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Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Sep 23, 2008 7:14 AM
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Icepick, Admiral Semmes [the greatest and most successful ships Captain in American history] was arrested and charged with treason.
The piracy charge was a joke, as was the treason charge, since commerce raiding is a perfectly legitimate wartime act.
--
1st Regiment of Virginia Volunteer Infantry
Fighting terrorism since 1861
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Posts:
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(32 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Sep 23, 2008 7:21 AM
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> > warrior Quote...
> > Lets talk about why Davis was never put on
> trial...
> > or convicted.
> >
> > care to?
After two years of imprisonment, Davis was released on bail which was posted by prominent citizens of both northern and southern states, including Horace Greeley, Cornelius Vanderbilt, and Gerrit Smith (Smith, as a member of the Secret Six, had earlier supported John Brown). Davis visited Canada, Cuba and Europe. In December 1868, the court rejected a motion to nullify the indictment, but the prosecution dropped the case in February 1869.
--
1st Regiment of Virginia Volunteer Infantry
Fighting terrorism since 1861
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Posts:
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(33 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Sep 23, 2008 7:57 AM
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<rdfx wrote:
"Admiral Semmes [the greatest and most successful ships Captain in American history] was arrested and charged with treason.">
If he was arrested and indicted for treason, I stand corrected. The two biographies that I have of Semmes only mention the piracy indictment even though website sources mention both.
<"The piracy charge was a joke, as was the treason charge, since commerce raiding is a perfectly legitimate wartime act.">
I agree that Semmes' commerce raiding was legitimate under the rules of war acknowledged by most nations during the mid-nineteenth century.
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Posts:
3,538
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Monticello
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(34 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Sep 23, 2008 8:45 AM
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> Not only do many anti-Southern revisionists of
> history claim that the Southern states had no right
> to secede from the Union but the U.S. government has
> offered no apologies to the thirteen states for
> challenging their right of secession.
But they did claim that those states never had that right individually, only collectively; and furthermore they claim that this right belonged likewise only to all of the states collectively, as more states were added.
The US government is bound by Lincoln's legal arguments, i.e. that no state can lawfully get out of the Union by its own unilateral motion. Therefore, the current regime (i.e. the US government) has to stand by this lie, or else lose all claim to sovereign power over the states.
> Some of the most crucial arguments regarding the
> right of secession can be found in Jefferson Davis'
> two volume, Rise and Fall of the Confederate
> Government and Raphael Semmes' Memoirs of Service
> Afloat. I cite both these texts because unlike many
> modern studies on the subject, facts replace opinion
> rather than the reverse.
>
> In studying the dozens of documents and events that
> prove the legality of secession from the birth of
> that right in the latter part of the 18th century
> America less than one hundred years since that time,
> Admiral Semmes brings a perfect case. It is a case
> so obvious and favoring of the states that practiced
> it, the U.S. government has neither then or now
> allowed it to be brought to court.
Not "to court," since no court has the power to hear such disputes; rather, they bar it from academia, so that it won't be given due credence, but will be hooted from all consideration-- ala The Emperor's Robe. As James Ostrowski writes, "any legal scholar who so concluded in print would take himself out of the job market at 99.9 percent of all law schools in the country."
By controlling academic thought, the government controls public opinion on the subject; it's no accident that the Pledge of Allegiance includes the words "one nation, indivsible;" it's a way of indoctrinating the people to believe pure dogma against all evidence to the contrary.
> In denying the
> rights of Southern citizens to stand before a jury in
> court to defend their right of secession, the issue
> was never fairly decided.
Such a tribunal would have to be designated by the warring factions themselves; for example, Napoleon Bonapart IIII offered to mediate the dispute, but was promptly refused by Lincoln, who knew he didn't have a chance against any neutral arbiter with his ridiculous legal arguments.
> Further examination will show that NOTHING in the
> constitution or what was recorded in the minutes of
> the state conventions that decided to join the union
> hint that the states did not have just as much right
> to make an exit.
More specifically, the Constitution forms a perpetual federal republic, which is clearly defined in the Law of Nations as preserving the individual sovereignty of every state, regardless of voluntary restriction of powers while a member therein.
However anyone who mentioned this fact under Lincoln's reign, would thereby earn himself a one-way ticket to Fort Lafeyette.
> Lastly, in January of 1848, Abraham Lincoln himself
> shared,
> "Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the
> power, have the right to rise up and shake off the
> existing government and form a new one that suits
> them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred
> right."
Ok, that's about the 1000th time this has been uttered in defense of secession; however I really can't believe that EVERYONE misses that conditional statement, "AND HAVING THE POWER." No power, no right.
However this does NOT APPLY to any individidual state, which did not need to "shake off its existing government," since that government was its own people themselves; the federal government was subordinate to it, by law.
So the people of any state didn't need the power to shake off their existing government, since they were the "existing government!"
> It is clear that the Northern government chose to
> first resupply a body of their troops in the waters
> of South Carolina and then call for nearly 100,000
> volunteers to invade the Southern states not because
> the South lacked the right to secede.
That's not what Lincoln claimed, however; if he had admitted that the states had the right to secede, then he would have been hanged the next day for trying to conquer peaceful sovereign nations.
>Rather, the
> North both refused to acknowledge the South's
> independence and made war against it because they,
> regardless of anybody's rights, wanted to keep the
> South in their Union.
> When it was good for the North, the right of
> secession was as safe and understood as it was from
> our country's birth. When this right seemed to
> benefit others not them and cause economic
> challenges for their own, secession was treason.
IOW, Yankees are shameless, ruthless hypocrites, liars and imperialists. Is anyone surprised?
> "If we were wrong in our contest, then the
> Declaration of Independence of 1776 was a grave
> mistake and the revolution to which it led was a
> crime. If Washington was a patriot; Lee cannot have
> been a rebel."
> -Major General Wade Hampton
Actually Washington was a rebel, but he won-- however it was a victory for the individual states, not the Union as a whole-- and the resulting Paris Peace Treaty of 1783 recognizes this. Likewise, the states nowhere surrendered their individual sovereignty, particularly not via the Constitution.
--
"Sovereign states may unite themselves together by a perpetual federal republic: this will not impair the sovereignty of each member, though they may, in certain respects, put some restraint on the exercise of it, in virtue of voluntary engagements. Meanwhile a state that has passed under the dominion of another, can no longer avail itself directly of the law of nations; such were the nations and kingdoms which the Romans rendered subject to their empire."
--Vattel
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Posts:
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(35 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Sep 23, 2008 9:07 AM
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<rdfx wrote:
"After two years of imprisonment, Davis was released on bail...Davis visited Canada, Cuba and Europe. In December 1868, the court rejected a motion to nullify the indictment, but the prosecution dropped the case in February 1869.">
Davis was released on bond duting May 1867. During that period the 14th Amendment was in the process of approval by the states with ratification being completed on July 28, 1868. While Davis was in Europe his attorney filed a show cause motion on his behalf in Federal District Court to have the indictment dismissed based on the newly ratified 14th Amendment. Salmon Chase acting in his capacity as one of the two assigned Federal District Court judges for the Court encompassing Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, and both North and South Carolina agreed with Davis's arguments while Judge John Underwood the second jurist for the District Court denied the motion causing the motion to move up to the U.S. Supreme Court where Chase was the Chief Justice and the indictment was dismissed in February 1869 .
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Posts:
13,153
From:
Los Angeles
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(36 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Sep 23, 2008 9:09 AM
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*
was it legal for New England to secede during the War of 1812 and join the Brits?
would be legal for Alaska to secede and become allied with Russia?
would it be legal for the South to secede and become allied with Spain?
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(37 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Sep 23, 2008 9:25 AM
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> > > warrior Quote...
>
> > > Lets talk about why Davis was never put on
> > trial...
> > > or convicted.
> > >
> > > care to?
>
> After two years of imprisonment, Davis was released
> on bail which was posted by prominent citizens of
> both northern and southern states, including Horace
> Greeley, Cornelius Vanderbilt, and Gerrit Smith
> (Smith, as a member of the Secret Six, had earlier
> supported John Brown). Davis visited Canada, Cuba and
> Europe. In December 1868, the court rejected a motion
> to nullify the indictment, but the prosecution
> dropped the case in February 1869.
And again, in most countries, Davis, Robert E. Lee, etc., would have been shot as traitors.
Or maybe you would prefer Russia, Germany, or China?
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Posts:
3,538
From:
Monticello
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(38 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Sep 23, 2008 9:59 AM
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> Icepick, Admiral Semmes [the greatest and most
> successful ships Captain in American history] was
> arrested and charged with treason.
>
> The piracy charge was a joke, as was the treason
> charge, since commerce raiding is a perfectly
> legitimate wartime act.
But treason is not war; therefore it comes down to a matter of sovereignty.
The Founders were accused of treason by King George-- thus their phrase "we must all hang together, or we shall all hang separately." Since the Founders won, then this treaon charge was naturally moot.
However the South did not win, and therefore the treason charge comes down to a matter of sovereignty of their given states.
--
"Sovereign states may unite themselves together by a perpetual federal republic: this will not impair the sovereignty of each member, though they may, in certain respects, put some restraint on the exercise of it, in virtue of voluntary engagements. Meanwhile a state that has passed under the dominion of another, can no longer avail itself directly of the law of nations; such were the nations and kingdoms which the Romans rendered subject to their empire."
--Vattel
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(39 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Oct 20, 2008 11:07 PM
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From the book, Lincoln And The Court, by Brian McGinty, chapter 7, The Old Lion, pg. 195-195:
"Since the constitutionality of secession never came before (Chief Justice of the Supreme Court) Taney in an official capacity, he did not have an opportunity to publicly record his opinions on the issue. But opinions he did have. In an unpublished, eight-page memorandum, apparently prepared late in January 186 for use in a court decision, if and when the issue should come before him, he addressed secession head-on. In the memorandum, Taney reiterated his support for slavery and argued that Northern states were obligated to respect the institution, because they "bound themselves by the social compact of the Constitution to uphold it." Then he wrote:
"The South contends that a state has a constitutional right to secede from the Union formed with her sister states. In this I submit the South errs. No power or right is constitutional but what can be exercised in a form or mode provided in the constitution for its exercise. Secession is therefore not constitutional, but revolutionary; and is only morally competent, like war, upon failure of justice."
(Source: "Fragment of a Manuscript Relating to Slavery in the United States," Robert B. Taney Papers, Library of Congress. Fehrenbacher, Dred Scott Case, 553-555, describes this memorandum and states that it was acquired by the Library of Congress in 1929.)
Just thought folks ought to know that Chief Justice Taney thought secession was "illegal" in that it could not be supported by anything in the US Constitution.
And I hought this thread was the best place to put this man's view on the subject.
Enjoy,
Unionblue
--
Belief does not make truth.
Evidence makes truth.
And belief does not make evidence.
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Posts:
3,403
From:
the south
Registered:
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(40 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Oct 20, 2008 11:16 PM
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There was a letter written by a Supreme Court Justice, can't recall who, that said that both sides had taken part in an illegal war.
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Posts:
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(41 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Oct 21, 2008 12:33 AM
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DD4,
You might want to check the book, Lincoln & The Court, by Brian McGinty, out of your local library.
I couldn't find any references to any of the Supreme Court Justices of Lincoln's time who said such about both sides fighting in an illegal war.
I'd be curious if you could find out who you say said this. You sure that it was a Supreme Court Justice?
Sincerely,
Unionblue
--
Belief does not make truth.
Evidence makes truth.
And belief does not make evidence.
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Posts:
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(42 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Oct 21, 2008 2:33 PM
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Yes, I can't recall where I saw it but it was about a month ago from a Supreme Court Justice to a member of Congress after the war. The laetter may have been an "off the record" personal opinion private correspondence. I'll try to find that for you. That bugs me that I can't remember where I saw it.
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Posts:
2,095
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(43 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Oct 22, 2008 2:35 PM
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Under the U.S. Constitution, Congress and only Congress had the power to suppress insurrection and who was under insurrection.
It was not the power of the state, nor the Confederate states, though the latter tried, to say who was in insurrection against the United States.
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(44 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Oct 22, 2008 2:38 PM
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> Under the U.S. Constitution, Congress and only
> Congress had the power to suppress insurrection and
> who was under insurrection.
Someone forgot to tell lincoln.
>
> It was not the power of the state, nor the
> Confederate states, though the latter tried, to say
> who was in insurrection against the United States.
It was a peaceful secession.
--
"Most Southern historians kept their heads down and their mouths shut from the end of the war until the end of the 19th century, because the North still held the South in the iron grip of poverty-with the ever-present threat of further government intervention."- Conner
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Posts:
3,538
From:
Monticello
Registered:
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(45 of 170)
Re: Anybody care to demonstrate that secession was illegal in 1860
Oct 22, 2008 4:02 PM
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> > care to demonstrate that secession was
> illegal in
> > 1860?
> > I don't have to it has already been done, in
> 1860.
> > The thing you fail to understand is that a true
> view
> > of history can not be had by applying new
> perceptions
> > to events after the fact but only viewing these
> event
> > s as the actual participants saw them. To borrow
> a
> > phrase from noted WWII historian Richard J.
> Overy
> >
> > "It is about the war as it was understood ,
> > however imperfectly or unethically, at the
> > time."
> >
> > The application of thought processes that did
> not
> > exist at the time invalidates them. To say it
> was not
> > rebellion when it was deemed as such, even by
> > prominent Southerners of the era, is frivolous
> > revisionism at its worst for it corrupts
> history.
> > Dan
>
> Come on, Dan. You know better than that. The states
> paper that was voted on by the people whether to
> secede or not is called the 'Declaration of
> Secession.' You are historically wrong. That says
> those that did the voting and those taking it to the
> people used the word 'Secession'.
Also "rebellion" can be a figure of speech, not a legal term.
--
"Sovereign states may unite themselves together by a perpetual federal republic: this will not impair the sovereignty of each member, though they may, in certain respects, put some restraint on the exercise of it, in virtue of voluntary engagements. Meanwhile a state that has passed under the dominion of another, can no longer avail itself directly of the law of nations; such were the nations and kingdoms which the Romans rendered subject to their empire."
--Vattel
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