Which of the following best describes the Confederate cause?

In My Humble Opinion
161

To follow up, first, I am not a Lost Cause Apologist and claiming that it was about states’ rights and not about slavery. It was absolutely about slavery, but the states’ rights aspect is a larger and more relevant debate even in today’s world.

In a large and diverse country like the United States, in order for most people to be satisfied with their government, and have laws which reflect their own view of right and wrong, morality and happiness, the original intent of the Constitution should prevail: that the national government is one of very limited and enumerated powers, only enacted to preserve our common defense, free trade and movement, and to guarantee basic rights.

We have to have allowances for people in urban and progressive states to legalize marijuana, casino gambling, abortion, and same sex marriage; likewise, these states can restrict gun carrying and ownership to levels allowed by the national charter.

But we also have to understand and accept that there are areas of the country who want to keep drugs, gambling, and abortion illegal and have legal school prayer.

I don’t want to rehash the debate over those specific issues, but there has to be a principle that the national government, unless absolutely necessary, is hands off for almost every issue that only concerns internal issues within the states unless large swaths of the country have to live under laws that they are unhappy with. Ours in a federal society where individual state laws matter, and that continues to be papered over.

The neo-Confederate supporters are not asking for a return to slavery or Jim Crow; they are simply tired of being told that their way of life is stupid, backwards, and should be governed by the “better informed” elitists from California and New York from Washington, D.C.

If West Virginia, for example, wants to allow a 16 year old kid to carrying his hunting rifle to school so he can ride the bus home to his friends house to go hunting later, or he wants to share a beer with his dad, then you have every right to think that is stupid and irresponsible, but why should that matter in a federal system?

That is what a lot of the pushback is about and why the south has gotten respect from the Civil War in modern times. It is a middle finger to those who would look down upon certain ways of living and a “leave us alone” attitude.

162

I agree in part and disagree in part. The South made a poor decision to secede how and when they did. They bought into the slippery slope argument (which turned out to be absolutely correct) and took an extra-legal act which they lost. That sucks to be them in those circumstances.

However, the government stacked the deck. They kept admitting territories as states under the condition that they prohibit slavery in their constitutions. That was, as Lincoln said, deliberated designed to limit slavery to the southern states and by choice set up slavery to die on its own. In fairness, that was not agreed to by the South when it joined the Union.

A similar example might be that California joins the Union under a hypothetical constitutional guarantee of legal same sex marriage and abortion. Yet twenty years later, Alabama is divided into twenty different states and a convention is to be called to propose amendments to the Constitution.

California would rightly see that as bad faith, a stab in the back in order to pass an amendment disallowing those things that it was told it could have.

And if California then said, “You know what, guys, we are outta here. This isn’t what we agreed to” I could see a valid argument for California wanting to leave.

Again, I hate naming specific issues because they cause sub-debates, but we can agree that there are things that are vitally important to some people, and equally opposed by others and vice versa.

163

Oh my God I have never read such a load of comically unvarnished hogwash. This never happened, there was never any such deal. The South felt it was entitled to extend slavery through the western territories all the way to South America, and that everyone else should further accede to slavery by complying with fugitive slave laws. The south seceded and initiated violence just on the bare suggestion that Lincoln’s election meant they couldn’t impose their will on the rest of the country and indeed the entire west hemisphere. The south probably could have kept slavery forever if they hadn’t insisted on starting a war over expanding slavery outside of southern states.

Many bad takes in this thread, yours is by far the worst, congrats.

164

The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 demonstrates the bad faith of the Confederate leaders. They didn’t care about states rights at all, aside from those specifically aimed at preserving slavery.

165

Sure, but dont say they dont want a return to Jim Crow. Voter Suppression is highest in the old South.

166

How is that bad faith? That was specifically and indisputably part of the Constitution:

167

Then why was the act necessary at all? Yours is not a credible argument. They opposed any and every “state’s right” that made it harder for Southern states to maintain slavery.

And the act went far, far beyond the Constitution. It prevented Northern states from even attempting to ascertain whether any supposed escaped slaves were truly slaves, or just random black people targeted by thugs. And much more than that. A bullshit argument, and you shouldn’t spread such bullshit Confederate apologia.

168

Altho that quote is correct, you dont seem to know what the Fugitive Slave act did:

wiki: *The Missouri Supreme Court routinely held with the laws of neighboring free states, that slaves who had been voluntarily transported by their owners into free states, with the intent of the masters’ residing there permanently or indefinitely, gained their freedom as a result.[4] The Fugitive Slave Law dealt with slaves who escaped to free states without their master’s consent. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled, in Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842), that states did not have to offer aid in the hunting or recapture of slaves, greatly weakening the law of 1793…In response to the weakening of the original fugitive slave act, the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 penalized officials who did not arrest an alleged runaway slave, and made them liable to a fine of $1,000 (about $29,000 in present-day value). Law-enforcement officials everywhere were required to arrest people suspected of being a runaway slave on as little as a claimant’s sworn testimony of ownership. The suspected slave could not ask for a jury trial or testify on his or her own behalf…

Slave owners needed only to supply an affidavit to a Federal marshal to capture an escaped slave. Since a suspected slave was not eligible for a trial, the law resulted in the kidnapping and conscription of free blacks into slavery, as suspected fugitive slaves had no rights in court and could not defend themselves against accusations.[8]*

So altho the Constitution did require that escaped Slaves (or prisoners) did have to be sent back, Article IV, Section II, Clause III did not speak to Slaveholders voluntarily bringing their slaves into Free states. Thus since some States held that bringing your slave into their territory made him free- ie.e “States Rights” the Fugitive Slave act was anti-States Rights.

Article IV, Section II, Clause III also did not have any enforcement clause. And in effect, any White man could point at any black man in a Free state and claim that man was his escaped slave and that Black man had no legal recourse.

169

It is interesting, we havent had a real Southern Apologist here for a long time.

170

Sure, there’s a valid argument there. And the valid way to prosecute that argument is to go to Congress and say, “This isn’t the deal that we signed up for, and we’d like to leave the union.” It would not be valid to just start shooting at federal troops and then go off and plunder Fort Bragg. If we did that, the rest of the country would be absolutely justified in shooting back at us, and coming in here to get their stuff back.

171

Except you see, the Republicans were not proposing to end slavery. There was no bad deal.

In fact the Constitution had clause that were clearly meant for a eventual end to slavery, viz article 1 section 9=The Migration or Importation of such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the Year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but a tax or duty may be imposed on such Importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each

In other words, the deal was that Congress couldn’t end the slave trade until 1808. No where was there any deal that Slavery was to be allowed forever.

172

This argument has already been raised and rebutted in this thread. But I’ll shoot it down again.

If the divide in the United States had been between agricultural states and industrial states, the mid-western and western states - which were agricultural - would have sided with the southern states against the northeastern.

But they didn’t. The agricultural states of the mid-west and west sided with the industrial states of the north east against the agricultural states of the south. Or, to make it really obvious, the free states of the mid-west, the west, and the northeast were all opposed to the slave states of the south.

During the war, when Jefferson Davis was asked if he would welcome any northern states into the confederacy is they chose to secede, he said he wouldn’t - he said only slave states belonged in the Confederacy.

This the same kind of pseudo-legal nonsense you usually hear from Sovereign Citizens.

173

Bullshit. If you want to show your support for states rights, you should be waving your state flag.

If you’re waving a Confederate flag, you’re associating yourself with the causes of the Confederacy; slavery and a desire to attack the United States.

174

To be fair, that wasn’t really what happened at Sumter. Neither side was anxious to start hostilities. South Carolina felt that all previously federal property was state property in trust to the federal government and thus occupation of the forts was itself a hostile act. They spent four months petitioning the federal government to remove their troops. Buchanan originally promised not to occupy Sumter, but Buell moved troops there anyway. The straw that broke the camel’s back so to say was Lincoln sending a relief expedition to the fort that promised to bring only supplies, but South Carolina thought was bringing reinforcements. South Carolina requested the surrender and evacuation of the fort. The commander in charge said that he would at an unspecified later date unless he received orders from above not to. The South Carolinians worried about the warships approaching the fort and gave him a very short deadline in which to evacuate or bombardment would begin. He did not evacuate. They began bombardment.

175

So, they started shooting at federal troops.

176

I think that that statement robs it of the political nuance of the situation. Let’s pretend for a moment that this Khashoggi situation goes south and we decide to expel Saudi diplomats. We tell them that their embassy in DC is now closed and they need to vacate the premises. They say that they might, but make no move to do so. They begin building stronger walls around it. We say emphatically that they need to leave and they say “We’ll see.” They then begin making plans to move Saudi marines into the embassy. They start airlifting troops into the embassy. At a certain point, the use of force may become justified. We wouldn’t then say that the United States was being irrationally aggressive and violent as the original statement implied. Nor would we phrase this prelude to war as “The US just started shooting at Saudi troops and went off and plundered their Embassy.”

177

Please expand upon that thought.

178

I hate arguing this point because I am a Tolstoyan, but I think that it’s generally accepted that there exist points in human relations at which force is justified to achieve means. This could get into a very large argument over ‘just war theory’ and a number of other issues, but most people are not complete pacifists. The idea of confronting existential threats as an example is one point at which force is usually said to be justified. Does my Saudi example or more appropriately Fort Sumter reach the point of justifiable use of force? That’s certainly debatable, but my point is that it IS debatable and there was a great deal more nuance to the confrontation than simply, “One side started shooting and looting.” That statement implies that there was little to debate when we know that after the fact, the more neutral states did feel that the North was being the aggressor and thus voted to secede. It’s possible (I won’t comment on the likelihood, but the possibility was open until Sumter and the subsequent call to arms.) that if Sumter were evacuated without bombardment that some of those states (including Virginia) might have been convinced to stay in the Union through diplomatic means.

179

You know what happens when neither side is eager to commence hostilities? Hostilities don’t commence. Maybe the traitors weren’t eager to commence hostilities right away, but by April 12, 1861, they clearly were.

180

I think both sides were very eager to “commence hostilities”.

There were public voices frothing at the mouth for war on both sides, probably making both sides incorrectly feel that it was inevitable.