Tag: slavery

The Reparations Fad – This Issue is More Complex Than You Think, and It’s a Political Hustle!

The latest attempt at further fracturing race relations towards ensuring politicians are employed well into the future is the idea of reparations for blacks in the US. Just like the Republicans of the late 1860s and early 1870s, the Democrats of today want to use blacks in the US to enrich their future to provide a government service in the form of money to offset past wrongs. It isn’t that politicians want every black person in the US to get a check, oh no, it is that they would “manage” this enormous fund and determine who is worthy to receive other taxpayer’s money.

Walter E. Williams in a 2014 piece (yes, this subject has been cycling thorough the US for many decades) explains the complexities involved:

One of the most ignored facts about slavery’s tragic history — and it’s virtually a secret today — is that slavery was a worldwide institution for thousands of years. It did not become a moral issue until the 18th century. Plus, the moral crusade against slavery started in the West, most notably England.

By worldwide, Walter means that blacks AND whites were slaves at one time or another. Even Alphonse-Louis Vinh noted in this recent post that:

Yes, slavery is evil, but this was something that was universal. Slavery was the backbone of our ancestral civilisation, the Greco-Roman World. Slavery has been universal for at least 5,000 years. Slavery still exists in the Muslim world. The monstrous evil of sexual slavery, which is a major concern of mine, exists everywhere, and I want to help destroy it.

To be specific, a decade ago there was NO slavery in Libya, but today, thanks to the US/NATO overthrow of Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi, this horrible practice is again thriving in this region. Bombing the world for “democracy” should be the US Empire’s tagline!

So lets get back to Walter E. Williams list of complexities to consider.

First and foremost:

.. let me say that I agree with reparations advocates that slavery was a horrible, despicable violation of basic human rights. The gross discrimination that followed emancipation made a mockery of the guarantees of the U.S. Constitution. I also agree that slave owners and slave traders should make reparations to those whom they enslaved. The problem, of course, is that slaves, slave owners and slave traders are all dead. Thus, punishing perpetrators and compensating victims is out of the hands of the living .. What moral principle justifies punishing a white of today to compensate a black of today for what a white of yesterday did to a black of yesterday?

Exactly. Great question. However, there is more!

Government has no resources of its very own. The only way for government to give one American a dollar is to first — through intimidation, threats and coercion — confiscate that dollar from some other American .. A large percentage, if not most, of today’s Americans — be they of European, Asian, African or Latin ancestry — don’t even go back three or four generations as American citizens. Their ancestors arrived on our shores long after slavery. What standard of justice justifies their being taxed to compensate blacks for slavery? For example, in 1956, thousands of Hungarians fled the brutality of the USSR to settle in the U.S. What do Hungarians owe blacks for slavery?

Another great question. How on earth is government going to do this “fairly”? DNA testing? Even that has issues in trying to determine the descendants of both white slave-owners and black slaves. But wait, there is more!

During slavery, some free blacks purchased other blacks as a means to free family members.

But other blacks owned slaves for the same reason whites owned slaves — to work farms or plantations. Are descendants of these slaveholding blacks eligible for and deserving of reparations?

Exactly. How does one determine the motive of people that lived in the US states of MD, KY, MO, DE (yes, these were slave states too) as well as TX, LA, AK, MS, AL, TN, GA, SC, NC, and VA prior to December 1865 when chattel slavery was abolished?

Adding to the complicated nature of this issue is the way slaves were captured in Africa (by African blacks) and placed on US New England slave ships, financed by US New England investors to get the slaves to Washington DC (yes, slave auctions were a thing there), Richmond, VA and Charleston, SC.

When African slavery began, there was no way Europeans could have enslaved millions of Africans. They had no immunity from diseases that flourished in tropical Africa. Capturing Africans to sell into slavery was done by Arabs and black Africans. Would reparations advocates demand that citizens of Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Kenya and several Muslim states tax themselves to make reparation payments to progeny of people whom their ancestors helped to enslave?

The final thing Walter corrects is the myth that the slave system made for

Reparations advocates make the foolish unchallenged argument that the United States became rich on the backs of free black labor. That’s nonsense that cannot be supported by fact. Slavery doesn’t have a very good record of producing wealth. Slavery was all over the South, and it was outlawed in most of the North.

Buying into the reparations argument about the riches of slavery, one would conclude that the antebellum South was rich and the slave-starved North was poor. The truth of the matter is just the opposite. In fact, the poorest states and regions of our nation were places where slavery flourished — Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia — while the richest states and regions were those where slavery was absent: Pennsylvania, New York and Massachusetts.

Basically, the only reason the North could do what it did in 1861 when it commenced a war on Southern civilians was because it had prospered much more than the South from 1820s on to 1860. It was not always that way as from 1775 to the War of 1812 it was the South that was the most prosperous section of the young nation. So strong was the South that the North considered secession in 1798 and again in 1814 but never pulled the trigger.

Lastly, do we really want to open up this can of worms in the 21st century as to reparations for past slavery? The fact is that every nation in the world owes REPARATION to somebody ELSE.

Case in point is in this 2002 post about a case for reparations that was filed here in the US by Jack Kershaw of Menphis, TN:

[Jack] wants to file a class-action lawsuit against the US government for reparations. Not on behalf of the descendants of slaves but on behalf of Southerners of all races whose ancestors were the victims of the US government’s rampage of pillaging, plundering, burning, and raping of Southern civilians during the War for Southern Independence [so-called American Civil War]

While the Southerners of 1865-1877 and beyond were undoubtedly trashed by the vindictive Northern army and later Republican politicians, should we go back multiple generations across this globe and transact billions or trillions of dollars IF there is evidence to do so?

To be honest, the South took it on the chin for only wanting out of the marriage to this psycho partner called the Yankee/Northerner/Defender of the Union. Not only was this a legal move constitutionally (Lincoln was very careful to never acknowledge that secession took place), it was the right thing to do as it was well known by 1860 that the North got rich in part due to the tariff revenue generated in the South being REDISTRIBUTED to Northern “improvements” (steel industry, railroads, etc).

Some examples of wartime atrocities abound. To start with, the specific targeting of civilians was outright illegal when the North started the war against the “insurrection” (Lincoln’s word) in the South:

In 1860 international law — and the US government’s own military code — prohibited the intentional targeting of civilians in war, although it was recognized that civilian casualties are always inevitable. .. The kind of wanton looting and destruction of private property that was practiced by the Union army for the entire duration of the war was forbidden, and perpetrators were to be imprisoned or hanged. This was all described in great detail in the book, International Law, authored by San Francisco attorney Henry Halleck, who was appointed by Lincoln as general in chief of the Union armies in July 1862.

Early on in the war, frustrated Union officers took war to a new level and outside the bounds of law:

Unable to subdue their enemy combatants, many Union officers waged war on civilians instead, with Lincoln’s full knowledge and approval. Grimsley describes how Union Colonel John Beatty warned the residents of Paint Rock, Alabama, that “Every time the telegraph wire was cut we would burn a house; every time a train was fired upon we would hang a man; and we would continue to do this until every house was burned and every man hanged between Decatur and Bridgeport.” Beatty ended up burning the entire town of Paint Rock to the ground.

Note that this vengence was not aimed only at white civilians in the south (only 5% of them actually owned slaves since in a typical family of 5 at that time, the father generally owned the slaves), …

Slave states NOT in the Confederate States of America (CSA):

DELAWARE 112,216 1,798 18,966 110,418 587 3% 2%
KENTUCKY 1,155,684 225,483 166,321 930,201 38,645 23% 20%
MARYLAND 687,049 87,189 110,278 599,860 13,783 12% 13%
MISSOURI 1,182,012 114,931 192,073 1,067,081 24,320 13% 10%

 

 

… but the targeting included the slaves themselves. This actually makes more sense as post-war there was NOT a mass migration of blacks to the Northern states. Blacks may have initially thought that the white army from the North was there to free them, but the fact is, most Northerners did not want blacks competing for their jobs. The very potential for this mass migration was what prompted Lincoln, a “free-soil” Republican, to seriously consider sending blacks back to Africa or to the Caribbean.

In October of 1864 Sherman even ordered the murder of randomly chosen citizens in retaliation for Confederate Army attacks. He wrote to General Louis D. Watkins: “Cannot you send over about Fairmount and Adairsville, burn ten or twelve houses . . ., kill a few at random, and let them know that it will be repeated every time a train is fired upon . . .” (See John Bennett Walters, Merchant of Terror: General Sherman and Total War, p. 137).

The indiscriminate bombing of Southern cities, which was outlawed by international law at the time, killed hundreds, if not thousands of slaves. The slaves were targeted by Union Army plunderers as much as anyone. As Grimsley writes, “With the utter disregard for blacks that was the norm among Union troops, the soldiers ransacked the slave cabins, taking whatever they liked.” A typical practice was to put a hangman’s noose around a slave’s neck and threaten to hang him unless he revealed where the household’s jewelry and silverware were hidden. Some slaves were beaten to death by Union soldiers.

It is no doubt that black slaves knew that the North was not their true friends. The “Underground Railroad” went to Canada, not to any particular northern state. Only Wisconsin ever nullified the Fugitive Slave Act which mandated that escaped slaves were required by law to be returned to their owners in the slave states.

The fact that when both Indiana (1816) and Illinois (1818) abolished slavery upon statehood, they also ensure that black immigration was minimized by requiring blacks to produce legal documents proving they were free and posting bond of up to $1000 (in 1860 dollars – approximately $30,000 today!). Additional anti-immigration legislation was enacted (and supported by Lincoln) in Illinois in 1819, 1829 and 1853 and in Indiana in 1831 and 1852 as well as in the Michigan Territory in 1827. The bottom line was that Northern whites, and politicians themselves, feared black immigration!

In summary, reparations are best applied in real-time, within the generation of the offense. This is why even an author who suggests that Southerners are hard on General Sherman and Sheridan would state on the record:

Historian Lee Kennett, author of ‘Marching through Georgia: The Story of Soldiers and Civilians during Sherman’s Campaign’ page 286:

“Had the Confederates somehow won, had their victory put them in position to bring their chief opponents before some sort of tribunal, they would have found themselves justified (as victors generally do) in stringing up President Lincoln and the entire Union high command for violation of the laws of war, specifically for waging war against noncombatants.”

Now you know.

-SF1

1860: Worlds Collide as the Northern States Elect a President for ALL the USA

This point in time (1860) was not when friction started between the three major regions of the “united States of America”. Please note that in many documents, the “u” in union was because the emphasis on this “new nation” launched in 1776 was on the States and the powers it reserved for themselves verses the power delegated to the general (now called federal) government. The Articles of Confederation spelled this out better in print and in practice. The Constitution, however, was construed in secret backrooms in Philadelphia in 1787 and became a document that Patrick Henry would prophetically claim “I smell a rat”.

The most telling aspect of the state bent of the original view of this “republic” experiment was the language used to describe it until 1860. An example is the phrase “the United States are a republic.” Yes, you read that right. It sounds wrong only because everyone has been taught that the United States is singular and not plural. In our eyes, it is a nation, it is “one” .. and as the socialist pledge teaches us, it is indivisible.

So what happened? Well if you can imagine a marriage of two regions, south (the strongest region in the 1770s) and the north (the weakest region at this time) set aside their differences to fight off an empire. Successful as they were, they knew that only because England was pulled into a world war on various fronts and the assistance of the French, they were very lucky. Exiting these war years with the Articles of Confederation holding them somewhat together (general government could not tax, raise armies or borrow money), there came an effort to “strengthen” these bonds out of fear. The new marriage vows were designed to allow a stronger bond, general government taxes (a whiskey tax of 25% that put the British Empire’s stamp tax that the colonies revolted against to shame) and other new powers that centralized control. Patrick Henry, George Mason and Richard Henry Lee all saw through the sham of this shift towards tyranny. Eventually Thomas Jefferson would see the defects of this modified republic experiment, but it was too late. A great quote by William M. Robinson, Jr. about this moment in time is:

“The successful working of the dual system (Madison’s ‘dual sovereignty’) depended on the concert and mutual respect of the State and federal governments. When this noble experiment in government was launched in 1789, the world watched with interest and wondered whether human nature would be equal to it.”

Human nature was not equal to it. Compromises was made and even though eventually ten amendments were added (but note these “bill of rights” were not central to this document), these modified “vows” hung heavier and heavier as the country grew and expanded.

Working from a piece from Abbeville Institute on the defining differences in constitutions it is shared about what changed between 1787 and 1860:

Between 1789 and 1861 the US Constitution became a cudgel splintering on the anvil of human nature. No Founder could foresee the social, political and economic upheavals of the next 70 years: the stunning acquisition of land called the Louisiana Purchase doubling the size of a once small Republic cuddled along the Atlantic seaboard; the explosive value of cotton in the 1800 teens; our Industrial Revolution in the 1820’s; a population growth from 3.9 million in 1790 to 31.5 million in 1860, mostly in the North. Neither Jefferson nor Hamilton believed a Republic could govern so large a landmass and diverse a population. By 1860 Washington was long rutted on the road of Empire where human nature roams by instinct to the acquisition of further wealth and power.

By 1860 there was a strong North who had emerged as a leader in political power that left the south and the west (both Midwest and Pacific West) in the shadows. The ability of the general government to tweak tariff revenue dis-proportionally among the regions and subsidize northern “internal improvements” and industry were particularly prominent since about the 1830s. Redistribution of tax monies is never an easy pill to swallow. By 1860, the South felt backed into a corner and when the election results were in, it understood that the North could elect a regional president with only 39% of the country’s votes. This was a marriage that they could no longer be a party too.

However, instead of arguing purely on emotional lines, they decided to use the legality of their exit, by stating that “slavery” was their reason in many of the secessionist documents. Secession/divorce was never ruled out as an option as the North had considered that when it was the weaker partner in 1798 and 1814. Even Lincoln knew he could not push on the slavery issue legally during his first inaugural address in March 1861:

Apprehension seems to exist among the people of the Southern States that by the accession of a Republican Administration their property and their peace and personal security are to be endangered. There has never been any reasonable cause for such apprehension. Indeed, the most ample evidence to the contrary has all the while existed and been open to their inspection. It is found in nearly all the published speeches of him who now addresses you. I do but quote from one of those speeches when I declare that—

I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.

So here we are, seven states had legally seceded from the united States and the newly elected president, the first one elected specifically by a section of the nation alone, is saying that the Constitution limits his ability to end slavery.

Lincoln does not stop there however, from his same speech he says:

I will venture to add that to me the convention mode seems preferable, in that it allows amendments to originate with the people themselves, instead of only permitting them to take or reject propositions originated by others, not especially chosen for the purpose, and which might not be precisely such as they would wish to either accept or refuse. I understand a proposed amendment to the Constitution—which amendment, however, I have not seen—has passed Congress, to the effect that the Federal Government shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the States, including that of persons held to service. To avoid misconstruction of what I have said, I depart from my purpose not to speak of particular amendments so far as to say that, holding such a provision to now be implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable.

Yes, Lincoln was willing to make slavery permanent in the states that desired this, IF these seven states would return.

When you read the first inaugural address you can’t say that slavery was the issue for the war that followed, because to Abraham Lincoln, slavery was not worth fighting over. A future post will discuss why a war had to be the only response the North considered when the southern seven states refused to re-join the union. It should be noted that the reasons for secession differ from the reasons for war.

As a side note, when comparing the US and CSA constitutions (again, from the Abbeville Institute article referenced earlier), the slavery sections are identical:

… the CSA [constitution] enunciates what was understood but not written in 1787, especially in three places: 1) the CSA extends the Fugitive Slave Clause to Territories; 2) in the governance of Territories the CSA allows slavery until the Territory becomes a State. The people of that State then choose whether to be a Slave or Free State; 3) the CSA explicitly forbids the Central government interfering with slavery in any State. This last was also the 1861 US Corwin Amendment that Lincoln supported. All three were part of the original, unwritten understanding of the US Founders.

In summary, the major differences were not about slavery, but about sovereignty, which is as follows:

1.        Eliminated ‘dual sovereignty’. No powers were granted to the Central government. Specific powers were delegated.

2.        Created a Defined and Unmistakable Federal government.

3.        Mandated a solitary 6 year term for the President; gave the President a line item veto; required a mere majority vote in Congress for fiscal spending initiated by the President, but a 2/3’s majority if initiated by Congress.

4.        Placed Constitutional amendment conventions entirely in the hands of the States. The Central government had no role but the mandate to issue a call for a convention when 3 of the 7 States had already proposed amendments.

That alone does not look like a slavery-centric divorce/exit plan. This is about letting states have primary powers and specifically giving the general government limited powers. This had been the rub all along!

Also, on a final note, Lincoln too used the marriage analogy in his first inaugural address, but claimed that the “nation” could not do this:

Physically speaking, we can not separate. We can not remove our respective sections from each other nor build an impassable wall between them. A husband and wife may be divorced and go out of the presence and beyond the reach of each other, but the different parts of our country can not do this. They can not but remain face to face, and intercourse [communication], either amicable or hostile, must continue between them.

Lincoln has been proven wrong many times on this .. especially with the breakup of the USSR and the subsequent republics that were successfully birthed as a result.

In summary, 1860’s election changed the course of this federated republic, and the reactions to this new reality included the death of over 700,000 men and the ravaging of the southern region physically, emotionally and financially for the next hundred years. In the northern mind, one must pay an eternal price from desiring separation and divorce. Forced to be in this marriage, the south has never been the same, and this marriage has never been the same. Is it over yet?

-SF1

1868: When You Think You Have Been Taught All You Need to Know: Andrew Johnson – Impeached But Not Convicted

Impeachment proceedings in the US Senate 1868

Back in the day, when the newspaper would list all those convicted in the local courts, you (and I) probably developed a bias towards that person. Especially if you knew of the crime and all what was written in the paper you (and I) felt we knew the whole story and if we ever met that person on the street, there probably would have been no meeting of the eyes.

However, if you knew that person, the person’s character and past history and things did not seem to line up, you might have had doubts, but in the end if the courts (i.e. State) did their job, they must have been guilty as charged.

But, if you had been “there”, witnessed the “crime”, maybe that is when the court’s performance might have been suspect. We hear all the time these days, quietly, how convictions from decades ago are overturned due to DNA testing or false positives on hair samples, etc.

Also, if one has just been accused of a “crime” and has to go through the very public fight for justice, there is a blemish on their record in our eyes that their character is flawed and that they can’t be trusted.

All this to say, when you compare the reputation of Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson in the State’s textbooks, it is the comparison of “good” and “bad” respectively.  Right there is a hint that something might not be right, because if the State’s narrative suggests Andrew Johnson is indeed bad, and that the State is known to lie, well then, why don’t we research Andrew Johnson himself and determine who he really might be, since we weren’t there and we don’t personally know him.

From the Abbeville Institute comes a sort but informative overview of Andrew’s life, from humble beginnings to his days as the president of the United States right as the War of Northern Aggression (Civil War) concluded and how the general government should treat the states that left (according to them) or wanted to leave (according to Lincoln and his supporters).

Andrew Johnson was born into poverty in rural North Carolina. His father died after saving some town locals from drowning and left the family to fend for themselves in a two-room shack. A young Andrew began working as a tailor’s apprentice and developed an appreciation for the laboring class early on. Johnson was poorly educated and learned how to write from his wife, while he was still working as a tailor.

Michael Martin – Abbeville Institute “Lessons in Conservatism from Andrew Johnson”

OK, so he was not like Lincoln, born in a log cabin, but he did have very humble beginnings. A self-made man whose passions led him into politics, but NOT as a politician, oh no, his idols were statesmen!

Johnson admired true statesmen, hated politicians, and was most conservative when it came to government spending. He would debate anything that required the expenditure of public funds, having introduced bills to reduce Congressional salaries and even opposed proposals like the Smithsonian Institute because he thought it would be an unjust burden on the treasury.

Michael Martin – Abbeville Institute “Lessons in Conservatism from Andrew Johnson”

Johnson also had “ownership” in how the country’s revenue was spent. Undoubtedly, his time as a politician especially during the war years showed him how easily that money could be squandered by all those bureaucrats that had no “skin in the game”.

When Johnson faced Reconstruction, he was initially welcomed by Radical Republicans that wanted to punish the South. However, Johnson’s plan differed from Lincoln’s only slightly, favored leniency, and virtually ignored the freed slaves. This put him at odds with the radical plan for the South to be run by a bayonet, carpetbag government. Most narratives portray Johnson as a Southern racist who wanted to deny equality to newly freed slaves. Johnson, however, had stated years before that he supported emancipation and was mostly opposed to the outrageous spending habits of Congress.

Michael Martin – Abbeville Institute “Lessons in Conservatism from Andrew Johnson”

We see here that in summary, Johnson’s philosophical views differed from his political opponents in the House and Senate of the US Government. That was all it took for impeachment to take place. When Johnson tried to follow the letter of the law, the Constitution, and keep from squandering the people’s money, he was brought up on trumped (no pun intended) charges.

On the issue of the Freedmen’s Bureau, for example, Johnson vetoed a bill to make it permanent and then three days later gave a speech where he charged Congress with seeking to destroy the fundamental principles of the Constitution. His exact words were that “There is an attempt to concentrate the power of the Government in the hands of a few, and thereby bring about a consolidation, which is equally dangerous and objectionable with separation.”

Michael Martin – Abbeville Institute “Lessons in Conservatism from Andrew Johnson”

In my mind, the previous president (Lincoln) paid so little attention to the US Constitution that the Congress felt that it was to be a free for all! The former president in fact, never validated the fact that the 11 states that left the union actually did so, because as a lawyer he knew he could use post-Constitution laws to justify “putting down a general rebellion / insurrection” for all his war efforts in the south. The spouse (in his mind, actually 11 spouses) that left needed to be beat back into the home. Now that the spouse was back in the home, the Congress wanted to abuse her even more and Johnson said NO!

In his veto of the Freedmen’s Bureau bill, Johnson explained that opposed it because he was against a military government of the South, against the unlimited distribution of funds to former slaves and their families, and against taking land away from Southerners. In Johnson’s mind, the defeated Southern states were part of the Union and did not need further punishing, and he broke down how virtually every part of the Freedmen’s Bureau bill was incompatible with the Constitution. His main focus was on government spending and the fact that the Constitution was not designed to guarantee any type of special privileges, just basic rights.

Michael Martin – Abbeville Institute “Lessons in Conservatism from Andrew Johnson”

The Radical Republicans indeed wanted a dependency class in the south and the newly freed blacks was to be that class and it remained that way until 1877 in the military districts that were formed to further suck the life out of this abused spouse yet again.

This is effectively what the Northern Union / US Government did to the south. Recovery in this region would take a century economically however, psychologically, it’s culture has never been the same.

Andrew Johnson can be shown as about the only Unionist who cared, and so he was targeted and marginalized in all the US History books published these days.

Four million slaves were emancipated and given an equal chance and fair start to make their own support-to work and produce; and having worked and produced, to have their own property and apply it to their own support. But the Freedmen’s Bureau comes and says we must take charge of these 4,000,000 slaves. The bureau comes along and proposes, at an expense of a fraction less than $12,000,000 a year, to take charge of these slaves. You had already expended $3,000,000,000 to set them free and give them a fair opportunity to take care of themselves -then these gentlemen, who are such great friends of the people, tell us they must be taxed $12,000,000 to sustain the Freedmen’s Bureau.

Andrew Johnson 1866 in Cleveland, OH

So the slavery of 4 million souls in 1865 transferred into the tax slavery of 350 souls in 2018 as the cancer of centralized government continues to suck the life out of all who remain, and there are no Andrew Johnsons allowed to enter politics and gain any political power again.

“Johnson, in fact, continually upheld his oath of office, making him one of the best presidents in American history.”

Brion McClanahan

-SF1

1861: What Triggered Secession and What Triggered War?

I have been reading about the so-called American Civil War  all my life. The more I research this period of the federated republic’s life, the more I see the secession action as filing for divorce and the war as the abusive spouse that refuses to let go.  Over the past few years on social media I have encountered some people who point to the secession documents and scream “told you it was about slavery” even when I know it wasn’t. If it was the Union would have freed ALL the slaves they had control over in 1861, and not in December 1865 well after Abe Lincoln had died.

The writings of Paul Craig Roberts are getting better. I guess that comes with age and wisdom, one tends to let the truth fly. So today I was hit with this article from his website that had me say, “why didn’t I think of that?” Well, it is probably because I was never a lawyer.

I am going to liberally quote the former official from the Ronald Reagan administration below, hang on for some learnin’

In response to my short essay on November 9 ( https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2018/11/09/the-prevalence-of-myth-over-history/ ), a reader sent me a link to secession documents that implicated slavery, not the tariff, as the reason for Southern secession. It is typical for the uneducated to come across a document of which they have no understanding and to send it off with a rude “got you” note to one who does understand the document.

Bingo. Been there done that. But instead of fighting the good fight a few years ago, I just ignored the pest (now I know they we an uneducated pest, but everyone is “in process”, bless their heart).

Paul goes on to explain the crux of that matter, from a legal position, because just like in a divorce, there was first a contract, and so one has to maneuver into filing for divorce on the proper grounds:

When the Southern states seceded, they were concerned to do so legally or constitutionally under the Constitution so that the North could not legally claim that it was an act of rebellion and invade the Southern states. To make this case, the South needed to make a case that the North had broken the Consltitutional contract and that the South was seceding because the North had not kept to the Constitution.

This presented a legal challenge for the South, because the reason for which the Southern states were seceding was the tariff, but the Constitution gave the federal government the right to levy a tariff. Therefore, the Southern states could not cite the tariff as a breach of the Constitutional fabric.

Slavery was the only issue that the South could use to make a legal case that it was not in rebellion.

Exactly. So out of context, many will think the seven states that initially seceded were not concerned about the tariff (even though that was the primary motivation to file for “divorce” and seek a peaceful separation), but were concerned about treatment of runaway slaves.

Article 4 of the US Constitution reads: “No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.” In defiance of Article 4, some Northern states had passed laws that nullified the Fugitive Slave Act and other laws that upheld this article of the Constitution. The South used these nullification laws to make its case that Northern states had broken the Constitutional contract, thus justifying the Southern states secession.

Legal maneuvering was to be primary in order to exit peacefully and not be considered “in rebellion”. Lincoln, the proverbial lawyer, knew exactly what he was up against:

Lincoln understood that he had no authority under the Constitution to abolish slavery. In his inaugural address he said: “I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.” The North had no intention of going to war over slavery. The same day that the Republican Congress passed the tariff, Congress passed the Corwin Amendment that added more constitutional protection to slavery.

Lincoln said that the South could have all the slavery that it wanted as long as the Southern states paid the tariff. The North would not go to war over slavery, but it would to collect the tariff. Lincoln said that “there needs to be no bloodshed or violence” over collecting the tariff, but that he will use the government’s power “to collect the duties and imposts.” The tariff was important to the North, because it financed Northern industrialization at the economic expense of the South.

Money. Finances were at the heart of why the majority of states north and west (called Midwest today) just could not let the seven states leave in peace. Their economic future looked bleak with a possible “free-trade” country next to the remnants of the Union. “She” could not go, because the lifestyle that was in effect for the previous 40 years simply could not be maintained!

The South’s effort to exit the union legally and constitutionally was to no avail. Secession was declared a rebellion, and the South was invaded.

Get that? Even though the southern seven (and eventually eleven) states had painfully followed the legal route, per the contract (Constitution), the abuse escalated and horror was brought upon these states who attempted to leave, especially during the war itself with innocent women, children and older men never spared, but total war (Sherman style, like we used in Iraq) was waged followed by occupation of the south for 12 more years followed by impoverishment of a whole region for a century. Even today, the South is treated as second class citizens unless they keep the “Union” as their god and master.

Occupation of the South – Military Districts

What about Lincoln himself, the so-called “Great Emancipator”?

The misportrayal of the War of Northern Aggression as Lincoln’s war to free slaves is also impossible to reconcile with Lincoln’s view of blacks. Here is “the Great Emancipator” in his own words:

“I have said that the separation of the races is the only perfect preventive of amalgamation [of the white and black races] . . . Such separation . . . must be affected by colonization” [sending blacks to Liberia or Central America]. (Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln vol. II, p. 409).

“Let us be brought to believe it is morally right, and . . . favorable to . . . our interest, to transfer the African to his native clime.” (Collected Works, vol. II, p. 409).

“I am not nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races. I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people” (Collected Works, vol. III, pp. 145-146).

How was Lincoln turned into “the Great Emancipator”?

Great question Paul. It is the great myth, the deification of a racist president towards solidifying the concept that the Union always was (before the states/colonies) and that this republic is “indivisible”. Epic lies from a politician, who would have thought that?

Finally, in a line that promises much more in the months to come from this writer:

Just as Civil War history is mistaught in order to support the Identity Politics agenda of fomenting hatred of whites, the histories of the two world wars were fabricated in order to blame Germany, more about which later.

Bingo.

When you start to research for yourself all you have been taught, you come up against information that undermines the narrative you might have held as gospel for decades. Only then can you entertain a thought, without accepting it .. and go from there .. in your own time!

Like the old Royal Caribbean tag line goes .. “get out there!” .. research stuff!

-SF1

 

West Virginia: How Did It Happen?

Notice that in this June 1861 map, the Confederate States of America are represented in gray. Look closely and you will see a part of Virginia that reaches within 100 miles of Canada almost slitting what is left of the “Union” in two.

If you could look closer you would see the railroad lines that go through that region that connect the east with the west (current Midwest) … and now you start to see how nervous Lincoln was about this area.

Lincoln already had cannon aimed at Dover, DE to prevent that state from considering secession, and in MD Lincoln placed all who were suspected of voting for secession in jail. Dealing with those counties in Virginia that had the railroad lines, coal and timber would take a little bit longer. However, being a new dictator has its privileges.

To know why Virginia seceded, you have to know what happened. The first time Virginia voted, they said NO to secession. Then Lincoln attempted to resupply two southern forts still under his control (Fort Sumter in South Carolina and Fort Pickens in Alabama) there was cannon fire in Charleston Harbor BUT no one was killed. The fort surrendered and then Lincoln called up 75,000 volunteers from all his states (36 minus the 7 that had left the union) to put down an “insurrection” (he took care not to call them states) and he did not fathom the fallout from that fateful decision. Four more states would leave the union with Virginia voting again and this time in favor of leaving. If the reason was to keep slavery, don’t you think the vote would have been the same both times? If it was the high tariffs, the vote should have been the same as well. Maybe, just maybe, these regions did not want to be a colony of another empire yet again!!!

One look at the demographics will reveal a lot about the area south of Wheeling that had ZERO say in what happened next according to quotes below from the Abbeville Institute article from June:

.. In 1860 the mountainous counties of northwestern Virginia cared little about slavery. Even in the southern counties McDowell had 10% slaves, Mercer 150 of a total population of 4500. …. The B & O Railroad, running across northwestern Virginia, provided a vital link between the Yankee states and the West. This explains why the first battle of the War took place at Philippi ‘West’ Virginia…

People generally can tell when the weather is changing .. no different by 1860 when those in western sections of Virginia and the rest of the south saw this:

… western Virginians were horrified by the hijacking of the federal government by Northern industrialists and bankers in 1860. Money had totally bought out the law. A railroad corporate lawyer, Abraham Lincoln, president, swore to defeat the Democratic states even in the North, i.e., New York State, Ohio and the so-called Copperhead states in the West. To the so-called Radical Republicans this was a real civil war. They had to subjugate the Democratic Party representing the workers’ interests. The world was shocked. Even the pope called Lincoln a “tyrant and a usurper” and sent President Jefferson Davis a crown of thorns…

Yes, they sensed what had been coming for several generations, something Patrick Henry prophesied about that rule by a corrupt majority to the north was coming true.

Then, the fallout continued as key US Army personnel had to make some big decisions based on selfish interests OR on principle:

.. General Lee (today called a traitor in the national media) had to resign his commission in the US Army so as not to help subject his native Virginia to the rule of Northern bankers. In the Sound of Music, Captain von Trapp was similarly forced to flee the Nazis…

Since this “Union” that Lincoln professed to keep seemed so very fragile, (actually, it was his party’s inability to hold on to political power indefinitely) it was decided to manufacturer another state for electoral votes needed in 1864 (they admitted Nevada prematurely for the same reason). The method they used is found no where in the Constitution .. but like all things of the Republican party at that time .. you just make things up because the ends justify the means:

.. Just create a “Restored Government of Virginia” in federally controlled areas near Washington. Appoint a governor, Francis Pierpont, and of course an ad hoc legislature. Propose one bill, devoted to the question of secession of the northwestern counties. Vote for it, get paid and go home. Democracy was somewhat crushed, of course. Twenty-two counties did not vote. One county “sent” one representative, some guy who elected himself, etc. But the whole thing worked like a charm, at least in the Union media. The cover-up was well under way. As of June 20, 1863 the federal government declared West Virginia a new state. ..

So even after the war, West Virginia was kept from being part of Virginia again .. politics:

… In legal limbo, ‘West’ Virginia did not democratically or legally secede. Neither was it annexed with any real popular support. Like India as a British colony, our people are seen as second-class citizens, if that. We are berated for our accents and behavior. And we are blamed for a system we did not create. Like the rest of the Confederate states we are in fact a colony…

I contend that except in the big political power centers of major metro areas, the rest of this country is treated as colonies … taxed to feed the federal beast. The American Empire.

Sick I know, but true. Now you know what your high school history teacher forgot to tell you.

-SF1