is wrong.

If I spent all my time reading revisionist posts like yours, I would never learn another perspective.

My guess is most folks don't read your long-winded posts. It's not being lazy, this is not the forum for lengthy posts! Go write a book if you are so smart - you'll make money off your yankee friends.

327 posted on 01/01/2002 7:17:31 PM PST by stainlessbanner
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To: Who is John Galt?
'Might makes right,' eh? Or is it 'Might - and a compliant judiciary - makes right?'

To whom was Chief Justice Jay being compliant when he wrote:

"Here we see the people acting as the sovereigns of the whole country; and in the language of sovereignty, establishing a Constitution by which it was their will, that the state governments should be bound, and to which the State Constitutions should be made to conform. Every State Constitution is a compact made by and between the citizens of a state to govern themeselves in a certain manner; and the Constitution of the United States is liekwise a compact made by the people of the United States to govern themselves as to general objects, in a certain manner."

Chief Justice John Jay, 1793

Or Chief Justice Marshall:

"That the United States form, for many, and for most important purposes, a single natiion, has not yet been denied. In war, we are one people. In making peace, we are one people. In all commercial regulations, we are one and the same people. In many other respects, the American people are one; and the government which is alone capable of controlling and managing their interests in all these respects, is the government of the Union. It is their government and in that character, they have no other."

Chief Justice John Marshall, 1821

Or Justice Story:

The constitution of the United States was ordained and established, not by the states in their sovereign capacities, but emphatically, as the preamble of the constitution declares, by "the people of the United States."

--Justice Story, 1816

You cherry pick the record and takes what suits you, or just pervery the record to suit yourself:

To: donmeaker

Under the terms of the 10th Amendment, powers not delegated or prohibited by the Constitution are reserved to the States or the people of the States - and the Constitution nowhere delegates or prohibits secession. 'So: there. No legal foundation to oppose secession. End of story.' As Harvard history professor William Gienapp recently noted, "the proponents of secession had a strong constitutional argument, probably a stronger argument than the nationalists advanced"...;>)

57 posted on 12/24/01 2:36 PM Pacific by Who is John Galt?

You perverted the record to suit yourself. Your position is absurd. No one with an open mind will see anything else.

Walt

328 posted on 01/02/2002 1:39:01 AM PST by WhiskeyPapa
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To: H.Akston
How on earth did the image of George Washington get on the Great Seal of the CSA?"

A Tory like you, Walt, will never understand.

You obviously have no explanation, or you would post it. But keep up with the sniping; it only opens the doors to blast you with the record.

"I do not conceive we can exist long as a nation, without having lodged somewhere a power which will pervade the whole Union in as energetic a manner, as the authority of the different state governments extends over the several states. To be fearful of vesting Congress, constituted as that body is, with ample authorities for national purposes, appears to me to be the very climax of popular absurdity and madness."

George Washington to John Jay, 15 August 1786

"What stronger evidence can be given of the want of energy in our government than these disorders? If there exists not a power to check them, what security has a man of life, liberty, or property? To you, I am sure I need not add aught on this subject, the consequences of a lax or inefficient government, are too obvious to be dwelt on. Thirteen sovereignties pulling against each other, and all tugging at the federal head, will soon bring ruin to the whole; whereas a liberal, and energetic Constitution, well guarded and closely watched, to prevent encroachments, might restore us to that degree of respectability and consequence, to which we had a fair claim, and the brightest prospect of attaining..."

George Washington to James Madison November 5, 1786

"In all our deliberations on this subject we kept steadily in our view, that which appears to us the greatest interest of every true American, the consolidation of our Union, in which is involved our prosperity, felicity, safety, perhaps our national existance.

George Washington to the Continental Congress September 17, 1787

Anyone who examines the record will find it riven with dishonorable acts by the secessionists. You can't enlist George Washington to help you in your hateful crusade.

Now I know Shuckmaster wasnts to discount the statements of the people of the past because they just happen to be dead!

Others will not.

Walt

329 posted on 01/02/2002 1:44:37 AM PST by WhiskeyPapa
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To: Who is John Galt?
To: donmeaker

Under the terms of the 10th Amendment, powers not delegated or prohibited by the Constitution are reserved to the States or the people of the States - and the Constitution nowhere delegates or prohibits secession. 'So: there. No legal foundation to oppose secession. End of story.' As Harvard history professor William Gienapp recently noted, "the proponents of secession had a strong constitutional argument, probably a stronger argument than the nationalists advanced"...

;>)

57 posted on 12/24/01 2:36 PM Pacific by Who is John Galt?

Okay, that is not what the tenth amendment says.

Now, as to Madison:

You've got some brass, posting your own lies in a new note.

Walt

330 posted on 01/02/2002 3:38:55 AM PST by WhiskeyPapa
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To: Who is John Galt?
Does that mean you can't "show us where the Constitution 'delegated' or 'prohibited' secession? Perhaps, then, you can show us where the federal government was ever authorized to act upon any other basis?

;>)

Right here.

This is part of section 13 of the Judiciary Act of 1789:

"And be it further enacted, That the Supreme Court shall have exclusive jurisdiction of all controversies of a civil nature, where a state is a party, except between a state and its citizens; and except also between a state and citizens of other states, or aliens, in which latter case it shall have original but not exclusive jurisdiction."

Walt

331 posted on 01/02/2002 4:21:06 AM PST by WhiskeyPapa
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To: WhiskeyPapa
Thanks for the post. I am a yankee who has moved to the South (Texas). I wasn't born here, but I got here as quick as I could.

Your comments, as well as the comments of other well meaning yet ignorant folks that simply fail to "get it" with regard to the great war, vividly illustrate why continued education is necessary.

Lincoln's record is clear; if you choose to do your homework you'd find that he, Lincoln, was in fact the model for FDR and the Clintons. Maybe not openly, maybe they didn't invoke his name/memory when setting the policies which stripped us of liberties by enslaving us with onerous taxes, but certainly Lincoln was the first real transgressor of our liberties and a bully. He got what he deserved. I spit on that filthy bastard.

As for you and the other so called conservatives of this board, there can only be one side of this contoversy that you can support. Big government enslaving us and redistributing the fruits of your labor or taking a stand. Take the stand. Good does not always triumph over evil....at least not rapidly. One thing is for certain, without the taking a stand you guarantee the victory of villany. The Lincolns, FDRs and Clintons love your kind of conservatism.

332 posted on 01/02/2002 4:36:24 AM PST by Nimitz
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To: Nimitz
It's too bad that the hateful ignorant people like yourself feel compelled to post, while so many of the real Americans see fit to only lurk.

Wlat

333 posted on 01/02/2002 5:27:27 AM PST by WhiskeyPapa
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To: WhiskeyPapa
To whom was Chief Justice Jay being compliant when he wrote:
"Here we see the people acting as the sovereigns of the whole country...the Constitution of the United States is liekwise a compact made by the people of the United States to govern themselves as to general objects, in a certain manner."

It can safely be said that Mr. Justice Jay was not being “compliant” to historical fact, at least in so far as he suggested that “the people” acted as a “-whole-“ (as you describe it) when they ratified the Constitution. As James Madison (whom many consider the primary author of the Constitution) noted, "...(T)his assent and ratification is to be given by the people, not as individuals composing one entire nation, but as composing the distinct and independent States to which they respectively belong...[an] act of the people, as forming so many independent States, not as forming one aggregate nation..."

You may also wish to read Article VII of the Constitution sometime: it nowhere mentions ratification by the people of the “-whole-“ country: quite the opposite, in fact.

Finally, in so far as Mr. Justice Jay’s “general objects, in a certain manner” comment suggests the delegation of specifically limited powers to the new federal government (contrary, BTW, to your “almost unlimited” federal power claims), he may have been “compliant” to the truth of the matter.

Or Chief Justice Marshall:
"That the United States form, for many, and for most important purposes, a single natiion, has not yet been denied. In war, we are one people. In making peace, we are one people. In all commercial regulations, we are one and the same people. In many other respects, the American people are one; and the government which is alone capable of controlling and managing their interests in all these respects, is the government of the Union. It is their government and in that character, they have no other."

You really must enjoy posting judicial opinion – this one appears to be entirely irrelevant, apart from any pleasure you may have taken in wasting our time with it. “For most important purposes,” Mr. Justice Marshall states. “In many other respects,” he says. “They have no other [government],” he declares. How nice – you take ‘First Prize’ for pointless generalities.

Or Justice Story:
The constitution of the United States was ordained and established, not by the states in their sovereign capacities, but emphatically, as the preamble of the constitution declares, by "the people of the United States."

Ah, the ‘Preamble canard’ – yet again. I’ve shot this ridiculous argument to pieces so often that it’s becoming boring. Nevertheless, as one historian and legal scholar has noted:

Neither did the Constitution "emanate from the whole people." Leaving aside the preamble for the moment, the actual language of the text is to the contrary:

"Article VII. The Ratification of the Conventions of nine States, shall be sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the Same. . . Done in Convention by the Unanimous Consent of the States present. . . " "Article V. [The Constitution may be amended] when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths, thereof. . . "

Since the Constitution was proposed by a convention called by the states, was ratified by the states, and can only be amended by the states, the notion that it "emanates from the whole people" or that "the government proceeds directly from the people," or that it is "of the people" and "by the people" can only be described as "metaphysical" nonsense invented by those who view the states as a mere inconvenience on the path to creating an all-powerful central government.

Much has been made by unionists of the preamble to the Constitution:

”We, the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution of the United States of America."

This reliance is understandable. If one lacks support for one's view in the text of the constitution, one seeks it in the preamble. The underscored phrase, however, has no unambiguous meaning. Its meaning depends on whether the word "United", an adjective, or "States", a noun, is given greater emphasis.

There is no need to resolve this issue, however, because the very presence of the phrase, "We, the People of the United States," in the preamble, is an accident! It originally read:

”That the people of the States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia do ordain, declare and establish the following constitution for the government of ourselves and our posterity."

Judge Eugene Gary explains:

"[I]t was amended, not for the purpose of submitting the constitution to the people in the aggregate, but because the convention could not tell, in advance, which States would ratify it."

It appears that Mr. Justice Story was not being “compliant” to historical fact – any more than are you...

;>)

334 posted on 01/02/2002 8:18:44 AM PST by Who is John Galt?
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To: WhiskeyPapa
You cherry pick the record and takes what suits you, or just pervery the record to suit yourself...

Does this mean that you wish to discuss the secession of the ratifying States from the so-called ‘perpetual union’ formed under the Articles of Confederation? No? How about the palpably unconstitutional Alien and Sedition Acts – which were enforced by federal judges? I thought not. What was it, again, that you were saying about "the whole record? And what were you saying about ‘cherry picking?’

;>)

To: donmeaker
Under the terms of the 10th Amendment, powers not delegated or prohibited by the Constitution are reserved to the States or the people of the States - and the Constitution nowhere delegates or prohibits secession. 'So: there. No legal foundation to oppose secession. End of story.' As Harvard history professor William Gienapp recently noted, "the proponents of secession had a strong constitutional argument, probably a stronger argument than the nationalists advanced"...;>)
57 posted on 12/24/01 2:36 PM Pacific by Who is John Galt? You perverted the record to suit yourself. Your position is absurd. No one with an open mind will see anything else.

Can your “open mind” see this?

WE the Delegates of the People of the State of New York... Do declare and make known... That the Powers of Government may be reassumed by the People, whensoever it shall become necessary to their Happiness; that every Power, Jurisdiction and right, which is not by the said Constitution clearly delegated to the Congress of the United States, or the departments of the Government thereof, remains to the People of the several States, or to their respective State Governments...

Does your “open mind” recognize the genesis of the Tenth Amendment? What does your “open mind” make of this?

We the Delegates of the People of the State of Rhode-Island, and Providence Plantations... do declare and make known; In That there are certain natural rights, of which men when they form a social compact, cannot deprive or divest their posterity... That the powers of government may be reassumed by the people, whensoever it shall become necessary to their happiness:- That the rights of the States respectively, to nominate and appoint all State Officers, and every other power, jurisdiction and right, which is not by the said constitution clearly delegated to the Congress of the United States or to the departments of government thereof, remain to the people of the several states, or their respective State Governments to whom they may have granted the same; and that those clauses in the said constitution which declare that Congress shall not have or exercise certain powers, do not imply, that Congress is entitled to any powers not given by the said constitution...

Based on your posts here, it appears that your “open mind” interprets such documents as the ratifying “almost unlimited” power for the federal government. Obviously, your “open mind” needs help.

You've got some brass, posting your own lies in a new note.

“Lies?” (You really are a comedian, aren’t you?) Are you suggesting that James Madison did not state the following in his Federalist No. 39?

"...(T)his assent and ratification is to be given by the people, not as individuals composing one entire nation, but as composing the distinct and independent States to which they respectively belong...[an] act of the people, as forming so many independent States, not as forming one aggregate nation..."

“Get used to seeing this.”

;>)

This is part of section 13 of the Judiciary Act of 1789...

Are you suggesting that a simple act of Congress. such as the “Judiciary Act of 1789,” can take precedence over the Constitution itself? If so, why did the Founders include Article V? Any reservation of rights under the Tenth Amendment is completely and utterly unaffected by your “Judiciary Act of 1789.” To modify or repeal the Tenth Amendment requires another constitutional amendment, not an act of Congress.

It's too bad that the hateful ignorant people like yourself feel compelled to post, while so many of the real Americans see fit to only lurk.

How amusing: you were the one who went trolling for a debate when you started this thread. When you get it, you start throwing insults. As for “real Americans,” I find it quite entertaining when you post veiled threats regarding federal arrest – apparently because those with whom you disagree quote Thomas Jefferson and James Madison...

Happy New Year’s, Walt!

;>)

335 posted on 01/02/2002 8:28:17 AM PST by Who is John Galt?
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To: Who is John Galt?
I stopped responding to WP's crap last week when he tried to imply that I was lying about whether I had ever read Martin v. Hunter's Lessee while in college. He cuts and pastes quotes that don't support his claims, then flails around and tries to insult those who may have a different opinion than he. One of my favorites is when he misreads the text of what he cuts and pastes, such as his insistence that the Chisolm v. Georgia ruling means that Georgia and the other states have no sovereignty. He doesn't realize that the phrase "As to the purposes of Union, Georgia is not sovereign" means that states cannot interfere with the Federal government in areas in which it has been vested with authority by the states through the U.S. Constitution.

Also, how could the Federal government have been created by the people when the state delegates did not meet in Philadelphia with the intention of creating a national government, but merely to work on the Articles of Confederation. I don't remember anything in my history class about a national election to ratify the constitution, but then again I'm sure I'm probably lying just like you must be for contradicting the self-annointed "big dog."

336 posted on 01/02/2002 8:34:45 AM PST by Leesylvanian
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To: Who is John Galt?
Are you suggesting that a simple act of Congress. such as the “Judiciary Act of 1789,” can take precedence over the Constitution itself?

You know that's false. The Constitution says that the Constitution, and the laws passed in pursuance, shall be the supreme law of the land.

You don't fool anybody who doesn't want to be fooled.

Walt

337 posted on 01/02/2002 8:59:08 AM PST by WhiskeyPapa
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To: Ditto
I hate to keep these sub-themes going, but I can't let your reply go by unanswered. You apologized for sending a reply to me by mistake, then insisted that I am a racist just like the Freeper you intended to send the post. And come to think of it, I don't even remember anything racist said by the person you intended to post to.

In regards to what I said to Confed. Missourian, it is a paraphrasing of what you and WhiskeyPapa and some others apparently believe. I didn't say that you said it. I didn't even put words in your mouth and you get upset.

338 posted on 01/02/2002 9:14:13 AM PST by Leesylvanian
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To: Leesylvanian
I stopped responding to WP's crap last week when he tried to imply that I was lying about whether I had ever read Martin v. Hunter's Lessee while in college.

I didn't -imply- anything. You're lying. I stated plainly that you've lied.

You lie in this post too. Chief Justice Jay clearly states in his ruling on Chisholm that the states -transferred- certain elements of sovereignty to the federal government. The states retain -other- elements of sovereignty. It is wrong to say that I -ever- said that the states were not sovereign, or that the ruling says that.

So you are caught again in unclever deception, and flat lies.

Walt

339 posted on 01/02/2002 9:15:51 AM PST by WhiskeyPapa
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To: Leesylvanian
Also, how could the Federal government have been created by the people when the state delegates did not meet in Philadelphia with the intention of creating a national government, but merely to work on the Articles of Confederation.

Don't expect an answer from Walt: when you mention the ratification process, he tends to run like a turpentined cat. (Anytime you want to have fun, just ask him to discuss the secession of the ratifying States from the so-called 'perpetual union' formed under the Articles, or the 'federal-judge-approved-yet-blatantly-unconstitutional' Alien and Sedition Acts... ;>)

In the end, there are only a limited number of ways in which to interpret Walt’s argument:

* The States willingly and knowingly made irrevocable and permanent unwritten commitments to the new (and admittedly ‘experimental’) union when they ratified the Constitution. Or;

* The States unwillingly or unknowingly made irrevocable and permanent unwritten commitments to the new (and admittedly ‘experimental’) union when they ratified the Constitution, If so;

* Then the Founders were worse than the worst sort of used car salesmen, and bamboozled the people of the individual States into ratifying a new federal government with “almost unlimited” power. Or;

* Neither the Founders nor the people of the States intended to create an ‘imperial judiciary,’ but once the Supreme Court declared that it's word was law, there was absolutely nothing anyone could do about it, despite anything the written Constitution might say to the contrary.

Anyway you look at it, his argument is asinine. As the colonists noted in 1775:

By one [British] statute it is declared, that parliament can "of right make laws to bind us in all cases whatsoever." What is to defend us against so enormous, so unlimited a power? ... We saw the misery to which such despotism would reduce us.

The Founders and the people of the several States would never have agreed to such a provision in the new Constitution: they had just fought a war to escape such “despotism.” Nevertheless, that is exactly what Walt argues, when he insists that the Constitution permits a nearly-limitless expansion of the ‘implied powers’ doctrine by an activist judiciary, to create a federal government of “almost unlimited” power. And when we ask, “What is to defend us against so enormous, so unlimited a [federal] power?” – he responds with insults.

I would not be surprised to see, during my lifetime, the federal government declare that civilian ownership of firearms is unlawful, or to see the high court announce that the death penalty is unconstitutional. This, despite the fact that the Constitution declares that the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, and despite the fact that the constitution as ratified specifically referred to capital punishment. If (or when) the federal government takes such action, some ‘Conservatives’ will no doubt just put on their ‘Big Government’ kneepads and pucker up...

340 posted on 01/02/2002 9:26:10 AM PST by Who is John Galt?
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