Posted on 10/29/2001 11:26:49 AM PST by aomagrat
Well, I guess that makes it alright then. Want to win? Just terrorize innocents (Hmmm...sounds familiar!). If the south had adopted Sherman's tactic of terror and cowardly inhumane treatment of innocent civilians, Washington D.C. would be a Confederate tourist site today. We didn't burn and pillage as we went and Lee wouldn't have allowed it.
You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out."
Fine statement, he should probably be posthumously tried for war crimes. It sounds like Sherman's real fight was with Lincoln and the Union forces in Mobile Alabama. You know...the ones that fired the real first shots of the war.
You just have it your way. If I honor my Southern heritage it means I hate and dishonor blacks. You honor your heriatage and you are Indian hater I guess. That reasoning doesn't make much sense to me but to each his own.
Last point, Lee is remembered fondly by historians (North and South), and Sherman/Grant are not. Why is that?
History trivia:
Did any Southern state(s) have an elected black State Senator just months prior to the WONA? If so, name it/them.
That's not correct.
Lincoln was a lifelong opponent of slavery.
"This is a world of compensations; and he that would -be- no slave, must consent to --have-- no slave. Those that deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves, and under a just God cannot long retain it."
3/1/59
"Viewed from the genuine abolition ground, Mr. Lincoln seemed tardy, cold, dull and indifferent; but measuring him by the sentiment of his country, a sentiment he was bound as a statesman to consult, he was swift, zealous, radical and determined."
--Frederick Douglass
Now consider several facts about Lincoln's political career:
1. While Lincoln was building political strength in local Illinois politics, he opposed the war with Mexico as inexpedient for several reasons, including that it was waged to increase the power of slave states in the institutions of Federal government.
2. During Lincoln's first term as U.S. congressman from Illinois in the late 1840's, he continued to criticize the Mexican war and worked out a bill (never introduced) calling for a referendum in the District of Columbia designed to free the slaves in that Federal enclave and compensate their owners.
3. His reentry into national politics in 1854 was clearly for the purpose of opposing the expansion of slavery into the territories under the provisions of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. He had his heart and soul involved with the idea of gradual emancipation to bring the fullest meaning to the words of Declaration of Independence that all men are created equal.
4. From 1854 to his nomination for the presidency in 1860, as James McPherson noted in his DRAWN WITH THE SWORD, "the dominant, unifying theme of Lincoln's career was opposition to the expansion of slavery as a vital first step toward placing it in the course of ultimate extinction." In those years he gave approximately 175 political speeches. McPherson notes that the "central message of these speeches showed Lincoln to be a "one-issue" man - the issue being slavery." Thus, Lincoln's nomination to the presidency was based on a principled opposition to slavery on moral grounds, and that position was clear to voters both in the South and the North.
5. In his early speeches and actions as president-elect and president, he was clear in his opinion that he had no legal authority to interfere with slavery in the slave states. However, he was persistent and consistent in his efforts to encourage and aid voluntary emancipation in the loyal Border States, territories and the District of Columbia. These efforts predated his publication of the Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation.
In summary, I think one can safely say that Lincoln was clearly a gradual abolitionist from the beginning of his political career.
--from the AOL ACW forum
Walt
I disagree. I lived in Germany. They may not be proud of what happened during the Third Reich, but, other than that, the Germans are quite proud of their heritage.
If I am not mistaken, it had something to do with keeping the British from coming into the war on the side of the South.
As for the indians, you seem to forget that the Cherokee nation was uprooted and sent west on their Trail of Tears inthe 1820's at the behest of the people of North Carolina and Georgia. Most of the initial troops were Georgia militia. Don't preach to me about love and respect for Indians. Neither side has clean hands where that is concerned.
As to Lee vs. Sherman and Grant, where the heck did you get that statistic - League of the South? Lee was as fine man and a good general but he met his match in Grant and Sherman. Lee beat every general the North sent against him until Meade. Grant beat every general the south sent his way period.
OK, I'll bite on the trivia question. What's the answer?
One of the more comical aspects of neo-confederatism is this constant referring to the Great Seal of the CSA, with its "Deo Vindice" theme. The Great Seal is powerful proof that the common men of the south were duped into fighting for the slave power. Why else would would the image of George Washington appear thereon? Washinston was a strong proponent of a national government, as he made abundantly clear.
"I do not conceive we can exist long as a nation, without having lodged somewhere a power which will pervade the whole Union in as energetic a manner, as the authority of the different state governments extends over the several states. To be fearful of vesting Congress, constituted as that body is, with ample authorities for national purposes, appears to me to be the very climax of popular absurdity and madness."
George Washington to John Jay, 15 August 1786
"What stronger evidence can be given of the want of energy in our government than these disorders? If there exists not a power to check them, what security has a man of life, liberty, or property? To you, I am sure I need not add aught on this subject, the consequences of a lax or inefficient government, are too obvious to be dwelt on. Thirteen sovereignties pulling against each other, and all tugging at the federal head, will soon bring ruin to the whole; whereas a liberal, and energetic Constitution, well guarded and closely watched, to prevent encroachments, might restore us to that degree of respectability and consequence, to which we had a fair claim, and the brightest prospect of attaining..."
George Washington to James Madison November 5, 1786
"In all our deliberations on this subject we kept steadily in our view, that which appears to us the greatest interest of every true American, the consolidation of our Union, in which is involved our prosperity, felicity, safety, perhaps our national existance. This important consideration, seriously and deeply impressed on our minds [at the constitutional convention] led each State in the convention to be less rigid on points of inferior magnitude...the constitution, which we now present, is the result of of a spirit of amity, and of that mutual deference and concession which the peculularity of our political situation rendered indispensible."
George Washington to the Continental Congress September 17, 1787
"The unity of government which constitutes you one people is also now dear to you. It is justly so, for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence, the support of your tranquility at home [and] your peace abroad, of your safety, of your prosperity, of that very liberty which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee that from different causes and from different quarters much pains will be taken, many artifices employed to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth; as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite moment that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national union to your collective and individual happiness....You should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it, accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the palladium of your political safety and prosperity, watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety, discountenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion that it can in any event be abandoned, and indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the various parts.
The basis of our political systems is the right of the people to make and to alter their Constitutions of Government. But the Constitution which at any time exists, till changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole people, is sacredly obligatory upon all.
-- George Washington, Farewell Address
Failing to be grounded in the historical record is also a failing of most neo-confederates.
Walt
Same here.
That icky "G" word?
You are clearly mistaken:
"Frankfort, Ky
Executive Mansion
Washington D.C. April 4, 1864
My Dear Sir:
You ask me to put in writing the substance of what I verbally said the other day, in your presence, to Governor Bramlette and Senator Dixon. It was about as follows:
"I am naturally anti-slavery. If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong. I can not remember when I did not so think, and feel. And yet I have never understood that the presidency conferred upon me an unrestricted right to act upon this judgment and feeling. It was in the oath I took, that I would, to the utmost of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. I could not take the office without taking the oath. Nor was it my view that I might take an oath to get power, and break the oath in using the power. I understood too, that in ordinary civil administration this oath even forbade me to practically indulge my primary abstract judgment on the moral question of slavery. I have publically declared this many times, and in many ways. And I aver that, to this day, I have done no official act in mere deference to my abstract judgment and feeling on slavery. I did understand however that my oath to preserve the constitution to the best of my ability, imposed upon me the duty of preserving by every indispensible means, that government--that nation--of which that constitution was the organic law. Was it possible to lose the nation, and preserve the constitution? By general law life and limb must be protected; yet often a limb must be amputated to save a life; but a life is never wisely given to save a limb. I felt that measures, otherwise unconstitutional, might become lawful, by becoming indispensible to to the preservation of the of the Constitution, through the preservation of the nation. Right or wrong, I assumed this ground, and now avow it...
When in March, and May and July 1862 I made earnest, and succcessive appeals to the border states to favor compensated emancipation, I believed the indispensable neccessity for military emancipation and arming the blacks would come, unless averted by that measure. They declined the proposition; and I was, in my best judgment, driven to the alternative of either surrendering the Union, and with it the Constitution, or of laying strong hand upon the colored element. I chose the latter. In choosing it, I hoped for greater gain than loss; but of this, I was not entirely confident. More than a year of trial now shows no loss by it in our foreign relations, none in our home popular sentiment, none in our white military force, no loss any how or any where. On the contrary, it shows a gain of quite one hundred and thirty thousand soldiers, seamen and laborers. These are palpable facts, about which there can be no cavilling. We have the men; and we could not have them without the measure.
And now let any Union man who complains of the measure, test himself by writing down in one line that he is for subduing the rebellion by force of arms; and in the next, that he is for taking these hundred and thirty thousand men from the Union side, and placing them where they would be but for the measure he condemns. If he can not face his case so stated, it is only because he can not face the truth.
I add a word which was not in the verbal conversation. In telling this tale I attempt no compliment to my own sagacity. I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events have controlled me. Now, at the end of three years struggle the Nation's condition is not what either party, or any man devised, or expected. God alone can claim it. Whither it is tending seems plain. If God now wills the removal of a great wrong, and wills also that we of the North as well as you of the South, shall pay for our complicity in that wrong, impartial history will find therein new cause to attest and revere the justice and goodness of God.
Yours truly
A. Lincoln"
My italics.
Walt
IF Half of the people who reside in the US donot pay Federal income taxes .
And, Half of the people who pay income taxes donot vote .
AND, the Half of the voters who donot pay taxes are taking the money the taxpayers earned at the ballot box .
THEN, You are probably right about the ignorance ,but you might need to attribute intolerance and arrogance to the voters who don't pay taxes .
IMHO.
A very familiar sight around one Southern city is a Mercedes-Benz S-560 with single digit South Carolina Judiciary plates and a Stars and Bars bumper sticker. That particular judge is from one of South Carolina's oldest and most respected families.
People who live there know exactly who I'm talking about.
"Gee, I got this picture off of the American Knights of the KKK website. It's a tee shirt that they sell. So what is that pictured in the background? Behind the guys with the pillowcases on their heads?"
Are you talking the cross or the Confederate battle flag?
The KKK has adopted both symbols it seems. Are you suggesting that because those assh*les use these symbols we should .... what ... abrogate displaying the cross or confederate flag ... or both?
VP Dick Cheney recently refused to attend the funeral of SC state Senator Spencer because of that gentleman's request to have the ANV battleflag displayed at his funeral and for "Dixie" to be sung.
The GOP is the single largest obstacle to conservatism in this country today. Southerners should never have rescued those socialists from obscurity and we should join together today to form a true conservative party. If we would do so, our ranks would soon be swelled by westerners and midwesterners and the GOP would die.
The democrats enthusiastically embrace socialism, and the republicans "reluctantly" embrace it, but both parties, in the end, embrace socialism.
Please don't confuse the GOP with conservatism, and don't ever think of it as a party which deserves the allegiance of Southern conservatives.
What do you have to say about the points contained in the article? I'll give you time to read it, because it's obvious that you haven't done so.
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