Perspective: Die-hard Confederates should be reconstructed

"All confederates were draftees.
In point of fact, the 26th Carolina was enrolled after the National Confederate conscription act. In that act, southerners who enlisted within thirty days of the start of the act were allowed to enlist in a regiment of their choice and elect their officers. They were also given a 50 dollar (trash confederate paper) bonus, but still, that was better than nothing. The alternative if they were between the ages of 18 and 35 at that time was to simply be conscripted and then assigned to existing regiments.

Note there was a tremendous amount of encouragement beyond that for men to enlist. Harry Heth, for instance, published an order in his part of Virginia stating that any man who didn't answer the conscription call should be shot on sight. Arguments like that did tend to get a response from 'volunteers' like you ancestor. Heth's order in in the O.R"

In point of fact, the 26th South Carolina Volunteers was formed from a consolidation of the 6th (Byrd's) and the 9th (Nesbit's) Battalions in which my ancestor previously served. He was wounded thrice and was promoted to 2nd Lt. in February, 1865. Another of my ancestors enlisted in Company D, 1st regiment of South Carolina Rifles, on July 20, 1861, at Camp Pickens, South Carolina. Both men volunteered, but had they been drafted, they would have done their duty and served honorably as the majority of Americans have done through-out our history.

It is the night before the historic recall of Joe "Gray-out" Davis. Let me briefly touch on one point about the Texas vs White decision. It is worth reading the entire history of the case and that can be found on several websites.

Chief Justice Salmon Chase, in his majority opinion, recognized that American jurisprudence is not based solely on the Constitution of 1787. There are antecedents to that document and pre-constitutional laws (one we geologists would be most familiar with are the Northwest Ordinances which establish the baseline system of surveying public and private lands). These antecedents include the first American Constitution - the Articles of Confederation, compacts made between the American colonies, colonial charters, and English common law, among others.

Chase recognized that the Constitution of 1787 did not create a new country. Therefore, in the absence of clear language in the Constitution of 1787, he looked at the documents which preceded it and the intent of those who both founded the country and established the type of government. There is where he found the rationale for the judgment of the US Supreme Court in Texas vs White. Although parts of the White case have been superceded by time and changing laws it still stands as the final word on the illegality of secession. Until such time as the issue is revisited, the Court has found invalid the argument that the "right of secession" can be derived from the Constitution or Amendments to the Constitution in existence at that time.

I'll be able to get back to you in greater detail after we get rid of Joe "Gray-out" Davis tomorrow.

"CR - It was clear from my comments I was taking about the period of time after the crisis caused by the Dred Scott decision to the (time) the CSA formed in Montgomery in February of 1861."

"GOPC - You stated no such thing ..."

Therein lies the problem with long threads. If you go back to my posts #482 and #628 (in reply to other posters), you will understand the context and timing of my posts. I have consistantly talked about what could have happened prior to secession.

Both men volunteered, but had they been drafted, they would have done their duty and served honorably as the majority of Americans have done through-out our history.

Actually, South Carolina had a state draft from the very beginning. So they were drafted just the same. We can concede they would have done their duty in any case, because if they didn't they would have been hung.

Pity their duty was fighting to extend slavery.

Now, can we assume that since President Bush has not spoken out against your scheme to forcibly deport every muslim in the country is an indication that he approves it?

Considering that I am not Paul Wolfowitz we could not assume that. If Paul Wolfowitz, or perhaps another similar administration official, proposed it and Bush responded as Lincoln did to Mitchell that could be a different story entirely. But you have yet to answer my original question - if the events I previously described happened between Wolfowitz and Bush would it be legitimate grounds for another to either praise or criticize Bush for his role in the matter? It's a simple yes or no question.

In 682 it was implicit that mohammedism was at war with us. Do you deny that they are?

Mitchell wrote a proposal and submitted it to the President. It was internal to the administration.

No it wasn't. Had that been the case Mitchell would have submitted a single written report to Lincoln in an envelope. He did not. Instead he had multiple copies bound at the Government Printing Office.

Because secession was legal, the Confederates had every right to remove foreign trespassers from Confederate soil in Charleston harbor.

You are absolutely correct about that. If you were not, Britain would still have a right to garrison a fort in every major city harbor on the east coast.

The poster who in his latest form goes by held_to_ransom is also quite fond of claiming that the confederates "stole" the forts in Charleston from the federal government and implies that these forts were constructed with northern tax dollars. This is a falsehood. Forts Moultrie, Johnson, and Pinckney were all revolutionary era structures. In fact Fort Johnson was built by the british in 1706 and Fort Moultrie was the site of a battle in the revolution. Castle Pinckney was completed on a long-known defensive position in the 1790's. At that time the state of South Carolina owned and improved upon all three of them. In 1794 congress passed a law that would allow states to conditionally transfer control of their forts to the military for defensive purposes. SC took advantage of that law in 1805 and made a conditional cession of those three forts by name to the federal army. It required the feds to maintain a garrison there and to keep the forts within working order (interestingly enough the feds failed to uphold there part of the bargain and let Fort Johnson fall into ruin by about 1807). By the time the civil war came about a fourth fort had been constructed on an artificial island in the harbor, Fort Sumter. It too took an act of the state legislature to build but was federally funded. This was not uncommon for forts of this era though. Other forts were constructed using federal funds in both the north and south including New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Charleston (Baltimore even had a similar manmade island fort outside its harbor).

When SC seceded the Charleston command was based out of Fort Moultrie. Sumter was virtually mothballed at the time - it was stocked with provisions in case a foreign power declared war but had no garrison. Then on Dec. 26 Robert Anderson, the commander at Moultrie, decided without any orders and with the intention of decieving Charlestonians to gather the garrisons from the other forts and move them into Sumter - an act that was seen as openly hostile both in SC and Washington. The War Department thought it was a disaster and gave Anderson a verbal lashing. But when he pulled out of Moultrie, Johnson, and Pinckney the SC militia simply moved in behind him and occupied those abandoned forts. That is not stealing by any sense of the word as held_to_ransom would have us believe. In fact it isn't even the taking of federally funded property because all three of those forts were built before South Carolina turned them over to the feds in 1805! I've corrected held_to_ransom on this fact many times but it seems he still does not get it. Dumb yankees never learn.

Bingo my ass. Wishful thinking and tortured twisting is more like it.

Then do you believe that Saint Abe isn't responsible for what the members of his administration that he appointed are doing on the government dime? Do you believe that he fought to keep Mitchell's job in spite of Mitchell pushing a policy that he did not support (or so you claim)? Do you believe that the Lincoln administration was so disorganized and out of the president's control that its subordinates simply did whatever they want and administered whatever policy they desired without consequence or reprimand from the boss? You are truly grasping at straws on this one, non-seq - even more than you usually do.

By non-seq's illogical reasoning, Bill Clinton had absolutely no responsibility for all that goofy crap Joycelyn Elders was spewing as Surgeon General. After all, Clinton didn't publicly come out in his state of the union and endorse teaching sex ed to 6 year olds!

Let's repeat your quote and continue it to the part where the opinion gets interesting.

LINK

When, therefore, Texas became one of the United States, she entered into an indissoluble relation. All the obligations of perpetual union, and all the guaranties of republican government in the Union, attached at once to the State. The act which consummated her admission into the Union was something more than a compact; it was the incorporation of a new member into the political body. And it was final. The union between Texas and the other States was as complete, as perpetual, and as indissoluble as the union between the original States. There was no place for reconsideration, or revocation, except through revolution, or through consent of the States.

Considered therefore as transactions under the Constitution, the ordinance of secession, adopted by the convention and ratified by a majority of the citizens of Texas, and all the acts of her legislature intended to give effect to that ordinance, were absolutely null. They were utterly without operation in law. The obligations of the State, as a member of the Union, and of every citizen of the State, as a citizen of the United States, remained perfect and unimpaired. It certainly follows that the State did not cease to be a State, nor her citizens to be citizens of the Union. If this were otherwise, the State must have become foreign, and her citizens foreigners. The war must have ceased to be a war for the suppression of rebellion, and must have become a war for conquest and subjugation.

Our conclusion therefore is, that Texas continued to be a State, and a State of the Union, notwithstanding the transactions to which we have referred. And this conclusion, in our judgment, is not in conflict with any act or declaration of any department of the National government, but entirely in accordance with the whole series of such acts and declarations since the first outbreak of the rebellion.

But in order to the exercise, by a State, of the right to sue in this court, there needs to be a State government, competent to represent the State in its relations with the National governmet, so far as least as the institution and prosecution of a suit is concerned.

And it is by no means a logical conclusion, from the premises which we have endeavored to establish, that the governmental relations of Texas to the Union remained unaltered. Obligations often remain unimpaired, while relations are greatly changed. The obligations of allegiance to the State, and of obedience to her laws, subject to the Constitution of the United States, are binding upon all citizens, whether faithful or unfaithful to them; but the relations which subsist while these obligations are performed, are essentially different from those which arise when they are disregarded and set at nought. And the same must necessarily be true of the obligations and relations of States and citizens to the Union. No one has been bold enough to contend that, while Texas was controlled by a government hostile to the United States, and in affiliation with a hostile confederation, waging war upon the United States, senators chosen by her legislature, or representatives elected by her citizens, were entitled to seats in Congress; or that any suit, instituted in her name, could be entertained in this court. All admit that, during this condition of civil war, the rights of the State as a member, and of her people as citizens of the Union, were suspended. The government and the citizens of the State, refusing to recognize their constitutional obligations, assumed the character of enemies, and incurred the consequences of rebellion.

These new relations imposed new duties upon the United States. The first was that of suppressing the rebellion. The next was that of re- establishing the broken relations of the State with the Union. The first of these duties having been performed, the next necessarily engaged the attention of the National government.

The authority for the performance of the first had been found in the power to suppress insurrection and carry on war; for the performance of the second, authority was derived from the obligation of the United States to guarantee to every State in the Union a republican form of government. The latter, indeed, in the case of a rebellion which involves the government of a State, and for the time excludes the National authority from its limits, seems to be a necessary complement to the former.

Of this, the case of Texas furnishes a striking illustration. When the war closed there was no government in the State except that which had been organized for the purpose of waging war against the United States. That government immediately disappeared. The chief functionaries left the State. Many of the subordinate officials followed their example. Legal responsibilities were annulled or greatly impaired. It was inevitable that great confusion should prevail. If order was maintained, it was where the good sense and virtue of the citizens gave support to local acting magistrates, or supplied more directly the needful restraints.

A great social change increased the difficulty of the situation. Slaves, in the insurgent States, with certain local exceptions, had been declared free by the Proclamation of Emancipation; and whatever questions might be made as to the effect of that act, under the Constitution, it was clear, from the beginning, that its practical operation, in connection with legislative acts of like tendency, must be complete enfranchisement. Wherever the National forces obtained control, the slaves became freemen. Support to the acts of Congress and the proclamation of the President, concerning slaves, was made a condition of amnesty13 by President Lincoln, in December, 1863, and by President Johnson in May, 1865.14 And emancipation was confirmed, rather than ordained, in the insurgent States, by the amendment to the Constitution prohibiting slavery throughout the Union, which was proposed by Congress in February, 1865, and ratified, before the close of the following autumn, by the requisite three-fourths of the States. 15 The new freemen necessarily became part of the people, and the people still constituted the State; for States, like individuals, retain their identity, though changed to some extent in their constituent elements. And it was the State, thus constituted, which was now entitled to the benefit of the constitutional guaranty.

There being then no government in Texas in constitutional relations with the Union, it became the duty of the United States to provide for the restoration of such a government. But the restoration of the government which existed before the rebellion, without a new election of officers, was obviously impossible; and before any such election could be properly held, it was necessary that the old constitution should receive such amendments as would conform its provisions to the new conditions created by emancipation, and afford adequate security to the people of the State.

In the exercise of the power conferred by the guaranty clause, as in the exercise of every other constitutional power, a discretion in the choice of means is necessarily allowed. It is essential only that the means must be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the power conferred, through the restoration of the State to its constitutional relations, under a republican form of government, and that no acts be done, and no authority exerted, which is either prohibited or unsanctioned by the Constitution. It is not important to review, at length, the measures which have been taken, under this power, by the executive and legislative departments of the National government. It is proper, however, to observe that almost immediately after the cessation of organized hostilities, and while the war yet smouldered in Texas, the President of the United States issued his proclamation appointing a provisional governor for the State, and providing for the assembling of a convention, with a view to the re- establishment of a republican government, under an amended constitution, and to the restoration of the State to her proper constitutional relations. A convention was accordingly assembled, the constitution amended, elections held, and a State government, acknowledging its obligations to the Union, established.

Whether the action then taken was, in all respects, warranted by the Constitution, it is not now necessary to determine. The power exercised by the President was supposed, doubtless, to be derived from his constitutional functions, as commander-in-chief; and, so long as the war continued, it cannot be denied that he might institute temporary government within insurgent districts, occupied by the National forces, or take measures, in any State, for the restoration of State government faithful to the Union, employing, however, in such efforts, only such means and agents as were authorized by constitutional laws.

But, the power to carry into effect the clause of guaranty is primarily a legislative power, and resides in Congress. 'Under the fourth article of the Constitution, it rests with Congress to decide what government is the established one in a State. For, as the United States guarantee to each State a republican government, Congress must necessarily decide what government is established in the State, before it can determine whether it is republican or not.'

This is the language of the late Chief Justice, speaking for this court, in a case from Rhode Island,16 arising from the organization of opposing governments in that State. And, we think that the principle sanctioned by it may be applied, with even more propriety, to the case of a State deprived of all rightful government, by revolutionary violence; though necessarily limited to cases where the rightful government is thus subverted, or in imminent danger of being overthrown by an opposing government, set up by force within the State.

The action of the President must, therefore, be considered as provisional, and, in that light, it seems to have been regarded by Congress. It was taken after the term of the 38th Congress had expired. The 39th Congress, which assembled in December, 1865, followed by the 40th Congress, which met in March, 1867, proceeded, after long deliberation, to adopt various measures for reorganization and restoration. These measures were embodied in proposed amendments to the Constitution, and in the acts known as the Reconsturction Acts, which have been so far carried into effect, that a majority of the States which were engaged in the rebellion have been restored to their constitutional relations, under forms of government, adjudged to be republican by Congress, through the admission of their 'Senators and Representatives into the councils of the Union.' Nothing in the case before us requires the court to pronounce judgment upon the constitutionality of any particular provision of these acts.

But, it is important to observe that these acts themselves show that the governments, which had been established and had been in actual operation under executive direction, were recognized by Congress as provisional, as existing, and as capable of continuance.

By the act of March 2, 1867,17 the first of the series, these governments were, indeed, pronounced illegal and were subjected to military control, and were declared to be provisional only; and by the supplementary act of July 19, 1867, the third of the series, it was further declared that it was the true intent and meaning of the act of March 2, that the governments then existing were not legal State governments, and if continued, were to be continued subject to the military commanders of the respective districts and to the paramount authority of Congress. We do not inquire here into the constitutionality of this legislation so far as it relates to military authority, or to the paramount authority of Congress. It suffices to say, that the terms of the acts necessarily imply recognition of actually existing governments; and that in point of fact, the governments thus recognized, in some important respects, still exist.

What has thus been said generally describes, with sufficient accuracy, the situation of Texas. A provisional governor of the State was appointed by the President in 1865; in 1866 a governor was elected by the people under the constitution of that year; at a subsequent date a governor was appointed by the commander of the district. Each of the three exercised executive functions and actually represented the State in the executive department.

In the case before us each has given his sanction to the prosecution of the suit, and we find no difficulty, without investigating the legal title of either to the executive office, in holding that the sanction thus given sufficiently warranted the action of the solicitor and counsel in behalf of the State. The necessary conclusion is that the suit was instituted and is prosecuted by competent authority.

The question of jurisdiction being thus disposed of, we proceed to the consideration of the merits as presented by the pleadings and the evidence.

"...the U.S. government, as the successor State to the former Confederate States of America..."

"...The U.S., as successor state to the Confederacy..."

The United States Government said it was the successor state to what?

LINK

Office of Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public Affairs)
Washington, D.C. 20301

Reference Number: No. 203-95

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April 17, 1995
IMMEDIATE RELEASE

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CSS ALABAMA 1995

The U.S. Naval Historical Center and the French Association CSS Alabama have signed a five-year joint agreement that establishes a precedent for international cooperation in archaeological research and the protection of a famous Confederate warship.

The CSS ALABAMA was sunk off Cherbourg, France, on June 19, 1864, by USS KEARSARGE. A shipwreck was located in 1984 by the French navy mine hunter CIRCE and confirmed to be ALABAMA by French navy Capt. Max Guerout. The non-profit Association CSS Alabama was founded in France in 1988 to conduct scientific exploration of the shipwreck and has, to date, completed seven underwater archaeological surveys and excavations on the site.

Although the wreck resides within French territorial waters, the U.S. government, as the successor State to the former Confederate States of America, is the owner of the wreck, as recognized by the government of the Republic of France.

On Oct. 3, 1989, the U.S. and the Republic of France signed an agreement recognizing the wreck of CSS ALABAMA as an important heritage resource of both nations and establishing a Joint French-American Scientific Committee to consider issues of protection and the conditions for archaeological exploration.

===============

LINK

Channel Mud & Bureaucratic Mire

She had her work cut out for her. The Alabama became mired as much in international bureacracy as in Channel sediment. The ship was sunk outside the then territorial limit (three miles), but in 1971 that limit was extended to twelve miles, so she clearly is in French waters.

International law states that a warship that is not captured belongs to the country whose flag she flies, wherever she may be.

The U.S., as successor state to the Confederacy, claimed that it owned the wreck and everything on it.

On October 3, 1989, the two countries finally signed an executive agreement concerning the protection and study of the wreck and its artifacts.

Essentially, the agreement gives ownership of the wreck to the United States, but the French retain custody. Given the state and location of the wreck, any other arrangement would have been patently absurd! The agreement creats a scientific committee "on a basis of equality", composed of two representatives from each government, plus experts. The Director of Naval History, Department of the Navy, and the Chief Historian of the National Park Service (in that order) represent the U.S. Dr. Bonnel says that they have shown "...no desire whatsoever to simplify things". The French, on the other hand, wanted to get on with the excavation while time remained.

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WP: Show which clause expressly allows it.

The Tenth Amendment reserves ALL powers not delegated or prohibited by the Constitution....

Why you seem to think you are so clever is beyond me.

The Tenth amendment says not a word about secession. The Constitution says not a word about secession one way of the other. The Supreme Court said the secessionists were traitors. None of the quotes you use can gainsay that.

Unilateral state secession is treason; it is outside the laws or anything the framers contemplated.

Walt

When SC seceded...

South Carolina and the other so-called seceded states were never out of the Union for an instant.

Walt

[nc quoting mitchell to lincoln] But we cannot go further now than suggesting...

[Non-Seq changing what was said] OK, Mitchell suggested. That's not the same as being the administration game plan. When did Lincoln take his suggestions and put them into action?

Mitchell advised Lincoln that he could not publically go further than suggesting voluntary emigration at that time. The plan was gradual compensated emancipation. Lincoln soon began to publically use the word "deportation."

The Colonization Plan is dated May 18, 1862.

14 Aug 1862 - Lincoln meets at White House with five (5) Black ministers. They are ushered in by James Mitchell who arranged and attended the meeting. Lincoln tells them: "I suppose one of the principal difficulties in the way of colonization is that the free colored man cannot see that his comfort would be advanced by it. You may believe you can live in Washington or elsewhere in the United States the remainder of your life [as easily], perhaps more so than you can in any foreign country, and hence you may come to the conclusion that you have nothing to do with the idea of going to a foreign country. This is (I speak in no unkind sense) an extremely selfish view of the case."
15 Aug 1862 - Mitchell places an ad in Northern newspapers "Correspondence is desired with colored men favorable to Central America, Liberian or Hatian emigration, especially the first named."
Lincoln appointed Senator Samuel Pomeroy as United States Colonization Agent for the Chiriqui project.
26 Aug 1862 - Pomeroy issed official appeal "To the Free Colored People of the United States" - "The hour has now arrived in the history of your settlement upon this continent when it is within your own power to take one step that will secure, if successful, the elevation, freedom, and social position of your race upon the American continent..."
12 Sep 1862 - Federal govt concluded provisional contract with Ambrose Thompson re Chiriqui project.
Along with the signatures of Thompson and Interior Secretary Caleb Smith, the contract contained a note by President Lincoln: "The within contract is approved, and the Secretary of the Interior is directed to execute the same. A. Lincoln."
16 Sep 62 - Interior Secretary Smith wired Pomeroy: "President wants information... has Murray the control and custody of the vessel? Is there order of sale; and if so, when? Is any deposit necessry to get the vessel?"
1 Dec 1862 - Lincoln to Congress: "I cannot make it better known than it already is, that I strongly favor colonization." He referred to "deportation" three times.
In April 1865, Lincoln said General Butler, "But what shall we do with the negroes after they are free? I can hardly believe that the South and North can live in peace, unless we can get rid of the negroes. Certainly they cannot if we don’t get rid of the negroes whom we have armed and disciplined and who have fought with us. . . . I believe that it would be better to export them all to some fertile country with a good climate, which they could have to themselves."
27 Feb 1860: Lincoln stated, "In the language of Mr. Jefferson, uttered many years ago, ``It is still in our power to direct the process of emancipation, and deportation, peaceably, and in such slow degrees, as that the evil will wear off insensibly; and their places be, pari passu, filled up by free white laborers."
Lamon said that Lincoln "zealously and persistently devised schemes for the deportation of the Negroes, which the latter deemed cruel and atrocious in the extreme..."
The Rev. James Mitchell told the St. Louis Daily Globe-Democrat, August 26, 1894, of Lincoln that it was "his honest conviction that it was better for both races to separate. This was the central point of his policy, around which hung all his private views, and as far as others would let him, his public acts."

What a bunch of profoundly irrelevant quotes.

South Carolina and the other so-called seceded states were never out of the Union for an instant.

From the time the ninth state ratified the Constitution, until North Carolina decided to join the new nation that had been formed, a period of more than a year, of precisely what union was North Carolina a member?

Hypothetically, North Carolina could have kept voting "no" right up until today. In that case, of precisely what union would it be a member today?

The Militia Act is an absolute bar to unilateral state secession

The disputed right to secession is a Constitutional question.

No Constitutional question can be decided by any Federal law.

In any case, the Militia Act is irrelevant to peaceful secession.

No Constitutional question can be decided by any Federal law.

The Supreme Court ruled that the president had power under the Militia Act to put down the rebellion.

Walt

In any case, the Militia Act is irrelevant to peaceful secession.

Shovel that crap back in your manure wagon.

The Judiciary Act of 1789 requires that "controversies of a civil nature" be submitted to the Supreme Court.

That's why the slave power didn't dare bring any of this crap before the courts.

--Even-- old Taney held that the president had the power under law to suppress the rebellion.

For the record, this is part of section 13 of the Judiciary Act of 1789:

"And be it further enacted, That the Supreme Court shall have exclusive jurisdiction of all controversies of a civil nature, where a state is a party, except between a state and its citizens; and except also between a state and citizens of other states, or aliens, in which latter case it shall have original but not exclusive jurisdiction."

The idea of legal unilateral state secession is a fiction. It cannot be supported in the record.

Walt