Comparison between 1776 and 1861

Many try to condone the actions of the southern secessionists by saying that they were just acting in accordance with the Declaration of Independence and following the lead of the Founding Generation. But it is a misconception that they were actually following the lead of the men who lead the nation through the War for Independence. Of course, the Declaration states that there is a natural right to revolution and that a government cannot rule without the consent of the governed. But one must look past this as well, and compare why the colonies were breaking away as opposed to why the South was seceding.

The Declaration states a long list of grievances held by the colonists and says that this is why they were breaking away and becoming and independent nation. This list is actually a concise form of a previous work by Thomas Jefferson called "A Summary View of the Rights of British America," which was written a couple of years prior and was a letter stating what the colonies saw going wrong and trying to get the King to do something about it. But these grievances are clear and they do not match up at all with the reasons the South stated for seceding.

For example, one reason Jefferson states is that the King had "refused to pass other laws for the Accomadation of Large Districts of People, unless those People would relinquish the Right of Representation in the Legislature, a Right inestimable to them, and formidable to Tyrants only." More simply, the King would not allow a part of a colony to form another colony, or a portion of a county to break away from another, unless they relinquished their right to representation in the colonial legislatures. Now when, it must be asked, did this happen in the first eighty years of the Republic? The answer is: never! Not once was any part of the United States, north or south, denied representation in Congress, or their state legislatures. If a reapportionment occured, which happens every ten years in conjuntion with the Census, representation is added accordingly if need be. So the South cannot claim that they were denied representation in this or any other matter. In fact, for a while, the Southern states attempted to deny representation to many people in their own states, allowing onlyl the propertied to vote.

Another grievance listed is the fact that when some crimes were committed, the English were "transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended Offences," and the were "depriving [the accused] in many Cases of the Benefits of Trial by Jury." Colonists were accused of crimes, such as murder, and instead of being tried in the colonies, they were being taken to England for trial, in front of, not their peers, but people who had no idea what was going on in the case, for it had no bearing on them. Certain witnesses also had to go, leaving their families behind for atleast a year to fend for themselves. Now, can anybody name a single case in which a man committed a crime such as murder in one state, say Alabama, and he was transported all the way to, say Wisconsin, for his trial? One can say pretty safely that no, that didn't happen. So the Southern states were not being unfairly tried for crimes committed in their own states.

Here is a common excuse that Southern apologists like to give: taxes. As many know, Great Britain had imposed unfair duties and taxes on certain goods, and this resulted in events such as the Boston Tea Party. In the Declaration, Jefferson states as a reason that fact that England had been "imposing Taxes on us without our Consent," hence the phrase "No taxation without Representation." The colonists has nobody representing them in Congress, yet they were being taxed and they didn't have a say in the matter, and they saw this as unfair. Now, if one has a knowledge of the Constitution, they know that any tax that is imposed must be passed by Congress. Therefore, if a tax or duty is in place, it was duly voted on and approved by a majority of Congress and signed into law. It is therefore lawful and one can complain, but it will do them no good. Now Southerners could say that they didn't like a certain tax, as they did with the tariff, but they can't claim they don't have a say, because they have representatives in the House and Senate. If something they don't like passes, they had better try harder the next time to vote it down and get others to do so as well.

There are so many others, that it would take a book to compare all of them. The point is, the South was breaking away for one reason only: to protect the institution of slavery, which they saw as being threatened, even though Lincoln most likely would have done nothing to harm the institution. They knew that slavery was going to die. It had to eventually. The only way to keep it alive, was expansion. The Republicans were opposed to slavery in the territories. With a threat to what they saw as essential, they broke away, even though they did not have a clear right to do so, unlike the 13 colonies, who had a slew of grievances to prove that they were being treated unfairly, something it would be hard for the South to prove, considering they were pandered to constantly in the years before the war. The point is, 1776 and 1861 are not comparable. They are totally separate events, in no way alike. The South was not the 13 colonies, and they can't claim to be such.

Secession...Destructive to the Entire Nation.

Many have tried to justify secession and claimed aggression on the Union for bringing about the Civil War. They say that Lincoln should have just let the South go and then 600,000+ men would not have died in four years of bloody fighting. What they do not realize is that if Lincoln had accepted secession, then he would have destroyed everything that the Founders had created and basically would have destroyed the United States. The Constitution would have had to be rewritten and the nation practically remade.

Think of it this way. If Lincoln had accepted secession, it would be a concession that a state has more power than the Federal government, and that the states could basically do whatever they wanted to, and if the Federal government said that they could not, then they could just threaten secession, as South Carolina had done during the Nullification Crisis. If the Congress or President did not then meet their demands, they could just leave. In their view, the states held all the power, and had ceded very little to the Federal government when the Constitution was signed and ratified by the states. This is in no way true. When the Constitution formed a new government out of the states that had been originally governed by the Articles of Confederation, which had been heavily states over federal, it reversed the government and put a strong federal government with an executive head over the states. The states did in turn retain some rights, but secession was not one of those rights.

For Lincoln to have allowed the secession of the southern states would have been to show the world that the United States was weak. The government had no power to control the states which were still loyal. The governors of the remaining states in theory become equal to or even more powerful than the President. The government would have no power to collect revenue or taxes to keep the nation. The Constitution would have about as much power as the defunct Articles of Confederation. The United States that the Founding Fathers had fought to form would be a failure.

And yet so many do not realize this. They still try to justify secession as legitimate and that the Southerners were carrying on the memory of the Revolutionary generation. Yet, in reality, they besmirch that memory of the Founders if they think that men just as Madison and Washington would have accepted secession. James Madison himself said in a short letter before he died, that if he could given any advice to the nation, that it would be "that the Union of the States be cherished and perpetuated," and that the "open enemy to it be regarded as a Pandora with her box opened; and the disguised one, as the Serpent creeping with his deadly wiles into Paradise." (James Madison,Advice to My Country.) None of the Founders wanted secession, because they realized that it would be destructive to the entire nation, and that if one state went, the United States would quite possibly cease to exist. So Lincoln could not accept the secession of the Southern states. He knew what was at stake, and he did the right thing by not accepting any alternative but Union.

Lee's Second Invasion of the North a Good Idea?

Well, I am back. Been pretty lax in posting, but I should be able to post more often now that school is over.

So I thought that I would post about the idea of Lee's Gettysburg campaign being a good idea or not. I have been in a discussion about this for the past day or so and I thought that I would put my ideas up and let you guys decide for yourselves.

In my view of the campaign and looking at Lee's purpose behind it, I think that Lee had some real justifications in carrying the campaign to the North again. Now, personally, I don't think the campaign was a great idea to begin with, but I will give credit to Lee for coming up with the plan. After the Battle of Chancellorsville, Lee knew that carrying on a campaign in Virginia was becoming nigh on impossible. The land had been picked clean by the operation of two massive armies operating within its bounds for two years. There was not food to be had anywhere and the supply situation for the Army of Northern Virginia wasn't looking very good. However, the areas of Maryland and Pennsylvania were ripe for the picking, and a few months foraging up north of the Mason-Dixon could give Virginia farmers time to harvest crops and get marauding Union men out of their hair for a time. There was no place else really to go for food, seeing as the whole south was trying to provide for both the armies in the field and the civilian population. It wasn't like in the North which had a vast industrial complex to provide food and supplies for the armies in the field.

Secondly, Lee wanted to try and finally break the back on the Union juggernaut. He had reason to believe that he could defeat Hooker on his own territory and very possibly bring the Union to the negotiating table. Hooker had no confidence in himself and his army was demoralized by being so badly beaten at Chancellorsville. Lee had every reason to believe that he could do it again. And heading North was the way that Lee saw to do it.

Thirdly, I think that Lee was trying to keep his men in the Eastern theater of operations. The other option that was being presented to him was to send men west to help either relieve Vicksburg, or to help defeat Rosecrans. Lee understood that to do this would take a good portion of men away from his command, which was protecting Richmond. With a corps from his army away, he would have to pull back into the defenses of Richmond and risk being besieged, which was something that he did not want to do.

I have heard some say that it would have been better to have sent men to the west, and that this was the only time that they could do it, because shortly thereafter, the rail line between Petersburg and Knoxville was cut, and if men were to be sent, they would have to take a very roundabout route. My problem with sending men west is that any of the men sent there would be placed under some pretty incompetent commanders. They would have been put in the command of Bragg, who, lets face it, wasn't the greatest general, or under Joe Johnston, who wasn't the best either. They would have been going up against men who were equal to, or possibly even better than, them in combat. The western armies were not made up of soft city boys like many of the units in the east, but rough country men who were used to the privations of war and had fought long and hard. And with commanders like Grant and Sherman, it would have been a slugging match that would have eventually taken men from the East and needlessly killed them.

I think that Lee had justifications for making a move North. I don't think it was smart that he did so, because he was fighting deep in enemy territory and with extended lines of supply and communication, that would make it hard to maneuver the farther he went. However, I can see where Lee was going, and I think that an invasion of the North was the lesser of two evils. Though Gettysburg wasn't a good idea, as hindsight tells us, it was better than detaching troops and sending them far out of support range and risking a seige. I have to agree that Lee was right in choosing to go North than sending men west.

Intolerable!!

This is the first post in quite a long time, but hopefully one of many soon to come on many topics. What I want to speak about is an issue of intolerance that must be addressed.

Now this has to do with a symbol of the conflict that tore this nation apart 140 years ago, not about which side was right or wrong in the conflict (that subject is being researched by me right now, and I shall expound upon it later.) That symbol is the flag of the the ill fated Confederate States of America. It is a symbol that brings pride to those who have heritage among the South, and illicits a certain amount of respect for those who fought and died fighting under it. However, this flag has unfortunately been used by some groups as a symbol of hatred, and is therefore construed in being racist in origin.

If the Confederate battle flag (for this is the flag that most are familiar with) is a symbol of racism, then we must take down other well known symbols of racism as well. Such as, unfortunately, the American flag. For almost eighty years prior to the Civil War, and for 100 years after, American law held African-American's in slavery, and afterward, it disenfranchised many of them, segregating schools, making it almost impossible for blacks to vote, and other methods of racism that were supported by American laws; and the flag is a symbol of America.

As unfortunate as it is that certain groups such as the Ku Klux Klan have taken the Confederate battle standard and used it as a symbol of their own intolerance, it does not mean that it is a symbol of hatred or racism. Blacks fought under that flag as well as whites (if you don't believe me, look it up) and it became their standard as well. Let those who take pride in what their ancestors did proudly display it. It is their right as an American; it is their First Amendment right as given them by the United States Constitution. It is heritage, not hatred.