Care to address the content at all, even a little bit? Come on you can do it. I find it disheartening that your research methods rely on “ctrl F”
I guess you missed the part where they state that it was through anti-slavery movement they hoped to reinstitute the tariff? If so you have missed the most important part of the document. The authors were most definitely afraid of the Republican Party’s opposition to slavery, but they were also keen to the reasons why this opposition was exploited. Economy, sir.
Why am I reminded of Robert L Fish’s “Schlock Homes” parodies, where one of the recurring gags was 1)a presentation of blindingly obvious clues, which 2)Homes would proceed to interpret in some absurdly counterintuitive manner?
If only we had two historical examples – one of a secession threat provoked by a tariff and one of a secession threat provoked by the election of an slavery-unsympathetic President – and could see which one fizzled out and which one led to war…
Yes every time something similar happens, the same result must follow.
A guy beats his wife on monday. She threatens to leave, but does not.
He beats her again on thursday, she leaves.
Guy: “There must be some other reason she left, I beat her on monday but she didn’t leave.”
^Plausible reasoning to Steve MB. Crock of bullshit to every other living being.
What are you talking about? They bombarded a US military installation, an act of treason. What sort of nation are you supposing, that allows an act of terrorism like that to stand?
What sort of nation allows a hostile fort in her waterways? It was no longer necessary for the Union to protect SC, so why did they arm a fort there?
Good question. Here’s a similar one: Why would the United States maintain a coaling station in the Caribbean in 1962? Their ships didn’t use coal anymore. So if I understand your argument, you would say that the Castro government would be justified in bombarding a US facility as well. For that matter, Japan could well have been justified in doing so in 1941.
But to answer your question, the US had a military installation near Charleston because Charleston was part of the United States, whose borders were established by treaties which were subsequently ratified by the Senate and signed by the President, and so were the law of the land. The borders of the United States could only be changed by Congress, regardless what a group of traitors thought.
How does a small, vocal contingent of followers (the aforementioned Copperheads) and two overwhelming losses in both post-Sumter elections not define fringe group? What more could the majority of voters have done to convince you that they didn’t agree with Vallandigham? Kick him out of Union controlled territory? Oh, wait. They actually did that.
As Little Nemo noted early on in the thread, it’s easy to avoid a war when one side doesn’t show up. You might as well point out that the Battle of Hasting wouldn’t have occurred if King Harold had just given his country to the Normans. To repeat his question, why didn’t the South just avoid seceding and prevent the war? To repeat my question, are you somehow incapable of seeing the USA as a single entity?
You seem confused. The seceding States were never a nation. We quite literally had a war over this point, and it was most definitively settled at a court house in Appomattox. They were in fact taking up arms against their own country, the USA.
I only see one person here whose arguments are being generally rejected as a crock of bullshit, and his initials are WF. (Apparently the “T” got lost somewhere in the intertubes.)
So his opinions, which are substantiated by other sources I have provided, are void because he lost elections? He was influential in his party. That removes “fringe” from his description.
Are you somehow incapable of seeing the USA as a union of states?
If they were still part of the U.S., why were they not afforded representation in congress? The answer is because they were seceding, as was their right, and formed a seperate government.
I’m merely presenting the evidence for my side of the argument. Using mostly primary sources from the era, I have made my case. You have presented jokes and an argument that was dispatched with one post; afterwards, you responded with a less funny joke.
The South could have not opened fire on Fort Sumter. I think that pretty well explains why there was a war.
Losing elections, by definition, proves that he did not represent the views of the nation.
This definition leads to absurd results (e.g. it excludes Birther crackpots from the description “fringe”), and is therefore rejected.
Yes – a UNION. Traitors tried to break the union, they got shut down (and treated with remarkable mercy compared to the usual punishments meted out for treason).
Their elected representatives refused to show up for work. Anyone who felt unrepresented should have taken it up with them.
He lost elections, so it follows that he was wrong about the intentions of Northern war hawks? No you are wrong.
When Birthers get a plank passed at the convention come talk to me until then you are wrong.
Unions can’t be broken? Ok I’ll take your word for it.
This doesn’t explain why they weren’t afforded representation after the war when extra-constitutional requirements were set before they could be represented.
Was the Missouri Compromise about the tariff? Was the fighting and bloodshed in Kansas about the tariff?
What do you think the South feared the most - an increase in the tariff, which could be easily reversed, or the banning of slavery, which could not be? Which do you think threatened their way of life more?
The bolded part is where you go off the rails every time. You are wrong, you will always be wrong. The states did not, do not, nor will they ever have the “right to secede.” Period.
[QUOTE=silenus]
The bolded part is where you go off the rails every time. You are wrong, you will always be wrong. The states did not, do not, nor will they ever have the “right to secede.” Period.
[/QUOTE]
Well…it was a gray area until the Civil War pretty much settled the question. Before that there seems to have been a presumption that (formerly sovereign) states COULD leave the Union just as they had joined it, but it was never really put to the test until the CW pretty much settled the question. At least that’s what my history prof always contended…which, according to him, was why no one in the Southern government was tried for treason. I do know that original Articles of Confederation (IIRC) that the original 13 colonies subscribed to had a large number of states withdrawing from several years after it was first ratified, and that there wasn’t anything in the original Constitution that specified that membership was permanent…and, I believe that was by design, since a lot of states (who were sovereign before hand) might have balked at joining a union they couldn’t leave at a later time.
Of course, this is all moot now, since the Civil War pretty much settled this question once and for all.
-XT
The only thing that could be described as states leaving the Articles of Confederation was when a bunch of them got together to set up a stronger federal government (that is, the current Constitution). Incidentally, the Articles of Confederation talked about a “Confederation and perpetual Union” between the thirteen states, for what that’s worth. (And the current Constitution mentions a “more perfect Union”.)
Nationalism or economic self-interest aside, the pragmatic answer to why the North contested secession is simply that no government can ever- for any reason good, bad, or indifferent- acquiesce to a diminishment of it’s authority, short of absolute defeat. A government that cannot or will not enforce it’s will is a nonentity.
Okay, if you insist.
You are wrong. You are absolutely and completely and totally wrong. Everything you have said in this thread is wrong. What you have posted here demonstrates a profound ignorance of history, economics, politics, law, and military science.
There. I think I’ve addressed everything you’ve written.