Lincoln

[Faustus]

This conversation has almost gone to the point where saying anything about Lincoln the man seems out of place. But because Lincoln was to some of us today what would be called a

[Horatius]

Why is self governance indefensible? My statement said nothing about slavery. In multiple posts throughout this thread, I've stated that slavery is wrong and that the northern states were morally justified in their stance against it. However, I do believe that each state has the fundamental (if not legal) right to declare their own course.

I'm not trying to discuss slavery here. I am trying to discuss the right of free people to self government. Lets just get it out of the way, SLAVERY IS BAD. There, I said it, you can imagine big tears pouring from my eyes as I say it if you wish.

That out of the way, I believe that people have the right to self government. So did the Founding Fathers, that's kind of why they revolted against England in the first place. The People have the right to self government, provided that they are willing to fight, and if need be to die, to preserve this right.

Look, you can not talk about the CSA without talking about slavery.That is what they were about that is ALL they were about. Glorifying them as some poor state struggling for their rights is nonsense. I hate to use that tired old example of the Nazis but in this case it is fitting because the CSA was every bit as monstrous. It is illegal today in Germany to display the Nazi flag or espouse Nazi propaganda but it is done enthusiastically in the US even today in regards to the CSA. Moral relativism at its worst. If it didn't influence our society even today I wouldn't care so much but it does in many subtle and insidious ways. Maybe we should focus instead on the good things that the CSA bequeathed to civilization ...oh wait there isn't any. Anyway it is 140 years too late to eradicate the symbols and ideology of the Confederacy. I guess I am not making my point clear but that is just my ineptitude.No JR I don't believe any government has the right to subject their people to enslavement or death, if it does that government is illegitimate.

[Moonlapse]

Read carefully:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_Hitlerum

 

I'm not particularly making reference to mentions of Nazis, which are in some ways justified, but to the methods of association described and how they relate to the political issues being discussed which also exist outside the scope of slavery.

[Sequens]

This conversation has almost gone to the point where saying anything about Lincoln the man seems out of place. Faustus

 

Not at all. Reading a biography of his life was what really gave me a deep admiration for the man. Among other things his humor is famous, and lives on in some ways. I was reading something recently about humorous things written by kids. One started their book report with 'Abraham Lincoln was born in a log cabin he built with his own hands.'

 

One of his own quips I thought very good which I only can paraphrase was during a speech or town meeting sort of thing. Someone asked him how long a man's legs should be, making allusion I guess, to his tall, spare appearence. He instantly came back with something like 'long enough to reach the ground I reckon'

[Nephele]

I hate to use that tired old example of the Nazis but in this case it is fitting because the CSA was every bit as monstrous... I don't believe any government has the right to subject their people to enslavement or death, if it does that government is illegitimate.

 

Your comparison of the Confederate States of America to Nazi Germany is a poor one. While I believe that all here agree that slavery was (and still is today in the world) an indefensible institution, it should be noted that the government of the Confederacy never subjected "their people to enslavement" -- as the slaves were never citizens to begin with. Just as the slaves of ancient Rome were not citizens.

 

The Jews of Nazi-era Germany, however, were German citizens until the advent of the Nuremberg Laws on citizenship and race in 1935. Many of those Jews, in fact, fought in World War I on the side of the very nation that would later disenfranchise them (and worse).

 

I'm not pointing this out to minimize or excuse the treatment of the slaves in the ante-bellum South. The process of dehumanization is the same -- whether an individual is made a captive slave in a land foreign to him, or whether a citizen discovers that he is suddenly a non-citizen in the nation which his family has called home for generations.

 

But since you're defining a government's legitimacy by the treatment of "their people" (i.e. citizenry), I'm just saying that the government of the Confederacy didn't strip vested citizens of their rights in the way that Germany's Third Reich did.

 

-- Nephele

[Ludovicus]

Edit: by the by, I laid out my reasoning for the illegality of secession here. The original post was seemingly ignored or perhaps just summarily dismissed. A pox upon you all!

 

Hey! I read your post, so take your pox back, I'm getting itchy!

 

 

 

But anyway. I would say that the CS had the same rights to sucession that the 13 colonies had when they suceeded from Great Britain. To quote the DoI: "That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government..." (actually I am quoting MPC quoting the DoI, if it is misquoted blame him!).

 

The People of the 11 Southern states were exercising their right to abolish the Government and institute a new one.

 

The South had the same right to suceed from the US that the 13 colonies had to suceed from Britain. The difference was, the 13 Colonies won (with signifigant help from France), and the 11 States lost. That is the bottom line. Vae Victus.

 

 

The slave population of the secessionist states was at least one fourth that of free citizens there. In Alabama, 435,080 slaves to 519,121 free. What kind of "right" are we talking about here? Very large populations in these Confederate States had no say in deciding to secede.

 

This was not a heroic struggle for freedom on the part of the CSA. It was a rebellion in favor of continuing the enslavement of a very large part of the inhabitants of that part of the country.

 

To really see the stark difference between the two economies, slave and free, see the census of 1860:

 

http://www.civilwarhome.com/population1860.htm

 

 

To get back to Lincoln, his greatness lay in understanding the threat of slavery to the Union, explaining that threat to the entire country, and then, finally, acting to save the union from the aggression of the secessionist states.

[Sequens]

Although, to my mind the war was justified to free the slaves alone, I am also convinced that demonizing the South is not justified. The South embraced many people with many opinions, and they were by and large exactly the same sort of people you found in the North. Negative attitudes such as racism were as common north as south of the Mason-Dixon line. The so called 'Draft Riots' in New York were actually anti-black pogroms.

 

I would sum it as the South was wrong to try and maintain slavery & the war itself was due to it, but the war only changed some legal code and did not fix the embedded racism throughout the entire country that lasts to this day.

[Ludovicus]

Although, to my mind the war was justified to free the slaves alone, I am also convinced that demonizing the South is not justified. The South embraced many people with many opinions, and they were by and large exactly the same sort of people you found in the North. Negative attitudes such as racism were as common north as south of the Mason-Dixon line. The so called 'Draft Riots' in New York were actually anti-black pogroms.

 

I would sum it as the South was wrong to try and maintain slavery & the war itself was due to it, but the war only changed some legal code and did not fix the embedded racism throughout the entire country that lasts to this day.

 

 

I agree with you. Yes, the Draft Riots in New York City were exactly that, anti-black pogroms.

And the Civil War didn't end racism. It's found throughout the country. In fact, in some cases the South has made better progress in dealing with it than other parts of the country.

[Sequens]

I agree with you. Yes, the Draft Riots in New York City were exactly that, anti-black pogroms.

And the Civil War didn't end racism. It's found throughout the country. In fact, in some cases the South has made better progress in dealing with it than other parts of the country.

 

I believe I have seen that myself when stationed in different parts of the South. I think it often comes down to individuals and small groups. Our national situation is the sum total of it all, but we generally only see and hear part, and that part either generated by political groups or shown to us selectively by media groups.

[Faustus]

I agree with you. Yes, the Draft Riots in New York City were exactly that, anti-black pogroms.

And the Civil War didn't end racism. It's found throughout the country. In fact, in some cases the South has made better progress in dealing with it than other parts of the country.

I believe I have seen that myself when stationed in different parts of the South. I think it often comes down to individuals and small groups. Our national situation is the sum total of it all, but we generally only see and hear part, and that part either generated by political groups or shown to us selectively by media groups.

You are exactly right in this. I'm from the north but I lived in North Carolina for four years in the early 60's, and have visited the south many times since. There black people have mixed much more thoroughly into the larger southern culture and with the white population socially, as friends and neighbors, and there is less suspicion between the two races. Even the language used by blacks in the south is more of the larger population, while in the north there is usage that stands apart, a rejection of the larger