The Civil War: Everything You Wanted to Know but Were too Afraid to Ask!

[Andre Bolkonsky]

9 minutes ago, Mr. Mercanto said:

I don't think that's quite a fair representation of what I've said...especially since I actually just posted a rather long explanation of how Lee felt about slavery . I've actually spent a good deal of time studying the Southern view of slavery. In fact, that was originally the going to be the focus of my Master's Thesis (until I totally changed my topic lol). Have you read Chandra Manning's work on the subject? 

I also posted on Jefferson and his views on slavery :P. 

There are actual examples of slave owners freeing their slaves and risking their financial future because of their views on slavery. Or, in the Grimke sisters' case, destroying all of their ties to home, family, and wealth due to their conversion to Abolitionism. You might be surprised at the moral courage exhibited by the very rare individual. Some of the most ardent Abolitionists were the children of slave owners. Broadly speaking, I think its rather silly to say "what I would have done" et cetera, because its really impossible to say what kind of person someone might be in such a radically different context. I just happen to be a proud SJW, so I had to tease a little . 

To your last point, yes I was referring to that meeting when I said he was "disabused of the notion" :P. That and the fact that the first Liberia experiment was a ghastly failure. Lincoln did not hold orgininality for the idea though, it had been floated long before he was even a candidate. Also, the fact that he invited the opinion of black civic leaders and intellectuals was nothing short of extraordinary for a president in 1862. It was an error on his part to consider Liberia, but it was a blip. People tend to act as if it was the sum total of his complex views on Abolition, which is the germ of my pet peeve. I don't wish to accuse you of that, of course, but it is why I always respond to that.

With all due respect: 

You ponder the Southern mentality.

I lived it. 

 

Edited February 13, 2017 by Andre Bolkonsky

[Andre Bolkonsky]

1 minute ago, GeneralPITA said:

Might I interject that Mercanto's post about Lee (albeit thoughtful and authored by himself) was copy & pasted. I'm 86ing ctrl+v for this thread.

 

At least he wrote his own copy, rather than just pasting someone else's words answering a question that wasn't even asked. 

[Mr. Mercanto]

2 minutes ago, GeneralPITA said:

Might I interject that Mercanto's post about Lee (albeit thoughtful and authored by himself) was copy & pasted. I'm 86ing ctrl+v for this thread.

 

Lmao! I've become the monster I hate most of all!! 

[Mr. Mercanto]

3 minutes ago, Andre Bolkonsky said:

With all due respect: 

You ponder the Southern mentality.

I lived it.

Your move. 

 

Well I have no influence where I was born  

But pondered and studied I have, and a great deal. I would love to pick your brain about the lived experience though  

(but not tonight though) 

[GeneralPITA]

Just now, Mr. Mercanto said:

Well I have no influence where I was born sir  

But pondered and studied I have, and a great deal. I would love to pick your brain about the lived experience though  

(but not tonight though) 

I was born on the west coast and stationed in the bible belt for three years. Let's just say I'm glad I'm in California. 

Andre, where do you hail from?

[Andre Bolkonsky]

8 minutes ago, Mr. Mercanto said:

Well I have no influence where I was born  

But pondered and studied I have, and a great deal. I would love to pick your brain about the lived experience though  

(but not tonight though) 

I have a good story to tell.

I came from a white family. We had black servants. I've seen the 'Driving Miss Daisy' servant-master symbiotic love affair from the inside. My 'Nurse' had been with the family for three generations. We bought a house for her five minutes from where we lived, and my father was instrumental in helping black nurses further their medical education. Oh, there was Klan on my block. My best friends father, hard core Klan I found out later, bought him a vintage Wehrmacht uniform complete with black spider armband for this thirteenth birthday. A beginning of my absolute hatred of the SS and the Klan, you will find few people more willing to go after the Kameraden than me. 

Wrap your mind around that, then get back to me, as you study the problem from the inside. 

Edited February 13, 2017 by Andre Bolkonsky

[Andre Bolkonsky]

16 minutes ago, GeneralPITA said:

I was born on the west coast and stationed in the bible belt for three years. Let's just say I'm glad I'm in California. 

Andre, where do you hail from?

California is nice, I love sitting on freeways for hours at a time. 

Oh, and the OC, there is a reason there is a direct flight between Houston and John Wayne Airport. And Napa, the wine train is a personal favorite. And Hollywood (not the town, the history). California is a place I love to visit but I'm not sure I'd want to live there.

I grew up in South East Arkansas, learned to read, studied history, and somehow ended up in Houston after college. 

Edited February 13, 2017 by Andre Bolkonsky

[Col_Kelly]

My turn

Were they 100 000 black confederates fighting in the southern army ? 

Ok I'm out. Sorry

[dsfgsdfgsdfgdsfgsdf3q4]

From a legal point of view, did states have a right to peacefully leave the Union in that time period?

[Hethwill]

5 minutes ago, Acika011 said:

From a legal point of view, did states have a right to peacefully leave the Union in that time period?

Not a USA citizen myself, but aren't ( weren't ) the States foundation based upon the Union itself ( articles of association and confederation and ultimately constitutional states )?

[fox2run]

USA was founded by illegal terrorists obsessed by avoiding taxes for the relatively cheap British military. 

Ironic development so to speak. 

 

[Col_Kelly]

37 minutes ago, Acika011 said:

From a legal point of view, did states have a right to peacefully leave the Union in that time period?

It's a short answer and our official historian will probably add to it but there was nothing in the Constitution that prevented a state from seceding at the time. That is why the war wasn't triggered by South Carolina's decision to leave the Union but by the attack on Fort Sumter (Beauregard's decision to bombard the place is probably the most stupid move of the whole ACW btw).

So yes, secession was legal simply because no one thought of forbidding it.

[fox2run]

Maybe Beauregard wanted a war? 

[Mr. Mercanto]

4 hours ago, Col_Kelly said:

My turn

Were they 100 000 black confederates fighting in the southern army ? 

Ok I'm out. Sorry

Ahahahaha! 


Just to be clear. No. No there were not :p. 

[Mr. Mercanto]

1 hour ago, Acika011 said:

From a legal point of view, did states have a right to peacefully leave the Union in that time period?

The truth is, no constitutional scholar has been definetively able to answer the question whether or no secession was strictly speaking legal, as the Constitution is essentially silent on the direct issue. Personally, I read the Constitution as being anti-secession. While the Constitution does not state explicitly what the legality of such an act, the document does contain a number of important clauses which have implications on the issue. Article I Section 10 denies the States the right to mint their own currency, establish their own treaties of trade, defense, or offense, and to maintain their own armies.Obviously, all of these are powers of a soveriegn nation, and all necessary to the establisment of a country. Denying them clearly denies an individual state the ability to become a nation. Article I Section 8 empowers the United States government to deploy the armed forces of nation to suppress an local insurrection. Article IV Section 3 enjoins the President to preserve and protect the government and gaurantee a "Republican for of Government" which would be impossible without maintaining the Union.

Legal precedent also favours this conclusion. The Constitution was written after the disaster's Shay's Rebellion, which nearly destroyed the young Republic. The nation;s inability to draw taxes and protect itself from internal insurrection led to the creation of a document which emowered the government to do such things. These Constitutional provisions were employed to respond to several threats to the Union, such as the suppression of the Whiskey Rebellion and the Hartford Convention, which seems to suggest that the President has the authority to suppress secession. It is worth noting that most of the key founders, including the "Father of the Constitution" James Madison, were Unionists who believed that Disunion would be calmatous, and wished to empower a "Perpetual Union."

There was, throughout American history, a reconition of the "Right of Revolution," which the Unionists recognized in the war. However, that right was only acknowledged in cases where the government in question was directly contravening the rights of its peoples. For example, the Revolution of 1776 was essentially a struggle to maintain the English liberties hitherto enjoyed by the colonists. The Empire had begun to revoke the English liberties of the colonies, and so the colonies revoked their fealty to the soveriegn in order to rpeserve them. In the Civil War, no rights of the slave states were violated. A President was elected in a legal election and on a platform foundationally based in the Constitution. The Confederates seceded not to protect their rights, but to continue to extend and preserve slavery, and because their hegemonic power of the US was, for the first time, threatened. The South was not being oppressed, it was, for the the first time, not getting its way. This hardly justifies revolution.

Basically, based on legal precedent and history, I would argue that secession was not legal.  
 

1 hour ago, Hethwill said:

Not a USA citizen myself, but aren't ( weren't ) the States foundation based upon the Union itself ( articles of association and confederation and ultimately constitutional states )?

This is a phenomenal question, and one that was key in the Civil War (and remains so). I would argue that, yes they were. Its a very nuanced distinction, but effectively, rather then being a Confederation of sovereign Republics, the states were a collection of colonies who were only made independent by the formation of the Union. In effect, this means a state could not leave the Union to resume its sovereignty, because it had never enjoyed sovereignty to begin with. It was the Union which granted them independence from Empire, and thus the Union that predated any claim to state independence a state might have. Furthermore, this means that the states did not enter the Union as Republics, but as colonies attempting to become one nation. Clearly, this is a devastating blow to the argument favouring the right of secession. This was actually a key legal distinction Lincoln drew upon frequently. 

Obviously, Texas is a bit of an exception to this, as they were a Republic nine years before becoming a state. Though Texas did voluntarily join the Union due to its inability to protect its decalared border from Mexico and Comancharia. So, it hardly had a better argument for secession

[Mr. Mercanto]

1 hour ago, fox2run said:

USA was founded by illegal terrorists obsessed by avoiding taxes for the relatively cheap British military. 

Ironic development so to speak. 

 

Bernard Baylin might argue that there was a just a litttllleee bit more to it then that  

[Mr. Mercanto]

1 hour ago, fox2run said:

Maybe Beauregard wanted a war? 

I'm not actually sure if he wanted a war or not. I suspect the Creole did not, as most of the Southern leadership seem to have nominally preferred to have peaceful secession if possible. However, the Confederates like Beauregard were more then happy to make war if the Union did not allow them to leave with everything they desired (which, incidentally, was more then half the geographic country and the destruction of the Constitution ). 

[Mr. Mercanto]

1 hour ago, Col_Kelly said:

It's a short answer and our official historian will probably add to it but there was nothing in the Constitution that prevented a state from seceding at the time. That is why the war wasn't triggered by South Carolina's decision to leave the Union but by the attack on Fort Sumter (Beauregard's decision to bombard the place is probably the most stupid move of the whole ACW btw).

So yes, secession was legal simply because no one thought of forbidding it.

The reason there was no fighting until Sumter had less to do with the Constitution and more to do with the administration's strategy. In theory, had James Buchanan any moral courage, he might have deployed the army to South Carolina when it convened its Secession Convention, based on Article I Section 8. There was legal precedent for this. When the New England States convened the Hartford Convention in 1813, Madison deployed troops immediately to quash it. 

Until Sumter, the Lincoln administration had promised to hold all Federal forts, and otherwise was attemtpting "Masterful Inaction." In effect, his government was not taking any further action, and hoping that the silent majority of Southern Unionists would peacefully compel these Rebels to lay down their arms before any fighting was necessary. They were trying not to escalate the situation. When Sumter was shelled, it became impossible to continue this strategy, and the Union either had to respond with military force, or let the Constitution and the Union fall apart. 

[Mr. Mercanto]

6 hours ago, Andre Bolkonsky said:

I have a good story to tell.

I came from a white family. We had black servants. I've seen the 'Driving Miss Daisy' servant-master symbiotic love affair from the inside. My 'Nurse' had been with the family for three generations. We bought a house for her five minutes from where we lived, and my father was instrumental in helping black nurses further their medical education. Oh, there was Klan on my block. My best friends father, hard core Klan I found out later, bought him a vintage Wehrmacht uniform complete with black spider armband for this thirteenth birthday. A beginning of my absolute hatred of the SS and the Klan, you will find few people more willing to go after the Kameraden than me. 

Wrap your mind around that, then get back to me, as you study the problem from the inside. 

Wow. 

[Col_Kelly]

26 minutes ago, Mr. Mercanto said:

The reason there was no fighting until Sumter had less to do with the Constitution and more to do with the administration's strategy. In theory, had James Buchanan any moral courage, he might have deployed the army to South Carolina when it convened its Secession Convention, based on Article I Section 8. There was legal precedent for this. When the New England States convened the Hartford Convention in 1813, Madison deployed troops immediately to quash it. 

Until Sumter, the Lincoln administration had promised to hold all Federal forts, and otherwise was attemtpting "Masterful Inaction." In effect, his government was not taking any further action, and hoping that the silent majority of Southern Unionists would peacefully compel these Rebels to lay down their arms before any fighting was necessary. They were trying not to escalate the situation. When Sumter was shelled, it became impossible to continue this strategy, and the Union either had to respond with military force, or let the Constitution and the Union fall apart. 

This time I'm up for a debate  (Normally I just nod at your valuable input)

You can find lots of 'hints' in the Constitution that goes against Secession but no clear statement saying they're not allowed of leaving the Union. And when it comes to law a good interpretation is always gonna fall short. Denying the states sovereign rights like printing your own currency or raising private armies is effective while these States are in but it doesn't mean you're not allowed to get out. I imagine that explains Buchanan's passivity as Art. I section 8 is a bit weak here : secession doesn't mean insurrection and an armed repression might have been viewed as tyrannical. I feel that politically the Fed. governement didn't have much options left, hence Buchanan's passivity (he was a convinced Unionist after all). But then retarded PGT jumped in obviously :). 

It's the same for the Euro zone today when you come to think of it. Once you're a part of it you're obviously not allowed to adopt your own currency but technically you can still leave it legally. 

 

[Captiva]

7 hours ago, Andre Bolkonsky said:

They would be the same type you'd hear today discussing the fact Texas can leave the Union whenever we damn well choose. 

You can now safely add those type's in California.

I'm enjoying the thread! Thank you for starting this.

Edited February 13, 2017 by Captiva

[Mr. Mercanto]

11 minutes ago, Col_Kelly said:

This time I'm up for a debate  (Normally I just nod at your valuable input)

You can find lots of 'hints' in the Constitution that goes against Secession but no clear statement saying they're not allowed of leaving the Union. Denying the states sovereign rights like printing your own currency or raising private armies is effective while these States are in but it doesn't mean you're not allowed to get out. I imagine that explains Buchanan's passivity as Art. I section 8 is a bit weak here : secession doesn't mean insurrection and an armed repression might have been viewed as tyrannical. 

It's the same for the Euro zone today when you come to think of it. Once you're a part of it you're obviously not allowed to adopt your own currency but technically you can still leave it legally. 

 

Debate away! It may not be easy though . Have you had a chance to read my longer post on the subject in response to Acikai?  It responds to a good deal of what you're saying here.

Basically the Constitution denies them all the acts necessary to actually secede, and supplies the government the power to suppress such action. Futhermore, the Constitution as designed after such a crisis nearly destroyed the country (Shay's Rebellion). Legal precedent also must be considered. It was under these same powers that Washington ended the Whiskey Rebellion, and Madison the Hartford Convention (which proposed the secession of New England). Both of these actions were viewed as in keeping with the Constitution.

As I acknowledged in my original answer, the Constitution never explicitly says secession is illegal, but implicitly, the constitution and precedent made it illegal in most circumstances. 

The problem with the Eurozone analogy is that the EU is made of sovereign nations joining of their own accord as separate countries. As I explained in that long post, this was not the case in the formation of the United States. (as for separate currency in the EU, that's your playground, not mine, but doesn't Britain maintain the Pound Sterling? ;P)


However, the heart of my post in response to your's was not to argue that secession was explicitly illegal in the Constitution, but to argue that Lincoln did not refrain from action because the Constitution was unclear. Lincoln was very clear from the outset that secession was illegal, and was prepared to use military force. His choice not to until Sumter had noting to do with his reading of the Constitution, it was entirely strategic. 

[Mr. Mercanto]

4 minutes ago, Captiva said:

You can now safely add those type's in California.

I'm enjoying the thread! Thank you for starting this.

Me too!  I'm very happy that its caught people's interest  

[Col_Kelly]

1 minute ago, Mr. Mercanto said:

Debate away! It may not be easy though . Have you had a chance to read my longer post on the subject in response to Acikai?  It responds to a good deal of what you're saying here.

Basically the Constitution denies them all the acts necessary to actually secede, and supplies the government the power to suppress such action. Futhermore, the Constitution as designed after such a crisis nearly destroyed the country (Shay's Rebellion). Legal precedent also must be considered. It was under these same powers that Washington ended the Whiskey Rebellion, and Madison the Hartford Convention. Both of these actions were viewed as in keeping with the Constitution.

As I acknowledged in my original answer, the Constitution never explicitly says secession is illegal, but implicitly, the constitution and precedent made it illegal in most circumstances. 

The problem with the Eurozone analogy is that the EU is made of sovereign nations joining of their own accord as separate countries. As I explained in that long post, this was not the case in the formation of the United States. (as for separate currency in the EU, that's your playground, not mine, but doesn't Britain maintain the Pound Sterling? ;P)


However, the heart of my post in response to your's was not to argue that secession was explicitly illegal in the Constitution, but to argue that Lincoln did not refrain from action because the Constitution was unclear. Lincoln was very clear from the outset that secession was illegal, and was prepared to use military force. His choice not to until Sumter had noting to do with his reading of the Constitution, it was entirely strategic. 

On the Lincoln part I have to fold, I really lack the knowledge there. I read your first answer though, which is why I quoted Art. 1 section 8

However can you really compare those early rebellions with the secession of a recognized political entity ? Daniel Shay and his band had no legal status unlike the SC governor. Same for the 'Whiskey boys'. These were clearly insurrections, secession seems different as SC did not take up arms against the Federal governement in the first weeks.  

As for 'implicit' rights to prevent secession I still feel that's not enough to enforce repression in such a case. 

As for the european analogy the UK decided to stay out of the Eurozone so they're not bound by their rules. (EU and Eurozone are different things). But France or Germany would obviously had to leave if they wanted to produce their own currency. 

[Col_Kelly]

Btw I'm not saying that the Federal governement wasn't right in taking action against Secession, whatevers needs to be done in order to keep a country together is justified in my opinion.