Posted on 04/28/2002 1:24:25 PM PDT by Ditto
Yes, it does. But in consistency with other rulings on legislative authority, that does not become an issue.
as does Taney's well known pro-slavery inclinations.
Not really beyond the circumstantial attempts to discredit him that you make, which as I noted are irrational. Taney's opinion on habeas corpus is not the same thing as his opinion on slavery, making it absurd to discredit one based upon the other.
You're late for class. I've already explained in Post #60 that your Marshall quote was mere dictum.
No. You simply asserted it to be so, used your own assertion as grounds to ignore it, and left it at that.
There are legislative powers specified in Articles II, III, IV, and V. Art.
But all in relation to the primary functions of their respective articles. The legislature itself is established in Article I where its functions are described and where all pertains to either the legislature directly or a direct and immediate situation in which the legislature interacts with another branch on a matter of legislative issues (i.e. signing of bills into law)
I deals mostly but not exclusively with legislative powers.
It is exclusive in the sense that all within Article I directly pertains to the legislature itself or a direct relationship between it and another branch in a legislative funtion.
Things aren't as cut and dried as you and 4Con would have us believe.
They certainly are for any direct and strict reading of the Constitution. In fact, I would venture to say that the ONLY way you can make the argument you do is to exercise what may be, by all reasonable means, characterized as an extremely tortured and intentionally loose reading of the document. That much is evidenced in the great degree of bending you have gone through to simply reach your basic argument, much less defend it.
Restrictions contained throughout that section [9] are oriented to the national legislative branch alone...
So you and 4Con would have us presume.
No. So I assert to be so in any reasonable direct reading of the document.
I was wisely taught in law school to never make presumptions regarding the law.
If that is so, why do you do just that?
If Section 9 is only intended to apply to Congress, why does the last paragraph state "No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States" instead of "by the Congress"?
Because you intentionally truncated the last paragraph, which continues to read in full "And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State."
Federal Courts (including Taney's Circuit Court) have the power to enforce their habeas corpus orders with U.S. Marshals
Yet need not necessarily do so if the circumstances do not permit it. There was more than enough tension at the time for Taney to know that he himself was not immune to Lincoln's wrath. It is documented historical fact that Taney made sure Lincoln recieved a copy of his opinion in Merryman, which would have had definate relevance to acts being undertaken by Lincoln, and Lincoln basically ignored it. You figure out the rest.
I'm not "attacking" anyone or anything.
Indeed you are. You are drawing into question the validity of Taney's opinion by posing what you presume to be arguments against its validity.
I'm simply pointing out the facts
And I am pointing out that your "facts" are riddled with circumstance, subjectivity, and questionable presumptions.
and speculating on why Taney didn't make more of an effort to have his order enforced.
And again, I am pointing out that you made your speculation with the express purpose of attempting to discredit the intrinsic merits of Taney's argument. I am also pointing out that your speculation is just that and nothing more.
Do you deny that Taney was a friend of the Confederates?
It is admissable that Taney's own beliefs were shared more so among the southern and border states than the north, but that in itself ammounts to little substantive in weighing the merits of his opinion beyond your admitted speculation. Therefore I question what your purpose of debating it is.
I strongly agree.
Good! There's one matter of agreement then.
No, because hiking the income tax could not reasonably be said to fall within the scope of being "commander in chief"
If one were to torture the language of the constitution enough, he could arrive at that conclusion. i.e. The commander in chief needs an army to exercise his authority and needs to pay that army, and in the absence of congress to appropriate funds to that army or raise such funds due to session being out and the inconvenience of calling it in. Therefore could one not suppose on the same ground that the president could raise the funds to appropriate for that legislative act of raising an army under his function as CoC, just as your argument says he may do under the legislative act of suspending habeas corpus?
Hardly. Plans by Maryland secessionists to invade and/or cut off Washington, D.C. from nonslave states were quickly being implemented.
And you are saying none of these incidents could have been thwarted by simple military force rather than the suspension of habeas corpus by one without the authority to make that suspension?
You are incorrect. Congress is mentioned specifically by name in both clause 1 and clause 8. It is also inherent to the language of several of the clauses that the reference could not be to anything but congress, as I previously noted and you failed to respond to.
Specifically...
Clause 3: "No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed." Exempting your world of modern day judicial activism, this clause could ONLY apply to the legislature as it specifically refers to the act of legislation itself and the passage of such legislation in the legislature.
Clause 4: "No Capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, unless in Proportion to the Census or Enumeration herein before directed to be taken." To lay a tax is again a legislative act, giving us the same situation - clause 4 pertains to the legislature and could not pertain elsewhere under any sane and direct reading of the text. Requirement of the census indicates that the reference is to the federal legislature
Clause 5: "No Tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from any State." Same situation. To lay a tax is an act of the legislature inherently, and the specified applicability of this prohibition to areas between the states indicates that it is the national legislature being referenced.
Clauses 6 and 7 follow in the same suit.
So again, you are left in the same situation. Only by giving an extremely tortured reading of the Constitution may you legitimately arrive at the conclusion you do.
And you are saying none of these incidents could have been thwarted by simple military force rather than the suspension of habeas corpus by one without the authority to make that suspension?
No, I'm just arguing that Lincoln had a good faith belief that suspension of habeas corpus was necessary to protect the public. Keep in mind that there were no great hordes of Justice Department lawyers at that time to prepare criminal cases against tens of thousands of rebels in close proximity to the capital. Moreover, all able bodied government officials were directly involved in defending Washington against the rebels. (See Battle Cry, pp. 285-286.)
It is also inherent to the language of several of the clauses that the reference could not be to anything but congress, as I previously noted and you failed to respond to.
No, your quoted provisions could also be read to restrict state governments.
And as I noted, you made no explanation but rather merely asserted it so and used that assertion to ignore the statement all together. I think it reasonable to note that this is sloppy at best on your part.
I believe a more detailed examination of this case is merited.
Marshall opens by very clearly stating its issue in that of the authority to issue a writ and the source of that authority: "The inquiry therefore on this motion will be, whether by any statute, compatible with the constitution of the United States, the power to award a writ of habeas corpus, in such a case as that of Erick Bollman and Samuel Swartwout, has been given to this court" meaning his own court, an issue where dispute had arisen.
To answer that question, Marshall examines the nature of such a writ in its legal history before posing the next question before the court "If the act of congress gives this court the power to award a writ of habeas corpus in the present case, it remains to inquire whether that act be compatible with the constitution." The answer, he notes, is found in the nature of the case, which is an appellate jurisdiction, hence the marbury issue does not impede. Accordingly, the court's duty is found in obeying the law prescribed by the legislature, hence Marshall's recognition of the fact that "If at any time the public safety should require the suspension of the powers vested by this act in the courts of the United States, it is for the legislature to say so." It is this issue of legislative action upon which the case itself turns. Marshall continues immediately "That question depends on political considerations, on which the legislature is to decide. Until the legislative will be expressed, this court can only see its duty, and must obey the laws. The motion, therefore, must be granted."
In other words, it would seem that the final question asked of Marshall in the case comes down to this issue of the legislature acting on article 1, section 9, clause 2, and thereby raising the point that his court's duty lies in obeying the laws. The answer turns around this duty, therefore it is an issue in the case.
One of the juriprudential reasons that dictum is given no precedential weight is that since the issue it relates to was not an issue in the case, the Court did not have the benefit of briefs on it from all interested parties.
But the legislature's role on the act WAS an issue in this case, and in fact the issue upon which the final question posed in the decision by Marshall turned, hence it immediately being followed by, in recognition, "The motion, therefore, must be granted."
No, I'm just arguing that Lincoln had a good faith belief that suspension of habeas corpus was necessary to protect the public.
Good faith belief or not, one's own whims do not give him the authority to supersede the constitution.
Keep in mind that there were no great hordes of Justice Department lawyers at that time to prepare criminal cases against tens of thousands of rebels in close proximity to the capital.
Irrelevant. The issue is on the constitutionality of Lincoln's act. Taney's ruling in merryman suggests unconstitutionality. Story's famed legal scholarship suggests unconstitutionality. Marshall's ruling does the same. In other words, Lincoln's act came up against the expressed writings of three prominent supreme court justices, two of them chief justices, one of them being made in the immediate time frame on a directly related issue, and the other having been made as an opinion of the supreme court as a whole drafted by the justice who is perhaps the single most respected authority on the constitution before the court itself in american history.
No, your quoted provisions could also be read to restrict state governments.
Untrue.
Clause 4: "No Capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, unless in Proportion to the Census or Enumeration herein before directed to be taken." - census provision renders the clause applicable in itself only by the federal congress
Clause 5: "No Tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from any State." - refers to interstate commerce, an inherently and explicitly federal congressional authority. States themselves cannot legislate an intrastate duties policy for the rest of the nation as to do so would be to extend beyond the scope of state authority.
Clause 6: "6: No Preference shall be given by any Regulation of Commerce or Revenue to the Ports of one State over those of another" - State A cannot legislate preference to its own ports in statutory relation to those of State B as to do so would require authority to write statute governing both. The Massachussetts legislature cannot write statute governing the port of Charleston, as that falls under South Carolina, not Massachussetts.
Clause 7: "No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law" - a state cannot legitimately legislate itself money from the nation's treasury on a whim. Congress must act, therefore this clause is directed to congress and may only reasonably apply to Congress.
Clause 8: "No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States" - a state cannot grant something that is beyond itself and its own authority, of which a title of nobility from the nation as a whole would be. So yet again, this is not applicable to states.
In other words, your argument, as I previously demonstrated and demonstrate to you again, fails you under any circumstance other than the intentionally tortured and unreasonably loose reading of the constitution you are giving.
Political ideology aside, I do prefer change for the better. But unlike some, I insist that it be done legally.
"Nor would I want a constitution like the Confederates' that prohibited the abolition of slavery. Talk about the despotic power! "
And what clause of the US Constitution prohibits slavery?
That's the problem with you Confederate glorifiers. To you, the state can do no wrong. If a majority of the citizens of your state wanted to secede so that they could form a state based on the ritual kidnapping and raping of nine year old girls, your analysis would support their "right of secession and self-government."
And now thanks to Lincoln I'm stuck in one that sanctioned the murder of 30 MILLION unborn children. The states once had sovereignty, now thanks to Federalism all states must allow a Doctor to suck the brains out of a child seconds from being born. Thanks but no thanks.
Name one [city destroyed by Sherman] .Although Sherman's tactics were hard on civilian property, few citizens were harmed by his tactics compared to other wars.
Try Randolph, Tennessee. Jackson and Meridian, Mississippi, where Sherman boasted that "Meridian no longer exists." The town of New Manchester, Georgia was completely destroyed - Sherman ordered the arrest and deportation of women and children, "I have ordered General Garrard to arrest for treason all owners and employees, foreign and native, and send them under guard to Marietta, whence I will send them North...... The Women can find employment in Indiana." The town was never rebuilt. Pardon me if I don't share in your admoration for a man targeting civilians.
The problem with rules of war which seek to protect civilians is that they only encourage dictators and their armed forces to hide behind human shields.
Yes - dictators do hide behide human shields. Ever heard of the "Immortal Six Hundred"? FYI , they were Confederates.
War is hell, but for some 4 million negroes, life itself under slavery was also hell.
If life was hell for slaves, were are the records of 4 million of them fleeing to the North after emacipation? With the men off fighting the war, a slave revolt and mass escapes would have been common. Again, read the Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers project for the truth about slavery. And newspapers also give creedence to "real" truths:
"A day or two ago a letter was received at the Treasury Department from a negro man, named Henry Jones, the property of Mr. E. Cannon, of Clarksville, in this State, which is worthy of the highest commendation, and justly entitled to be imitated by those who have been hoarding their treasure during the troubles which at present afflict the country. Henry places at the disposal of the Secretary of the Treasury $465 in gold, which he hopes will be of some service to the Government. In his letter he speaks of "our glorious cause," and declares that the slaves of the South have a deeper interest in the establishment of Southern independence than the white population. He thinks if the Yankees are successful the negroes are destined to the most cruel treatment at their hands."
"Patriotism of a Colored Man", Staunton Spectator, Staunton, VA, 18 Aug 1863, p. 2, c. 3
There were plenty of Northerners who were quite sympathetic to the plight of negroes and attempted to help them, including Mary Todd Lincoln.
But the most remarkable testimony on the subject, is borne by no less a personage than the notorious Henry Ward Beecher. In a recent sermon, Mr. Beecher says the free colored people at the North "are almost without education, with but little sympathy for ignorance." "They cannot even ride in the cars of our city railroads. They are snuffed at in the house of God, or tolerated with ill-disguised disgust." The negro cannot be employed as a stone mason, bricklayer, or carpenter. "There is scarcely a carpenter's shop in New York in which a journeyman would continue to work if a black man was employed in it." There is scarcely one of the common industries of life in which he can engage. "He is crowded down, down, down, through the most menial callings to the bottom of society." "We heap upon them," says Beecher, moral obloquy more atrocious than that which the master heaps upon the slave. And notwithstanding all this, we lift ourselves up to talk to the Southern people about the rights and liberties of the human soul, and especially the African soul."
Staunton Spectator, Staunton, VA, 6 Dec 1859, p. 2, c. 1
So why did Northern states like Illinois have laws preventing blacks from immigrating into those states?
Believe it or not, to an extent - I just happen to agree with you. I do hold that the courts can rule on the legality of an execution of powers (a la suspension of the writ of habeas corpus by executive), after all, there are checks and balances on each branch of government. Thomas Jefferson wrote that it "is a very dangerous doctrine to consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions".
Who stated in 1859 that the "people of these United States are the rightful masters of both Congresses and courts--not to overthrow the constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert that constitution"? Abraham Lincoln, and he left out a branch.
But the other whole point is that Taney can't decide for the President the limits and priorities of his office. ... But those decisions cannot be sovereign over the sovereign executive power. Supreme Court decisions can, of course, exercise moral authority or rational authority over the President's judgment. But they cannot dictate it. ... What he did not do, and could not do without violating his oath, was to place the responsibility for determining his duty in the hands of the Chief Justice.
The courts cannot tell the President what to do - the congress, people, states and courts can correct any deficiences - they can tell him when he's wrong. Taney was not telling Lincoln how to run the war, he simply ruled that Lincoln was wrong in one area. Congress could have suspended the writ, and Taney would have been content - the Constitution had been followed. But holding the executive above reproach is the 1st step to tyranny.
It is clear enough that it is implicitly contemplated by the Constitution as being under the supervision or concern of the Congress to suspend habeus corpus -- the Congress being normally the body most concerned to guard civil liberties, I suppose. But it is, to me, more clear that the Constitution does not explicitly restrict the power to Congress, and that the duties of the executive -- of executive power in principle -- in time of crisis include a general responsibility that the national sovereignty not fail of its legitimate application because of merely implicit and technical considerations. One can no doubt fret at great length about the danger of tyranny in such cases, but I find it a wholly abstract and impractical fretting.
The founders had taken pains to prohibit the states (Article I, section 10), several of the same powers prohibited to the federal legislature (Article I, section 9). The Suspension clause in contained within Article I, not even mentioned in Article II. The clause is both a delegation and limitation of powers. Advocating that it applies to the Executive is just as ludicrous as stating that it applies to the judiciary. If the Executive is legally entitled to suspend the writ, why would Congress need to legislate approval?
Regarding fretting about it, in ex parte Milligan, Justice Davis commented thusly, "[t]he Constitution of the United States is a law for rulers and people, equally in war and in peace, and covers with the shield of its protection all classes of men, at all times and under all circumstances. No doctrine involving more pernicious consequences was ever invented by the wit of man than that any of its provisions can be suspended during any of the great exigencies of government."
Either the Constitution means what it says, or why bother having a written Constitution?
The idea of a snap quorum of representatives from states that happen to be close to Washington raise such other, alarming questions as to make my general point in this whole discussion -- the Constitution envisions real men making real prudential judgments. Lincoln summoned a special session in what I consider to be clearly the shortest time he could reasonably have done so.
The idea of a quorum was written into the Constitution by the founders for a reason - to obviate the necessity of having every member present. As it was, a simple majority of Congressmen could have been assembled in days - enough to grant legislative sanctions to Lincoln's actions. In the age of trains and telegraphs, it's absurd to suggest that every member of Congress wait almost 2 and 1/2 months to convene if such an dire emergency existed.
I think it is clear enough that the clause is not an explicit and direct delegation of a power to the Congress. It is literally a statement of when the writ shall not be suspended, and only implicitly a delegation of the power to do so to the Congress. But I do not dispute that implicit delegation. The limitation of that power exclusively to the Congress is a further, and more implicit point, depending much on an overall theory of limitation of powers and separation of branches.
I am aware of no one that suggests that the president simply "has the power to suspend the writ" the way he has the power to veto bills or negotiate treaties. The question is whether a clause that only implicitly (by its negative formulation) grants the power to suspend the writ at all, and even more implicitly assigns that power to Congress, and even more implicitly denies it to the executive or judicial branches in their own right, must be read as making it absolutely unconstitutional for the president to anticipate Congressional approval of a suspension for the purpose of securing the nation's capitol, which (under his duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed) is the President's job.
I don't object to Taney's fussiness. But I don't think it is reasonable to make such a big deal out of this, when the President clearly (see Neely on this) was operating only out of a judgment of the necessary measures to secure the capitol, and was perfectly ready to submit his actions to the Congress, once it convened. Lincoln's notion of executive authority was pretty Whiggish, and that means that he had a very vivid sense of the president's duty not to overstep the voice of the people as the Congress continually manifested it. I think that an under-examined aspect of this whole business is the possibility that he had a duty to act on his understanding of what any damn fool knew Congress would want him to do.
Regarding quorums, I thought quorums were to prevent all kinds of various mischief, from minorities leaving to prevent business to minorities gathering to conduct it illicitly. I don't see how telegraphs and railroads help when you have Western delegations who can't arrive by either means, and hostile troops surrounding the capitol. I believe special elections were necessary in two states even to produce representatives.
Isn't this right?: the function of the special session is really, in significant measure, a function of the reasons the President calls it. I think he called it because he knew that he needed the people's endorsement for the things his oath plainly required him to begin doing, but not that he needed that endorsement instantly. He thought his job description was pretty clear. I think he called it for July 4, among other reasons, because it was a reasonable period for representatives to gather, and because he didn't judge that it was extremely urgent to have them assemble at once, and it might well be dangerous and counter-productive to do so. This decision, as the Constitution makes clear, is his to make.
The proof is in the pudding of Lincoln's overall action as chief executive. Those who believe he demonstrated contempt for the Constitution over the next four years will no doubt read the suspension as a first step. Those who believe he was striving always to be measured by the Constitution and the will of the people, and above all by the Declaration, will see him doing what he judged to be necessary and just, without undue concern for technicalities that he believed the framers would also have viewed as trivial. He know that our Founders also had a proper respect for the fact that government is finally a matter of principled prudence, not legal slavishness.
Lawyers, and particularly judges, will always be more fastidious about technicalities than politicians and executives. This should not make us easily agree that the executives are careless about rule of law. Judges will be more impatient for genuine technical legality, executives for the just accomplishment of the things they have been charged with accomplishing. Each will tend both to disparage and respect the concerns of the other, and the tension between them is fruitful.
This is such a rich question that I do wish we could move on beyond assertion and counter-assertion regarding the legality of the Constitutional interpretation. Finally, the Constitution cannot substitute for the living and good faith political and moral judgment of our principal citizens. The Constitution cannot be a computer program, with rigid logic and binary interpretation. It is the instrument of self-government for rational animals. It is discouraging how difficult it is to have an examination of these matters with the assumption that the actors had good faith, and good reason, and still disagreed richly and tragically. That's surely what the war represented, for the most part, and I don't understand what is hoped to be gained by trying to portray Lincoln as contemptuous of the Constitution. (I do not say that you are doing this last thing -- I am reflecting on this whole dispute which DiLorenzo's hatchet job has provoked, and wishing it had a more edifying occasion.)
Try the 13th Amendment.
And now thanks to Lincoln I'm stuck in one that sanctioned the murder of 30 MILLION unborn children.
It fugures that a narrow mind like yours would enlist in the "abortion is murder" army. Apparently you long for the "good old days" in the antebellum South when black women were raped to produce more slaves, which to you would apparently constitute a laudible "pro-life" agenda.
Try Randolph, Tennessee. Jackson and Meridian, Mississippi, where Sherman boasted that "Meridian no longer exists."
"According to the official website of Meridian, Sherman was wrong about Meridian no longer existing. Apparently he left four homes standing and spared the residents, who complained most bitterly about losing their slaves.
I'm not familiar with Randolph, Tennessee. Was it a "city" during the Civil War or just a hamlet? (Dittos re New Manchester, GA.) Jackson received a great deal of damage after Joe Johnston unwisely decided to dig in there and try to hold off the Union forces moving toward Vicksburg, but it could hardly be considered "destroyed".
By the way, the Confederates burned and pillaged plenty of homes and businesses when they had the rare opportunity to reach enemy territory (eg. Chambersburg, PA). The residents of Frederick, MD paid the demanded Confederate ransom to avoid the pillaging.
Yes - dictators do hide behide human shields. Ever heard of the "Immortal Six Hundred"? FYI , they were Confederates.
I was referring to civilians. You've changed the subject to union mistreatment of prisoners as retaliation for Confederate mistreatment of prisoners. The Civil War prisoner exchange program broke down when the Confederates started talking about executing all captured negro Union soldiers and their officers, and the Confederates implemented their negro soldier execution program at Fort Pillow under the command of the brutal slaveholder Nathan Bedford Forrest (who by the way once said "if we ain't fightin' fer slavery, I don't know what we're fightin' fer.")
If life was hell for slaves, were [sic] are the records of 4 million of them fleeing to the North after emacipation [sic]?
So you believe that the fact that most freed negroes couldn't afford to move north after emancipation means that they enjoyed life as slaves? You're a real comedian who has apparently never heard of the Underground railroad and slave patrols.
With the men off fighting the war, a slave revolt and mass escapes would have been common.
Actually, slaveholders received exemption from the draft. They also made liberal use of whips, chains, dogs, and slave patrols to discourage "servile insurrection". Also, most negroes were smart enough to figure out that their freedom was being won by Union forces.
In his letter he speaks of "our glorious cause," and declares that the slaves of the South have a deeper interest in the establishment of Southern independence than the white population. He thinks if the Yankees are successful the negroes are destined to the most cruel treatment at their hands." "Patriotism of a Colored Man", Staunton Spectator, Staunton, VA, 18 Aug 1863
Surely a Confederate paper would only be interested in printing the gospel truth about slavery (particularly just after Gettysburg had rendered their cause so desperate)?
But the most remarkable testimony on the subject, is borne by no less a personage than the notorious Henry Ward Beecher. In a recent sermon, Mr. Beecher says the free colored people at the North "are almost without education, with but little sympathy for ignorance." "They cannot even ride in the cars of our city railroads. They are snuffed at in the house of God, or tolerated with ill-disguised disgust." The negro cannot be employed as a stone mason, bricklayer, or carpenter. "There is scarcely a carpenter's shop in New York in which a journeyman would continue to work if a black man was employed in it.
Henry Ward Beecher is talking about New York City, which was full of Democrats and the poor immigrants they cultivated with warnings about how negroes would take their jobs. That's why they had draft riots there. NYC was hardly representative of the State of New York, let alone the North, with regard to enlightened attitudes about negroes.
So why did Northern states like Illinois have laws preventing blacks from immigrating into those states?
Because many lower North states like Illinois were still dominated by Democrats well into the 1860's, and even many Republicans had understandable fears about their communities being overrun with desperate negro refugees. Nevertheless, 3/5 of the Illinois Republicans voted against the 1862 exclusion law. (See Battle Cry, p.507.)
By the way, do you support open borders?
Guess again. It was passed AFTER the war.
It fugures that a narrow mind like yours would enlist in the "abortion is murder" army.
Narrow? Thank you. But with state sovereignty intact - each state could decide for itself to be rid of this reprehensible practice, now they have no choice.
I'm not familiar with Randolph, Tennessee. Was it a "city" during the Civil War or just a hamlet? (Dittos re New Manchester, GA.)
If you were a resident of those towns, would you still maintain that the size of the city mattered?
More later.
Pillaging? Oh, you mean paying for requisitioned goods in Confederate scrip and currency. Like the Union Army sometimes did in the South if they were in a good mood!
You have your gall, mewing about Chambersburg getting its hair mussed, when we both know that Confederate misconduct was minimal -- and when we both know what Sherman and others did later, without provocation, as cold-blooded measures carried out without pity on civilians.
You have your gall, boy.
What better reason to separate the two countries that are stuck in the same Republic?
You revile us and tell us how rotten we are, and how incapable we are of reasoned thought and human virtuosity......but you keep us around to be your punching bag. Does anything suggest to you that this relationship might be just the least bit dysfunctional?
Or is maintaining national power with large numbers of Southern military volunteers a little higher on your agenda than how anyone is getting along in our new, improved, post-Constitutional semirepublic?
Congress could NOT easily consult with constituents once assembled. Decisions reached on fundamental matters with the delegations of some states not present, and not having spoken, could have important implications in a sectional crisis.
But I don't know if any of this was actually going on. My suspicion is that the whole discussion today is dominated by anachronistic civil libertarian concerns that played no part in anybody's thinking at the time. Do you know if there is any good scholarship on the question at all? Was the delay considered long? Short? Just right? The whole debate about the "delay" of summoning a body that he knew perfectly well could throw him out on his butt once they got there strikes me as strange. But I am eager to learn more about the particular circumstances and motives involved.
Well, if things were so bad down here - why did ANY stay? Certainly out of 4 MILLION blacks, huge numbers would have fled north. It's not like the slaves were guarded by men with guns - those men were off fighting in the war. To the contrary, many remained - "guarded" by women and children. To insinuate that blacks couldn't flee from such conditions - if they had so desired - is a disservice to them. But of course, many believe that conditions were bad for blacks in the South, and heaven for them in the north. Even some northern editors saw the absurdity of that position:
A band of colored musicians from Hagerstown visited this place on Monday last. They discoursed some very fine music through our streets and after enjoying themselves among their "free brethren," on this side the line, returned home to "bondage," in the evening train, very well convinced, we have no doubt, that the worst form of Slavery that can possibly exist may be found among the negroes of Pennsylvania. We believe it is the custom in Maryland, at Easter time, to allow the negroes the largest liberty, and this Band had the audacity, on this occasion, to come into a free State as if for no other purpose than to show the sympathizers of John Brown, deceased, that their pikes and Sharpe's Rifles were not required to improve their condition, and that all the Republican philanthropy expended on the slave could be more appropriately used in bettering the condition of the free negro in the North.
Valley Spirit, Chambersburg, PA, 11 Apr 1860 p. 5 c.2
Regarding the Underground Railroad - it ended in CANADA. The blacks certainly weren't in a rush to settle in Illinois and other northern states. No welcome mat waiting for them - most prohibited the immigration of blacks.
Actually, slaveholders received exemption from the draft. They also made liberal use of whips, chains, dogs, and slave patrols to discourage "servile insurrection". Also, most negroes were smart enough to figure out that their freedom was being won by Union forces.
I thought that ALL southerners were slaveholders. ; My gggrandfather didn't own a single slave, he VOLUNTEERED. And there were many slaveowners that volunteered, ofter accompanied willingly by their slaves. If most blacks understood that the union for fighting for their freedom, why didn't they join them en masse, or revolt?
Surely a Confederate paper would only be interested in printing the gospel truth about slavery (particularly just after Gettysburg had rendered their cause so desperate)?
That's why they printed the sory of Mr. Jones - a slave - who donated $465 in gold to the Southern cause.
Henry Ward Beecher is talking about New York City, which was full of Democrats and the poor immigrants they cultivated with warnings about how negroes would take their jobs. That's why they had draft riots there. NYC was hardly representative of the State of New York, let alone the North, with regard to enlightened attitudes about negroes.
The draft riots occurred when Lincoln instituted the draft, white northerners revolted and sacked the city, killing blacks. The article cited was prefaced by: "Mr. Beecher says the free colored people at the North", not of NYC. Check the date of the riots, and that of the EP. Many saw the war now - not as Lincoln's big lie, but as an attempt to free slaves, which one Pennslyvania newspaper stated that they were "Willing to fight for Uncle Sam", but not "for Uncle Sambo". The archbishop of New York wrote Seward, and stated
"We have had a week of trouble and apprehension in this city. I think the trouble is now over. The plea of the discontents is, on the surface, the draft. At its bottom, however, in my opinion, the discontent will be found in what the misguided people imagine to be a disposition on the part of a few here and elsewhere to make black labor equal to white labor, and put both on the same equality, with the difference that black labor shall have local patronage over the toil of the white man."
BTW, did the south ever revolt over conscription and kill blacks?
By the way, do you support open borders?
Open where anyone can saunter into the US at will - no. Allow foreign terrorists, criminals and such egress - no. Paying benefits or subsidizing non-Americans - no. Otherwise to allow immigration to those wishing to immigrate, that want to become Americans, and support America - yes.
It seems to me that Lincoln did not view assembling Congress as being simply for the sake of gaining immediate approval of the details of his first responses to the outbreak of war. I don't think he was summoning a body to give him technical approval of specific security measures in Maryland, but the representatives of the loyal part of the Union to express the people's will over the entire crisis.
I think Lincoln pushed the convening of Congress out far enough into the future. It then becomes a matter of why it was so far out - given the nature of things. One would think that a lawyer of Lincoln's repute would want legislative sanction for his actions, assuming of course that he understood that it was Congress that declared war. Is there any evidence that this was the case?
"I suppose he [Judge Douglas] knows that under the constitution, Congress, and not the president, declares war."
Abraham Lincoln, "Speech to the Springfield Scott Club", 14 Aug 1852, Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, (Roy P. Basler, ed.), Vol. II, p. 153
That answers that. But considering the amount of time involved, I would assume that Lincoln could have forgotten. Again, is there evidence to the contrary? To that end, I refer to a letter that Lincoln wrote Seward, in response to some points Seward had raised. In those points, Seward demanded non-intervention responses from several European nations, and "if satisfactory explanations are not received from Spain and France, Would convene Congress and declare war against them." Lincoln's response included that "[w]hen a general line of policy is adopted, I apprehend there is no danger of its being changed without good reason, or continuing to be a subject of unnecessary debate." (Abraham Lincoln, "To William H. Seward", 1 Apr 1861, Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, (Roy P. Basler, ed.), Vol. IV, pp. 317-318.). Delay convening, and few would disagree with Lincoln.
Someone once wrote a famous lawyer asking his esteemed opinion on the Contitutionality of the President being the sole arbiter of necessary force to repel invasion. The lawyer restated the supposition when framing his response:
"It is, that if it shall become necessary, to repel invasion, the President may, without violation of the Constitution, cross the line, and invade the teritory of another country; and that whether such necessity exists in any given case, the President is to be the sole judge." [italics in original]
In his reply, the lawyer voiced his opinion:
"Before going further, consider well whether this is, or is not your position. If it is, it is a position that neither the President himself, nor any friend of his, so far as I know, has ever taken."
"But to return to your position: Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so, whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such purpose---and you allow him to make war at pleasure."
"The provision of the Constitution giving the war-making power to Congress , was dictated, as I understand it, by the following reasons. Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of the people was the object. This, our Convention understood to be the most oppressive of all Kingly oppressions; and they resolved to so frame the Constitution that no one man should hold the power of bringing this oppression upon us . But your view destroys the whole matter, and places our President where kings have always stood." [italics in original]
Abraham Lincoln, "To William H. Herndon", 15 Feb 1848, Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, (Roy P. Basler, ed.), Vol. I, pp. 451-452.
It looks like he didn't think it was Constitutional.
Freegards,
4CJ
Why do you think any of this applies, unless you expect me to grant that the Confederacy was sovereign, that a declaration of war was appropriate, etc., etc., etc?
In their fashion they did at least half of what you ask. In his book "Look Away: A History of the Confederate States of America" William C. Davis talks about whole sections of states like Alambama and Mississippi where whole counties were held by deserters and draft-dodgers and where representatives of the confederate government dared not go. Governors did their best to undermine conscription by allowing increases in militia and state employees. Were their riots like up North? No. It was worse. It was a concerted effort by civil authority to undermine conscription imposed by the central government. How can you compare civil unrest to that?
The powers delegated by this constitution, are appropriated to the departments to which they are respectively distributed: so that the legislative department shall never exercise the powers vested in the executive or judicial; nor the executive exercise the powers vested in the legislative or judicial; nor the judicial exercise the powers vested in the legislative or executive departments.
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