Secession: Answering the Critics

[SouthernByGrace]

Introductory Comments

   In this topic, let’s take a look at some of the arguments used by those who do not believe that the South, or any other state or group of states, has or ever has had the right to withdraw peacefully from the Union. What IRONY! Americans who oppose secession for Dixie find themselves in bed with the communist generals of Yugoslavia and the communist hard-liners of the former Soviet Union.
   I will point out seven of the most popular myths about the nature of secession as it related to the South in 1860. I will demonstrate where and why the critics’ arguments are faulty and prove once again that our Southern ancestors were correct in their claim to the right of secession.
   I will also show how the United States Military Academy at West Point has in its library a textbook on the Constitution which teaches that secession was and is a right of each state. This book, used as a textbook and also kept as a reference, is William Rawle’s Views on the Constitution published in 1825. Rawle’s book was used as a text for one year and is still kept in the library at West Point. Another book I will refer to is Commentaries on American Law by James Kent. This book, in one of its editions, was used at West Point from 1827 until just after the War for Southern Independence. Kent did not approach the subject of secession per se, but left no doubt about his beliefs in the reserved rights of the states and the independent nature of the states when they acceded to the Union. These facts have proven to be more than a little embarrassing to the enemies of Southern independence. Be assured that I take great pride in bringing these facts to you!

Secession: Answering the Critics

     An overbearing Yankee once asked a Southerner, “When are you people going to stop fighting the war?” The Southerner responded, “Oh, I reckon we’ll stop fighting when you damn Yankees stop shootin’ at us!”

   With far more insight than the average viewer of Yankeefied television, our redneck philosopher cut through innumerable myths and identified the key issue. Indeed, today we Southerners are bombarded by a constant barrage of cultural insults and falsehoods. These attacks come from the liberal media of Yankeedom and there Scalawag running dogs of the “New South” mentality. Yet, when Southerners stand up and defend their heritage and the values of the South, they are met with the condescending question, “Why are you people still fighting the war?”
   Secession movements are so common today that no one questions if they are correct or not. The secessionists of Quebec, Eastern Europe, the Baltics, and various republics of the former Soviet Union are blessed with official sanction from the liberal media and even the government in Washington. How odd! Odd indeed, when we remember how the government falls all over itself in its efforts to prove how evil and wrong secession is for the South.
   Why is it that something that was considered evil and wrong in 1861 was given official sanction by the same Republican Party in 1991? Why is it that the government in Washington will applaud Vaclav Havel of Czechoslovakia for withdrawing his country from the Soviet Union’s rule, but continue its attack upon Jefferson Davis and his fellow Southerners for doing the exact same thing for the South? By now you no doubt know why these attacks continue – because our conquerors must never cease their propaganda about the righteousness of their oppression of the Southern People. In so doing they have promoted several myths about secession.  (I will tackle them, one at a time, for time’s sake, and to keep from boring some of you to death.) According to Yankee myth, Southern secession was (and therefore still is) wrong for several reasons:

1. Secession would have destroyed the United States and the South.

2. Secession was a way to protect the system of slavery, and the “Civil War” would not have been fought had  slavery not existed.

3. Lincoln was justified in using whatever force at whatever cost to save the Union.

4. Secession is an act of a sovereign state, and no state in America was sovereign before or after the Declaration of Independence was signed.

5. The original thirteen states did not secede from the Union when they withdrew from the Articles of Confederation. The perpetual union under the Articles of Confederation is the exact same union under the United States Constitution.

6. Secession was an action taken by Southerners to save the institution of slavery and/or to destroy America.

7. Nullification and secession had already been proven illegal by the federal government.

   The people of the South have a long history of resistance to tyrants that extends back to their ancestral homelands. Just one example of this happened in 1320 with the declaration of Arbroath, otherwise known as the Scottish Declaration of Independence, when the nobles of Scotland stated that they had the right to give their consent to their king and to withdraw that consent from him. They stated that, if the king who governed them did not rule as they saw fit, they reserved the right to “make some other man who was well able to defend us our King.” Sound familiar? This is but one example. Political ideas such as government by the consent of the governed and State’s Rights do indeed have a long and rich heritage for all Americans.
   The critics of secession use two broad avenues of attack when wrestling with the idea of secession. First, they use an appeal to emotion by seeking to take the high moral ground and, by inference, to leave the South in the position of supporting an immoral object, be that the destruction of “America,” or support of human slavery. (see arguments 1,2,3, and 6 above). Second, they make a tortuous and difficult appeal to legality (see arguments 4, 5, and 7). In other words, “if you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with B.S.” Let’s now take a closer look at these arguments and in so doing expose and explode a few more Yankee myths. 

1. Secession would have destroyed the Unites States and the South.

   With this appeal to emotional fantasy, we are expected to disregard all the reasons for which the republic of 1776 was called into being in the first place. Without the opportunity to say good-bye to the principle of government by the consent of the governed, we Southerners are driven down the dead-end road of regret. At the end of that road we will be instructed to perch again on our “stools of everlasting repentance.” It should be remembered that whenever anyone states this first myth about secession, they always fail to take note of the fact that the North’s war of aggression did indeed destroy the South. We must question our opponent’s vaunted good-will for “the United States and the South” when they make the statement that secession would destroy “America” (see point 6).
   The anti-secessionist argument that the war was necessary in order to save America from self-destruction and from “falling apart” needs closer investigation. Do secession movements cause the destruction of one or both parties involved in the act of secession? In answering this question, let’s not make an appeal to raw emotion; rather, let’s adhere to historical facts.
   Has secession caused the destruction of one or both parties in the past? If I can show that secession has not caused such misery but has actually done the opposite, then this anti-secession statement is false.

Now look at some successful secession movements:

A. Ireland seceded from the British Empire. Neither Ireland nor the British Empire was destroyed as a result of the independence of Ireland from Britain. Both nations have taken their places among the free nations of the world and have played important roles in history.

B. Norway seceded from Sweden. For ninety-one years from 1814 until 1905 Norway was in a union with Sweden. (The North and South had only been in a union for eighty-four years when Dixie seceded.) In 1905, the legislature of Norway declared that country’s independence. Sweden, after some thought of war, recognized the independence of Norway. Neither country has “gone to the dogs” because of this secession movement, but rather both countries have learned how to work together for common goals. It is sad that “America” could not have pursued the same course.

C. Texas seceded from Mexico. Does anyone think that Texas would be better off if it had lost its war of secession with Mexico?

D. Portugal seceded from Spanish rule. Portugal had to fight four “civil wars” with Spain before it gained independence in 1139. This was well before the great world exploration both countries were to experience as independent nations. Secession kept neither Spain nor Portugal from becoming world powers. In fact, it could be argued that secession is what caused their rise as world powers.

E. The United States of America seceded from Great Britain. Can anyone argue against the fact that these two separate nations enjoy one of the strongest bonds, both political and military, in the entire world? Not to mention the fact that both nations are the two most powerful nations on earth!

F. Panama seceded from Colombia. Neither country fell into oblivion because of this successful secession movement. A revealing point should be made in this instance. The secession of Panama could never have happened without the backing of the United States! The history of this fact is well documented but seldom spoken of in the Yankee’s official record of history. Before the War of Southern Independence, the United States supported the secession of Texas, and after the War, the U.S. supported the secession movement in Panama. Strange is the working of the Yankee mind. Over a 65 year period, the United States supported the secession of Texas from Mexico, opposed the secession of the South from the North, and then supported the secession of Panama from Colombia! In fact, the United States has supported more secession movements than any other nation in history; with itself being Born of Secession! They believe it to be fitting and proper for all the people of the world, unless those people are Southern!

   The list of inequities could go on, but the point has been made. Secession in and of itself Does Not cause the destruction of the nation that secedes Nor the nation from which it withdraws. The bloodshed and evil that can result from a secession movement will occur at the discretion of the nation from which the seceding is being done. If cool and rational heads are in control, then war and heartache are avoided as evidenced in the secession of Norway from Sweden. As in the case of Portugal and Spain, however, it may require many wars before the empire will free its subjugated people.

Coming up next…
Part 2 in the arguments against secession.  Bear with me as we delve further into the Yankee mind and expose a few more myths. 

[Ga.windbreak]

A new book!

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0765809435/lewrockwell/


Secession, State, and Liberty by David Gordon

A large portion of this collection of essays, as you might expect, examines the pre-eminent example of secession in American history, the Confederacy. The three essays dealing with this period -- Joseph Stromberg's "Republicanism, Federalism, and Secession in the South, 1790-1865;" Thomas DiLorenzo's "Yankee Confederates: New England Secession Movements Prior to the War Between the States;" and James Ostrowski's "Was the Union Army's Invasion of the Confederate States a Lawful Act? An Analysis of President Lincoln's Legal Arguments Against Secession" -- form the core of the book. However, this title is more than just an apologetic for the South. Philosophical, legal, and political analyses by other contributors provide a solid framework for secession as a political theory in our era as well.

The last essay, Bruce Benson's look at arbitration as an alternative to state-run judicial systems in commerce and trade, provides a true-life example of a type of modern individual "secession," and recalls Mises' suggestion (quoted by several contributors) that the right to secession can ultimately be carried down to the community, home, and even individual level. Murray Rothbard reinforces this idea in "Nations by Consent: Decomposing the Nation State."

This is a very important and valuable book, challenging as it does the accepted, post-1865 wisdom of Constitutional interpretation. Secession didn't die at Appomattox, either as a political theory or as a right inherent to each state in the American union. As several of the contributors note, secession (and the threat of it) is the single most powerful check on the expansion of federal power -- which, of course, explains why, from Lincoln on down, so many people have worked so feverishly to discredit it. But truth is just truth, and no matter how hard the "enlightened" classes try to deny it, analyses like the ones in this collection show that a true idea cannot be silenced forever.

A true idea can't be silenced!!!!

[SouthernByGrace]

Part 2

Secession Was A Way To Protect The System Of Slavery,

And The "Civil War" Would Not Have Been Fought Had Slavery Not Existed

   The issue of why the South fought the war has already been covered in other threads here on GBO. But the anti-secessionist notion that the war would never have been fought had it not been for the issue of slavery should be scrutinized.
   To say that a civil war would never have been fought if slavery had not existed is to say that slavery CAUSES civil war. Obviously, more civil wars have been fought in which the issue of slavery played absolutely NO part than otherwise. Nevertheless, many people will accept the notion that without slavery the so-called "Civil War" would never have been fought. Wars are caused by many reasons. Of all the issues that have caused war, none is greater than the issue of economics, i.e., MONEY! To protect its economic well-being, the North waged a war of aggression against the South. Economics motivated the war; slavery and maintaining the Union were no more than smoke screens to hide the North's imperialist objectives. Its empire was built on the graves and ashes of the South. On Southern impoverishment, Northern cumulative wealth was built!
   In early 1820, before slavery had been seized upon by the North as an issue to use against the South and after the financial panic of 1819 and a House committee report of mismanagement and speculation by the Bank of the United States, a Kentuckian predicted that events would continue "... with a steady pace, to civil war and dissolution of the Union." At about the same time, Thomas Cooper, president of South Carolina College, said, "We shall ere long be forced to calculate the value of our Union, to ask of what use is an unequal alliance by which the South has always been the loser and the North always the winner." (41 years before the war...)
   In 1850 a little known incident almost caused the secession of Texas from the Union ten years before South Carolina seceded. A dispute arose when a federal army officer called a convention to form the state of New Mexico on land that was claimed by Texas. Governor Peter H. Bell called for force to be used to maintain the integrity of Texas. War was averted by a compromise giving Texas $10,000,000 and 33,333 square miles of land. The point is that this near war, in which the South had stood by Texas against the interests of the federal government, was not about slaves but about land claimed by Texas and the federal government.
   These two examples clearly show that issues other than slavery were at play in the United States even as early as 1820. In Both cases, these forces had been set in motion by the North as it advanced its general welfare at the expense of the South. Even at this early date, Southerners were expressing the need to separate from the North. Even if there had been no question about slavery, the North and the South would have been on a collision course. Either each region would have had to go its own way, or one region would have had to wage a war of aggression and conquer the other. The North chose war and subjugation.

Part 3 will be up next time...

SBG
DEO VINDICE
   

[SouthernByGrace]

PART 3

Lincoln was justified in using whatever force at whatever cost to save the Union.

   Only if one believes in the barbaric idea that the ends justify the means could it be maintained that Lincoln and the North had a right to do whatever was necessary to win the war and save the Union. If winning at any cost is justifiable, then men such as Saddam Hussein have the right to use poison gas or human shields as long as they are in pursuit of victory. The following quote may not sit well with those who think that might makes right or that the ends justify the means. It is taken from James Kent's Commentaries on American Law: "No one nation had a right to force the way of the liberation of Africa, by trampling on the independence of other states; or to procure an eminent good by means that were unlawful; or to press forward to a great principle, by breaking through other great principles that stood in the way." Kent was making a point about the proper and lawful way to stop the slave trade. As he noted, we cannot, according to international law, break one law or principle even if we were pursuing a greater good. Kent's textbook was used by the United States military cadets at West Point from 1826 through 1865. Such men as Robert E. Lee, Albert Sydney Johnston, Joseph Johnston, and Jefferson Davis were instructed on principles of international law by Kent's textbook. (This book is STILL in the library at West Point.)

   Although Lincoln and his worshippers believe that NO price was too great to save the Union, international law does not uphold that position. In the Le Louis case, British courts established that British vessels of war could not board a French vessel in search of slave traders even if that trade was deemed illegal by British and French law. This case reinforced the principle of free navigation. Only if the countries involved were under treaty obligation to police each other's maritime fleet could one nation's vessel of war stop and search a vessel of another nation during time of peace. The British stated that the greater good of ending the slave trade did not give a nation the right to trample principles of International law: "The right of visitation and search, on the high seas, did not exist in time of peace. If it belonged to one nation, it equally belongs to All, and would lead to gigantic mischief, and universal war." So, according to internationally recognized principles, the ends do not justify the means. Lincoln could not legally pursue the cause of union at any price. Edmund Burke, in an address to the British Parliament entitled "Conciliation with the Colonies" (1775), stated that the use of force to bring the colonies back under British law was wrong because, "...you impair the object of your very endeavors to preserve it. The thing you fought for is not the thing you recover, but depreciated, sunk, wasted, and consumed in the contest." Burke declared that, to prove that the colonies should not be free, "...we are obliged to depreciate the value of freedom itself." Lincoln erred as the British had done; that is, to save the Union, he was willing to "depreciate the value of freedom." Without question, Lincoln and his fellow Northerners were acting outside of internationally accepted principles when they sought to coerce the South back into the Union.

[Ga.windbreak]

There are 547 people in this country who are above the laws of the land and we are SLAVES to those people. Lincoln, more than any other man proved that the person that sets on the throne of President of the United States can do as he wishes and to hell with the law. As SBG stated you CAN NOT do a little bad for the greater good. Negitives never increase positives they only lower them.

We were a Nation of laws until Lincoln became President. At that very crossroad of History we became less than what our Framers wanted us to be, we cheapened the gift we were handed by allowing this person to manipulate our core belief system to the point that even today there are those who call their brother "traitor" when in fact the true traitor was the Federal Government led by Mr. Lincoln. It is so very odd that we are coming up on the 150th Anniversary of this tragic event at a time in our history when it appears that the country is again at war with itself with a man at the helm who professes to imbrace Lincoln's ideas and keeps a book of his at his bedside. Woe to those who forget histories lessions for they surely will repeat those mistakes.

[SouthernByGrace]

Part 4

Secession is an act of a sovereign state,

and no state in America was sovereign before or after

the Declaration of Independence was signed.

   One fact that bothers the anti-secessionist more than any other is that the colonies acted as independent states before and after the Revolutionary War. Obviously, if the states did function as independent states and did freely enter into a compact with other free states, then only the states could judge for themselves how long they would stay in that compact or union.
   The anti-secessionist will throw up many smoke screens and try to dance around the idea that the colonies and then the states did indeed act as independent bodies. First the anti-secessionist will advance the theory that "sovereignty is indivisible," and therefore the several states could not be sovereign. They will state that sovereignty resided in the hands of the British while the states were colonies, and it had to remain in the hands of the United States government after the colonies had gained their independence. The idea that all power of sovereignty must be in the hands of one agent and not divided among many is a throwback to the erroneous notion of the divine right of kings. This idea had effectually been refuted by British noteworthies such as Milton and Locke. Within the british empire sovereign authority was divided between Parliament and the Monarch in the 17th century.
   The Greatest fear among the American patriots of 1776 focused on the placement of too much power in the hands of the government. The colonies and, later the states, always strove to prevent the accumulation of too much power in the hands of the few. This fear brought forth the idea of shared powers and a government of co-equal partners. Each partner would share in the function of government; each partner was supreme in its own sphere, but the greater bulk of rights and power would always remain in the hands of the agent of the people, the state.
   So much for abstract theory. Regardless of what we may think about theory, the facts will speak absolutely on this matter.
   One anti-secessionist made this statement about the American colonies "...they possess neither independence nor sovereignty nor any other attribute or form of authority commonly associated with states." It is an easy matter to look at the history of the American colonies and see if they did indeed possess any attributes of a state.
   The following are some of these attributes. A state:

1.   Conducts war or pursues peace
2.   Makes laws to regulate society
3.   Taxes and spends tax funds
4.   Raises military forces
5.   Conducts relationships with sovereign nations.

   If I can show that the colonies performed any of the above functions, then they cannot be said to be lacking in those characteristics "commonly associated with states." Proof that the colonies exercised the attributes of sovereignty will be taken from a textbook on Southern history entitled The History of the South written by F.B. Simpkins.
   In 1689, the British Parliament tried to exercise power, which had previously been held by the monarch, over the colonies. The colonies resisted and demanded that their legislative assemblies should be co-ordinate with Parliament; each within its own sphere should exercise sovereign authority. Parliament gave in to the demands of the colonies. Even at this early date, the clamor for State's Rights could be heard. According to Simpkins in The History of the South, every Southern colony, by 1700, had an elected legislature and had won two privileges from the British Crown: (1) the right to assent to laws and taxes, and (2) the right to initiate legislation. Here we see the colonies performing two major functions of a state: taxing and spending, and regulating society.
   Even so, the anti-secessionist will tell us that these rights were instituted under the watchful eye of the governor of the colonies who was appointed by Britain's monarch; therefore they were functioning as part of the sovereign British nation. But, according to the royal governor of South Carolina, James Glen (1748), "The people have the whole of the administration in their hands." Yes, self-government has a long tradition in the South. Southerners insisted early in the colonial era on the right to govern themselves. Not only had Southerners elected their own legislatures in each colony by 1700, but also by early 1776 ALL royal governors had been removed from office and replaced by governors chosen by the people or their representatives. These elections all occurred before the Declaration of Independence was signed. The following is a list of the royal governors and the dates of their removal by the people of the South:
          1.  Virginia governor John Murray Dunmore, June 1775
          2.  North Carolina governor J. Martin, August 1775
          3.  South Carolina governor W. Campbell, early 1776
          4.  Georgia governor James Wright, January 1776

   Each of the Southern colonies was demonstrating the attributes of a sovereign state by changing the type of government under which its people would live. These actions were performed by a free people. The theory that the Declaration of Independence formed the Union and that this document called the states into being cannot be justified by historical facts.
   Take a look at more evidence that the Southern states existed before the signing of the declaration of Independence.
   In April 1776, the congress of Georgia had empowered its delegates to the Continental Congress to vote for American independence. Now, if the states did not exist before the Declaration of Independence, how could the state of Georgia empower its delegation to vote for American independence?
   The last straw to which the anti-secessionist will cling is the myth that in international matters the colonies always had to depend on either the British government or the Union. Sorry; wrong again!! According to James Kent, in Commentaries on American Law, Vol. I, the only way the colonial congress could enforce the rule of international law was "...to have infractions of it punished in the only way that was then lawful, by the exercise of the authority of the Legislatures of the several states. James Kent was from new York, and Not a Southerner. He states that the only way to enforce the rule of international law was through the power of the individual states. It has now been demonstrated that the Southern states have been active in the pursuit of the rights of free men since 1700! And Before the signing of the Declaration of Independence the Southern states has exercised Every attribute of a sovereign power. So much for yet another Yankee myth.

To Be Continued:

[Ga.windbreak]

Great post TM7 and so very true about just who killed lincoln and why. Lincoln's plan was to make the "greenbacks" permenate and it got him killed. The Kennedy boys were the next to try and breakaway and did with the stroke of a pen yet 3 months later Jack is dead and that 480 million that had been printed up to that point was scooped up and burned! Bobby then is going to win after Calif. and that very night he lay dead on the floor. No President since has had the guts to cross these blood suckers. Now we are all slaves to the Bankers. BOA just today declared a profit of 4.8 BILLION in the first quarter. Need more proof? All McCain had to do was declare that he stood against the Bailout and the Presidency was his, what did he do, put hie tail between his legs and RUN to stand with the rest of the blood suckers. And BOA takes it payoff and adds it to the rest of their profit made from tha sweat of our backs!

Nero plays while Rome burns.

[SouthernByGrace]

Part 4 Continued...

   If the colonies acted as independent states prior to the Declaration of Independence, how did they view themselves while adopting the United States Constitution? A glance at how Massachusetts expressed herself as far as her sovereign rights will demonstrate that even the Northern states considered themselves sovereign. Before it would ratify the United States Constitution, Massachusetts demanded "... that it be explicitly declared, that all powers not delegated by the aforesaid Constitution are reserved to the several states, to be by them exercised." Before it would adopt the Constitution, the state of Pennsylvania insisted on the following amendment to the Constitution: "All rights of sovereignty which are not, by the said Constitution, expressly and plainly vested in the Congress, shall be deemed to remain with, and shall be exercised by the several states in the Union." Every state insisted that this and similar language be added to the U.S. Constitution, directly resulting in the adoption of the 10th Amendment: "The powers not delegated to the United States, by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it, are reserved to the states, or to the people."

   It has now been determined that the people of the states acted as sovereign and independent states before the Declaration of Independence and during the ratification process of the Constitution. Now take a look at how these states perceived their role once they were in the Union.

   The anti-secessionists will tell you that state sovereignty never existed, and, if it did, it surely died with the adoption of the Constitution. Again, they are wrong. The state of New Hampshire adopted her state constitution in 1792, three years after the United states Constitution went into effect. Yet note the strong assertion of state sovereignty placed into its state constitution, "The people of this Commonwealth have the sole and exclusive right of governing themselves as a free, sovereign and independent State; and do and forever hereafter shall exercise and enjoy every power, jurisdiction, and right which is not, or may not hereafter be, by them, expressly delegated to the United States." The people of New Hampshire, like the people of other states, believed that they were members  of an independent state (which, of course, they were). No one tried to accuse the people of New Hampshire of being "traitors" because they believed in State's Rights.

   One last look at how the people of the states of America viewed their states in relation to the Union will show that the people did believe the states to be co-equal with the federal government and Not subservient to the Union.

   Even after the adoption of the Bill of Rights, in 1791, the states were very jealous of the acts of the federal government (Union). Just six years after the Constitution the states became enraged when the federal Supreme Court stated that Article III of the U.S. Constitution permitted states to be sued in federal courts by citizens of another state. The state of Georgia was then ordered to appear before the court (Chisholm v. Georgia). Georgia refused to appear, stating that the states were co-equal with the federal government, and therefore could Not be compelled by the federal government to act against their will. The states of the Union were so incensed by the federal court's action that the 11th Amendment was quickly passed. That amendment reaffirmed the sovereignty of the states by declaring that "The judicial power of the United States shall not extend to a suit against a state by citizens of another state."
Clearly the people of America at this time believed that the states were indeed independent and sovereign agents!

[Ga.windbreak]

SBG I fear you have, by your very eloquence, driven the Union people from our midst. Or at the very least they are struct speechless!!

[Oldshooter]

Good read SBG, I'm keeping up!

[SouthernByGrace]

Part 5

The Original 13 states did not secede from the Union when they withdrew from the Articles of Confederation.

The perpetual union under the Articles of Confederation is the same union under the United States Constitution.

   How embarrassing it is for those who oppose secession when they consider that Nowhere in the Constitution is there a statement about perpetuity. It is doubly embarrassing when they note that there IS a statement about perpetuity in the Articles of Confederation, the government that the states seceded from in order to form the government under the Constitution. The anti-secessionist will claim that the Union is the Union regardless of the type of government we have; therefore the Union is perpetual.

   A political union is an association of political entities for a predetermined purpose. The Articles of Confederation stated how the union of the states was to act and how it could be changed. Each state, before it became a partner in this union, had to ratify the Articles of Confederation. Note that in the body of the articles the statement that the only way this association could be changed was by the unanimous approval of the members of the union. When the states changed from a union under the Articles of Confederation to a union under the Constitution, it was done NOT by unanimous approval of the states, but by the approval of only nine of the thirteen states of the old union. With the approval of 9 of the 13 states of the old union under the Articles of Confederation, a new type of association would then exist between ONLY those states ratifying the Constitution. This means that from one to four states would be under a different type of national government than the other nine. Can Anyone pretend that these two groups were the same? Remember that North Carolina and Rhode Island did not join the new union for more than a Year after it had been in effect among the other states. They were treated as independent states! The union of states under the Articles of Confederation was disbanded by the SECESSION of nine states from the articles. The states, in doing so, were acting as Sovereign entities. They were not acting as states of the present Constitutional Union do when they ratify a constitutional amendment because such an act requires a 3/4ths majority to pass, and the amendment becomes binding upon ALL states. Note that the act of ratifying the Constitution required the approval of EACH state, acting on its own, not in concert with anyone else, and that this act was binding ONLY on the states ratifying the Constitution. The two unions could be considered the same ONLY if the 2nd union, under the Constitution,  had all the same member states and the same form of government as the first, under the Articles of Confederation. This was NOT the case. No One ever suggested that the other states of the Union had the right to wage war upon North Carolina and Rhode Island in order to "save the Union." Why Not? Because, this was a new and different Union, and each state had the right to decide for itself IF and WHEN it would become a member state.

This all sounds a little familiar, don't it? 

SBG

DEO VINDICE

[SouthernByGrace]

PART 6

Secession was an action taken by Southerners to save the institution of slavery and/or to destroy America.

   The theory that secession was a slaveholders' wicked plot is favored by many New South scalawags.

   The idea that to withdraw from the Union was an illegal act is based on the false notion that the Union was to be perpetual - that in America, government was to have some form of everlasting life. Yet when we look at the FIRST Union of American colonies, we will find that even though this union WAS styled as "perpetual," it died a natural death.

   In 1643, four New England colonies formed the very first union in North America, the United Colonies of new England. This union was declared to be "firm and perpetual." As Kent stated, the colonies that joined this union "...acted in fact as independent sovereignties , and free from the control of any superior power." This union existed for more than 40 years. Note that, even though the Yankee colonies had stated that their union was perpetual, it was not. Also note that each of these colonies entered into this union, according to Kent, "...as Free, and Independent Sovereignties." Thus puts to rest the Yankee myth that the states were never sovereign before or after July 4, 1776.

   Twice in our history, Northern states have left a "perpetual" Union: once in 1686 at the death of the United Colonies of New England and again in 1787 as they withdrew from the union formed by the Articles of Confederation. With such a secession track record, is it any wonder that in 1814 the new England states met at Hartford, Connecticut, for the purpose of discussing secession from the federal union? Even still, the Yankee myth-makers persist in claiming that secession was an evil Southern plot.

   Northern myyth-makers would have a somewhat valid case if secession from the American Union had never been discussed or written about before the 1860 election. Then and only then would the anti-secessionist argument be valid. is there a record in American history of secession being taught as a right of the states? The answer is a clear-cut YES! 

Secession as Taught at West Point

   Yes, as early as 1825 the right of secession was being taught as a clear-cut right of the states. But, even more shocking is the fact that the federal government itself was paying for that teaching! Beginning in 1825, the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York used William Rawle's Views of the Constitution as its textbook on constitutional law. Men such as Confederate General Albert Sydney Johnston were taught constitutional law from this book. Rawle, born in 1759, was 30 years old when the United States Constitution was adopted. His book was warmly received when published. The North American Review, a journal of Boston political orthadoxy, blessed Rawle's book as, "...a safe and intelligent guide." Here is what Rawle had to say about states sovereignty and secession:

          It depends on the state itself to retain or abolish the principle of representation,
          because it depends on itself whether it will continue as a member of the Union.
          To deny this right would be inconsistent with the principle of which all our political
          systems are founded, which is, that the people have in all cases, a right to determine
          how they will be governed.
          This right must be considered an ingredient in the original composition of the general
          government, which, though not expressed, was mutually understood...

   Here you have it from a textbook used at West Point Academy. Rawle said that the people held the right to "...determine how they will be governed." This is merely a reflection of Jefferson's pronouncement from the Declaration of Independence that a just government was one which was based on the consent of the governed. Rawle is restating a historical fact. The United States was founded on the principle that we, the people, acting through our agent, the state, have the right to give or take away the right of any government to rule over us. To deny this principle is to attack our very freedom.

   But what about the act of secession itself? Rawle was even more specific about when and How a state should and could go about seceding from the Union.

          The secession of a state from the Union depends on the will of the people of such state.
          The people alone, as we have already seen, hold the power to alter their constitution.
             But in any manner by which secession is to take place, nothing is more certain than that the
          act should be deliberate, clear, and unequivocal.
             To withdraw from the Union is a solemn, serious act. Whenever it may appear expedient to the
          people of a state, it must be manifested in a direct and unequivocal manner.

   Rawle explains how a state should withdraw from the Union. He clearly notes that if a state did leave the Union, that state would leave many benefits behind. Jefferson Davis also felt the same way. In his farewell address to the United states Senate, Senator Davis said, "A state ... out of the Union surrenders all the benefits (and they are known to be many), deprives herself of the advantages (and they are known to be great), severs all the ties of affection (and they are close and enduring), which have bound her to the Union." Davis learned well from Rawle. Rawle taught that the secession of a state had to be carried out carefully. Davis and all Southerners had to weigh the pros and cons of secession and, after doing so, they found the Union wanting. If we look at the manner in which the first 11 states of the South seceded, we would see that they followed Rawle's prescription for secession to the Tee.

TO BE CONTINUED...