Posted on 04/22/2009 7:12:17 AM PDT by AmericanHunter
When Texas Gov. Rick Perry floated the idea of secession if the federal government continues to pursue an aggressive tax-and-spend policy, the mainstream media, as well as the political establishment, cringed.
MSNBC’s Chris Matthews called talk of secession “whack-job stuff,” calling Mr. Perry a “bozo” and telling the Texas governor, “You don’t have a choice buddy.” Mr. Matthews’ colleague, Rachael Maddow, said Mr. Perry was “flirting to the point of adultery” by talking about secession, while commentator Thomas Frank reinforced the disconnect between the media and many Americans.
“What you’re seeing … what is one of the surprising things about these tea parties … surprising to people like you and me, is how mainstream extremism is in the Republican Party and the conservative movement,” Mr. Frank, author of Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule, told Ms. Maddow.
But is the idea of secession a foreign concept to the American experience? Is talk of secession automatically treasonous? Is any secessionist movement doomed to be defined by the Civil War and exiled to the political wilderness?
“I think the biggest surprise to me was the outrage expressed by an individual who even thinks ... along these lines,” U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, said yesterday on CNN’s American Morning.
“Because I heard people say, well, ‘this was treason,’ they say, and ‘this was un-American.’ But don’t they remember how we came in to our being? We used secession. We seceded from England. So it’s a very good principle. It’s a principle of a free society. It’s a shame we don’t have it anymore.”
Dr. Paul, who ran a hard fought grassroots campaign for the Republican nomination in 2008, argued the principle of secession is one that protects the union rather than threatens it.
“I argue that if you have the principle of secession, our federal government wouldn’t be as intrusive into state affairs. And to me, that would be very good,” Dr. Paul said. “We as a nation have endorsed secession all along. I mean, think of all the secession of the countries and the Republicans from the Soviet system. We were delighted. We love it. And yet we get hysterical over this.”
Critics of the coverage of the secession comment argue the media is trying to paint the Republican Party as extreme. They say Mr. Perry was not advocating secession, but rather saying the federal government could cause its resurrection.
“We got a great union. There’s absolutely no reason to dissolve it. But if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, you know, who knows what might come out of that?” Mr. Perry asked.
While the notion of secession was floated by Mr. Perry, he was not expressly advocating Texas leave the Union. Rather, the Texas governor used the idea in a manner Dr. Paul believes is historically accurate — to send a warning shot across the bow of a federal government that is encroaching on state’s rights and individual liberties.
Last week’s tea parties exposed a major rift in the country, and some are concerned the Obama administration does not understand the degree of dissent that is fomenting outside the Beltway. And despite panning by the political establishment, the majority of the nation viewed tea party dissent in a favorable light.
Fifty-one percent of Americans had a favorable view of the nationwide rallies, while 32 percent responded their view was very favorable, according to a poll released by Rasmussen Reports. A third of the nation had an unfavorable view with 15 percent unsure.
But among the nation’s “Political Class,” Rasmussen found just 13 percent held a favorable assessment and zero percent held a very favorable view of the nationwide protest. This disconnect, according to Dr. Paul, is a major part of the problem.
“People are angry. And if we don’t sense that, we don’t know it’s actually what’s going on there,” the Texas congressman said. Dr. Paul said the worst is yet to come because secession will achieve a greater legitimacy as the country struggles.
“When the dollar collapses and the federal government can’t fulfill any of its promises, what if they send you dollars and they don’t work,” Dr. Paul said. “People are just going to — they’re not going to have a violent cessation. They’re just going to ignore the federal government because they will be inept.”
Congressional approval is needed to join the Union. Once allowed to join, Congressional approval is needed to combine states or split states into one or more new states. Congressional approval is needed to change the border of a state by a fraction of an inch. Since Congressional approval is needed for these changes, the implied in that is the need for such approval to leave altogether.
It is not within the power of a single state to claim the compact is broken. Other states could say that the compact is not. Why are they wrong and Idaho right?
Are you seriously suggesting that anything Idaho does has to be run by all other states before it can act on it?
Idaho is a sovereign state and is free to run its own show within its own border pretty much as it wishes without interference from the other states, so long as it doesn't violate Constitutional provisions. But Idaho is not free to take actions that impact the interests of the other states any more than they are free to take unilateral actions that may harm Idaho.
If Idaho doubles taxes then people are likely to leave which affects other states. If it cuts all taxes to bare minimum, it is likely to see an influx of people which affects other states.
But in both cases, it's internal to Idaho. Other states can cut their own taxes or increase them as they wish. But they can't place a tax on people in Idaho any more that Idaho can tax people in Washington.
A policy backed by force, not law.
A decision handed down by the Supreme Court.
A foreign army was on their land.
The land wasn't theirs. Sumter was a federal fort, built with federal funds on land deeded to the govenrment free and clear by act of the South Carolina legislature. They had absolutely no claim to the property whatsoever.
They offered repeatedly to pay for its safe transport back.
Even if true, nothing forced the army garrison to accept the offer.
They attacked when Lincoln sent a resupply ship after previously promising not to.
Lincoln informed Governor Pickens of his intent to land supplies and the confederacy chose to attach the fort. An act of war in any language.
No one was killed. Lincoln proceeded to annihilate the South.
So if Japan had bombed Pearl Harbor and through some miracle all those ships were sunk but nobody had been killed, would you say that Roosevelt's actions afterwards would have been uncalled for?
Idaho is the determiner if the compact is violated
“ The states, then, being the parties to the constitutional compact, and in their sovereign capacity, it follows of necessity that there can be no tribunal above their authority to decide, in the last resort, whether the compact made by them be violated and consequently that, as the parties to it, they must themselves decide”
“Idaho is a sovereign state and is free to run its own show within its own border pretty much as it wishes without interference from the other states, so long as it doesn't violate Constitutional provisions.”
I wish this was true! Apparently Federal bureaucracy's don't have the same understanding.They not us violate Constitutional provisions..Such as second Amendment guarantees
“A decision handed down by the Supreme Court.”
Like— Roe v. Wade and other brilliant decisions
“The land wasn't theirs”
This land is your land,
This land is my land...Sorry struck a funny bone
***Since Congressional approval is needed for these changes, the implied in that is the need for such approval to leave altogether.***
implied to some people maybe, but not written. It clearly states rules for entry and alteration, not secession.
No, the implied would be that if Congress has the authority to force a State OUT of the Union, then it would have the authority to force it to stay.
Just because Congress must be consulted in a few specified areas concerning a States' borders or division doesn't carry with the the ability to dictate any other terms other than those in the Constitution.
Saying the federal government can force a State to stay in the Union is like saying you could force someone to stay in your home just because you had previously invited that person in.
Madison Gives more detail—
“Two questions of a very delicate nature present themselves on this occasion: 1. On what principle the Confederation, which stands in the solemn form of a compact among the States, can be superseded without the unanimous consent of the parties to it? 2. What relation is to subsist between the nine or more States ratifying the Constitution, and the remaining few who do not become parties to it?”
“The first question is answered at once by recurring to the absolute necessity of the case; to the great principle of self-preservation; to the transcendent law of nature and of nature's God, which declares that the safety and happiness of society are the objects at which all political institutions aim, and to which all such institutions must be sacrificed. Perhaps, also, an answer may be found without searching beyond the principles of the compact itself. It has been heretofore noted among the defects of the Confederation, that in many of the States it had received no higher sanction than a mere legislative ratification. The principle of reciprocality seems to require that its obligation on the other States should be reduced to the same standard. A compact between independent sovereigns, founded on ordinary acts of legislative authority, can pretend to no higher validity than a league or treaty between the parties. It is an established doctrine on the subject of treaties, that all the articles are mutually conditions of each other; that a breach of any one article is a breach of the whole treaty; and that a breach, committed by either of the parties, absolves the others, and authorizes them, if they please, to pronounce the compact violated and void. Should it unhappily be necessary to appeal to these delicate truths for a justification for dispensing with the consent of particular States to a dissolution of the federal pact, will not the complaining parties find it a difficult task to answer the multiplied and important infractions with which they may be confronted? The time has been when it was incumbent on us all to veil the ideas which this paragraph exhibits. The scene is now changed, and with it the part which the same motives dictate.”
***So if Japan had bombed Pearl Harbor and through some miracle all those ships were sunk but nobody had been killed, would you say that Roosevelt’s actions afterwards would have been uncalled for?***
No, but then we weren’t trying to conquer Japan. We were attacked and we retaliated. Lincoln just needed the excuse to attack to quell the “rebellion”. We would have likely accepted Japan’s surrender long before 1945 if they had been willing to. Lincoln had no interest in letting the South be free. And several states joined the Confederacy only after Lincoln decided to mobilize.
***Idaho is a sovereign state and is free to run its own show within its own border pretty much as it wishes without interference from the other states, so long as it doesn’t violate Constitutional provisions. But Idaho is not free to take actions that impact the interests of the other states any more than they are free to take unilateral actions that may harm Idaho.***
Secession doesn’t violate the Constitution. How does Idaho’s secession necessarily impact other states any more than Idaho deciding to slash taxes? Other states in addition to having the power to cut taxes also have the right to secede and join Idaho if they so choose. Idaho isn’t really sovereign if it can’t get out of a contract that the other party (the federal government) is free to violate.
***A decision handed down by the Supreme Court.***
Right, because what the court says is always constitutional. Like the lemon test. That’s in the Constitution! And abortion is clearly a federal issue as it appears in the Constitution SO many times.
Says who?
“ The states, then, being the parties to the constitutional compact, and in their sovereign capacity, it follows of necessity that there can be no tribunal above their authority to decide, in the last resort, whether the compact made by them be violated and consequently that, as the parties to it, they must themselves decide”
"It surely does not follow, from the fact of the States, or rather the people embodied in them, having as parties to the Constitutional compact no tribunal above them, that, in controverted meanings of the compact, a minority of the parties can rightfully decide gains the majority; still less than a single party can decide against the rest; and as little that it can at will withdraw from its compact with the rest."
I wish this was true! Apparently Federal bureaucracy's don't have the same understanding.They not us violate Constitutional provisions..Such as second Amendment guarantees.
Because you say that they do?
Like— Roe v. Wade and other brilliant decisions
Like Brown v. Topeka Board of Education or Boy Scouts v. Dale and Ex Parte Milligan...and other brilliant decisions.
Implied powers based on a clear reading of the Constitution is a concept that goes back to Chief Justice Marshall.
Funny you should say that. "An inference from the doctrine that a single state has a right to secede at will from the rest, is that the rest would have an equal right to secede from it; in other words, to turn it, against its will, out of its union with them." Is Madison right? If not, why not?
As with the rebellion. The confederacy attacked and Lincoln retaliated.
Lincoln just needed the excuse to attack to quell the “rebellion”.
Ah yes, the ever popular "We fell right into Lincoln's trap" defense. Lincoln sent supplies to the fort. Davis could have allowed them to be landed and maintain the status quo. Instead he chose to start a war. And suffered the consequences.
We would have likely accepted Japan’s surrender long before 1945 if they had been willing to. Lincoln had no interest in letting the South be free.
I think you've got that twisted around. I have no doubt that Japan would have accepted our surrender long before 1945, but that wasn't about to happen. Likewise, the confederacy would have been glad to let Lincoln surrender, but they badly misjudged him.
And several states joined the Confederacy only after Lincoln decided to mobilize.
Which was likely why Davis chose to start his war in the first place.
Secession doesn’t violate the Constitution.
Unilateral secession does.
How does Idaho’s secession necessarily impact other states any more than Idaho deciding to slash taxes?
Walking out on their responsibility for obligations entered by the nation as a whole while a part.
Right, because what the court says is always constitutional.
That's how it works.
Source, please.
As it happens, the same letter you dismissed as being a forgery - the 1833 letter to Alexander Rives. Link
He wrote Nicholas P. Trist stating “usurpations or abuses of power justly having that effect” would alleviate the State of obligations
“Applying a like view of the subject to the case of the U. S. it results, that the compact being among individuals as embodied into States, no State can at pleasure release itself therefrom, and set up for itself. The compact can only be dissolved by the consent of the other parties, or by usurpations or abuses of power justly having that effect.” (Letter from James Madison to Nicholas P. Trist, February 15, 1830
“Says who?”
Saint Nick
“Unilateral secession does.”
Would one State a week be Constitutional?
I'm not sure exactly what point you're trying to make here. In this sentence, and in several other places in the letter in question, Madison makes his point clear - secession requires the consent of the other states. States cannot secede at will. Unilateral secession in the form that would be practiced by the Southern states is illegal. That is exactly what I have been saying all along. All I can think is that you are somehow clinging to the 'abuses of power' qualifier that Madison included. But if you're doing that then you are deluding yourself because Madison also says that a single state cannot proclaim the compact to be broken.
If they do so with the consent of the other states.
I usually don’t like to play ‘what if’
but I will make an exception in this case...
‘What if’:
South Carolina ‘claimed’ to leave the union,
and no shots were fired at Ft. Sumter?
What would the federal government have done?
That's true, I do believe it is highly unlikely that letter originated with Madison, and I've made my reasoning quite clear.
I notice you still avoid the simple question if you have, except for this single instance, EVER seen a correspondence by Madison where it was noted that it was neither dated nor signed?
He was signing and dating them in 1835, so why is the 1833 letter to Rivas the ONLY exception?
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On the other hand, Madison did author Federalist, no. 39, in which he stated:
Each State in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body independent of all others, and only to be bound by its own voluntary act.
Acknowledging that a State, having the ability to bind itself with a 'voluntary act', would imply that State would also have the ability to UNBIND itself with another 'voluntary act', would it not?
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