Quote:
By the time Lincon took the oath of office on March 4th 1861, the secession had already started, in fact the forces of the Confederacy had already taken most all of the Federal forts within thier boundries except for Fort Sumter and three others.

In Janurary, before Lincon even took office confederate forces fired upon the Star of the West, a unarmed hired ship, while intransit to resupply Fort Sumter. Then in February the 1861 Peace Conference failed to find compromise and the slave states agreed to meet again in June...But that didn't happen.

On April 4th Lincoln decided to resupply Fort Sumter which was short on provisions. He notified the governor of South Carolina on April 6th, stateing that "an attempt will be made to supply Fort Sumter with provisions only, and that if such attempt be not resisted, no effort to throw in men, arms, or ammunition will be made without further notice, [except] in case of an attack on the fort."

On April 9th the Confederacy decided to respond by fireing upon Fort Sumter...which ultimately started the civil war.





The war very much was about slavery.

The slave states were feeling thier power in congress shrink as territories were adapted. Lincoln was intrumental in forming the Republican party in 1854 with the express purpose of stoping the expansion of slavery. Then the 1857 suprime courts Dred Scott decision trampled upon anti-slavery states rights (where was the accountability then?). Slavery was irrefuteably the core issue of the civil war, the Confedercy even said so, and the Emancipation Proclamation cemented it.

By modern standards Lincon can likely be seen as a racist. But judgeing from the standards of his time, this is FAR from true.

I know you're repeating what you've read and feel you have an informed opinion on the subject, I once would have replied in kind, but with all due respect your conclusion defies all evidence.


Walter Williams Article

Quote:
As DiLorenzo documents – contrary to conventional wisdom, books about Lincoln, and the lessons taught in schools and colleges – the War between the States was not fought to end slavery; Even if it were, a natural question arises: Why was a costly war fought to end it? African slavery existed in many parts of the Western world, but it did not take warfare to end it. Dozens of countries, including the territorial possessions of the British, French, Portuguese, and Spanish, ended slavery peacefully during the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Countries such as Venezuela and Colombia experienced conflict because slave emancipation was simply a ruse for revolutionaries who were seeking state power and were not motivated by emancipation per se.

Abraham Lincoln’s direct statements indicated his support for slavery; He defended slave owners’ right to own their property, saying that "when they remind us of their constitutional rights [to own slaves], I acknowledge them, not grudgingly but fully and fairly; and I would give them any legislation for the claiming of their fugitives" (in indicating support for the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850).

Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation was little more than a political gimmick, and he admitted so in a letter to Treasury Secretary Salmon P. Chase: "The original proclamation has no...legal justification, except as a military measure." Secretary of State William Seward said, "We show our sympathy with slavery by emancipating slaves where we cannot reach them and holding them in bondage where we can set them free. " Seward was acknowledging the fact that the Emancipation Proclamation applied only to slaves in states in rebellion against the United States and not to slaves in states not in rebellion.

So Lincoln freed the slaves he had no authority over and kept in slavery the ones he could have actually freed. It was war propaganda. Lincoln acknowledges that very claim.

DiLorenzo's reply to National Review

Quote:
The Gettysburg Address was brilliant oratory, but it was also political subterfuge. As H.L. Mencken pointed out, it was the Southerners who were fighting for the consent of the governed and it was Lincoln’s government that opposed them. They no longer consented to being governed by Washington, DC.

Lincoln’s admonition that government "of the people, by the people, for the people" would perish from the earth if the right of secession were sustained was equally absurd. The United States remained a democracy, and the Confederate States of America would have been a democratic country as well.

Lincoln’s notion that secession would "destroy" the government of the United States is also bizarre in light of the fact that after secession took place the US government fielded the largest and best-equipped army and navy in the history of the world up to that point for four long years.

The truth is that Lincoln repudiated the dictum of the Declaration of Independence that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. He also unequivocally denied that "all men are created equal." "I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races," he said in the August 21, 1858, debate with Stephan Douglas. "Free them [slaves], and make them politically and socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this . . . . We cannot, then, make them equals," he continued.

Lincoln opposed making jurors or voters of "Negroes;" he supported the Illinois constitutional amendment to prohibit the immigration of black people into the state; he supported a proposed amendment to the constitution (in March of 1861) that would have prohibited the federal government from ever interfering with Southern slavery; and was a strong supporter of colonization or deportation, as noted above. As Joe Sobran has remarked, his position was that black people could be "equal" all right, but not in the US. And yet Jaffa and his acolytes implausibly claim that Lincoln was somehow devoted to natural rights.

Quote:
Masugi ludicrously claims that Lincoln was an advocate of limited government, based once again on a few words of a political speech. In reality (as opposed to the mind of Masugi), Lincoln essentially declared himself a dictator by suspending the writ of habeas corpus and having the military arrest tens of thousands of his Northern political critics and opponents; launched an invasion of the South without the consent of Congress; blockaded Southern ports without first declaring war; censored all telegraph communication; imprisoned dozens of opposition newspaper editors and owners; ordered federal troops to interfere with Northern elections; unconstitutionally created the state of West Virginia to shore up his electoral college vote count; confiscated firearms and other private property; deported the most outspoken member of the Democratic opposition, Congressman Clement L. Vallandigham of Ohio; and gutted the Ninth and Tenth Amendments. "This amazing disregard of the Constitution," wrote the distinguished historian Clinton Rossiter, "was considered by nobody as legal." Yet Masugi incredibly claims that Lincoln was "the greatest friend of the founder’s Constitution." He supposedly had to destroy the Constitution in order to save it.

Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

Quote:
The Gettysburg Address was brilliant oratory, but it was also political subterfuge. As H.L. Mencken pointed out, it was the Southerners who were fighting for the consent of the governed and it was Lincoln’s government that opposed them. They no longer consented to being governed by Washington, DC.

Lincoln’s admonition that government "of the people, by the people, for the people" would perish from the earth if the right of secession were sustained was equally absurd. The United States remained a democracy, and the Confederate States of America would have been a democratic country as well.

The implausiblity of running a functional democratic government when one can seceed from the authority of said government whenever one dislikes the decisions of the majority, should be apparrent from the operations of the Confederacy itself, which were continually hampered by threats of secession from governers, if thier military and economic demands were not met.

Quote:
Lincoln’s notion that secession would "destroy" the government of the United States is also bizarre in light of the fact that after secession took place the US government fielded the largest and best-equipped army and navy in the history of the world up to that point for four long years.

Once the principle is established that you can take your ball and go home if you dont get your way, then in the long term government is impossible. Even the Confederacy understood this to some extent, since they bloodily repressed several sucession attempts.

Quote: Original post by laeuchli
If the American Civil War was fought over states rights, then it must have been over the excersice of some paticular right, unless one wants to claim they were leaving just for the heck of it, which would be a curious position to take, to say the least. What rights then were they fighting over? Let's see what the cornerstone speech given by the vice-president of the CSA says on the matter:

Quote:
The new constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution — African slavery as it exists amongst us — the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union would split." He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted.

the vice-president went on to say

(Jefferson's) ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. ... Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner–stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery — subordination to the superior race — is his natural and normal condition.

Pretty clear from this what right many of the leaders of the confederate government where fighting for. Were there others? Maybe, but its pretty hard to be intrested in them, when such an illegitmate one was the conerstone(thier words) of thier proposed new state.

Of course, Lincoln's immediate war goal was to preserve the union, and the constitution of the united states. However, the confederacy didnt feel compeled to leave the union simply for kicks, they did because for a long time the Northern states had been working against thier pecular institution. So its wrong to claim that the war had nothing to do with slavery, when the events leading up to the war had everything to do with it, and the confederate leaders went on record claiming this.


As for the claims that Lincoln was a bigot because he held regressive views on racial differences, surely thats beside the point. Who cares what his views on the subject were? Look at his actions, and the fruit of them, for example, the 13th amendment, which was a cornerstone of his campaign for a second term. Lets have more bigots like Lincoln.

By all means look at his actions. The Emancipation Proclamation freed exactly 0 slaves. He supported the deportation of blacks throughout his political career.
He arrested his political adversaries. He put a dead stop to free speech. In short, he was a tyrant.

The "he had to destroy the constitution to save it" argument is baseless. Virtually every other civilized nation ended slavery before the US, without all of the accompanying massacre and destruction of civil liberties. If the purpose of the civil war was to end slavery then why didn;t Lincoln follow the same path every other country had already proven successful?

Slavery was one of many issues at hand during the civil war. The "whitewash" job, if you'll excuse the expression, and deification of Lincoln is throughly institutionalized. The south was trading with Europe and the central government passed a tariff that required the South to not only sell exclusively in the North but also at a price control.

That the VP of the CSA was a bigot is immaterial. That the "prophet" Lincoln was a bigot is pertinent.

Quote: Original post by laeuchli
The implausiblity of running a functional democratic government when one can seceed from the authority of said government whenever one dislikes the decisions of the majority, should be apparrent from the operations of the Confederacy itself, which were continually hampered by threats of secession from governers, if thier military and economic demands were not met.

Quote:
Lincoln’s notion that secession would "destroy" the government of the United States is also bizarre in light of the fact that after secession took place the US government fielded the largest and best-equipped army and navy in the history of the world up to that point for four long years.

Once the principle is established that you can take your ball and go home if you dont get your way, then in the long term government is impossible. Even the Confederacy understood this to some extent, since they bloodily repressed several sucession attempts.

The EU has a "get out" clause does it not? Every consensual organization I can join has a "get out" clause yet still manages to remain solvent.

The only organization I can think of that doesn't is the mafia, which is an apt comparison.


To assume that one can not govern what one can not assert their right to kill is based on the premise that the act of being governed is not consentual.

The text of the Declaration of Independence is explicit in this, "that government derives its power by the consent of the governed."

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

Quote: Original post by laeuchli
If the American Civil War was fought over states rights, then it must have been over the excersice of some paticular right, unless one wants to claim they were leaving just for the heck of it, which would be a curious position to take, to say the least. What rights then were they fighting over? Let's see what the cornerstone speech given by the vice-president of the CSA says on the matter:

Quote:
The new constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution — African slavery as it exists amongst us — the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union would split." He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted.

the vice-president went on to say

(Jefferson's) ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. ... Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner–stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery — subordination to the superior race — is his natural and normal condition.

Pretty clear from this what right many of the leaders of the confederate government where fighting for. Were there others? Maybe, but its pretty hard to be intrested in them, when such an illegitmate one was the conerstone(thier words) of thier proposed new state.

Of course, Lincoln's immediate war goal was to preserve the union, and the constitution of the united states. However, the confederacy didnt feel compeled to leave the union simply for kicks, they did because for a long time the Northern states had been working against thier pecular institution. So its wrong to claim that the war had nothing to do with slavery, when the events leading up to the war had everything to do with it, and the confederate leaders went on record claiming this.


As for the claims that Lincoln was a bigot because he held regressive views on racial differences, surely thats beside the point. Who cares what his views on the subject were? Look at his actions, and the fruit of them, for example, the 13th amendment, which was a cornerstone of his campaign for a second term. Lets have more bigots like Lincoln.

By all means look at his actions. The Emancipation Proclamation freed exactly 0 slaves. He supported the deportation of blacks throughout his political career.
He arrested his political adversaries. He put a dead stop to free speech. In short, he was a tyrant.

The "he had to destroy the constitution to save it" argument is baseless. Virtually every other civilized nation ended slavery before the US, without all of the accompanying massacre and destruction of civil liberties. If the purpose of the civil war was to end slavery then why didn;t Lincoln follow the same path every other country had already proven successful?

Slavery was one of many issues at hand during the civil war. The "whitewash" job, if you'll excuse the expression, and deification of Lincoln is throughly institutionalized. The south was trading with Europe and the central government passed a tariff that required the South to not only sell exclusively in the North but also at a price control.

That the VP of the CSA was a bigot is immaterial. That the "prophet" Lincoln was a bigot is pertinent.

That the Proclamation at the time of promulgation freed no slaves is questionable(see the wikipedia article,http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emancipation_Proclamation) but it freed some as the army advanced deeper into confederate territory. Certainly the end result of the victory in the war, and the ratification of the 13th amendment resulted in the complete abolition of slavery. Lincoln was heavily involved in both those endevours, so I think his record will bear scrutiny on this subject. Many slaves were freed as a result of lincolns actions, thus I think we could do with more bigots like Lincoln. I dont see how Lincoln could have employed the methods other countries used to end slavery, since the situtation were vastly different. The UK wasnt facing a civil war when it ended slavery in the British Empire for instance.

I agree there are legitimate bones to pick with on civil liberties, such as his improper suspension of habeus corpus(although he did it properly at last), but what tryants put themselves up for elections in the middle of a war? If he was a tryant, the american people certainly had ample oppertunity to get rid of him.


I brought up the VP of the CSA and his speech, not directly in response to your posting, but to the posts of others implying that slavery was not key cause of the war, when senior members of the CSA government were giving speeches stating the exact opposite.

[Edited by - laeuchli on March 13, 2009 6:25:01 PM]

Quote: Original post by ChurchSkiz

Quote: Original post by LessBread
It seems to me that 600,000+ Americans died nearly 150 years ago deciding the question of secession. I don't know why neo-Confederates waste other people's time revisiting the issue. I'm glad to hear the measure died in committee. It smacks of make work for a wack job politician. And yes I know that New Hampshire wasn't part of the Confederacy, but those who talk up secession deserve the label.

I've heard out of the mouths of liberals that they would like to see us become more like Europe. Bill Maher commented that there is a movement in the US where 50% of the population wants to lead into a progressive country and the other 50% want to remain unchanged (actually he said the other 50% were fairy tale believing idiots but that's for another time).

Maher always angles for the joke, so he's sloppy when it comes to such things. I'd say he came up with his 50-50 split looking at the results of the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections. If he looked at polls asking about specific policies, he'd find the split is closer to 65-35.

Quote: Original post by ChurchSkiz
I have no right to tell 50% of this country what direction to travel, but I feel there are enough people that love and appreciate the country as it is, that they could band together if the ideal was lost. I don't think it's so hard to fathom, if our ancestors seceeded from the ideals of the European region 200 years ago, why couldn't we do it again today? Do you think the decision to seceed from Britain was easy in the 18th century?

You have the right to voice your opinion on matters concerning everyone. And if you agree to be a part of that community, then you have an obligation to abide by the decisions reached by the community. I don't think our ancestors seceded from the ideals of Europe 200 years ago. They didn't abandon Christianity. They didn't abandon Locke or Hume or Montesquieu and so on. They didn't secede from Britain, they revolted. A colonial revolution is not secession.

Quote: Original post by ChurchSkiz
You mentioned some questions that weren't thought through from secessionists. Were those questions answered 200 years ago? A group of rag tags with no official military, no official navy, no currency, they decided they were going to fight the largest super power in the world. Why would they sign up for something like that? Because they were being taxed heavily, they weren't being listened to, and they wanted control of their own destiny.

I don't think many of today's secessionists have thought things through. I think they feel themselves to be morally superior and use that to fuel their outrage in a vicious circle. You seem to forget, or not be aware, that only about one third of the colonies revolted. One third remained loyal to Britain and the other third indifferent (and that's not counting slaves and natives - both of those groups would have been better off sticking with Britain). I guess the third in revolt thought they had the right to tell the other two-thirds what direction to travel. It would seem that the one third in revolt had many different reasons for their actions. Some likely thought they could make more money afterward. Others probably thought they could gain power. Still others, higher social standing. As the war progressed, there were probably those who simply wanted revenge against the British for having killed a relative or for quartering troops in their homes.

Quote: Original post by ChurchSkiz
In that matter, though the civil war was bitter and the south lost, I think it was still important to show that people would not bend over and take anything that the government threw at them. That people could feel strongly enough about certain things that they would fight to the death to defend them. That spirit doesn't die because we have the internet and a 50-star flag. History tells us that no country lasts forever. Don't be naive enough to think that another civil war couldn't happen in this century.

I think that's kind of foolish. I also think that most people who think that way today would likely not extend that sense of righteousness to people who got out and protested against the government on other issues. I mean, that sounds a lot like the revisionist justification for the civil war commonly made in the South, a place that does not support labor unions and strikes and that responded to civil rights protests with dogs and water cannons. I think the vicious circle mentioned above operates in this.

Quote: Original post by ChurchSkiz
And no I am not advocating secession, but I think it is important to discuss it when it comes up and not dismiss it even when it seems irrational.

That's reasonable. That's why I asked what problems it would solve. If it wouldn't solve any problems, then it would seem to me to be grounded in the irrational.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

Quote: Original post by laeuchli
The implausiblity of running a functional democratic government when one can seceed from the authority of said government whenever one dislikes the decisions of the majority, should be apparrent from the operations of the Confederacy itself, which were continually hampered by threats of secession from governers, if thier military and economic demands were not met.

Quote:
Lincoln’s notion that secession would "destroy" the government of the United States is also bizarre in light of the fact that after secession took place the US government fielded the largest and best-equipped army and navy in the history of the world up to that point for four long years.

Once the principle is established that you can take your ball and go home if you dont get your way, then in the long term government is impossible. Even the Confederacy understood this to some extent, since they bloodily repressed several sucession attempts.

The EU has a "get out" clause does it not? Every consensual organization I can join has a "get out" clause yet still manages to remain solvent.

The only organization I can think of that doesn't is the mafia, which is an apt comparison.


To assume that one can not govern what one can not assert their right to kill is based on the premise that the act of being governed is not consentual.

The text of the Declaration of Independence is explicit in this, "that government derives its power by the consent of the governed."

The EU may be solvent, but I would not classify it as a functional government, as it stands now. I'm also fairly certain theres no provison for withdrawal.

If one reads the declaration of Independence as an assertion of the right to capriciously withdraw ones consent to being governed whenever one doesnt get ones way, then how can any government exist? Being governed by defination means that you will have to follow rules you dont like. The founding fathers laid out a strong moral case for why they were withdrawing thier consent, in my opinion the confederacy did the exact opposite.

*edit* wikipedia link on eu withdrawal(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_withdrawal).

[Edited by - laeuchli on March 13, 2009 6:27:36 PM]

Quote: Original post by Washu

Quote: Original post by LessBread
What?

Most California residents polled say no to a split state (March 12, 2009)

Quote:
They don't care how you slice it: Californians think the idea of splitting up the state is still baloney.

In fact, they are less in favor of bisecting the Golden State than at any time since 1981. And it doesn't matter much whether the proposal to make two states out of one is proposed along longitudinal or latitudinal lines.

At least that's what today's Field Poll results say. A survey taken during the last week of February found that a whopping 82 percent of those polled disapproved of splitting the state into Eastern California and Western California.

A hefty 71 percent didn't like the idea of formally dividing Northern California from Southern California.
...

Huh. Frankly I'm surprised the idea even has that much support. Doing business across the state is already a pain, doing it across state boundaries would just make it worse (although, I suspect most of those polled wouldn't know one end of a business from the end of a broom).

Not to mention the socal water problems that would arise due to a split (increased taxes on their end, more complicated jurisdictional rules, environmental rules would have to be changed, etc. etc.)

Good points.

The politician promoting this effort was termed out two years ago. I think he's trying to drum this up as a way to get back in the game. If you check out his proposal, it boils down to an effort by a Republican to expel the Liberal regions of the state, not that the Central Coast region is Liberal (it's not) but if he tried to expel San Francisco and Los Angeles without the connecting regions his intent would be glaringly obvious. The sad thing is that this politician used to represent the poorest region in the entire United States and instead of starting a crusade to remedy that, he's chosen this.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom
I know you're repeating what you've read and feel you have an informed opinion on the subject, I once would have replied in kind, but with all due respect your conclusion defies all evidence.

You miss the forest for the trees.

Quote:

Quote:
The truth is that Lincoln repudiated the dictum of the Declaration of Independence that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. He also unequivocally denied that "all men are created equal." "I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races," he said in the August 21, 1858, debate with Stephan Douglas. "Free them [slaves], and make them politically and socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this . . . . We cannot, then, make them equals," he continued.

Those Lincoln quotes are taken out of context from his Peoria Speech during the Lincoln/Douglas debates on October 16th 1854 concerning the Kansas-Nebraska Act and repeal of the Missouri Compromise(which outlawed slavery above the 36°30' parallel.


Here is that bit with all those dots filled in:

Quote: What next? Free them, and make them politically and socially, our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this; and if mine would, we well know that those of the great mass of white people will not. Whether this feeling accords with justice and sound judgment, is not the sole question, if indeed, it is any part of it. A universal feeling, whether well or ill-founded, can not be safely disregarded. We can not, then, make them equals. It does seem to me that systems of gradual emancipation might be adopted; but for their tardiness in this, I will not undertake to judge our brethren of the south.

Full text of the speech:
http://www.ashbrook.org/library/19/lincoln/peoria.html

Quote:
You miss the forest for the trees.

Any attempt to right the ship will be seen as contentious.

Quote:
The truth is that Lincoln repudiated the dictum of the Declaration of Independence that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. He also unequivocally denied that "all men are created equal." "I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races," he said in the August 21, 1858, debate with Stephan Douglas. "Free them [slaves], and make them politically and socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this . . . . We cannot, then, make them equals," he continued.

Quote:
Those Lincoln quotes are taken out of context from his Peoria Speech during the Lincoln/Douglas debates on October 16th 1854 concerning the Kansas-Nebraska Act and repeal of the Missouri Compromise(which outlawed slavery above the 36°30' parallel.

Quote:
Here is that bit with all those dots filled in:

Quote: What next? Free them, and make them politically and socially, our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this; and if mine would, we well know that those of the great mass of white people will not. Whether this feeling accords with justice and sound judgment, is not the sole question, if indeed, it is any part of it. A universal feeling, whether well or ill-founded, can not be safely disregarded. We can not, then, make them equals. It does seem to me that systems of gradual emancipation might be adopted; but for their tardiness in this, I will not undertake to judge our brethren of the south.

In what way does you additional context change anything? If anything it confirms the subtext I quoted earlier. Further you have a lifetime in politics you're going to have to refute if your goal is to make Lincoln any more than a white supremist. He supported an ammendment to the constitution codifing slavery.(as an example)