Was Secession Treason?

Daveblack ^ | June 30, 2003 | DaveBlack

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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. For those specific purposes the thirteen states adopted the Articles of Confederation in 1781, thus creating the United States of America. The Articles of Confederation spelled out clearly where the real power lay. Article II said, “Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.” The Article also prohibited the secession of any member state (“the union shall be perpetual,” Article XIII) unless all of the states agreed to dissolve the Articles. 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 charter—the 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. Lincoln’s 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.

[hobbes1]

“Clause 2: The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States; and nothing in this Constitution shall be so construed as to Prejudice any Claims of the United States,

Even the Document linked by sheltonmac above, acknowledges the "Common territory of the Republic" placing the area of the United States under a degree of congressional control.

Clause 1: New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the Jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.”

To begin with a State is a political entity by definition, and in forming the Confederacy, the states were violating the Constitution.

Continuing, That having been said, the Fully half of the states that seceded were Created by the Union.(in the Louisiana Purchase)...

Now, If you wish to argue about the original ratifiers, that might be one thing, However, Every state West of the Mississippi had it's Freedom from France negotiated and Paid for , by the Union Government....Now I am not saying they should have remained without rights, but surely they were more securely bound to the Union than say, the Southeastern states...

Further, As the document linked above by sheltonmac clearly lays out, there was no long list of usurpations and horrors, they were losing at the table of Democracy, and didn't like it.

[billbears]

"The citizens of the US get the government they vote for. When we no longer have the right to vote, then we'll dust off your submission for a new DOI

No we get the government the power brokers in Washington tell us we're going to have. Any respective citizen that doesn't get the nod from one of numerous political national organizations, even if the role is strictly for one state, gets thrown out like yesterday's trash.

Never mind the fact the original intent of the Founders was to be that we would never vote for Senators, except through voting on our state legislature

[TheDon]

Soooo..... I take it you can't supply any "train of abuses" either?

[hobbes1]

Actually, the "Long List of Abuses..." occurring prior to Shermans Heroic March to the Sea is over losing Electoral Power....Read the waaaaaa lists linked above.

[stand watie]

NOPE. it was a fight for LIBERTY.

end of story.

free dixie,sw

[CyberSpartacus]

It is not rediculous. It is a fact that radical northerners did want to punish the south, and did so whenever possible. Whether you like it or not, the simple fact is, slavery is wrong but the south was right.

[sheltonmac]

Do you think England could have had similar proclaimations worded to discourage or prevent "insurrection" against the Royal Crown?

I think there certainly are parallels between President Lincoln and King George:

Imagine King George ascending to the throne of England shortly before the Declaration of Independence was signed and making it his first order of business to address his subjects and argue his case for the preservation of the kingdom. The following is an excerpt of what King George might have said. If it seems a little familiar, it should. The bulk of this text was lifted directly from Abraham Lincoln's first inaugural address. A few words have been altered so that it may fit into the context of a brewing conflict between a king hoping to keep his empire intact and a group of secessionists seeking to form their own independent nation:

I hold that, in contemplation of universal law and of the Laws of Parliament, the Kingdom of Great Britain is perpetual. Perpetuity is implied, if not expressed, in the fundamental law of all national governments. It is safe to assert that no government proper ever had a provision in its organic law for its own termination. Continue to execute all the express provisions of our Parliamentary Laws, and the Kingdom will endure forever-- it being impossible to destroy it except by some action not provided for in the instrument itself.

Again, if Great Britain be not a government proper, but an association of colonies in the nature of contract merely, can it, as a contract, be peaceably unmade by less than all the parties who made it? One party to a contract may violate it-- break it, so to speak; but does it not require all to lawfully rescind it?

Descending from these general principles, we find the proposition that in legal contemplation the Kingdom is perpetual confirmed by the history of the Kingdom itself. The Kingdom is much older than the Colonies. It was formed, in fact, by Divine Providence. It was matured and continued by the practice of feudalism. It was further matured, and the faith of all the Barons expressly plighted and engaged that it should be perpetual, by the Magna Carta in 1215. And, finally, in 1689 by ordaining and establishing the English Bill of Rights to which its drafters pledged to "most humbly and faithfully submit themselves, their heirs and posterities for ever..."

But if the destruction of the Kingdom by one or by a part only of the colonies be lawfully possible, the Kingdom is less perfect than before, having lost the vital element of perpetuity.

It follows from these views that no Colony upon its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the Kingdom; that resolves and ordinances to that effect are legally void; and that acts of violence, within any Colony or Colonies, against the authority of the Kingdom, are insurrectionary or revolutionary, according to circumstances.

I therefore consider that, in view of Parliament and its laws, the Kingdom is unbroken; and to the extent of my ability I shall take care, as Parliament itself expressly enjoins upon me, that the laws of the Kingdom be faithfully executed in all the Colonies. Doing this I deem to be only a simple duty on my part; and I shall perform it so far as practicable, unless my rightful masters, the loyal subjects of the Crown, shall withhold the requisite means, or in some authoritative manner direct the contrary. I trust this will not be regarded as a menace, but only as the declared purpose of the Kingdom that it will lawfully defend and maintain itself...

...In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The Kingdom will not assail you. You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath registered in heaven to destroy the Kingdom, while I shall have the most solemn one to "preserve, protect, and defend it."

I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and loyalist grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Kingdom, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

(from Lincoln and George: An American History Paradox)

[sheltonmac]

Thanks for the link!

[hobbes1]

but the south was right.

So these guys keep saying.

When you point out, that the DOI lays out far greater injuries, they say the DOI is not a ruling Document, the Constitution is.

When you point out that the Constitution prohibits the States from Seceding, They say, The Constitution doesn't apply because the States seceded.

So in extraordinary circumstances, you have the Battlefield, and I guess all of the Baghdad Bobs still fighting this conflict, will say that doesn't matter either...

Just open your wallet, take out a 5, and tell me what you see.

[TheDon]

"It is relevant in the sense that states still have as much right to secede now as they did in 1861."

Now that is something we can agree on! They had no right then, and no right now! ;)

"As far as enumerating specific grievances, no such list is required."

So you say, and no doubt it would injure your argument to attempt such. That is why one never sees such a list today. When one attempts to cloak the rebellion of the Southern States in the DOI, you had better have such a list ready.

Georgia

"The majority of the people of the North in 1860 decided it in their own favor. We refuse to submit to that judgment"

Mississippi

"Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery"

South Carolina

"On the 4th day of March next, this party will take possession of the Government. It has announced that the South shall be excluded from the common territory, that the judicial tribunals shall be made sectional, and that a war must be waged against slavery until it shall cease throughout the United States."

No matter how they, or anyone today, try to cover it up, the Rebellion was always about slavery. Slavery, slavery, slavery. And you can see in the South Carolina admission, they aren't so much rebelling against abuses in the past, but those they envision in the future.

It is ironic that the path they chose led to the destruction of the institution of slavery that they were fighting to preserve.

[stainlessbanner]

Restoring the Republic is within our means and need not include secession, IMO. I believe our brothers on FR have pointed to the Free State Project as an alternative. The Founders, New Englanders, Westerners, Southerners, and even Lincoln recognized the right of secession. There are many written and spoken examples in America's history.

However, please don't confuse "viable option" with a hasty call for secession.

[stainlessbanner]

< continuing > Of course, Restoring the Republic is subject to interpretation. I suspect all is going according to plan for some......

[JohnGalt]

The purpose of reassessing the War of Secession is to debunk the anti-Christian 'might makes right' axiom or the Prussian 'war is an extension of politics' for the millions of indoctrinated disciples of government schools and government history books.


By demystifying/destigmatizing the cause of the South, we see secession as a cure for what ails us, so that our off-spring might know the ideal of liberty and provide the institutions that can be passed down to our heirs.

[hobbes1]

However, Could two separate Nations have staved off the Depredations of the European continent.....?

Louisiana might have started looking good to France....Texas to Mexico...etc...

The South lacking a real industrial base, would have been appetizing looking prey...

[A2J]

To argue otherwise would be to say that it was illegitimate for the colonies to seceed from Great Britian.

The compulsory need to be free from tyranny is in the DNA of those who believe that secession IS a moral right. This need was in our Founding Fathers as it was in those, both North and South, who believe that the South exercised its right to invoke that moral right.

[A2J]

Just open your wallet, take out a 5, and tell me what you see.

The Destroyer of the Constitution.

[hobbes1]

ROTFL... do the hysterics occur with the PMS, or are they constant....

[Arkinsaw]

Whats interesting about the Articles of Confederation is that it was specifically a 'perpetual' union. But then just a few years later George Washington and company held a Constitutional Convention which gave every State the opportunity to either ratify or not. Had a State not ratified then it would have been on its own. So much for perpetual union.

The word was left out of the new Constitution. Since the founders were already breaking up a 'perpetual' union to form the new one leaving the word in the new document would have been potentially embarassing.

[sheltonmac]

There were many in the South who advocated freeing the slaves before seceding. Regardless, war was inevitable.

[wasp69]

Well said.