Why the Confederacy Lives

Politico Magazine ^ | April 08, 2015 | EUAN HAGUE

[lqcincinnatus]

One hundred-fifty years after Appomattox, many Southerners still won’t give up.

One hundred fifty years ago, on April 9th, 1865, Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox Court House and the Union triumphed in the Civil War. Yet the passage of a century and a half has not dimmed the passion for the Confederacy among many Americans. Just three weeks ago, the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV) appeared before the Supreme Court arguing for the right to put a Confederate flag on vanity license plates in Texas. Just why would someone in 2015 want a Confederate flag on their license plate? The answer is likely not a desire to overtly display one’s genealogical research skills; nor can it be simplistically understood solely as an exhibition of racism, although the power of the Confederate flag to convey white supremacist beliefs cannot be discounted.

Rather, displaying the Confederate flag in 2015 is an indicator of a complex and reactionary politics that is very much alive in America today. It is a politics that harks back to the South’s proud stand in the Civil War as a way of rallying opinion against the federal government—and against the country’s changing demographic, economic, and moral character, of which Washington is often seen as the malign author. Today’s understanding of the Confederacy by its supporters is thus neither nostalgia, nor mere heritage; rather Confederate sympathy in 2015 is a well-funded and active political movement (which, in turn, supports a lucrative Confederate memorabilia industry).

[jmacusa]

“The difference between a free man and a slave is fifty cents a day’’. Lincoln. He wasn't willing to see a divided nation. And he signed the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. tell me, are you defending slavery here?

[jmacusa]

Has anyone put you ass up on a block and bid on a price for you? Or some member of your family? What I think of Obama would get me thrown off this website and have the Secret Service at my door in no time.

[jmacusa]

Um, so it was the North that fired on Ft. Sumter?

[jmacusa]

Ever read The Confederate Constitution? You should.

[FewsOrange]

The declarations of seccession adopted by various seceding states made it clear that the main reason they were seceding was slavery.

[PistolPaknMama]

And look where that surrender got us. The “union” is taking us down with it.

[BenLurkin]

It was the North which refused to relinquish the fortification to the proper authorities. That encroachment was the first act of invasion.

[jmacusa]

My people left a northern Irish ghetto over one hundred and sixty years ago and I'm damned glad they did. I'm not a ‘’Yankee’’ or an “Irish-American’’ or a “Northerner’’. I'm an American. What are you?

[centurion316]

The issue of slavery was settled in this country on the battlefield and wilted away in the Western Civilization within 25 years of Appomattox without further bloodshed. Notice that this article appears in a Leftwing political publication where the shouts of racism and encouragement of hatred advances their political cause. Ironic indeed.

[lqcincinnatus]

In answer to your question about being put on a block, the answer is yes! And when his father refused him his freedom he hauled to Texas and became a cattle drover.

[jmacusa]

Ironic indeed that the Confederate States were Democrats.

[jmacusa]

I said were YOU ever put on a block and sold to the highest bidder?

[Red in Blue PA]

Precisely. Slavery was patently Unconstitutional and would have been deemed so over time.

Instead, we have one man, Lincoln, send 600,000 men to their deaths because of this. In the process, he did away with habeas corpus, jailed those who disagreed with him, and shut down newspapers. And we are sold the line of crap that he is some sort of here? BS. Possibly the worst President ever.

Imagine any modern day President doing the things listed above.

[PistolPaknMama]

I just have to ask. Did a committee come up with your screen name? It looks like some sort of compromise. :))

[BenLurkin]

And by the way — that was one State. If the Union felt so irrevocably aggrieved by that one action that it was somehow compelled irretrievably into war. Then its war could only legitimately have been against South Carolina.

But I imagine everyone in hindsight can see that the Sumpter incident could and should have been quickly and peacefully resolved once the shooting there stopped. There was no legitimate call for a Northern invasion predicated upon that one incident.

[DiogenesLamp]

No one forced my ancestors to fight.

Well you would know better than me, but I do know they forced plenty of Irish off the boats into the Union army to go fight. It is one of the means by which they had the constant supply of bodies to keep grinding away at the South.

And why not? Why not draft foreigners who have no choice, and who wouldn't be missed? (Not missed by any of the powers that be, that is.)

I still consider it to be one of the most dastardly and evil things that they did. You don't force people who are fleeing starvation to go fight in a war they had no personal interest in just because you have the power to do so.

[jmacusa]

Hey Ben are you defending the CSA and slavery or what?

[Red in Blue PA]

here should read hero.

(he ain’t one)

[PistolPaknMama]

The South wanted to preserve slavery

The damnyankees had slaves in the north all throughout and after the war. Try again.

[iowacornman]

He got his.