Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Tom Sarbeck on March 16, 2012 at 6:22pm

Returning to the topic (when did the Repubs start shooting holes in their feet?):

The federal government's reign is not quite supreme.

Soon after Bush 2's election, his AG Ashcroft (Repub) sued Oregon (if not Demo then independent) to block that state's attempt to deal with health care costs. The federal courts reminded Ashcroft that the states are "laboratories" and tossed his suit.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by archaeopteryx on March 16, 2012 at 7:12pm

Tom - you mean, "Bush 2's 'selection,'" don't you?

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Shabaka Tecumseh on March 16, 2012 at 8:58am

overthrow-dissolve..succeed..and when the U.S. government refused to recognize that the south, by had the right to dissolve the Union/Constituion, the south resorted to aggression. (Ft. Sumpter). Just the fact that they formed a separate government indicated that they wanted to dissolve the CONSTITUTIONAL Union.

 

The Constitution (DOI) says that when the government is unresponsive to the PEOPLE (not just the south because they wanted, among other things, to keep people enslaved) they have the right to rebel.  I know you are probably a child of the south, but personally, I think there's something wrong with your reasoning. 

I know that this is not enough facts for your truth.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Scott Howard on March 16, 2012 at 5:44pm

Shabaka,

Whether or not I am or am not a child of the south is irrelevant. 

You seem stuck on slavery. While that was the reason the south seceded, that wasn't the reason Lincoln gave for going to war. So while slavery was a blight on our country, it was not what the war was fought over. Freeing the slaves was a by-product of the war. One of those, "while we're here, we may as well" type things. 

So the civil war was not about slavery, it was about: from Lincoln's point of view, union and from the south's point of view, the right to self-determination or as we call it today "states rights". You see it was a common belief in that day (contested, but commonly held) that STATES were sovereign and could, if they so desired, withdraw from the union BECAUSE THEY WERE SOVEREIGN. While there were alot of shennanigans that went on in some of the southern states when they seceded, most had some type of legal process they went through. Hell, Virginia even had its legislative vote ratified by a popular vote! 

As to your comment about the government being unresponsive to the people, what people? How many? How far does it have to go before a group (states (duly elected governmental bodies) in the case of the civil war) before they decide they've had enough? By your logic, we should still be english because the crown wasn't unresponsive to everyone, just the colonists.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Shabaka Tecumseh on March 16, 2012 at 6:18pm

NOPE, ain't stuck on enslavement (but it may make you feel more comfortable if I were), re-read  my post and you'll see the direct response was about POWER, (states rights). The snippet about Lincoln had to do with his attempts at COMPROMISE.

 

In 1865 the people were white men both north and south.  In 2012 the people are the elite class.

Nope "the majority" of the people in the then "colonies" in 1776 wanted to free themselves from England. But in 1862 it was the majority of white men in the south only...see the difference?  I doubt it..

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Scott Howard on March 16, 2012 at 9:14pm

Thanks for the conversation Shabaka, but I'm done. If you think that most colonist wanted to be free from England in the 1770s-80s, you really need to study American history. Only about 1/3 actually wanted independence.

Peace.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Shabaka Tecumseh on March 17, 2012 at 7:11am

Historians have estimated that between 15 and 20 percent of the European-American population of the colonies were Loyalists.^[2] Others have argued that as many as 33% were Loyalists with another 1/3 neutral at various points of the civil war

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Shabaka Tecumseh on March 16, 2012 at 6:26pm

"The balance of federal powers and those powers held by the states as defined in the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution was first addressed in the case of McCulloch v. Maryland (1819). The Court's decision by Chief Justice John Marshall asserted that the laws adopted by the federal government, when exercising its constitutional powers, are generally paramount over any conflicting laws adopted by state governments."

It was a common belief by the south maybe?

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Scott Howard on March 16, 2012 at 9:01pm

Obviously. However, the defining question would have been: What are "...its constitutional powers"?

For example, where in the constitution does it grant the federal government the power to compel a state to remain in the union? It doesn't.

Please bear in mind that the constitution was (no longer is) a document that had amongst its purposes to limit the power and reach of the federal government. Hence the 10th amendment: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Since there is no constitutional requirement for a state to remain in the union, it is (well, it was) within a states' right to withdraw.

Ironically, in our history, under The Articles of Confederation, the predecesor to the Constitution in Article 13, every state WAS required to remain in the union (confederation as it was called), but that language was dropped in the Constitution. 

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Tom Sarbeck on March 16, 2012 at 11:11pm

Scott, when will you stop refighting the Civil War and return to the topic?

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Scott Howard on March 17, 2012 at 7:59am

Tom, This thread started when I gave my opinion about the Republican party. It has always been the party of the industrialists.

Why do I keep talking about the civil war? Well, I was asked a few questions by one person and attacked by another. I attempted to intelligently answer the questions in a manner that showed that I have done some research (emphasis on some) on the topic because people tend to dismiss my opinion as a "child of tne south" simply because I live here. In the second case, I was attempting to rebutt the false assertions about Lincoln and the south.

My overall point was and is: if we don't understand that the very first Republican president destroyed our constitutional republic, we will never fully understand how we got to the government we have today.

Now, if one is happy with our current government, fine. Just please don't wave the Constitution around if one doesn't like the party in power at the moment since we haven't abided by the Constitution for 150 years. Licoln's war gave rise to all of it.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Shabaka Tecumseh on March 17, 2012 at 11:59am

Scott if I'm the one who you think "attacked" sorry but that's just my way of dealing with people. It may be f-up but it's NOT an attack.

"don't wave the Constitution around if one doesn't like the party in power at the moment since we haven't abided by the Constitution for 150 years. Licoln's war gave rise to all of it."-Scott

Further, if we abide by the premise that the Supreme Court is the arbitrator of the law of the land, (Supremacy Clause) then the 1819 McCulloch vs. Maryland was not just for the Northern half of the United States and the South could just pick and choose or make its own laws in opposition to the Constitution if they are still members of the Union as they were in 1859.  Therefore secession was an act of treason in 1860-1. 

• ▶ Reply

• ‹ Previous
• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• Next ›
• Page