Distortions of truth and history: Lee, a better friend of slaves than Lincoln

[Kepler]

Originally posted by jimmytrick


You are just not paying attention. Lee tried to get the CSA to free the slaves. If he had suceeded the South would have probably gained its freedom.

Oh for goodness sake.

OK, let's take it from the top and bury it.

(1) Neither Lee nor Lincoln was evil. They were both honorable men, both capable of deep and multi-leveled moral judgments, and both (like all of us) prisoners of their personal history. "In another reality I could have called you friend. Just one more duty to perform."

(2) Slavery was a manifestation of the central conflict of the civil war: states rights vs. federal control, and not the issue itself. The feds had history and logistics on their side and they won.

(3) Had they lost, we would have done it again, and murdered thousands more Americans. And again. And again. Until the federal authority finally trumped the states'. We can all read historical trends and we all know this is neither right nor wrong but inevitable. In retrospect, I'm glad we only did it once, but I wish we could have managed to make the transition without that disaster.

(4) Sandberg is overrated. However, "the fog comes in on little cat feet" is one of the greatest lines in all of poetry, and if you don't think so you haven't made a thorough study of either fog or little cat feet.

(5) F*ing get over it! The CSA gave it their best shot and lost. Get over it!

(6) The next great moment in the states' rights movement was the southern rebellion against integration in the 50's and 60's, and that was based solely on racism. Same place and roughly the same issue. You blame people for drawing a few conclusions?

[David Floyd]

I have to go to school, but let me just hit on one MAJOR error Ethelred is making in his understanding of the Constitution:

I think that your claim of game set and match does apply quite well here. No mention of Congress. A clear mention of rebellion. Lincoln acted legaly. The Supreme Court agreed as well.

Article I, which is where the line about Habeas Corpus is located, is entirely devoted to powers granted and denied to CONGRESS. If you want to talk about Presidential authority, see Article II. Article I doesn't need to specify Congress in every line, because the whole Article refers to Congress.

More later.

[Sava]

Originally posted by Sikander


Almost every one of your posts is a gem Sava. Would you care to explain exactly how the republican party is a neo-fascist organization? Your claim carries about as much weight as the far less common charge that the democrats are pinkos. You are at least as deluded in your reverence for the republicans of the last century. They were corrupt in almost every conceivable way, and they acted with about as much foresight and statesmenship as the out of control "class of 1974" in congress, who managed to drag our reputation, our economy, our military, and our international clout to new lows, and also managed to drag president Carter along for the ride. Those who hate Reagan should keep in mind just what sort of environment put him into power.

They're laughing at you, not with you.

[Ramo]

That is stonewalling. Hiding from the truth to avoid the facts.

This is bull****. Convuluting the issue through paranoid accusations and legalism.

In WW II, the USA committed the first act of war against Japan through an embargo. Does that mean the US is responsible for all the deaths in the conflicts between the US and Japan during this war?

Morality is not constrained to mindless legalism.

You also think who starts a war is irrelevant rather than a way to decide where responsibility lies.

Sometimes a war is justified, sometimes it isn't. Whoever "starts" a war isn't always who's responsible.

So I can't go on what you think.

Yep, no doubt you don't have the mental capacities to think beyond a superficial system of morality.

I think you may have a peculiar definition.

Why do you say that? Since you don't know anything about anarchism, the examples of anarchism I pointed out, or what I beleive on the topic.

You're stonewalling. What do you think a government is?

No thanks. I asked for link. I would like one to some slightly less biased source on top of it. You didn't even supply a biased one. I give links when asked or say that I can't find one. I don't blow off such requests as you just did.

I don't have any other online sources on the topic. You can look up one just as quickly as I can.

If you want print sources, that I can supply, for instance "Homage to Catalonia" by George Orwell.

I gave to you what you give to me. Frequently.

Bull****. I called you paranoid only after you accused me of deceit and stupidity (hardly equivalent insults). I then responded in kind only after you called me stupid one more time.

I made NO assnine assertions. Anarchists have earned insults many times in the past.

You have no idea what anarchism is, nor are you familiar with examples of it. How would you know what anarchists have done?

If you choose to call yourself one you should accept the results of your actions. It looks remarkably like the sort of thing kids do to annoy their parents and for no other reason.

And yet you have no idea what it is.

I'll give you a brief introduction. Modern anarchism as an ideology has been pioneered in the 19th century by the likes of Petr Kropotkin and Mikhail Bakunin. The simplest definition is the introduction of freedom of action into as many social spheres as possible. It is essentially a socialist variant of libertarianism (although "libertarianism" originally referred to anarchism, and still does throughout much of the world, before the libertarian capitalists co-opted it), where private and public authority is minimized (or abolished, under some variants).

That isn't what you said.

Yes it is. To recap:

"He imposed his oppressive system of protective tariffs. Of course, the South likely would've gone the same way, eventually."

I wrote this. This is what you quoted.

"Gone the same way" referred to the idea that the South would follow the mercantilist policies of the North.

Another? When was there a first?

Obviously you're not reading what I wrote. I was writing of the probable state of the country if Lincoln had not invaded the South.

By the way, the first(s) (before the CSA) would be the states that seceded from the Articles of Confederation.

Now that would really balkanize the South. Especially since secession was an explicit right in the CSA constitution.

That doesn't imply the CSA would recognize that right. It violated the Constitution by quite a bit during its war. I don't see why this is any different.

[Ramo]

No where does it say it is not the President that makes the decision.

It's listed under Article I, which refers to CONGRESS.

They don't mention seccession.

It doesn't have to. The 10th Amendment says states and the people have all powers not delegated to the federal government. Since the Constitution does not prohibit secession, states have such power.

A law was passed by Congress. That is the usual way.

Again, you're convuluting the issue. You asserted that Lincoln didn't oppose the Fugitive Slave Act because it was "legal." The only way that assertion makes sense in any way is if you think opposing the Fugitive Slave Act is illegal.

It wouldn't be overturned by the Supreme Court because insterstate trade is the responsibility of the Federal Government.

No. The interstate commerce clause referred to the federal gov't's ability to regulate trade barriers between states. Read the Federalist Papers.

And you claimed I wasn't thinking before posting.

Yes, I was mistaken. I assumed you had the capacity to think.

His action was not aproved by the man that did have the responsiblilty, Lincoln.

The point is WHY didn't he approve of this action. Since he obviously didn't have any problems with the EP.

Frankly, I wasn't sure what you are referring to. Looking back farther into the thread I would have to say that Halleck was doing the opposite of Fremont.

Yes. And Lincoln had no problems with his actions.

Missouri was not a rebelling state and the Constitution requires a court action to take property without paying for it. Anyone in that state was still subject to the Constitution, including the Generals.

1. Halleck was not in Missouri.
2. Fremont was dealing with rebels in Missouri.

BTW, the EP didn't deal with rebels under Union control even if they did reside in rebelling states.

Its hard to sell when you don't have any sort economic system. Conscription is kind of dificult without one.

What's your point? Are you saying that slaves didn't exist in hunter-gatherer societies that interacted with only other ones, just because they weren't bought or sold?

Slavery almost always is used to mean the actual ownership of human beings.

And that is precisely what happens in conscription. Ownership is nothing more and nothing less than legal control. An owned item isn't necessarily able to be bought or sold, and an owned item doesn't necessarily stay that way indefinitely.

Yes and it goes against your claim that conscription=slavery. The government is in no way a household or a person. Thank you for your help in showing the error of your ways.

The government is an organization controlled by a collection of people. No different than a corporation in this respect. Corporations that owned slaves in the US didn't actually own slaves?

BTW, you'll note that the definition referred to neither buying/selling, nor lasting indefinitely.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by David Floyd
Then I'll thank you not to use original intent arguments to tell me that secession is wrong, because if you do, I have a just as good or better argument based on original intent that says gun control is wrong.

Well, so much for my attempt at being devils' advocate. I fully support the right of people to bear arms on an individual basis, just that regulation of that right by reasonable means is something that, had the forefathers had the precognition to see the extent to which arms developed, they would have been in favor of. Under your interpretation, I could own a nuclear warhead. I think every reasonable person, as well as the SCOTUS, has accepted this is not a rational interpretation of the 2nd amendment.

Incorrect. Once a territory becomes a state, all applicable states rights apply to that state, including the 10th Amendment. The 10th Amendment overrides any federal laws or extra-constitutional federal claims.

Except in those areas of the state that are Federal property, yes.

Further, you assert that, essentially, because a state received federal monies, it was in essence federal property. That also is incorrect, found nowhere in the Constitution, but also makes no SENSE, because the people of that state paid into the federal government in various forms of taxes, excises, duties, etc.

Well, no, I wasn't asserting that. I was merely pointing out that the American people in the collective sense do have an interest in retaining American territory, and that the benefits of statehood work both ways.

Further, Texas, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia were all independent before they became states. Those 5 Confederate states formed a large part of the CSA's power, and included the Confederate seat of government, and supplied more troops to the CSA armies than the rest of the states combined. It sounds like you're admitting those 5 states at least could secede, which is a step in the right direction.

I don't admit they had that right, but as I said in the closing of my previous post, there are instances in which I think secession would be legal, this just was not such an instance.

It was the same in the US, so let's not go down this road. What, you want me to admit slavery was wrong? OK, damn, you got me there

No one's claiming it was unanimous.

What about them?

Is your point that the CSA wasn't run by angels either? Duh, I'll certainly grant you that. But the problems with the CSA are not the discussion here, but I readily admit there were plenty.

No, you're missing my point. You were repeatedly talking about the "will of the people" of those states, as if it were a collective unanimity. I would venture the proposal that secession wasn't supported by even a majority of the population. I think the will of those who were denied voices, in defiance of their natural rights that you so love, is just as important. Those townships were pro-Union and refused to secede. Shouldn't their will be just as important? If they chose to remain in the Union, then the CSA invasion of them was yet another agression against U.S. territory.

Again, only in matters where Constitutional federal laws conflicted with state laws. Secession is not covered by the Supremacy Clause.

Having read Amedment 10 over and over, i do not agree it allows for secession. I think it is merely giving states to enact laws not conflicting with Federal laws so long as they fit into the framework of the Constitution, nothing more.

Treaties can be legally dissolved in the US, an example would be the ABM treaty. There's no reason to assume another nation doesn't have the same ability to nullify or withdraw from a treaty it no longer agrees with.

Comparing the ABM treaty to a treaty wherein land is ceded to another country is ludicrous. If France suddenly invaded Louisiana and demanded the United States leave, would you not consider that an act of war? After all, it was sovereign French territory that they ceded to us. Under your logic, their invasion would be justified. And whatever land you own could be handed over to the Native Americans who used to own it.

Fort Sumter was on sovereign United States soil, soil that did not belong to S Carolina at all. Their attack on it was a hostile invasion of U.S. territory.

The CSA had a right to demand that the US military withdraw from within its borders, the same as any other sovereign nation.

Except the U.S. military wasn't within CSA borders, they were within U.S. borders still. Even if you assert the CSA was a legal entity, the Federal territory surrounded by those states was still federal territory. When the states adopted the Constitution, they ceded that land to the Federal government, permanently. There's no way to get around that.

Wouldn't the US fleet have to first enter CSA territorial waters in order to break the blockade?

As I said, I have no idea what the claims were on the water around Sumter. For all you and I know, some of the water might also have been Federal property. Who knows?

And besides, by your own argument blockading it wouldn't be illegal, because starting 1 inch outside of Ft Sumter, all waters and territory belongs to South Carolina, right?

Not necessarily, because it was clear the aim of the blockade was to seize the fort, an illegal action. In addition, laying seige to sovereign territory is certainly an act of aggression, whether they actually violate the territory or not. If French military forces blockaded the U.S. embassy with the intent to seize it, IMO the U.S. would be fully within its rights to breach the blockade to relieve the personel inside.

The oath is only valid if the Constitution is effective with regards to the person who took the oath. The oath doesn't prohibit secession, in fact, the oath swears one to protect and defend the Constitution. This oath was not broken by acting within the Constitution, but once a person was not a citizen of the US, neither the Constitution nor the oath meant anything with regards to them. If a Congressman, for example, emigrates to another country, he is not anymore bound by the oath, wouldn't you agree?

You're misinterpreting my meaning, sorry. The state legislators who voted for secession in each states did so illegally. That's because they were elected as agents of the Constitution and swore an Oath to support it which is binding. The second a legislator cast his vote to secede, he broke that Oath, he ceased to have the power to cast the vote, and the vote was rendered null and void. These men were not elected to be secessionists, they were elected to be legislators, and (IMO) had no legitimate authority to cast a vote for secession.

As a said, a direct referendum would have been better, at least from a legal standpoint.

[David Floyd]

Ethelred,

Buying or selling pot was not made illegal at least when the feds first acted to ban its sale. Someone in the US government came up with a rather clever scheme. A stamp tax was instituted on marijuana. Then the stamp was never issued so it was impossible to sell it legaly by paying the tax. However I don't know if that gimmick still holds especially in regards to the California situation.

That has nothing to do with current laws, and I don't see the courts upholding that method.

Since when can states secede. There has been only one instance. It failed. States cannot secede.

Fine, then the US is still part of Britain.

Russia is a Nation. The CSA was NOT a nation. It may have thought it was but the US did not recogonize it like it does Russia.

Sure the CSA was a nation. They fit all the qualifications of one, at any rate. Just because the US didn't care to believe them is irrelevant.

Well clearly Congress doesn't agree with you. It has chosen to pass laws FOR conscription not against it.

Since when does Congress care about the Constitution?

And it clearly DOES specificly ban slavery. You should look these things up first. I should do it more often myself.

My mistake, I had thought it only said involuntary servitude. That doesn't negate the point that conscription and involuntary servitude are one and the same, though.

So why did the CSA and the states that seceded GRAB land belonging the US Federal government? Why did THEY start the shooting at Ft. Sumter? If the CSA had wanted to live in peace it should have gone the negotiation route. Instead IT not the US started the violence and the land grabbing.

You're right, they should have started with negotiation.
But if they had, Lincoln's position would have been basically "Stop rebelling or I will invade", the CSA would have said no, Lincoln would have used force first, and history would be the same, except you'd be sitting here today still blaming the CSA for the war by virtue that they seceded in the first place.

Me and lots other people including Serbs and the victims.

And lots of people say differently.

Sherman was killing American rebels and not a specific ethinic or racial group.

He was killing and displacing unarmed civilians, who were citizens of a foreign, sovereign nation.

I can read it just fine. Show me where it says anything regarding states leaving the Union.

It doesn't have to mention secession, it simply reserved all powers not forbidden to the states or granted to the federal government to the states. Obviously it can't list every single one.

It does in the instance of rebellion. So it wasn't arbitary.

You're gonna have to point to that part of the Constitution for me.

Funny how the slaves were emancipated and the Supreme Court held it legal. It most certainly did have legal force.

Only because the victors said it did. It didn't REALLY.

Only a few of the secceeding states 'came together and formed a nation'. Almost all of them were carved out of US territory. Only Texas was ever truly sovereign. The few that did help form the Nation went from being colonies to being members of the Continental Congress at nearly the same time. Indeed it was exactly the same time.

Already addressed this.

I can't even find a reference to Martial Law but it has been enacted a number of times in the US.

Shouldn't that be an indicator that martial law is unconstitutional?

By that thinking since it doesn't say the States can't assinate the President then they may do so. What a state does internally is covered by the 10 Amendment. Secceeding is inherently an action that involves the whole Nation. Of course so would assasinating the President.

That's just ridiculous, and you know it.

Boris,

I think every reasonable person, as well as the SCOTUS, has accepted this is not a rational interpretation of the 2nd amendment.

Owning nuclear weapons has nothing to do with the 2nd Amendment, because nuclear weapons can be considered ordnance, not arms, and ordnance (such as cannons, in 1776) were not protected by the 2nd.
I support the right to own nuclear weapons from a property rights perspective, not a right to bear arms position.

Except in those areas of the state that are Federal property, yes.

So do you also think that a regular federal building, such as a post office, couldn't be forced to shut down?
Look, military bases in states allow the United States to station troops in both that base and that state. If that state no longer is part of the nation as a whole, I fail to see why the US could still base military forces in that former state without the consent of that state.

Well, no, I wasn't asserting that. I was merely pointing out that the American people in the collective sense do have an interest in retaining American territory, and that the benefits of statehood work both ways.

Of course the American people as a whole had an interest in retaining the seceding states, but what does that have to do with the right to secede?

I don't admit they had that right, but as I said in the closing of my previous post, there are instances in which I think secession would be legal, this just was not such an instance.

What instances are those, and under what Constitutional power would secession be legal, then, in your opinion?

No, you're missing my point. You were repeatedly talking about the "will of the people" of those states, as if it were a collective unanimity. I would venture the proposal that secession wasn't supported by even a majority of the population. I think the will of those who were denied voices, in defiance of their natural rights that you so love, is just as important.

That IS important, but quite frankly it's stupid to look at that. The disenfranchised in the South were also disenfranchised in the North, and while that is certainly wrong, you cannot throw out secession based upon the probable votes of people who were not allowed to vote anywhere in the US at that time.

Those townships were pro-Union and refused to secede. Shouldn't their will be just as important? If they chose to remain in the Union, then the CSA invasion of them was yet another agression against U.S. territory.

Yes, if a majority of the people in, say, Tennessee, didn't want to secede, then the state shouldn't have seceded. But that is a question for the people of Tennessee to decide, not the federal government.

Having read Amedment 10 over and over, i do not agree it allows for secession. I think it is merely giving states to enact laws not conflicting with Federal laws so long as they fit into the framework of the Constitution, nothing more.

The 10th Amendment says nothing about federal or state laws. It simply says that any power not granted to the federal government or denied to the states stays with the states and people.
I don't think you'll argue that the federal government had the power to secede, because that is nonsensical, and likewise I don't think you can argue that the Constitution prohibits secession, which is never even mentioned in the Constitution.

When the states adopted the Constitution, they ceded that land to the Federal government, permanently. There's no way to get around that.

I disagree. The intent of the States certainly would not have been to grant the federal government land within the state indefinitely, even if the state seceded. There was too much distrust of big government and federal power at the time for the states to intend any such thing, in my opinion.

The state legislators who voted for secession in each states did so illegally. That's because they were elected as agents of the Constitution and swore an Oath to support it which is binding. The second a legislator cast his vote to secede, he broke that Oath, he ceased to have the power to cast the vote, and the vote was rendered null and void. These men were not elected to be secessionists, they were elected to be legislators, and (IMO) had no legitimate authority to cast a vote for secession.

Yes, people in the State Legislatures were elected to be legislators. But voting for an article of secession doesn't turn anyone into some evil "secessionist", it simply means they legislated - did their job. You don't agree with their vote, but you can't say they weren't doing their job.

[Drake Tungsten]

God, can the posts in this thread get any longer?!?

[MrFun]

God -- I wish I have time to read ALL of the meaningful, longer posts from both sides. From what I have read and what I recall, here are my points:

1) Abraham Lincoln was human; he was not a one-dimensional archetype as Lincoln bashers would like to portray him.
His motivation behind the Emancipation Proclamation, which he began to seriously consider and formulate long before Anietam, was a mixture of humanitarian idealism, and political strategy.

2) The federal government had the right to continue their ownership of federal property after the Southern states seceded.

3) The Confederacy's political culture had hypocrisy to the extent that they claimed the right to secede, but then sought to deny Western Virginia's right to secede from the Confederacy, and prevented eastern Tenessee from seceding from the Confederacy.

4) I believe that the Confederacy would not have planned for eventual abolition of slavery, no matter what Robert E. Lee believed.
In fact, the Southern states in the 1850's were seeking to expand their plantation slave system into Central America, Cuba, and Mexico.
Some of these areas, slavery already existed and this would have facilitated these filibuster ambitions of the Southern states.
With secession, the Confederacy would have been in a greater position to attempt again, plans for imperial expansion, since they would not have to answer to federal authorities in regards to sovereignty of other nations.

5) Freedom of speech and Democratic campaigning were not crushed under Lincoln's suspension of habeas corpus, as far more press offices remained in operation compared to those that were forced to shut down by corrupt, over zealous, local officials.
There was one widely known exception of a Democratic candidate who was arbitrarily arrested, but Lincoln allowed him to go free when he returned from his escape into Canada.

[Sava]

Jesus christ people, get a fricking life

[JCG]

Neither Lincoln nor Lee were saints nor were they devils...everything else is just details.

Go on, by all means.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Since the Supreme Court did NOT overturn the Presidents actions then his actions were legal.

Read Ex Parte Milligan and then try to say that again with a straight face.

By your statements is seems that you know little to nothing about the Civil War. It isn't because I say so, it is because historians also say so. Slavery was a part of the overarching issue of states' rights, which has been part and parcel of the American experiment from the beginning to now. Most (if not all) of the Supreme Court cases that make news deal with the power of the states in respect to the federal government. If you can't understand that, you can't understand American history.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

Since the Supreme Court did NOT overturn the Presidents actions then his actions were legal.

Read Ex Parte Milligan and then try to say that again with a straight face.

By your statements is seems that you know little to nothing about the Civil War. It isn't because I say so, it is because historians also say so. Slavery was a part of the overarching issue of states' rights, which has been part and parcel of the American experiment from the beginning to now. Most (if not all) of the Supreme Court cases that make news deal with the power of the states in respect to the federal government. If you can't understand that, you can't understand American history.

Then why did the Southern states argue FOR a stronger federal government with the Fugitive Slave law?

But you are definitely right for the most part; who had the power in government to decide whether to expand or restrict slavery in regards to western territories?
That argument raged until the Civil War destroyed slavery itself for good.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by David Floyd
Owning nuclear weapons has nothing to do with the 2nd Amendment, because nuclear weapons can be considered ordnance, not arms, and ordnance (such as cannons, in 1776) were not protected by the 2nd.
I support the right to own nuclear weapons from a property rights perspective, not a right to bear arms position.

I have no idea where the line is drawn between ordnance and arms, but if a distinction can be made, then the government has the full right to regulate ordnance as it sees fit, given court precedent. I don't think anyone who isn't loonytunes would think there is some sort of right for an individual to possess a weapon capable of destroying entire cities.

At any rate, I agree with the court's opinion on this matter:

"In United States v. Miller, the Court sustained a statute requiring registration under the National Firearms Act of sawed-off shotguns. After reciting the original provisions of the Constitution dealing with the militia, the Court observed that ''[w]ith obvious purpose to assure the continuation and render possible the effectiveness of such forces the declaration and guarantee of the Second Amendment were made. It must be interpreted with that end in view.'' The significance of the militia, the Court continued, was that it was composed of ''civilians primarily, soldiers on occasion.'' It was upon this force that the States could rely for defense and securing of the laws, on a force that ''comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense,'' who, ''when called for service . . . were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time.'' Therefore, ''[i]n the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a 'shotgun having a barrel of less than 18 inches in length' at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well- regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument. Certainly it is not within judicial notice that this weapon is any part of the ordinary military equipment or that its use could contribute to the common defense.''

So do you also think that a regular federal building, such as a post office, couldn't be forced to shut down?

That would be a different matter, as such federal buildings are oftened leased from the states, particularly post offices. We're talking Federal forts and arsenals, which according to the Constitution, is a different matter. Sumter was not leased from SC, it was sovereign territory of the U.S. government.

Look, military bases in states allow the United States to station troops in both that base and that state. If that state no longer is part of the nation as a whole, I fail to see why the US could still base military forces in that former state without the consent of that state.

And again, while that may be true for some military bases, it was not the case for the Federal arsenals and forts seized. They were no longer property of the states, they were U.S. property.

Of course the American people as a whole had an interest in retaining the seceding states, but what does that have to do with the right to secede?

Because there is a difference between "the people" in the individual sense and "the people" in the collective sense. It has long been the interpretation of the courts that "the people" in the 2nd and 10th ammendments was the same as "We the people" in the Preamble, which is the collective people of the U.S.

What instances are those, and under what Constitutional power would secession be legal, then, in your opinion?

I already discussed the possibilities of this previously

That IS important, but quite frankly it's stupid to look at that. The disenfranchised in the South were also disenfranchised in the North, and while that is certainly wrong, you cannot throw out secession based upon the probable votes of people who were not allowed to vote anywhere in the US at that time.

The rights of any person are guaranteed whether they are voters or not.

Yes, if a majority of the people in, say, Tennessee, didn't want to secede, then the state shouldn't have seceded. But that is a question for the people of Tennessee to decide, not the federal government.

If the people of Tennessee were being forced to seceded by a government they found hostile, and they appealed to the U.S. government for aid, I see no reason the government shouldn't come to the aid of people they considered their citizens.

The 10th Amendment says nothing about federal or state laws. It simply says that any power not granted to the federal government or denied to the states stays with the states and people.

Right, which doesn't prevent the federal government from having the power to quell insurrection, which is allowed under Article I, Section 8, Clause 15

I don't think you'll argue that the federal government had the power to secede, because that is nonsensical, and likewise I don't think you can argue that the Constitution prohibits secession, which is never even mentioned in the Constitution.

Not sure how the government could secede, no. But I would argue that Congress could vote to remove a state from the Union, were it done in the same manner as a state joins.

I disagree. The intent of the States certainly would not have been to grant the federal government land within the state indefinitely, even if the state seceded. There was too much distrust of big government and federal power at the time for the states to intend any such thing, in my opinion.

I thought we were leaving intent out of it? By the Constitution, it is Federal property.

Yes, people in the State Legislatures were elected to be legislators. But voting for an article of secession doesn't turn anyone into some evil "secessionist", it simply means they legislated - did their job. You don't agree with their vote, but you can't say they weren't doing their job.

First I never said secessionists were evil, so not sure where you are quoting that from. I simply stated they were wrong. And I disagree, I don't believe, based on the scope of the Oath, that they had any authority to legislate themselves out of the Oath. They swore a binding oath to support the Constitution, and in doing so became agents, by extension, of the federal government. They had no authority to do such a thing while acting under the aegis of the Constitution.

If you swore an oath of loyalty to a king, if you then tried to turn your realm into your own sovereign country, it would be rebellion. The Oath on the Constitutuon is, IMO, a continuing of the Anglo-Saxon legal tradition of such oaths, albeit to the Constitution rather than a monarch. Breaking that Oath is still rebellion.

Now, while the Founding Fathers certainly intended the States should have the capacity to defend themselves from a tyrannical Federal regime, I don't think they would consider the grounds by which the South rebelled as legitimate, as the Federal government had been acting fully within its rights given by the Constitution prior to secession.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Then why did the Southern states argue FOR a stronger federal government with the Fugitive Slave law?

That is only a problem if you consider that the South was the only place that argued for states' rights. The fact is that they didn't. They argued for states' rights on most things, but sometimes they went for a stronger federal government. Same thing with Northern states. It was just different what they wanted the federal government to assert.

States' rights and Federalism has always been the essential part of US History and every state has been on different sides of the issue (for more state power or more federal power), but they usually go on the side of state power. Though in somethings, federal power is better (such as interstate disputes and highways).