[justshutupandtakeit]

I don't celebrate bravery in the service of evil whether that bravery was for the Nazis, the Soviets or Al Quieda. Nor do I celebrate the bravery of my ancestors fighting for the evil cause of the Slaveocracy.

If some get offended by that too bad.

[Ohioan]

I am not sure what the term "slaveocracy" is supposed to mean; but the issue was not slavery, but the right to make decisions about slavery and any other issue in North Carolina, rather than have it made by outsiders, trying to meddle in North Carolina's affairs.

Right now, there are many things enacted into law in the United States, which are absolutely outrageous to me. Nevertheless, I would certainly fight any foreign invader, who proposed coming in here and correcting those things. The principal involved has to do with the most basic concepts of self-Government.

I agree with your implied premise that slavery was a bad system--on any long term basis, very bad for both master and slave. No one is debating that today; although some of us are aware of the historic fact that at one time or another, most of the world's people had some form of slave experience--such as the centuries of feudalism in Europe. But the proper decisions as to what should have been done about any of those experiences, were not those to be made by outsiders. John Brown was very properly hung, in my opinion. The pity is that the evidence was too tenuous to have some of those who graduated from my Alma Mater, who may have helped finance his murderous rampages, swing beside him.

William Flax Return Of The Gods Web Site