House drops Confederate Flag ban for veterans cemeteries

politico.com ^ | 6/23/16 | Matthew Nussbaum

[ColdOne]

A measure to bar confederate flags from cemeteries run by the Department of Veterans Affairs was removed from legislation passed by the House early Thursday.

The flag ban was added to the VA funding bill in May by a vote of 265-159, with most Republicans voting against the ban. But Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) both supported the measure. Ryan was commended for allowing a vote on the controversial measure, but has since limited what amendments can be offered on the floor.

[PeaRidge]

You said: “Your data confirms one very important element of my overall argument: total exports for 1860 were $400 million.”

That number is the total, but includes specie of undetermined source and international reexports from other countries being transshipped through US ports.

So, if you want to make some point about the percentage of Southern produced goods measured against the total export value of 1860, the you will have to use the number $316,000,000. (See page 885, column 5.)

[PeaRidge]

Yes, having a GDP number would be good.

To my way of thinking, having the amount and value of domestic goods shipped out by port, gives you that number. However, the South shipped all sorts of goods North each year for their consumption, so the port figures would reflect the GDP fairly accurately. How much was shipped by rail or wagon is another matter.

One author/economist did develop figures of regional productions that came from the census and customs records.

Name is Thomas Kettell. His work can be found on line.

[rustbucket]

Now you [BroJoeK] may ask why '64 and '65 data is at some variance. Reason being is that Census/Customs data was published at the end of the callendar year. Treasury data was compiled and published on a June 30/July 1 schedule.

I read something the other day on why tariff revenue jumped up in 1864. The reason given was that importers removed items from the warehouses in advance of an impending higher tariff rate.

[BroJoeK]

rustbucket: "Perhaps our interlocutor forgets that back in those times Missouri, Kentucky, and even Maryland and Deleware were considered Southern states. See the following old map of the Southern States:"

"Interlocutor"?
The old rustbucket I remember didn't use such $2 words.
Do we now see a changed man?

Regardless, Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland & Delaware all remained Union states.
So their exports cannot be considered products of the Deep Confederate South and cannot be used to justify secession.

rustbucket: "Our interlocutor has his own version of what were considered Southern states at the time, preferring to call states that were taken over or invaded by pro-union troops "Northern" states."

No, Union states are those which never voted for secession, and should include regions of states which remained loyal throughout, such as western Virginia, eastern Tennessee -- anywhere the percentage of slaves was relatively low, there Unionism dominated:

rustbucket: "The exiled state government did pass a secession document, but whether a quorum existed to pass the document is disputed."

The fact is: the lawful Missouri Convention took just one vote on secession, March 19, 1861, and it was overwhelmingly (98-1) for Union.
In October an unlawful rump assembly voted for secession, but Missouri was solidly Union as can be seen by enlistment numbers: about 100,000 Union, just 30,000 Confederates.

The key factor in Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland & Delaware was slaves & slaver-ownership: relatively few, a small minority, and non-slave holders had no interest in secession.

rustbucket: "Perhaps the poster doesn't remember Lincoln arresting members of the Maryland legislature to prevent them from voting for secession, or "Beast" Butler commanding Massachusetts troops invading and taking over Annapolis and then Baltimore. "

Rusty, your memory is very selective, consisting of only what you wish, never the whole story.
In fact, Maryland like Missouri took only one vote on secession, on April 29, 1861 53-13 against secession.
It also voted for a secession convention if Virginia seceded, however on May 6, 1861 the Confederacy formally declared war on the United States thus satisfying the Constitution's definition of treason:

Article 3, section 3: "Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. "

On May 6, citizens of Union states who gave aid & comfort to the Confederacy were guilty of treason, and were treated accordingly.

rustbucket: "Kentucky is another Southern state whose loyalties were split.
Lincoln had only gotten 1,364 votes in Kentucky in the 1860 election.
A Kentucky group representing 68 of 110 counties adopted a secession ordinance and, like Missouri, was admitted to the Confederacy."

Rusty, I would be embarrassed and seek medical attention if my memory were as selective as yours.
In fact, like Missouri and Maryland, Kentucky never voted for secession.
In December 1860 its general assembly refused to consider secession.
In June 1861 Unionists won nine of ten Kentucky congressional seats.
The August 5 elections produced Unionist majorities of 76-24 in the House and 24-11 in the Senate, ending any lawful secessionist efforts.

Kentucky's Unionist sympathies are also seen in the numbers of troops supplied: about 100,000 Union, 30,000 Confederates.

rustbucket: "The action is perhaps roughly equivalent to the Federal Government accepting West Virginia's secession from Virginia although geographically most of the new state of West Virginia consisted of counties that had voted to secede from the Union."

Of West Virginia's 55 counties, three Northeastern counties were seriously secessionist.
However, after May 6, 1861 when the Confederacy formally declared war on the United States, those who gave aid & comfort to Confederates were constitutionally guilty of treason.
So not sure how much of a vote they would have in these matters.

Estimates of West Virginia troop numbers are disputed but do appear to be roughly equal Union & Confederate -- about 22,000 of each.
After the war, when Confederates were allowed to vote again, West Virginia became solid Democrat and has remained so ever since.

[PeaRidge]

You said: “But of course, “states of origin” is the very crux of the economic argument for secession.”

You can float that idea all you want, but the truth is that the pending direct trade with Europe and the inflow of low tariff goods was the problem for the Northern businesses and the Treasury. “States of origin” were the seceded states.
Simple enough?

[rustbucket]

How are the regions defined? I presume "West" meant California, Washington, etc? Or was it referring to the near West?

I assume "East" meant the North Eastern coastal areas.

The map shown by first link in my post 1536 might define the Southern states, but I'm not sure what the various books of economic data mean by the term. I suspect the term, the West, may refer to the Midwest. As you pointed out above, gold and silver were largely the products of California and Nevada. They aren't credited to the West in the first link I provided in post 1530. That source credits gold and silver to the East.

The East didn't produce enough products to purchase what they imported so that region had to pay cash to buy imports. The cash probably came from items they sold the West and the South at tariff-inflated prices. One could argue that the East had a trade deficit they made up for with cash taken from the rest of the country by means of the protective tariff.

[jmacusa]

Joe I’m learning a tremendous amount reading your posts, thank you. I think lost in all this is the fact that human being were reduced to mere chattel, as items to be bought and sold. Not to sound callous or dehumanizing here but was was the going price for a healthy black male between 20 or forty years old?

[rustbucket]

"Interlocutor"?
The old rustbucket I remember didn't use such $2 words.
Do we now see a changed man?

Interlocutor is a polite term. I'm sorry you had to look it up.

Rusty, your memory is very selective, consisting of only what you wish, never the whole story.
In fact, Maryland like Missouri took only one vote on secession, on April 29, 1861 53-13 against secession.

The situation was different in September. This was after Lincoln had ignored habeas corpus, thrown Marylanders in jail including newspaper editors and publishers, the Baltimore mayor, the Baltimore Marshal of Police, the Board of Police, etc., and basically taken over Baltimore and the state. The Lincoln Administration feared the Maryland Legislature was planning another secession vote in September and took steps to stop a lawfully elected state legislature from doing its business. I fear you'd have fit right in with the Federales, BJK.

See the following below regarding the Legislature and arrests: [Link]

On August 7, the General Assembly adjourned, intending to meet again on September 17. However, on that day Federal troops and Baltimore police officers arrived in Frederick with orders to arrest the pro-Confederate members of the General Assembly. Thus, the special session in Frederick ended, as did Frederick's summer as the state capital, as Maryland found itself inexorably drawn further and further into the heart of the bloodiest war in American history.

Lincoln had rebuffed the US House of Representatives when they asked for an explanations of the arrest of Baltimore officials. From the OR, Volume 2 Series 1 pages 155 and 156 beginning with part of a memorial from Baltimoreans to the House and Senate of the US Congress:

The protection afforded by constitutional guarantees of the liberty of the citizen and constitutional restraints imposed on the power of the Executive has been denied. Obedience to the courts is refused when they interfere for the protection of the citizen. Arms belonging to the city of Baltimore and rightfully in the custody of its authorities have been taken. The buildings of the city have been given into the custody of officers not known to its laws. Its court-house has been occupied by troops. Its civil authority has been disregarded, and a revolutionary government established by mere force of arms and against law.

Against these manifold wrongs your memorialist, for themselves and the free community which they represent, do most solemnly protest.

The State of Maryland has been and is subject to the Constitution and laws of the United States, and her citizens are of right entitled to the protection of that Constitution and of those laws. The civil authorities of this city have heretofore, and do now, render fitting obedience to the requirements of both. If disaffection is believed to exist, from which danger is apprehended, the guns of Fort McHenry turned on the homes of the women and children of an unarmed city, the Federal troops encamped around its limits, would seem an adequate protection to the Government. Whether that disaffection is weakened by depriving a whole community of the protection of its laws, whether the risk of disorder is diminished by establishing a police government which fails to command the respect accorded to undoubted lawful authority, you in your wisdom will determine.

But your memorialist respectfully, yet most earnestly, demand, as a matter of right, that their city may be governed according to the Constitution and laws of the United States and of the State of Maryland. They demand as a matter of right that citizens may e secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures, and that they be not deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law. They demand as a matter of right that the military render obedience to the civil authority, that our municipal laws be respected, that officers be released from imprisonment and restored to the lawful exercise of their functions, that the police government established by law be no longer impeded by armed force to the injury of peace and order. These their rightful demands your memorialist submit for the consideration of your honorable bodies.

Numbers 7. Resolution of the House of Representatives and reply of the President.

RESOLUTION.

Resolved, That the President be requested immediately to communicate to this House, if in his judgment not incompatible with the public interest, the grounds, reason, and evidence upon which the police commissioners of Baltimore were arrested, and are now detained as prisoners at Fort McHenry.

Adopted, July 24, 1864.

REPLY.

WASHINGTON, July 27, 1864.

To the House of Representatives:

In answer to the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 24th instant, asking the grounds, reason, and evidence upon which the police commissioners of Baltimore were arrested and are now detained as prisoners at Fort McHenry, I have to state that it is judged to be incompatible with the public interest at this time to furnish the information called for by the resolution.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

And from your favorite source, Wikipedia:

Lincoln's dismissal of Justice Taney's ruling was criticized in an editorial by Francis Scott Key's grandson, Baltimore newspaper editor Frank Key Howard, he was himself arrested without trial. (Ironically, federal troops imprisoned the young newspaper editor in Baltimore's Fort McHenry, which, as he noted, was the same fort where the Star Spangled Banner had been waving "o'er the land of the free" in his grandfather's lyrics.[33]) In 1863 Howard wrote about his experience as a "political prisoner" at Fort McHenry in the book Fourteen Months in the American Bastille;[33] two of the publishers selling the book were then arrested.[1]

One third of the members of the Maryland General Assembly were arrested on September 17, 1861, the first day of the legislature's new session, because of intelligence suggesting that the Assembly "would aid the anticipated rebel invasion and would attempt to take the state out of the Union".[34] Sitting U.S. Congressman from Maryland Henry May was also arrested without recourse to habeas corpus on suspicion of treason and held in Fort Lafayette.[35][36]

Now I understand that reference to Howard in the Maryland, my Maryland lyrics. I knew they had arrested the grandson of Francis Scott Key, but I didn't remember that Howard was his last name nor realize the arrest was for Howard criticizing Lincoln for ignoring Chief Justice Taney's valid order against the withholding of habeas corpus from Merryman.

In my post I had said the following: "The action [part of Kentucky voting to secede and the Confederacy accepting them] is perhaps roughly equivalent to the Federal Government accepting West Virginia's secession from Virginia although geographically most of the new state of West Virginia consisted of counties that had voted to secede from the Union."

You presented a different map than the one that illustrates my point. Here's a West Virginia map that supports exactly what I said: Link

The map shows that counties that had voted to secede from the Union were incorporated into the new state of West Virginia. From what I've read the people in many of those non-voting counties didn't vote so as not to give any legitimacy to something they wished to be no part of. I'm not sure what they had in common with Wheeling anyway. Perhaps it is like the people in the bulk of Pennsylvania being dominated or outvoted by the largest city in it, Philadelphia, with its suspected voter fraud.

after May 6, 1861 when the Confederacy formally declared war on the United States, those who gave aid & comfort to Confederates were constitutionally guilty of treason.

They were no longer members of the Union, and thus could not commit treason against it. Please show me the hoards of Confederates convicted of treason. You apparently hold that the Southern states did not have the right to secede. Yeah, I know you don't think they had sufficient cause to secede, but you don't get to decide that. Those states were the ones that decided if there was sufficient reason to secede. Also, please point out where in the Constitution secession is outlawed and how secession is not a reserved right of the states under the Tenth Amendment. Where in the Constitution is the power to stop secession given to the Federal government or to states that did not secede?

[rustbucket]

hoards = hordes

[rustbucket]

Of course I am astonished & amazed at your ability to recall and repost data originating many years ago.
Is that from memory, or some kind of filing system?

Both. I remembered that I said that to you, and a quick search of my files turned up the post.

I was once accused of having a photographic memory by some MIT classmates. I don't have such a memory.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp; "How are the regions defined?
I presume "West" meant California, Washington, etc?
Or was it referring to the near West?"

In Civil War era terms, "the West" meant west of Pennsylvania, i.e., Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, etc.
California & Nevada could be called "far West".

DiogenesLamp: "I assume "East" meant the North Eastern coastal areas."

From Pennsylvania north.

DiogenesLamp: "If we could find out how much each region produced in terms of the Gross National Product, we could determine how significant the European Trade was to the New York/New England area."

rustbucket responding to DL: "The East didn't produce enough products to purchase what they imported so that region had to pay cash to buy imports...
One could argue that the East had a trade deficit they made up for with cash taken from the rest of the country by means of the protective tariff."

Or not.

1. First, "the East" did not purchase everything they imported, much re-shipped & sold in other regions of the country.
   
2. Second, those tariffs protected US producers anywhere, north, south or west.
   
3. Third, when cotton exports ended in 1861, according to PeaRidge's numbers, US import tariff revenues fell only 25%.
   That suggests the US was less dependent on cotton than is often claimed.

Bottom line: in terms of this discussion, "the South" can only really include the Deep South hotbed of Fire Eating secessionists, the source of half of 1860 US exports: cotton.
Border slave-states which refused to secede, and even Unionist regions of Upper South states cannot be considered economically as "the South".
One reason is: those regions continued to produce exports for the Union throughout the Civil War.

Note significant manufacturing in many southern states:

[BroJoeK]

PeaRidge: "The exports from the US that bought those goods were worth $278,902,000 at the ports of exit from the US.
Of that amount, the value of cotton, tobacco, rice, naval stores, sugar, molasses, hemp, cotton manufactures (all originating in the South via US Customs house data) was worth $198,309,000 (Statistical abstract of the US, 1936 edition,pgs 435-439) or about 71%."

You're still fudging the numbers, FRiend.
In fact, 1859 exports including specie totaled $357 million.
Of that, cotton plus rice was roughly half.
Other major exports, like tobacco, hemp and cotton manufactures came from Union states, not the Deep South.

Indeed, if you'll examine rusty's link carefully, you'll notice that all manufactured cloth is classified as "Southern Origin" when, in fact, the value added of manufacturing should make up to half those numbers as Eastern origin.
To that point: rusty's data shows that even without raw cotton in 1861 US exports of cloth fell only 23%.
So raw cotton was not as important as sometimes claimed.

[BroJoeK]

PeaBrain: "BroCanard, in your post #1501, you were giving tariff revenue in the North by year. But you left out two years’ worth of data...."

I posted the data exactly as my source provided.
Your numbers are interesting because they show the following:
Change in Union tariff revenues by year:

1. 1861 = -26%
2. 1862 = +19%
3. 1863 = +37%
4. 1864 = +51%
5. 1865 = -16%
6. 1870 = +129%

PeaBrain: "Now you may ask why '64 and '65 data is at some variance. Reason being is... "

No problem since your numbers tell the same basic story as mine: that even without cotton in 1861 US revenues fell only 26% and soon recovered, growing 19%, then 37% and 51% in the following years.

Thanks.

[DiogenesLamp]

The map shown by first link in my post 1536 might define the Southern states, but I'm not sure what the various books of economic data mean by the term. I suspect the term, the West, may refer to the Midwest.

What makes it unclear are these categories "Oil, spermaceti -- Oil, whale and other fish Whalebone". You aren't going to get that from the Midwest.

As you pointed out above, gold and silver were largely the products of California and Nevada. They aren't credited to the West in the first link I provided in post 1530.

I don't think gold and silver should be counted in the analysis in which I am interested because they did not rely on Southern production and therefore would not have been affected by the South becoming an independent nation.

Only those economic factors affected by Southern independence should be cited as causing economic damage to the North, and especially economic damage to New York, because that is where I think the "Shadow Government" mentioned in the FBI investigation of Hillary, was centered at that time.

Yes, i'm noticing uncanny parallels between then and now.

That source credits gold and silver to the East.

Were there any significant gold and silver mines in the East?

The East didn't produce enough products to purchase what they imported so that region had to pay cash to buy imports. The cash probably came from items they sold the West and the South at tariff-inflated prices. One could argue that the East had a trade deficit they made up for with cash taken from the rest of the country by means of the protective tariff.

And this is no small point. That protectionism by government policy affected domestic purchases too. It basically resulted in a concentration of wealth and power in the region being "protected." As you mentioned, they could sell products at inflated prices to the detriment of others who had to pay them.

Southern independence upset that applecart too. With the South no longer constrained by the protectionist policies of the North, they would have been eventually able to supply the products which were previously coming from Northern businesses. Because the prices would have been lower, the shift of business to the South would be virtually guaranteed.

They could have supplied goods and services to the Midwest and territories, and eventually brought them into their orbit. Both Economic and Political power would have shifted to the South at the expense of the North.

Very frightening prospect if you are the chief beneficiary of the protectionist policies.

[BroJoeK]

PeaRidge: "That number is the total, but includes specie of undetermined source and international reexports from other countries being transshipped through US ports.
So, if you want to make some point about the percentage of Southern produced goods measured against the total export value of 1860, the you will have to use the number $316,000,000. (See page 885, column 5.)"

No, your own link shows total 1860 exports as $400 million, including specie.
And that is the number, not $316 million, which paid for import tariff revenues.
Further, strictly Deep South exports were $192 million for cotton, not the much larger number which includes Union produced goods.

Bottom line: it's totally fair to say that 3 million Deep South slaves produced 50% of US export revenue, but not the higher numbers 75% or 87%.
And we know this for certain because when cotton came out of the mix in 1861, US tariff revenues fell by only 26% and soon strongly recovered.
So Deep South produced products were not as important as some then & now claim.

[BroJoeK]

PeaRidge: "To my way of thinking, having the amount and value of domestic goods shipped out by port, gives you that number."

It might, if you only considered such Southern ports as Charleston or Savanah.
But over 80% of "Southern" commerce went through the two biggest ports of New Orleans and Baltimore.
And those ports both had major rail and steamboat connections to Northern & Western states.
So demonstrably large percentages of "Southern exports" were, in fact, produced in Union states.

Cotton & rice were the only certain exports of the Deep South.
Combined those contributed about 50% to the cost of tariffed imports.

1860 railroads, note New Orleans & Baltimore connections to Northern & Western producers.

[BroJoeK]

rustbucket: "I read something the other day on why tariff revenue jumped up in 1864.
The reason given was that importers removed items from the warehouses in advance of an impending higher tariff rate."

Regardless, the data clearly shows the Union economy and Federal tariff revenues were not as dependent on Deep South cotton as some have claimed.

[BroJoeK]

PeaRidge: "...truth is that the pending direct trade with Europe and the inflow of low tariff goods was the problem for the Northern businesses and the Treasury.
'States of origin' were the seceded states.
Simple enough?"

No, as always, you just hope to confuse & obfuscate the real issues.
"Direct trade with Europe" was already the case for about 80% of Southern port exports -- they shipped directly to Europe.
But many return ships stopped in such Northern ports as New York to deliver imports and immigrants.
Those would never go to Southern ports, regardless of Confederate tariffs because it would mean first paying two tariffs when imports shipped into Union states and second, providing transportation for immigrants to Northern cities which could employ them.

So, regardless of your Lost Causer fantasies, the "problem" you defined did not exist.

The real problem was loss of Deep South produced cotton reduced tariff revenues in 1861 by 26%.
Fortunately for the Union, Northern economies soon adjusted, adapted and continued to prosper without Confederate raw materials.

[BroJoeK]

jmacusa: "I think lost in all this is the fact that human being were reduced to mere chattel, as items to be bought and sold."

Sure, but you need to understand that many slaveocrats defended their "peculiar institution" on grounds that, actually, their slaves were treated better than Northern "wage slaves".
Ideally speaking, a Southern plantation was the ultimate welfare state -- to each according to his needs, from each according to abilities, cradle to grave.
To me, it's returning to this supposed ideal plantation life which motivates so many descendants of slaves today to vote Democrat.
Of course, they are not alone -- today's descendants of European serfs and Asian coolies also seek support from marse in the Big (white) House.

jmacusa: "Not to sound callous or dehumanizing here but was was the going price for a healthy black male between 20 or forty years old?"

Off the top of my head I can say that in 1860 approximately 4 million slaves were valued, in total, at $4 billion.
It was a huge investment and only total land itself was valued higher.
In today's terms we'd say about $16 trillion.
The loss of that much in assets was understood by all to be a crushing blow worth nearly anything to prevent.

[BroJoeK]

rustbucket: "Interlocutor is a polite term.
I'm sorry you had to look it up."

I didn't look it up, it's just I don't remember the old rustbucket using spurious insults.
Such insults usually suggest the insulter himself has run out of reasonable arguments and so wishes to escape the "battlefield" under a cloud of smoke -- insults, non-sequiturs, red herrings, straw men, etc., etc.

rustbucket used to be better than that, FRiend.

rustbucket: "The situation was different in September."

Of course, after the Confederacy formally declared war on the United States, anyone giving "aid and comfort" to the enemy was guilty of treason:

Article 3, section 3: "Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort."

rustbucket quoting petition: "Whether that disaffection is weakened by depriving a whole community of the protection of its laws, whether the risk of disorder is diminished by establishing a police government which fails to command the respect accorded to undoubted lawful authority, you in your wisdom will determine."

And Congress did determine that, according to Article 1, section 9, suspension of habeas corpus was necessary:

"The privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it."

rustbucket: "...the arrest was for Howard criticizing Lincoln for ignoring Chief Justice Taney's valid order against the withholding of habeas corpus from Merryman."

Congress decided otherwise.

rustbucket: "You presented a different map than the one that illustrates my point.
Here's a West Virginia map that supports exactly what I said."

Compare both maps side by side:

Clearly West Virginia took in enough secessionist counties to guarantee that forever after Mountaineers nearly always vote Democrat.

rustbucket: "They were no longer members of the Union, and thus could not commit treason against it."

Yet again I strongly advise you to seek medical attention for your highly selective historical memory.
Your argument against treason charges for Confederate state citizens is at least plausible, but not for citizens of Union states who provided "aid and comfort" to an enemy waging war against the United States.

Now do you remember?

rustbucket: "Please show me the hoards of Confederates convicted of treason."

They were all eventually pardoned by President Andrew Johnson.

rustbucket: "You apparently hold that the Southern states did not have the right to secede.
Yeah, I know you don't think they had sufficient cause to secede, but you don't get to decide that.
Those states were the ones that decided if there was sufficient reason to secede."

Again your selective historical memory is hard at work.
In fact, Unionists like Presidents Buchanan & Lincoln believed Confederates had seceded "at pleasure", making their secessions illegitimate.
But they did not believe that, on that account alone the Union could by force stop them.
That's why the Federal government took no military actions to stop secession until the Confederacy started and declared war on the United States.

Now do you remember, FRiend?