USAians: What are you doing on this loooong MLK weekend?

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Patroklos


You are better than petty emotion mongering.

That is a letter form a Southern officer to his wife. They should both be equally racist and would have no problem discussing the nobal institution institution of slavery openly between them, so why is there no mention of slavery if it was his true motivation?

Sorry for my slow editing.

here:

Anyway it doesn't matter. Do you think letters from SS officers during ww2 to their spouses were about the importance of the final solution or do you think they focused on the importance of defending the fatherland?

That doesn't mean the nazis went to war to defend the fatherland.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
... recognized as such by the federal government..

If the federal government decriminalized the use of medicinal MJ as is the case in what we were talking about, by what right would they be able to confiscate it?

If the state had a law on the books banning it, perhaps? All the dormant commerce clause does is prevent anti-competitive measures designed to help the state's industry.

As you know in Mississippi half of the counties forbid even the transportation of unopened containers of alcohol for anyone in the country. They can confiscate your alcohol if you violate that law, regardless of where you got it from.

In addition:

http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/Controversies/1140551076.html

Smaller jurisdictions exist which prohibit the sale of alcoholic beverages as well, such as dry towns. There are 129 dry towns and villages in Alaska. In thirty-two of these communities the mere possession of alcohol is a crime. There are hundreds of other dry towns in the United States, some existing within wet counties.

I'd imagine they'll confiscate your liquor in that town, even if you are passing through.

[Patroklos]

Anyway it doesn't matter. Do you think letters from SS officers during ww2 to their spouses were about the importance of the final solution or do you think they focused on the importance of defending the fatherland?

Actually SS officers routinely talked about the threat of the Jew and the ideological war when boaching the topic of why the war was waged in their correspondences. They left out the gorey (sp?) details, but they made no bones (my phrase of the day) about the racism.

That doesn't mean the nazis went to war to defend the fatherland.

Actually they did, to defend it from the dirty Jews inmany a mind anyways. They were obviously wrong, that doesn't change the fact that it WAS their stated motivation.

Btw, even with your editing that line makes no relevant contribution to this thread, let alone our own discussion.

[Ramo]

Pretending the Confederacy was "teh eval" for having slavery when most of their contemporaries had it less than a decade before is ridiculous.

The Confederacy was created specifically to preserve and expand slavery. The same certainly was not true about the US.

And I don't know what you mean by "most of their contemporaries." Their principal cultural contemporaries abolished slavery long before - Mexico and the British Empire three decades earlier, South America excluding Brazil four decades earlier, the states North of Delaware five or six decades earlier.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Patroklos


Then you better start writing your congressmen, bcause the movers and shakers of our government discussed all of this at nauseum during the founding of our nation and they all agreed slavery should exist.

But out of curiosity, what personage survives the march of time?

I'm certainly interested in the specifics. It's seems to me that both Washington and Jefferson were willing to look the other way. Despicable. But not as bad as taking an initiative to protect slavery. Compromise with slavery advocates is what Jefferson and Washington did. That's not the same as being a slavery advocate much less taking concrete action to assist slavery entrenchment.

I haven't written any congressmen about Lee Jackson day but rest assured I want Washington and Jefferson held accountable for their crimes letter writing or no.

When a personage no longer survives the passage of time because we realize how worthless they were then we ditch their pointless holiday. That's progress.

Originally posted by Patroklos
Actually Lee's military accomplishments are far more numerous and spectacular. And since you consider Lee a traitor, Washington's courage in do that is also equaled. What exactly did Washington do besides that?

Virginia has a whole lot of presidents, and they do celebrate Presidents Day as a state holiday.

military accomplishments in a lost war are worthless. They just waste lives and treasure. Anyway I oppose honoring people with holidays for their military accomplishments. For the record I credit washington with being our first president if nothing else. The fact remains that Jefferson and Washington accomplished a great deal while Lee accomplished nothing. He has nothing to show for his actions that's the same as accomplishing nothing. Since they choose to anonymously lump all those presidents together in one holiday they could at least hold the same standard for Lee and Jackson and call it loser generals day for all the generals who waste blood and money on lost wars.

Originally posted by Patroklos
Your opinion about slavery was the minority back then, on all sides. You also chose genocide to load your question.

Not a minority opinion everywhere. There were plenty of places in the confederacy where slaves and former slaves outnumbered everybody else.

Anyway if future generations all decide that owning pets and eating meat is evil and they get rid of MLK day because he did both, fine. At least their holidays are consistent with their stated values.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Patroklos
Actually they did, to defend it from the dirty Jews inmany a mind anyways. They were obviously wrong, that doesn't change the fact that it WAS their stated motivation.

You're saying no documentation exists that the confederacy seceded to defend it from yankee abolitionism? Because otherwise the comparison still stands. It doesn't matter what letter you dig out unless it conflicts with other sources and your letter doesn't conflict.

Originally posted by Patroklos
Btw, even with your editing that line makes no relevant contribution to this thread, let alone our own discussion.

bingo. and what pray tell was your contribution with the letter? I thought we were now free to throw out whatever random non sequitur flitted into our heads?

[Ramo]

South Carolina's declaration of causes for secession:

The people of the State of South Carolina, in Convention assembled, on the 26th day of April, A.D., 1852, declared that the frequent violations of the Constitution of the United States, by the Federal Government, and its encroachments upon the reserved rights of the States, fully justified this State in then withdrawing from the Federal Union; but in deference to the opinions and wishes of the other slaveholding States, she forbore at that time to exercise this right. Since that time, these encroachments have continued to increase, and further forbearance ceases to be a virtue.

And now the State of South Carolina having resumed her separate and equal place among nations, deems it due to herself, to the remaining United States of America, and to the nations of the world, that she should declare the immediate causes which have led to this act.

In the year 1765, that portion of the British Empire embracing Great Britain, undertook to make laws for the government of that portion composed of the thirteen American Colonies. A struggle for the right of self-government ensued, which resulted, on the 4th of July, 1776, in a Declaration, by the Colonies, "that they are, and of right ought to be, FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES; and that, as free and independent States, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent States may of right do."

They further solemnly declared that whenever any "form of government becomes destructive of the ends for which it was established, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government." Deeming the Government of Great Britain to have become destructive of these ends, they declared that the Colonies "are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved."

In pursuance of this Declaration of Independence, each of the thirteen States proceeded to exercise its separate sovereignty; adopted for itself a Constitution, and appointed officers for the administration of government in all its departments-- Legislative, Executive and Judicial. For purposes of defense, they united their arms and their counsels; and, in 1778, they entered into a League known as the Articles of Confederation, whereby they agreed to entrust the administration of their external relations to a common agent, known as the Congress of the United States, expressly declaring, in the first Article "that each State retains its sovereignty, freedom and independence, and every power, jurisdiction and right which is not, by this Confederation, expressly delegated to the United States in Congress assembled."

Under this Confederation the war of the Revolution was carried on, and on the 3rd of September, 1783, the contest ended, and a definite Treaty was signed by Great Britain, in which she acknowledged the independence of the Colonies in the following terms: "ARTICLE 1-- His Britannic Majesty acknowledges the said United States, viz: New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, to be FREE, SOVEREIGN AND INDEPENDENT STATES; that he treats with them as such; and for himself, his heirs and successors, relinquishes all claims to the government, propriety and territorial rights of the same and every part thereof."

Thus were established the two great principles asserted by the Colonies, namely: the right of a State to govern itself; and the right of a people to abolish a Government when it becomes destructive of the ends for which it was instituted. And concurrent with the establishment of these principles, was the fact, that each Colony became and was recognized by the mother Country a FREE, SOVEREIGN AND INDEPENDENT STATE.

In 1787, Deputies were appointed by the States to revise the Articles of Confederation, and on 17th September, 1787, these Deputies recommended for the adoption of the States, the Articles of Union, known as the Constitution of the United States.

The parties to whom this Constitution was submitted, were the several sovereign States; they were to agree or disagree, and when nine of them agreed the compact was to take effect among those concurring; and the General Government, as the common agent, was then invested with their authority.

If only nine of the thirteen States had concurred, the other four would have remained as they then were-- separate, sovereign States, independent of any of the provisions of the Constitution. In fact, two of the States did not accede to the Constitution until long after it had gone into operation among the other eleven; and during that interval, they each exercised the functions of an independent nation.

By this Constitution, certain duties were imposed upon the several States, and the exercise of certain of their powers was restrained, which necessarily implied their continued existence as sovereign States. But to remove all doubt, an amendment was added, which declared that 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. On the 23d May , 1788, South Carolina, by a Convention of her People, passed an Ordinance assenting to this Constitution, and afterwards altered her own Constitution, to conform herself to the obligations she had undertaken.

Thus was established, by compact between the States, a Government with definite objects and powers, limited to the express words of the grant. This limitation left the whole remaining mass of power subject to the clause reserving it to the States or to the people, and rendered unnecessary any specification of reserved rights.

We hold that the Government thus established is subject to the two great principles asserted in the Declaration of Independence; and we hold further, that the mode of its formation subjects it to a third fundamental principle, namely: the law of compact. We maintain that in every compact between two or more parties, the obligation is mutual; that the failure of one of the contracting parties to perform a material part of the agreement, entirely releases the obligation of the other; and that where no arbiter is provided, each party is remitted to his own judgment to determine the fact of failure, with all its consequences.

In the present case, that fact is established with certainty. We assert that fourteen of the States have deliberately refused, for years past, to fulfill their constitutional obligations, and we refer to their own Statutes for the proof.

The Constitution of the United States, in its fourth Article, provides as follows: "No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due."

This stipulation was so material to the compact, that without it that compact would not have been made. The greater number of the contracting parties held slaves, and they had previously evinced their estimate of the value of such a stipulation by making it a condition in the Ordinance for the government of the territory ceded by Virginia, which now composes the States north of the Ohio River.

The same article of the Constitution stipulates also for rendition by the several States of fugitives from justice from the other States.

The General Government, as the common agent, passed laws to carry into effect these stipulations of the States. For many years these laws were executed. But an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery, has led to a disregard of their obligations, and the laws of the General Government have ceased to effect the objects of the Constitution. The States of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa, have enacted laws which either nullify the Acts of Congress or render useless any attempt to execute them. In many of these States the fugitive is discharged from service or labor claimed, and in none of them has the State Government complied with the stipulation made in the Constitution. The State of New Jersey, at an early day, passed a law in conformity with her constitutional obligation; but the current of anti-slavery feeling has led her more recently to enact laws which render inoperative the remedies provided by her own law and by the laws of Congress. In the State of New York even the right of transit for a slave has been denied by her tribunals; and the States of Ohio and Iowa have refused to surrender to justice fugitives charged with murder, and with inciting servile insurrection in the State of Virginia. Thus the constituted compact has been deliberately broken and disregarded by the non-slaveholding States, and the consequence follows that South Carolina is released from her obligation.

The ends for which the Constitution was framed are declared by itself to be "to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity."

These ends it endeavored to accomplish by a Federal Government, in which each State was recognized as an equal, and had separate control over its own institutions. The right of property in slaves was recognized by giving to free persons distinct political rights, by giving them the right to represent, and burthening them with direct taxes for three-fifths of their slaves; by authorizing the importation of slaves for twenty years; and by stipulating for the rendition of fugitives from labor.

We affirm that these ends for which this Government was instituted have been defeated, and the Government itself has been made destructive of them by the action of the non-slaveholding States. Those States have assume the right of deciding upon the propriety of our domestic institutions; and have denied the rights of property established in fifteen of the States and recognized by the Constitution; they have denounced as sinful the institution of slavery; they have permitted open establishment among them of societies, whose avowed object is to disturb the peace and to eloign the property of the citizens of other States. They have encouraged and assisted thousands of our slaves to leave their homes; and those who remain, have been incited by emissaries, books and pictures to servile insurrection.

For twenty-five years this agitation has been steadily increasing, until it has now secured to its aid the power of the common Government. Observing the forms of the Constitution, a sectional party has found within that Article establishing the Executive Department, the means of subverting the Constitution itself. A geographical line has been drawn across the Union, and all the States north of that line have united in the election of a man to the high office of President of the United States, whose opinions and purposes are hostile to slavery. He is to be entrusted with the administration of the common Government, because he has declared that that "Government cannot endure permanently half slave, half free," and that the public mind must rest in the belief that slavery is in the course of ultimate extinction.

This sectional combination for the submersion of the Constitution, has been aided in some of the States by elevating to citizenship, persons who, by the supreme law of the land, are incapable of becoming citizens; and their votes have been used to inaugurate a new policy, hostile to the South, and destructive of its beliefs and safety.

On the 4th day of March next, this party will take possession of the Government. It has announced that the South shall be excluded from the common territory, that the judicial tribunals shall be made sectional, and that a war must be waged against slavery until it shall cease throughout the United States.

The guaranties of the Constitution will then no longer exist; the equal rights of the States will be lost. The slaveholding States will no longer have the power of self-government, or self-protection, and the Federal Government will have become their enemy.

Sectional interest and animosity will deepen the irritation, and all hope of remedy is rendered vain, by the fact that public opinion at the North has invested a great political error with the sanction of more erroneous religious belief.

We, therefore, the People of South Carolina, by our delegates in Convention assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, have solemnly declared that the Union heretofore existing between this State and the other States of North America, is dissolved, and that the State of South Carolina has resumed her position among the nations of the world, as a separate and independent State; with full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent States may of right do.

Adopted December 24, 1860

http://www.sonofthesouth.net/leefoundation/secession_causes.htm

No siree, nothing about slaves here.

[Patroklos]

And I don't know what you mean by "most of their contemporaries." Their principal cultural contemporaries abolished slavery long before - Mexico and the British Empire three decades earlier, South America excluding Brazil four decades earlier, the states North of Delaware five or six decades earlier.

Slavery in Britain ended in 1838, and the goverment actually compensated the slave owners with cash.

France? 1848.

The Dutch? 1863. Ouch.

Why don't you look up NJ and let us know what you find.

That's not the same as being a slavery advocate much less taking concrete action to assist slavery entrenchment.

They ownes slaves, how much more of an advocate can you be?

[Patroklos]

The people of the State of South Carolina, in Convention assembled, on the 26th day of April, A.D., 1852, declared that the frequent violations of the Constitution of the United States, by the Federal Government, and its encroachments upon the reserved rights of the States, fully justified this State in then withdrawing from the Federal Union; but in deference to the opinions and wishes of the other slaveholding States, she forbore at that time to exercise this right. Since that time, these encroachments have continued to increase, and further forbearance ceases to be a virtue.

Seems to be 4 parts voilating the rights of states guarunteed in the Constitution, 1 part slavery for flavor.

Thansk Ramo, that is an amazing proof of everything I have said in this thread. I was actually saving that.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Patroklos

They ownes slaves, how much more of an advocate can you be?

You could be a slaver or you could act politically to protect or extend slavery.

Owning slaves makes them despicable standing in the way of elimination of slavery would make them even worse.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Patroklos


Seems to be 4 parts voilating the rights of states guarunteed in the Constitution, 1 part slavery for flavor.

Thans Ramo, that is an amazing proof of everything I have said in this thread. I was actually saving that.

That only works if the violations of states rights listed don't relate to slavery.

For the record which do you think is worse? violating states rights or violating individuals liberty?

[Ramo]

France? 1848.

The Dutch? 1863. Ouch.

The Dutch constitute "most of their contemporaries?"

I should add that 1848 is not "less than a decade before" either the abolition of slavery in the South or secession. And that a good chunk of France's slaves revolted several decades earlier. And that slavery was abolished were several years during the first Republic, and IIRC was permanently banned on the mainland.

NJ was 1804 according to Wiki.

Slavery in Britain ended in 1838, and the goverment actually compensated the slave owners with cash.

I don't know what compensation has to do with the argument, and again 1861-1838=23, 1865-1838=27. Closer to three decades than "less than a decade."

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Patroklos
Seems to be 4 parts voilating the rights of states guarunteed in the Constitution, 1 part slavery for flavor.

Thansk Ramo, that is an amazing proof of everything I have said in this thread. I was actually saving that.

States' Rights.... to protect slavery. Like I said, look at what they said and what they meant. Sometimes they match and sometimes you read between the lines and see what they mean by states' rights is the right to protect slavery.

Hell, after all, the CSA had a federal military draft and Jeff Davis had just about as much federal power as Abe Lincoln did during that war.

[Patroklos]

bingo. and what pray tell was your contribution with the letter? I thought we were now free to throw out whatever random non sequitur flitted into our heads?

The comment was specifically addressed to Mr. Fun for a reason. Reas the thread.

You could be a slaver or you could act politically to protect or extend slavery.

You will be happy to know that all states independantly abolsihed internationl slave trading during the revolution, with the exception of Georgia who did soon thereafter.

You don't think George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, owners of Virginia slave run estates, did not have the incentive to see slavery continue?

Face it they bawked* word on the issue, and deliberately did not push the issue out of personal interest. At the very least even if they were antislavery they shelfed the issue in favore of a percieved loftier political goal. Sounds similar to what Lee did, and by similar I mean exactly the same.

For the record which do you think is worse? violating states rights or violating individuals liberty?

It doesn't matter whay I think, or you think Geronimo. What matters when determining intent is what THEY think.

Though it seems a relevant question to ask George and Thomas.

*I think that is the first time I have ever had to spell that word, I probably got it wrong

NJ was 1804 according to Wiki.

You should read one of Mr Funs books, according to the new improved Civil War you seem to love it is 1965 in reality.

I don't know what compensation has to do with the argument

You don't normally compensate someone for something you consider evil.

[Ramo]

Seems to be 4 parts voilating the rights of states guarunteed in the Constitution, 1 part slavery for flavor.

Ok, I'm out.