Well, that would explain rockrr's posting history.
Personally I don't understand how they can be so wrapped up by events that ended 150 years ago, but I accept that there are those who are.
Good! Accepting that there is a problem is really the first step on the path to recovery. Don't try to rush understanding. The breakthroughs will just come when you are really good and ready.
The Revolution was secession from England. No it wasn't.
Partial credit: The Revolution resulted in secession from the United Kingdom of Great Britain, as so named in the 1707 Acts of Union. I predict that you will, in short order, inform us that "Union" and "United..." somehow don't count, in this particular case.
The Revolutionary War was a rebellion against the British crown.
You see, HMS Surprise, this fellow has a problem common among leftists; his worldview is so simplistic that he believes that things can only posses one quality at a time. Because of this, he thinks that any attribute assigned to an object of study disproves all remaining properties. Observe: 'the soup is hot, and so cannot also be salty', 'the dog is tired, and so cannot also be shaggy', 'the shoes are matched, and so cannot also be leathern', 'the Revolutionary War was a rebellion, and so cannot also have been an act of secession'. See how it works?
The colonials tried for years to make their case for a representational seat at the table and were subjected to true acts of subjugation and tyranny for their efforts. When the Brits attempted to impose the tea tax shipments of tea sat unloaded, rotting at the piers and on the ships because Americans refused to accept the cargo with its poison pill. When the Boston Tea Party occurred the Brits responded by quarantining the harbor. When Americans responded by smuggling supplies into Boston the Brits sent out scouting parties to intercept and arrest them. Then the Brits advanced on Lexington to disarm the colonials. We know what happened next.
They declared their intent to secede from the political union which bound them to the Crown based, not on any legal right recognized within the applicable courts, but rather, on the natural right of self-determination from which all developed political power (theoretically) flows.
By contrast the southern slavers agitated a violent separation from the union thinly wrapped in the pretense of a secession.
So, the arguement is that the Revolution was not an act of secession because it is dislike the Civil War which, according to you, was also not an act of secession.
The orthodox definition of secession is the formal separation from an alliance or federation.
I'm pretty sure that is a definition you just spun out of whole cloth and tailored to suit your purpose. "Secession" is just a latinate word for 'withdrawl'.
But that is not how the slavers proceeded. Unlike the colonials, the slavers didn't avail themselves of their constitutional right (and duty) of redress. They didn't take their grievances to congress or the Supreme Court. Instead they turned their back on the United States Constitution and rebelled against their own country.
Note well, HMS Surprise, the ridiculous double standard rockrr employs here. It is his usual method. The "slavers" are called such because they maintained the SAME slavery practiced by their colonial ancestors. Besides, to be both 'slave holder' and 'colonist' at the same time would violate the rule-of-singular-quality described above.
They used the circumstance of the election of Lincoln to begin their insurrection. They began to steal everything and anything that wasn't nailed down and seizing territories - and states - in the name of their confederacy. They openly and defiantly declared their separation and dared the unionists to stop them. And they made war against their neighbors and erstwhile allies. They incited and perpetuated a war that literally tore our country apart.
Finally, he caps his proof of dissimilarity with a list of things common to both. The harder he tries, the harder he fails.
All that and this is all you came up with? You’re trying too hard (and falling far short).
Are you saying that the two are synonymous?
They declared their intent to secede from the political union which bound them to the Crown based, not on any legal right recognized within the applicable courts, but rather, on the natural right of self-determination from which all developed political power (theoretically) flows.
How could the colonies have been in a 'political union' with the Crown when they were denied any representation in the legislative body?
No BL, you have it just backwards.
And, comparing 1776 to early 1861 is a very informative exercise, you should try it sometime.
By 1776, the Brits had for years oppressed their American colonies, in almost every way imaginable, producing a long list of actual injustices, in the Declaration of Independence.
Actual British oppressions included everything from:
The Declaration's first drafts (later removed) even included a condemnation of Brits for imposing slavery on Americans!
That's a serious list of tyrannies, oppressions and usurpations (Founders' words), clearly showing that whatever "union" had previously existed, it was by 1776 already broken!
So the Declaration formally declared what had already happened: by their acts of tyranny and oppression, the Brits had made their American colonies free and Independent united States.
By stark contrast, the 1860 & early 1861 secessionists documents contained no lists of actual "usurpations" or "oppressions", but instead expressed their obsession with protecting the future of slavery against the newly elected Republicans.
Unlike our Founders in 1776, in 1860 the slave-power was fully represented -- indeed over-represented -- in Congress, the Executive and Judicial branches.
Yes, the Slave Power would soon be reduced by the 1860 elections, but that was largely their own doing: by engineering the split-up of their previously majority Democrat party.
In 1860 there had been no Federal "breech of contract", no "usurpations" or "oppressions" against the Slave Power.
The Union was not already broken, and indeed was not really broken by their Declarations of Secession.
What did break the Union, in early 1861, was numerous acts of secessionists' rebellion, insurrection and war against the United States, culminating in their assault on Fort Sumter (April 12) and confirmed by their Declaration of War against the United States, on May 6, 1861.
Where in 1776 the Brits had broken their Union with their united colonies -- by many acts of oppression and war -- in early 1861 only Slave-Power secessionists committed acts of oppression and war: against the United States!
Brass Lamp: "They declared their intent to secede from the political union which bound them to the Crown based, not on any legal right recognized within the applicable courts, but rather, on the natural right of self-determination from which all developed political power (theoretically) flows."
They declared no such "intent".
Rather, they declared that British acts of tyranny & disunion had already made the United Colonies into free and independent States.
By sharp contrast, Slave-Power secessionists in 1860 could not and did not make such claims.
Brass Lamp: "So, the arguement is that the Revolution was not an act of secession because it is dislike the Civil War which, according to you, was also not an act of secession."
Doubtless you intended to write, "unlike the Civil War".
Our Founders never used words like "secession" or "disunion" with regards to the British Empire.
Instead, they declared Independence from their status as oppressed colonies.
Both "secession" and "disunion" imply something legal and voluntary, not our Founders involuntary subjection to the oppressive British Empire.
Brass Lamp: "Finally, he caps his proof of dissimilarity with a list of things common to both.
The harder he tries, the harder he fails."
Your aspersions against rockrr are inaccurate.