Posted on 07/01/2003 6:12:02 AM PDT by stainlessbanner
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America was founded on a revolution against England, yet many Americans now believe the myth that secession was treasonable. The Declaration of Independence was, in fact, a declaration of secession. Its final paragraph declares inarguably the ultimate sovereignty of each state: [T]hat these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved of all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. Following the Declaration of Independence, each colony established by law the legitimacy of its own sovereignty as a state. Each one drew up, voted upon, and then ratified its own state constitution, which declared and defined its sovereignty as a state. Realizing that they could not survive upon the world stage as thirteen individual sovereign nations, the states then joined together formally into a confederation of states, but only for the purposes of negotiating treaties, waging war, and regulating foreign commerce.
Six years later, the Constitutional Convention was convened in Philadelphia, supposedly to overhaul the Articles. The delegates in Philadelphia decided to scrap the Articles and to propose to the states a different charterthe United States Constitution. Its purpose was to retain the sovereignty of the states but to delegate to the United States government a few more powers than the Articles had granted it. One major difference between the two charters was that the Constitution made no mention of perpetual union, and it did not contain any prohibition against the secession of states from the union. The point was raised in the convention: Should there be a perpetual union clause in the Constitution? The delegates voted it down, and the states were left free to secede under the Constitution, which remains the U. S. government charter today.
After the election of Thomas Jefferson, the Federalist Party in New England was so upset that for more than ten years they plotted to secede. The party actually held a secession convention in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1814. Although they ultimately decided not to leave the Union, nobody really questioned the fundamental right of secession. In fact, the leader of the whole movement, Massachusetts Senator Timothy Pickering, said that secession was the principle of the American Revolution. Even John Quincy Adams, who was a staunch unionist, said in an 1839 speech about secession that in dissolving that which can no longer bind, we would have to leave the separated parts to be reunited by the law of political gravitation to the center. Likewise, Alexander Hamilton said, to coerce the states is one of the maddest projects that was ever devised. These men, and many others, understood that there was a right of secession, and that the federal government would have no right to force anybody to remain in the Union. Some people see the Confederates as traitors to their nation because many Confederate leaders swore to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States when joining the United States Army. However, at that time people were citizens of individual states that were members of the United States, so that when a state seceded, the citizens of that state were no longer affiliated with the national government. Remember, the Constitution did not create an all-powerful national democracy, but rather a confederation of sovereign states. The existence of the Electoral College, the Bill of Rights, and the United States Senate clearly shows this, and although it is frequently ignored, the 10th Amendment specifically states that the rights not given to the federal government are the rights of the states and of the people. But if states do not have the right to secede, they have no rights at all. Lincolns war destroyed the government of our founding fathers by the might makes right method, a method the Republicans used to quash Confederates and loyal Democrats alike.
After the war, Jefferson Davis, the President of the Confederacy, was arrested and placed in prison prior to a trial. The trial was never held, because the chief justice of the Supreme Court, Mr. Salmon Portland Chase, informed President Andrew Johnson that if Davis were placed on trial for treason the United States would lose the case because nothing in the Constitution forbids secession. That is why no trial of Jefferson Davis was held, despite the fact that he wanted one. So was secession treason? The answer is clearly No.
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I am just curious, in what way was the Indian treated by the Rebel states?
Advocating abolition could get you killed in many areas of the south back then.
Many? How many is "many"?
Other Nations chose to avoid the war, but Sherman and Grant took care of them later.
Instead we have universal tyranny with no where to flee to.
Exactly. The whole concept of the "free and independent state" sought to prevent that.
Surely these facts do not discredit the American Revolution as a whole.
I didn't know I implied that.
I am just curious, in what way was the Indian treated by the Rebel states?
It seems Stainless gave an answer before I could get back. But I will add,,that no one in this country, North or South treated the Indian fairly in the beginning.
"native american" is a PC title, thought up by the most extreme, far left, revisionist fools out of the poison-ivy league schools of the northeast.
i know of NO Indian who likes the apellation. NONE!
free dixie,sw
otoh, the damnyankees routinely murdered any Indian who was unlucky enough to be captured by them,wearing rebel uniform.
MY family was slaughtered by the damnyankee army;only a few CSA vets of the family,who were away with the forces at the time, survived the mini-holocaust. the death count was at least 92 civilians.
but of course, no damnyankee wants to talk about THAT!
free dixie,sw
For that my friend,,, I offer and hope for acceptance, a heart felt apology. I know better than that. :(
If the preservation of slavery had been the primary reason for the Revolution, it probably would have. But the colonists had other and more prominent reasons for revolting.
Dunmore's proclamation did apparently inspire Congress or Washington to open the Continental army to blacks, and the issue of slavery was less clear-cut and focused in the Revolution than it was in the Civil War. The possibility of emancipation after the war wasn't wholly excluded. It did happen in some states in the 1780s. It was far less likely that the triumphant Confederates would have taken that path so soon after the war.
BTW, thanks for bringing up this little-known part of our history. Judging by websites, it may be better-known in Canada than here.
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