Incidentally, at the beginning of the Civil War, fully 60% of the population of South Carolina were slaves. Whatever “tyranny” there is in not allowing the other 40% of South Carolina residents to do whatever they want is vastly overshadowed by the tyranny that was the South Carolina government.
It was a yes/no question.
I guess the answer is No.
Open-minded are you, Curtis?
Yeah, generally I roll my eyes at Nazi comparisons, but Miller is dead on with this one. Black people were quite literally seen as sub-human in the pre-Civil-War American South. (And for quite some time afterward, to be honest.)
Miller, thankyou for your response. You’ve given me plenty to think about on the issue, and I think I need to look into it more deeply. I have one question now though.
The state or nation is large enough to self-govern effectively. You seem to be suggesting that no part of a country, ever, should choose to leave that country. Is that what you are saying, or are you just saying that it should not happen in the US?
I understand both these points. If the war had been fought because slavery was too abhorrent to survive, I’d have no problems - but it wasn’t, it was fought on the grounds that the southern states had no right to secede, or more precisely that the Federal government had the right to compel them not to by force of arms, and whether excercising that right was the best choice.
I’m well aware that slavery was and is evil, and exceptionally so in the southern states at that time, and my point was never to defend the actions of those states.
I agree with Martin Hyde. John Tyler’s civil war treason really blows all others out of the water.
I should probably let Miller answer this one, but as I see it no part of a country should be allowed to decide, on its own, to secede from the whole (unless this is specifically allowed by the country’s constitution).
If secession is truly in everyone’s best interest, then there should be a piece of legislature to separate the two countries. But this is a decision that should be made by both the seceding region and the country at large.
Nope. You are not the Lone Ranger. Wilson was the Incarnation of Evil and the damage that he did is hurting us today. And I ain’t talking a little owie here.
It is not incumbent on anyone in a debate to read the other person’s literature. There is no reason for a 14 year old boy to go out and buy a book just to make you happy. Especially since, if the book is accurate, the actual facts will be presented somewhere else.
If you have a point, make it. Don’t expect a kid to do your reading for you.
And, anyways, there are a lot of well-educated people who disagree with you, without having to read a book released to capitalize on the dislike of a former president.
The Declaration of Independence sets forth the 13 colonies’ grievances toward George the 3rd and the British Empire. There were pretty good reasons for the revolution, including the lack of representative government. By way of stark contrast, the Confederacy’s only grievance against the Federal Government was that the CSA wanted to keep its slaves and extend slave holding to new territories, and a growing number of people in the rest of the country thought that slave holding was immoral and opposed extending slavery beyond the CSA. The Confederacy was represented in Congress- one could argue that they were over represented, given that slaves were counted as 3/5 of a person for purposes of congressional representation - while the colonies were not represented in the British parliament at all.
Hindsight isn’t obvious at the time, which is the point. No scholarship that I’m aware of shows that in 1860 the majority of Americans thought that letting the
CSA go its own way was OK with them. Lincoln was elected on a platform of holding the union together. Once sworn in, he could hardly had turned on a dime and said it was fine with him if they left the union.
Interesting supposition though Steophan, about Lincoln being such an evil president. It may be bordering on hijack of this thread though.
However, he could have done more than just throw his hands up and declare that there was nothing he could do. Maybe invite SC delegates and Congressional leaders to the White House for a conference. It might not have worked, but you have to do something more than sitting back and saying fuckitall…
He backed the efforts of Crittenden, and Tyler to prevent secession, he backed the plan made by a group of governors in New York, he even tried to get a new constitutional convention called. All of his efforts were futile, and his actions concerning Fort Sumter were unwise, but not acheiving the impossible does not mean he was a horrible president. All Wilson had to do was keep his campaign promise to keep the US out of WW1, instead he threw away hundreds of thousand of lives for the sake of his own ego.
Who did the OP expect would garner the most votes? Are we allowed to ask that question? Will that question be answered?
If this were followed, the the US should not have left the British Empire without it’s consent. If you follow this rule, it will allow a majority to oppress a minority with no redress apart from war. Do you genuinely think that war is better than a political settlement? I’m specifically thinking that, these days, the UN could arbitrate when a smaller territory could secede from a larger one.
Also, you are assuming that such a discussion would even be possible with the country at large. Whilst this may be true for the US, it’s certainly not in, say, China, and most people agree Taiwan should be allowed to be completely independent regardless of the opinion of the PRC.
I’m not suggesting that Lincoln was evil at all - I’m suggesting that he may have been misguided, and that at some of the hero worship may be inappropriate. I don’t for a minute think he wanted to kill half a million southerners, and was just looking for an excuse, to echo some of the accusations leveled against Bush Jnr.
It may be a bit of a hijack, but as most of the discussion has been with a mod I’m assuming it’s ok!
I’m not immediately offended at the notion of Lincoln being the worst President, some of his actions were illegal and he was an incredibly polarizing figure in his own time (however I personally rank him as the greatest American President.)
I think Steophan is way off the mark. The comparisons between the CSA splitting from the Union have virtually nothing in common with a theoretical split of Scotland from the United Kingdom. Scotland is a modern democracy and any such split would require the support of a majority of Scots. Scotland would also negotiate with the UK on what would be done with various assets on Scottish land, it certainly would not start attacking British military bases or unilaterally seizing UK military assets.
Almost 40% of persons in the CSA were chattel slaves. A large portion of the whites in the CSA were poor and were routinely denied the political rights enshrined in the Constitution. Given that the Southern states were essentially becoming an oligarchy while the North was slowly evolving into a genuine democracy I think there are strong arguments that the Northern states had an obligation to not allow a few thousand Southern patricians to steal 1/3rd of the United States and deny its people their constitutional rights.
I was responding to Miller saying something I interpreted as meaning that no part of a country should separate from the whole under any circumstances, ever, a point I disagree with. Obviously there’s a right and a wrong way to attempt the split - my question is whether war is necessarily the best response to a territory that attempts to split in the wrong way.
In any event, the federal government did far more in 1861 than claim back specific federally-owned property.
Almost 40% of persons in the CSA were chattel slaves. A large portion of the whites in the CSA were poor and were routinely denied the political rights enshrined in the Constitution. Given that the Southern states were essentially becoming an oligarchy while the North was slowly evolving into a genuine democracy I think there are strong arguments that the Northern states had an obligation to not allow a few thousand Southern patricians to steal 1/3rd of the United States and deny its people their constitutional rights.
I don’t know what you mean by this.
The colonies did not have any part in the government of the United Kingdom. They had no representatives to put forth proposals of independence. They were powerless, which is why, when their pleas for representation fell on deaf ears, they had no choice but to take up arms.
This was obviously not the case for the southern states in pre-Civil War USA.
Doesn’t it take two to settle? If the minority can just take their ball and go home, there’s no settling.
Finally, what the southern states endured in pre-Civil War USA can hardly be considered “oppression.” There was no bill in Congress to eliminate slavery. There were restrictions or outright bans on slavery in new territories, but this not the same as changing the way of life in those states where slavery already existed.
Clearly slavery was going to be eliminated eventually, but this would have taken place with discussion and debate and compromises… the things our government does all the time.
I agree with pretty much all of this. However, none of these were the stated reason for the war - the preservation of the Union was. If war was appropriate for any of the reasons you have given, it would not necessarily have come at the point of secession.
My problem is that the war was not fought for the rights of any people, of whatever race or status, but for the preservation of a political entity.
It’s not entirely true that they had no representation, but it is true that what representation they had was not elected by the people of the colonies.
I’m using American Independence as an example of when it’s acceptable for separation to occur, not saying it shouldn’t have happened.
But as you’ve said earlier, if the majority refuses to even consider settling, there can be be no settlement. Do you honestly think that if one of the southern states in 1860 had attempted to leave the union politically rather than unilaterally, they would have been listened to?
Was the Federal government at the time willing to negotiate with the southern states about ending slavery, and particularly the economic issues of ending slavery? My understanding is that it was believed that the economy of the south would have collapsed if slavery was ended voluntarily, as it in fact did after the war.