Why the Cherokee Nation Allied Themselves With the Confederate States of America in 1861

Lew Rockwell.com ^ | January 7, 2004 | Leonard M. Scruggs

[stand watie]

NOPE, sorry i'm not buying any of that NONSENSE.

traditional scholars of the north/south/east/west, until the rise of the HATEFILLED, arrogant, anti-Southernist,self-righteous,REVISIONIST historiography in the mid-1960s, generally agreed on at least ONE thing: that the WBTS was NOT about chattal slavery.

traditional scholarship held (correctly in my view) that the WBTS was, while complex in causation, PRIMARILY about a continuation of the American Revolution.

it was about LIBERTY for dixie.nothing more,nothing less.

IF what you say were true, the CSA wouldn't have had at least 100,000 black men as volunteers for the war (and incidently NOT a few black women!). there may have been as many as 15,000 black men in the ranks of the CSA's various military formations, according to the late (& sorely missed!) Professor H R Blackerby of the history department of Tuskeegee University.

free dixie,sw

[lentulusgracchus]

If a former slave owner such as, say, Stonewall Jackson or Alexander Stephens (I don't know whether he did, but am assuming he did based on his place in society in Georgia) made some statement about the purposes of the Republic, or the meaning of a section of the Constitution, would the fact that he owned slaves place an asterisk, in your eyes, next to whatever he had said or written?

[stand watie]

SADLY, you are CORRECT!

free dixie,sw

[stand watie]

WELL SAID!

where the founding fathers FAILED is NOT "slapping down the USSC" when they usurped the "power to declare" ANYTHING un-Constituional!

free dixie,sw

[stand watie]

lincoln, the war CRIMINAL & tyrant, was a lawyer. it is the nature of a lawyer to be SELF-interested & amoral.

he was also just a CHEAP POLITICIAN, not any different than wee willie klintoon.

free dixie,sw

[stand watie]

TRUE!

FYI, "Running Brave" spends 100% of its publicly solicited donations to the "poorest of the poor" American Indians.

not one publicly donated DIME goes to fund raising or administration. (those necessary funds are raised privately from persons who are told EXACTLY what their dollars will buy = printing,salaries,utilities,rent,etc!)

my most recent donation bought a wood cookstove for a family @Rosebud Reservation.

free dixie,sw

[Tax-chick]

We buy a stove every year for the Navajo through the Southwest Indian Foundation. It's nice when you can get people a specific item that you know they really need! Civil War living conditions look good compared to many places on the reservations.

[Agnes Heep]

traditional scholarship held (correctly in my view) that the WBTS was, while complex in causation, PRIMARILY about a continuation of the American Revolution.

it was about LIBERTY for dixie.nothing more,nothing less.

One-eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the Southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was, somehow, the cause of the war. To strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the Union, even by war; while the government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it.

Once again, you're almost right. The "liberty" Dixie sought was the liberty of "wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces." The evil Union, acting through the elected representatives of the people, decided that they could have their precious chattel slavery, so long as it didn't go farther than it already had. That didn't suit the southerners; just as the ban on partial birth abortion doesn't suit contemporary liberals. Therefore they decided to take their ball and go home.

Does anyone seriously believe that if the Southern states had been allowed to secede they would have maintained their precious confederacy for any longer than it took each individual state to get pissed off over some decision by the majority that didn't jibe with its "interests"? The result would have been a hodgepodge of small, poor, agrarian nations, each run by an aristocratic oligarchy. Slaves and arrogance; that's a pretty good assessment. I'm glad they got their butts kicked, and what's more, you should be happy too.

[Aurelius]

The result would have been a hodgepodge of small, poor, agrarian nations, each run by an aristocratic oligarchy. Slaves and arrogance; that's a pretty good assessment. I'm glad they got their butts kicked, and what's more, you should be happy too.

Your prediction is logically inassailable. You can deduce anything from a false hypothesis.

[stainlessbanner]

TC - I don't have a book on Johnston handy. I have read little about him other than short passages in various books referring to Seven Pines and his defense of Richmond. If you find anything on him, I would be interested.

I searched my personal database and found nothing, but Amazon has a few entries for Joseph E. Johnston

Also, the Foxhole did a profile of Seven Pines in December

[carton253]

I don't care (except as an interesting historical question, "What do we 'know,' and why do we think we know it?") whether Gen. Jackson owned slaves. Is there a moral difference between owning a slave and renting the labor of one? Not to me. Is there a moral difference between owning a slave yourself, and your wife's owning a slave? Nope. Is there a moral difference between treating a person well, and treating a person poorly, irrespective of legal status? You betcha. No one has ever suggested that Jackson treated any person, in any context, without respect for his Christian dignity, and that's why I admire him.

Your defense of Jackson is passionate... and I don't begrudge you one word of it. But, I hope you don't think it was my intent to damage the reputation of this decent and honorable man. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am certainly not going to hold a man of the 1800's to 2003's standard of outraged political correctness.

I think the world could do with a whole lot more men cast in Jackson's mold.

[Tax-chick]

No, I certainly don't think you intended to denigrate Jackson! I'm assuming that, like me, you're interested in the various sources of historical evidence on a (somewhat) disputed point, and what we can learn from them ... and what influence our preconceptions have on our analysis of historical data :-).

I've stayed with this thread because I'm learning new facts and getting ideas for more reading. To me, some of the most interesting questions are the ones we may never know the answers for: Where was Andrew Jackson born? Who was Abraham Lincoln's father? What about Jefferson and Sally? What really caused the Hamilton/Burr duel? And then there are the "facts" we "know," that turn out to be wrong!

The answers don't really make much difference, but I'm fascinated by the idea that "The truth is out there!" but the principals just didn't bother to leave us idiot-proof records that are beyond dispute.

[Tax-chick]

Thanks! I'll try to remember to drop you a note if I find a really good book (all bets are off when I have the baby ...). Charlotte/Mecklenburg Library has a surprisingly broad collection for a Soviet institution :-).

[Godebert]

"To me, some of the most interesting questions are the ones we may never know the answers for: Where was Andrew Jackson born?"

Andrew Jackson was born at the Waxhaws, North Carolina in 1767. He was born 18 months after his parents left Carrickfergus on the shores of Belfast Lough for a new life in America. "The Scots-Irish in the Carolinas", p. 1997, Billy Kennedy.

[carton253]

I'm assuming that, like me, you're interested in the various sources of historical evidence on a (somewhat) disputed point, and what we can learn from them ... and what influence our preconceptions have on our analysis of historical data :-).

Big bump on that!

I also like the "what if" game. What if Jackson wasn't killed at Chancellorsville? What if the 2nd Corps wasn't split between AP Hill and Ewell? What if Jackson was at Gettysburg?

I got a book - Stonewall at Gettysburg but it was horrible. Total lack of imagination on the writer's part. Disappointing to say the least.

Anyway... I have Stephen Sears book on Gettysburg coming from the library... I've read his book on Antietam and Chancellorsville. They were very good.

[Tax-chick]

I live in the Waxhaws, NC, area! There are two locations, a few miles apart, offered as his birthplace. One is now in NC and one in SC, but at the time, the border hadn't been fixed by law. According to the local history sources, his mother was staying with one of her two married sisters when AJ was born, but the letters don't make it entirely clear which one.

South Carolina makes a bigger deal of it, at their state park, but Museum of the Waxhaws, NC, shows the birthplace near what's now the insignificant town of Mineral Springs, NC. (No library ... not even their own post office!)

Anyway, around here at least, it's a disputed issue. The truth is out there ...

[stainlessbanner]

I heard Newt's book on G'burg is good, too. We did a few reviews on FR last year and folks seemed to like it.

[Tax-chick]

If you're going to Gettysburg, there's an Army War College battlefield guide that's really good. I remember my dad had it when we visited in 1992. It was December, so we froze our extremities right off, but at least it wasn't crowded!

[carton253]

I did get Newt's book from the library, but didn't get a chance to read it. I'll have to put it on my list.

[carton253]

I am going to Gettysburg, so I will have to look up that battlefield guide. Thanks!