Posted on 07/07/2015 3:17:08 AM PDT by dennisw
In 1860 only a small minority of whites owned slaves. According to the U.S. census report for that last year before the Civil War, there were nearly 27 million whites in the country. Some eight million of them lived in the slaveholding states.
The census also determined that there were fewer than 385,000 individuals who owned slaves (1). Even if all slaveholders had been white, that would amount to only 1.4 percent of whites in the country (or 4.8 percent of southern whites owning one or more slaves).
The rare instances when the ownership of slaves by free Negroes is acknowledged in the history books, justification centers on the claim that black slave masters were simply individuals who purchased the freedom of a spouse or child from a white slaveholder and had been unable to legally manumit them. Although this did indeed happen at times, it is a misrepresentation of the majority of instances, one which is debunked by records of the period on blacks who owned slaves. These include individuals such as Justus Angel and Mistress L. Horry, of Colleton District, South Carolina, who each owned 84 slaves in 1830. In fact, in 1830 a fourth of the free Negro slave masters in South Carolina owned 10 or more slaves; eight owning 30 or more (2).
According to federal census reports, on June 1, 1860 there were nearly 4.5 million Negroes in the United States, with fewer than four million of them living in the southern slaveholding states. Of the blacks residing in the South, 261,988 were not slaves. Of thisnumber, 10,689 lived in New Orleans. The country's leading African American historian, Duke University professor John Hope Franklin, records that in New Orleans over 3,000 free Negroes owned slaves, or 28 percent of the free Negroes in that city.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
The strike on federal property was more than an affront - it was a portent of the violence by insurgents yet to come. I realize that anti-Americans like you don't care about such things but there are some of us who do.
I am completely against the notion that man passed laws can trump natural rights. Ownership of private property is a foundational principle of our society, and if I regard it beyond the authority of federal courts, I most certainly regard it as beyond the authority of state courts.
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Not at all. You simply ignore any messages from others (when they bring it up) and assume the conversation is all about what *YOU* say. I previously posted you an example of someone else bringing up the topic once more. Did you not see it?
Yours is the more uncommon position. By far, most of these discussions devolve down to the typical "Look! Squirrel!" of Slavery, instead of looking at the true and correct reasons for why the Union invaded.
It was all about power, and who would wield it versus who would recognize it.
I am not going to attempt to follow your non-sequitur.
So this is why they had troops stationed, dug in, and ready to confront the Union when it invaded on July 21, 1861 instead of hurriedly and frantically assembling men to meet it?
Well okay then. Just so long as we get our history accurate.
Oh, but wait. They weren't ready for that invasion. They *DID* hurriedly and frantically assemble forces to meet it. Sounds like they weren't trying to start any more violence at all.
Sounds like they just acted as would anyone confronting a sudden invasion.
So then can we put to rest your constant criticism of the Union for accepting the war and fighting it over a banged-up fort and zero casualties? Because you freely admit that the Confederate reason for initiating the war was even less justified than that.
But since you criticize the Kelo decision then you seem to believe that it isn't beyond the authority of the Federal courts. That the U.S. Supreme Court should have stepped in and issued a decision which, by the way, would impact every other state in how they use their eminent domain powers. And if you grant the Federal Government authority over eminent domain then how can you criticize it when it takes authority over marriage and abortion and what have you?
Of course they were trying to start more violence. Willing but not able. So it's the unions fault that they didn't plan their insurrection better?
No. Their response was disproportionate. It is as if a woman slaps her husband, and he beats her face in with his fists. It was an excessive overreaction.
Because you freely admit that the Confederate reason for initiating the war was even less justified than that.
It was most definitely a blunder. Even Fidel Castro knew better than to make that stupid move. They should have just swallowed their pride and lived with it, and just kept bugging Lincoln to turn it over to them.
They could have simply informed the lower court that their understanding of the purpose of "Imminent Domain" is incorrect; That public need and usage does not extend so far as to allow them to seize property to give to someone else to use to make a profit, and thus indirectly stimulate the economy which might indirectly benefits the state.
Imminent Domain should only be used for immediate and direct benefit to the Citizens and the state, and should not require the involvement of third parties and indirect revenue.
The State Court's understanding is wrong, and So apparently is the Federal Court's, and I don't find these levels of ignorance at all surprising because we see the same sort of foolishness regarding all sorts of other aspects of Law.
Our legal system has become a collection of imbeciles who badly need to be tossed out of it.
And if you grant the Federal Government authority over eminent domain then how can you criticize it when it takes authority over marriage and abortion and what have you?
Having a Federal Court point out to a State court that their understanding of the meaning of Imminent Domain is incorrect is not giving the Federal Government any new Authority over the state. It's insuring that the state recognizes and protects the long understood rights as outlined by the common law, and by specific protections in the Constitution and the Bill of rights.
For example, Bubba Ho-tep's argument about killing left handed people is an obvious violation of the long existing rights understood by all to extend to this class of people. You can't take away fundamental rights through the action of a state court except in punishment of a crime.
I think i’m going to skip this one as not worth the trouble.
Don’t go away mad....
It’s not a non-sequitur, it’s simply an extension of your position that states can secede at will, at any time, for any reason.
And the Confederate action of bombarding Sumter to rubble? Are you willing to say that was far more disproportionate to any provocation the South could name?
It is as if a woman slaps her husband, and he beats her face in with his fists. It was an excessive overreaction.
A simplistic and somewhat inaccurate analogy. It would be more like the wife took several shots at her husband and he got his gun and fired back. Would you call that an excessive overreaction?
It was most definitely a blunder.
Never mind what the South should have done, was what they did do justified? Did the actions the garrison at Sumter took justify being bombarded into surrender? Or was it an excessive overraction on the Confederacy's part?
Not going away, just not interested in dealing with your nonsense at the moment. I’ve got more interesting fish to filet. :)
And that is a straw man. Your claim is NOT an extension of my position.
Just a suggestion - you might have better luck with your "filleting" if you used a knife instead of a spoon.
Man has a natural right of liberty, to name one cited in the Declaration, but we imprison large numbers of people. Man has a natural right of life, but we execute people. People have a natural right to the "pursuit of happiness," but if driving at 150 mph is what makes you happy, you're going to have a hard time of it.
The fact is the "natural rights"--a slippery term that tends to mean whatever one wants it to mean--are trumped by laws all the time. Society is based on compromising natural rights--the "state of nature" where, we are told, life is "nasty, brutish and short" in order to enjoy the benefits and security that society offers.
THE right of nature, which writers commonly call jus naturale, is the liberty each man hath to use his own power as he will himself for the preservation of his own nature; that is to say, of his own life; and consequently, of doing anything which, in his own judgement and reason, he shall conceive to be the aptest means thereunto.(…)And because the condition of man (as hath been declared in the precedent chapter) is a condition of war of every one against every one, in which case every one is governed by his own reason, and there is nothing he can make use of that may not be a help unto him in preserving his life against his enemies; it followeth that in such a condition every man has a right to every thing, even to one another's body. And therefore, as long as this natural right of every man to every thing endureth, there can be no security to any man, how strong or wise soever he be, of living out the time which nature ordinarily alloweth men to live. And consequently it is a precept, or general rule of reason: that every man ought to endeavour peace, as far as he has hope of obtaining it; and when he cannot obtain it, that he may seek and use all helps and advantages of war. The first branch of which rule containeth the first and fundamental law of nature, which is: to seek peace and follow it. The second, the sum of the right of nature, which is: by all means we can to defend ourselves.
From this fundamental law of nature, by which men are commanded to endeavour peace, is derived this second law: that a man be willing, when others are so too, as far forth as for peace and defence of himself he shall think it necessary, to lay down this right to all things; and be contented with so much liberty against other men as he would allow other men against himself. For as long as every man holdeth this right, of doing anything he liketh; so long are all men in the condition of war. But if other men will not lay down their right, as well as he, then there is no reason for anyone to divest himself of his: for that were to expose himself to prey, which no man is bound to, rather than to dispose himself to peace. --Hobbes, Leviathan
No, it is quite accurate. If Ft. Sumter did not in any way match the level of destruction which would have been the result of a 35,000 man invasion.
If Ft. Sumter was a slap, First Battle of Bullrun was a punch to the face from what was initially intended to be a throat punch. (Seizure of Richmond and an end to the Confederacy.)
Subsequent events are perfectly analogous to a larger strong man brutally beating a woman into submission. Occasionally the Woman got in some good shots, but the Strength was always with the man.
Never mind what the South should have done, was what they did do justified? Did the actions the garrison at Sumter took justify being bombarded into surrender? Or was it an excessive overreaction on the Confederacy's part?
The answers to this question are in the eyes of the beholder. I have read that they tried to negotiate with Lincoln for Ft. Sumter, and that he initially agreed, then backed out, then led them to believe it would get resolved, then informed them that it would not, and so on.
I have read that they regarded this game playing with them as a deliberate affront and insult, and so perhaps they thought it was justified to put an end to it.
As an objective third party observer, (meaning me) it appears that this was a horrible blunder on their part. I have a friend that believes Lincoln cleverly engineered the whole thing to work out as it did, but even if that' true, which I don't know, they should have known better than to fall into such a trap.
What I have been contemplating since Tuesday is how this looked from the Union side. Apart from any skull duggery at manipulating events to make such a thing happened, if it was genuinely unexpected, then it would seem to be a very insulting and humiliating event, and one which requires an escalated response.
Though the thought of killing 600,000 people for a humiliation abhors me, they did not know at that time that this would be the eventual end result. Suffice it to say, some sort of violent response was warranted, but it should not have gone so far as an attempt to invade their territory and seize their capital city.
I was thinking more along the lines of sending the Navy and shelling Charleston or something. At the very least, the Soldiers that fired on Sumter.
It would have been better to have avoided the whole thing.
Well sure. Your methods wouldn't work any better for me than they did for you.
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