Reuters "making" the news...

[Streyeder 0]

Earlier, Dean had called for security to remove a couple of protesters who were shouting and waving the Confederate flag, a divisive symbol of racism and slavery in the South. As they were hustled out, Dean requested they not be "manhandled."

http://www.reuters.com/printerFriendlyPopu...storyID=4171476

If this were an editorial I wouldn't be so irked with it. While I agree racists wave confederate flags, this does NOT mean confederat flags are racist symbols. If racists drink milk, is drinking milk racist? But, that's not the biggest point. The worst part of this being in the article is that this a news story that is supposed to be objective. Reuters should be REPORTING the news, not MAKING it. It's an outrage and a disgrace when a major news wire service does such a disservice to our heritage.

If you would like to contact Reuters about this, here is a editor fedback link:

http://reuters-com.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/re.../site_fdbck.php

[Tiger Al 0]

When you see this flag, what do you think of?

[CCTAU 3,536]

Swastika is a pitiful example. It was created by a racist party for domination. The rebel flag was created by revolutionists to decry freedom.

Same ole, same ole. If in ain't pro minority, it's racist. Doesn't matter where it came from of what it was created to mean. A few distastful groups use it as a symbol so now its racist.

Gotta go.

Got milk in the fridge that I need to get rid of.

[Tiger Al 0]

Swastika is a pitiful example. It was created by a racist party for domination. The rebel flag was created by revolutionists to decry freedom.

Same ole, same ole. If in ain't pro minority, it's racist. Doesn't matter where it came from of what it was created to mean. A few distastful groups use it as a symbol so now its racist.

Gotta go.

Got milk in the fridge that I need to get rid of.

To decry the freedom of one group of people (Caucasians) to hold another group of people (Africans) captive against their will. That sounds like domination to me. Try again.

Back to the original question.

[MDM4AU 338]

First of all I am not a proponant of displaying the confederate flag in places other than those established for the observance of the Civil War.

That being said, Al, I see a pathetic liberal totally missing the point of a post about a news source editorializing rather than reporting the news.

Sorry!

[Tiger Al 0]

That being said, Al, I see a pathetic liberal totally missing the point of a post about a news source editorializing rather than reporting the news.

Sorry!

They're editorializing when they call a spade a spade? And, just a guess here, but, would it be me who is the 'pathetic liberal' you're talking about?

[CCTAU 3,536]

Swastika is a pitiful example. It was created by a racist party for domination. The rebel flag was created by revolutionists to decry freedom.

Same ole, same ole. If in ain't pro minority, it's racist. Doesn't matter where it came from of what it was created to mean. A few distastful groups use it as a symbol so now its racist.

Gotta go.

Got milk in the fridge that I need to get rid of.

To decry the freedom of one group of people (Caucasions) to hold another group of people (Africans) captive against their will. That sounds like domination to me. Try again.

Back to the original question.

Not much of a history buff are you. Please do some searching and you'll find tha for 224 years slavery was legal under the US Stars and Stripes. The confederate battle flag only flew for 4 years. And if you are so uneducated as to believe that the civil war was about slavery......

Here is an exerpt from a discussion on the flag:

Let me give you a quote that W Earl Douglas gave. He was a black journalist in Charleston, South Carolina and he is now dead, but here is what he said concerning the Confederate flag. "If hate had been the prevailing emotion between the races, then it is a safe bet that the Confederacy would have never been born." Did you hear what he said? If hate had been the prevailing emotions between the blacks and the whites in the South, he is saying it's a safe bet that the Confederacy would have never ever been born. I continue, "Fortunately", he says, "there was love, understanding, and compassion." Now listen to what this black man says. "And the two greatest lies ever perpetrated by history are number one that the South instigated the war and number two that it was fought by the North for the purpose of freeing the slaves! The Negro was merely used as the excuse for that War while the real reason for it is reflected in every area of our lives where the tentacles of government form the bars of a new slavery. No! Don't furl that Confederate Battle Flag. Let it wave all across the South to remind Americans that there exist here a yearning for liberty, freedom and independence that will not be denied. Let it fly as a testimonial to real men and real women who would rather work and fight and shed tears than to beg the government for charity." He understood, folks. He had more sense and more knowledge than most people today.

Some see it for what it really is. It is only racist because people like you have believed the revision of history by people (NAACP) who want to abolish anything confederate. Men and women of the south died defending their homes against a government that would over tax them and then try to enforce it.

Here is how the US government felt:

But, now wait, if you want racism, if you want hatred, if you want white supremacy, I will tell you where to find it…under the Stars and Stripes, the U.S. Flag. Not under the Confederate flag. Do you realize the Emancipation Proclamation was signed on January 1, 1863. On August 14, 1862, less than five months before the Emancipation Proclamation was signed, Abraham Lincoln invited a number of leading blacks to the White House to give them his words of wisdom and to demonstrate to them why he was attempting to colonize them back in Africa. By the way, Lincoln's Negro policy was to send them all back to Africa. That was his policy. William Seward, William Stanton, all of them the same thing. And so he invited these Negroes to come to the White House to hear his words of wisdom and I am quoting verbatim what Lincoln said, listen carefully, he says, "Why should people of your race be colonized and where? Why should they leave this country? This is perhaps the first question for proper consideration. You and we are different races. We have between us a broader difference than exists between almost any other two races. Whether it is right or wrong I need not discuss. But this physical difference is a great disadvantage to us both as I think. Your race suffers very greatly, many of them by living among us, while ours suffers from your presence. In a word, we suffer on each side. If this is admitted it affords a reason at least why we should be separated. You are free men here I suppose. Perhaps you have been long free, all of your lives. Your race is suffering, in my judgment, the greatest wrong inflicted on any people, but even when you cease to be slaves, you are yet far removed from being placed on an equality with a white race. The aspiration of men is to enjoy equality with the best when free, but on this broad continent, not a single man of your race is made the equal of a single man of our race."

So don't give me the old line about that flag being racist. That flag flew over the deaths of many good southern people BLACK and WHITE. Belive it or not, blacks fought on the side of the south without being forced. And the idea and reallity of slavery was disappearing daily. So to try and equate the confederate battle flag with racism is pure made for political agenda fodder by the NAACP. Like I told you a long time ago, just keep to the liberal agenda and you'll make sure this country loses all pride and heritage.......unless its black of course.

Here is more:

If you want to hate a flag, why not hate the Dutch flag or the Portuguese flag, or the Spanish flag? They sold slaves. And if you want to hate a flag today, how about hating the Muslim flags because even today the Muslims are still involved in slavery! I mean let's be honest. Now if you want to believe that the War of 1861 to 1865 was over slavery, I can show you two things that ought to forever correct your thinking in that area: The War was not over slavery. Slavery has only been made an issue by the liberal revisionists. It was not an issue. Let me prove to you just by two simple statements. I will give you more, but let me prove to you that the War was not fought over slavery and therefore this flag could never ever have represented slavery. You see Abraham Lincoln proposed a thirteenth amendment to the constitution. He proposed that thirteenth amendment in March of 1861. It is the only proposed constitutional amendment that was signed by a sitting President. It bears Abraham Lincoln's signature. Here was Abraham Lincoln's proposed thirteenth amendment: "No amendment shall be made to the Constitution which will authorize or give Congress the power to abolish or interfere within any state with the domestic institutions thereof, including that a person's held to labor or service by laws of said State." Did you hear that? Lincoln's proposed thirteenth amendment said Congress shall not have the power to interfere with any institutions within any state including those held to labor or service by the laws of that State. In other words, what Abraham Lincoln was saying to the South if you will accept this proposed thirteenth amendment, you may forever keep slaves. Folks, Beauregard never fired on Fort Sumter until April 9. This was in March of 1861! If the War had been about slavery and if the South wanted just to keep slaves and that was it, why fire a gun? Why fire a shot? Just simply accept this proposed thirteenth amendment and it would all be over. This resolution was passed unanimously by Congress on July 23, 1861. You may read it for yourself in the Congressional Record. Here is what this resolution says: The War is waged by the government of the United States not in the spirit of conquest or subjugation, nor for the purpose of overthrowing or interfering with the rights or institutions of the states, but to defend and protect the Union. Congress said the War is not about slavery. Lincoln said the War is not about slavery! I will even give you a thirteenth amendment that will allow you to make slavery permanent. Do you realize the South before the War was extremely wealthy. And the South before the War funded probably 75 to 80% of all the taxes. But the North wanted a 40% tariff. The South said no. The most we will ever agree to is a 10% tariff. And what Lincoln and the radical republicans were doing was this: They were saying we would give you the thirteenth amendment. We will let you keep your slaves if that is what you want. You just let us keep our tariffs. In other words, the North was willing to sell the blacks out for money, for higher taxes! They weren't interested in the slaves.

Man I'm tired. Believe what you want. I'll still fly it if I feel the need on confederate day or whenever. But I don't think of any race other than that of the southerner, black or white, who died defending his freedoms. But then again, I'm just racist!

And to sum it all up:

There have been numerous warnings down through history concerning our flag and concerning our heritage and our culture. One of those warnings came from General Patrick Clever. I want to read to you what General Patrick Clever said in January of 1864. And he was warning the South in regards to subjugation. You talk about a prophet, listen carefully. General Clever said this: "If the South lost it means that the history of this heroic struggle will be written by the enemy. That our youth will be trained by Northern school teachers, will learn from Northern school books their version of the war, will be impressed by all of the influences of History and Education to regard our gallant debt as traitors and our maimed veterans as fit subjects for derision." Folks let me tell you that is exactly what has happened in this country. You pick up any textbook that you want to pick up and it will just simply say, the War was over slavery, the North was right and the South was wrong. And most folks believe that junk. They have been taught it. The War was not over slavery, not over slavery at all. One of my favorite stories is about a reconstructed Southerner who ran into Mildred Lewis Rutherford. Mildred Lewis Rutherford was one of the finest Southern Historians that you could ever come across. I believe she died in 1928. But this one reconstructed Southerner said to Mrs. Rutherford, he said, "My father was a Confederate soldier, but had he lived, I am sure he would have regretted having fought for the wrong side." To which Mrs. Rutherford replied: "Far more probably he would have regretted having a son so disloyal to the principles for which he was willing to give his life". The Confederate flag is not a racist flag. The Confederate flag is not a flag of slavery.

[AUloggerhead 2,516]

When you see this flag, what do you think of?

National Socialists ... aka Big Government Socialists ... aka The Party that favors a Strong Centralized Government that believes in gun control, favors pagan over established religions, overreaching government control in all facets of citizen's lives, demands unity of thought, and abhors free market economics. You see where I'm going with this, don't you?

[Weagle98 119]

Black Confederates

During our War of 1861, ex-slave Frederick Douglass observed, "There are at the present moment, many colored men in the Confederate Army doing duty not only as cooks, servants and laborers, but as real soldiers, having muskets on their shoulders and bullets in their pockets, ready to shoot down . . . and do all that soldiers may do to destroy the Federal government."

Dr. Lewis Steiner, a Union Sanitary Commission employee who lived through the Confederate occupation of Frederick, Maryland said, "Most of the Negroes . . . were manifestly an integral portion of the Southern Confederacy Army." Erwin L. Jordan's book Black Confederates and Afro-Yankees in Civil War Virginia cites eyewitness accounts of the Antietam campaign of "armed blacks in rebel columns bearing rifles, sabers, and knives and carrying knapsacks and haversacks." After the Battle of Seven Pines in June 1862, Union soldiers said that "two black Confederate regiments not only fought but showed no mercy to the Yankee dead or wounded whom they mutilated, murdered and robbed."

In April 1861, a Petersburg, Virginia newspaper proposed "three cheers for the patriotic free Negroes of Lynchburg" after 70 blacks offered "to act in whatever capacity may be assigned to them" in defense of Virginia. Erwin L. Jordan cites one case where a captured group of white slave owners and blacks were offered freedom if they would take an oath of allegiance to the United States. One free black indignantly replied, "I can't take no such oaf as dat. I'm a secesh n****r." A slave in the group upon learning that his master refused to take the oath said, "I can't take no oath dat Massa won't take." A second slave said, "I ain't going out here on no dishonorable terms." One of the slave owners took the oath but his slave, who didn't take the oath, returning to Virginia under a flag of truce, expressed disgust at his master's disloyalty saying, "Massa had no principles."

Horace Greeley, in pointing out some differences between the two warring armies said, "For more than two years, Negroes have been extensively employed in belligerent operations by the Confederacy. They have been embodied and drilled as rebel soldiers and had paraded with white troops at a time when this would not have been tolerated in the armies of the Union." General Nathan Bedford Forrest had both slaves and freemen serving in units under his command. After the war, General Forrest said of the black men who served under him "[T]hese boys stayed with me . . . and better Confederates did not live." Southern generals owned slaves but northern generals owned them as well. General Ulysses Grant's slaves had to await for the Thirteenth Amendment for freedom. When asked why he didn't free his slaves earlier, General Grant said,"Good help is so hard to come by these days."

These are but a few examples of the important role that blacks served, both as slaves and freemen in the Confederacy during the War Between the States. The flap over the Confederate Flag is not quite as simple as the nation's race experts make it. They want us to believe the flag is a symbol of racism. Yes, racists have used the Confederate Flag, but racists have also used the Bible and the U.S. Flag. Should we get rid of the Bible and lower the U.S. Flag? Black civil rights activists and their white liberal supporters who're attacking the Confederate Flag have committed a deep, despicable dishonor to our patriotic black ancestors who marched, fought and died to protect their homeland from what they saw as Northern aggression. They don't deserve the dishonor.

Walter E. Williams

Walter Williams Home Page

[channonc 466]

The Confederate Flag did not start out as a symbol of hatred or racism. Unfortunately, a few groups have used the flag as a symbol of hatred and racism. This has given the flag a bad rap. When I see the Confederate Flag, I do not see hatred, instead I do see it as a symbol of states rights.

I understand how the flag can be offensive to some based on its misuse and misrepresentation. For that reason, I really only support flying the flag around Civil War memorials and other historical references.

[TitanTiger 21,238]

I think the reporter would have been more accurate (and less op-ed) if he had instead said:

"...and waving the Confederate flag, viewed by some, particularly in the African American community, as a divisive symbol of racism and slavery in the South."

or this shorter version;

"...and waving the Confederate flag, viewed by some as a divisive symbol of racism and slavery in the South."

The point being, the flag means different things to different people. I can understand why black folks view it the way they do. It's not like they see that symbol and think of cotillians and mint juleps on the veranda. They think of being forced to serve and clean up at the cotillions, serve the mint juleps on the veranda, and other tasks such as picking cotton. Not exactly happy memories.

But a lot of Southern whites see the Confederacy through something other than the simple prism of slavery. They see some of the good things that got thrown out with the bathwater. They see a way of life worth preserving (minus the slavery), they see a less restrictive federal government and more personal freedom, among other things.

The reporter, in not acknowledging the depth and complexity of the issue, did a disservice to his readers by slipping out of objective reporting and into simplistic editorializing.

[Tiger Al 0]

Wow! And to think I've had it wrong all these years! So, you mean to say that the slaves really weren't slaves in the fullest sense of the word? They were free to come and go wherever and whenever they wanted? To vote and own property and get an education and earn a wage for the work they produced? The south was actually fighting to keep them free and not fighting for the state's right to hold them in captivity, like the NAACP taught me?

Gosh. I feel betrayed. And the slave codes were there as, what, some unenforced rules that they just simply hadn't removed from the books yet? So, when it said that a freed negro wasn't allowed to live in Alabama, that's not REALLY what it meant, was it? I mean, they were FREED so they could live anywhere they wanted, right? And when it talks of groups of three or more slaves in a group having to have their master or his representative present, they didn't really mean MASTER so much as they meant EMPLOYER, is that it? And the ones that were volunteered, oops, I mean, that volunteered, for the army really didn't have to abide by those silly laws, either, because they were freed, too, right? They were fighting to maintain their freedom on the plantation?

[TitanTiger 21,238]

Which part of "minus the slavery" did you not catch, TigerAl? Can you not fathom that some people see a lot of good in the concept of the Confederacy, though they disagree with the emphasis on maintaining slavery?

All I tried to show you was that the Confederate flag has different connotations to different people. Therefore, the characterization by the reporter as it simply being a "divisive symbol of racism and slavery in the South" is not objective reporting, but editorializing.

[Tiger Al 0]

Which part of "minus the slavery" did you not catch, TigerAl? Can you not fathom that some people see a lot of good in the concept of the Confederacy, though they disagree with the emphasis on maintaining slavery?

All I tried to show you was that the Confederate flag has different connotations to different people. Therefore, the characterization by the reporter as it simply being a "divisive symbol of racism and slavery in the South" is not objective reporting, but editorializing.

Minus the slavery, what concept would have been so compelling as to break up a country? The mint julips?

[TitanTiger 21,238]

I'm not saying that breaking up the country was the correct approach. But I am saying that the Southern states had some legitimate gripes with how the Northern states were working things in Congress to gain advantages over the South economically. Slavery was only one component of it (although it was the proverbial final straw).

The country was much different than it is now. Technology has enabled most states to compete on a pretty equal basis...at least compared to back then. Northern states were rightfully upset at the economic advantage that slavery was allowing the South to have in areas of agriculture. But they were going beyond that and trying to push through other economic punitive measures (to the South) that would hurt the South's ability to compete. There were other states' rights issues that the North was trying to usurp as well.

I don't have the time to go into every detail of why the South seceded. I don't agree that they should have. This isn't a defense of slavery or seccession. It's simply an attempt (however futile), to show that symbols generally don't have just one meaning...something this reporter failed to recognize when he offered his own take on the issue. Just as seeing a Malcolm X t-shirt means one thing to a militant black Muslim, one thing to a young black person who admires the stance he took and the transformation he underwent later in life, and another to a white person who recalls being referred to as a "devil" by Malcolm and those who followed after his views pre-enlightenment.

To write a story and simply say, "the teen proudly displayed a Malcolm X t-shirt, a divisive symbol of black racism and militancy..." would be a similar error.

[Tiger Al 0]

Slavery was the major component to the secession. Take slavery out of the equation and there's no civil war. With the passage of the Misouri Compromise and the Kansas-Nebraska Act, the overwhelming minority the south was becoming in the House of Representatives due to migration and immigration into the industrial north and the rising voice of abolitionists made the writing on the wall very discernable for the south.

State's rights became an issue as the states felt they had the right to determine if they would permit slavery, not the federal government, and, if not allowed to, then the right to secede from the union as a result. The north's fight was primarily one of preservation of the country as a whole, not necessarily the abolition of slavery, although, the vast majority of slave owners were in the south and the only states that allowed blacks to vote were in the north. The perception of slavery and its acceptance as an institution were in great decline in the north.

But, again, if you don't have the issue of slavery then you don't have the civil war.

[TitanTiger 21,238]

Like I said, many people agree with the South's view of states rights, even if they disagree with it's application back then (slavery). The main point stands...symbols have different associations to different people. And to write an article and only give one slanted association any merit is unprofessional. Another similarly egregious example:

"...the star of David, a divisive symbol of Zionist hegemony, was prominently displayed..."

[CarolinaTiger 0]

all this discussion overlooks the irony of it all...dean wanted to be the candidate of those w/ confederate flags in their pickups...yet when they show up at a rally, they're 'escorted' out!

[Tiger Al 0]

all this discussion overlooks the irony of it all...dean wanted to be the candidate of those w/ confederate flags in their pickups...yet when they show up at a rally, they're 'escorted' out!

That's the sad truth.

[Tigermike 3,711]

all this discussion overlooks the irony of it all...dean wanted to be the candidate of those w/ confederate flags in their pickups...yet when they show up at a rally, they're 'escorted' out!

[CCTAU 3,536]

Slavery was the major component to the secession. Take slavery out of the equation and there's no civil war. With the passage of the Misouri Compromise and the Kansas-Nebraska Act, the overwhelming minority the south was becoming in the House of Representatives due to migration and immigration into the industrial north and the rising voice of abolitionists made the writing on the wall very discernable for the south.

State's rights became an issue as the states felt they had the right to determine if they would permit slavery, not the federal government, and, if not allowed to, then the right to secede from the union as a result. The north's fight was primarily one of preservation of the country as a whole, not necessarily the abolition of slavery, although, the vast majority of slave owners were in the south and the only states that allowed blacks to vote were in the north. The perception of slavery and its acceptance as an institution were in great decline in the north.

But, again, if you don't have the issue of slavery then you don't have the civil war.

Once again you speaketh total Bull$hit. Please read my post obove and you will see that once again you speak with an ignorant view. Here, I will repost the little part that disputes your "without slavery there would be no war" theory:

You see Abraham Lincoln proposed a thirteenth amendment to the constitution. He proposed that thirteenth amendment in March of 1861. It is the only proposed constitutional amendment that was signed by a sitting President. It bears Abraham Lincoln's signature. Here was Abraham Lincoln's proposed thirteenth amendment: "No amendment shall be made to the Constitution which will authorize or give Congress the power to abolish or interfere within any state with the domestic institutions thereof, including that a person's held to labor or service by laws of said State." Did you hear that? Lincoln's proposed thirteenth amendment said Congress shall not have the power to interfere with any institutions within any state including those held to labor or service by the laws of that State. In other words, what Abraham Lincoln was saying to the South if you will accept this proposed thirteenth amendment, you may forever keep slaves. Folks, Beauregard never fired on Fort Sumter until April 9. This was in March of 1861! If the War had been about slavery and if the South wanted just to keep slaves and that was it, why fire a gun? Why fire a shot? Just simply accept this proposed thirteenth amendment and it would all be over. This resolution was passed unanimously by Congress on July 23, 1861. You may read it for yourself in the Congressional Record. Here is what this resolution says: The War is waged by the government of the United States not in the spirit of conquest or subjugation, nor for the purpose of overthrowing or interfering with the rights or institutions of the states, but to defend and protect the Union. Congress said the War is not about slavery. Lincoln said the War is not about slavery! I will even give you a thirteenth amendment that will allow you to make slavery permanent

[Tiger Al 0]

And I can find Nazi apologists that can wax nostalgic on the virtues of the Third Reich, too. Doesn't change the fact that when you see their flag it has come to represent the murder of Jews.

The guy in your article is getting all worked up over an amendment that never happened and seems to forget one thing: The south had already seceded from the union at the time he alledges that Lincoln had signed his 'proposal.'

But, I know that's not good enough for you. Slavery had nothing to do with the south seceding. It seems that George Williamson-Commissioner of the State of Louisiana in 1861 must've been schooled by the NAACP as well. Here's what he says to the Texas Secession Convention March 9, 1861:

"Louisiana looks to the formation of a Southern confederacy to preserve the blessings of African slavery, and of the free institutions of the founders of the Federal Union, bequeathed to their posterity. As her neighbor and sister State, she desires the hearty co-operation of Texas in the formation of a Southern Confederacy. She congratulates herself on the recent disposition evinced by your body to meet this wish, by the election of delegates to the Montgomery convention.

Texas affords to the commerce of Louisiana a large portion of her products, and in exchange the banks of New Orleans furnish Texas with her only paper circulating medium. Louisiana supplies to Texas a market for her surplus wheat, grain and stock; both States have large areas of fertile, uncultivated lands, peculiarly adapted to slave labor; and they are both so deeply interested in African slavery that it may be said to be absolutely necessary to their existence, and is the keystone to the arch of their prosperity.

The people of Louisiana would consider it a most fatal blow to African slavery, if Texas either did not secede or having seceded should not join her destinies to theirs in a Southern Confederacy. If she remains in the union the abolitionists would continue their work of incendiarism and murder. Emigrant aid societies would arm with Sharp's rifles predatory bands to infest her northern borders. The Federal Government would mock at her calamity in accepting the recent bribes in the army bill and Pacific railroad bill, and with abolition treachery would leave her unprotected frontier to the murderous inroads of hostile savages.

The people of the slaveholding States are bound together by the same necessity and determination to preserve African slavery. The isolation of any one of them from the others would make her a theatre for abolition emissaries from the North and from Europe. Her existence would be one of constant peril to herself and of imminent danger to other neighboring slave-holding communities. A decent respect for the opinions and interests of the Gulf States seems to indicate that Texas should co-operate with them. I am authorized to say to your honorable body that Louisiana does not expect any beneficial result from the peace conference now assembled at Washington.

Her interests are identical with Texas and the seceding States. With them she will at present co-operate, hoping and believing in his own good time God will awaken the people of the border States to the vanity of asking for, or depending upon, guarantees or compromises wrung from a people whose consciences are too sublimated to be bound by that sacred compact, the constitution of the late United States. That constitution the Southern States have never violated, and taking it as the basis of our new government we hope to form a slave-holding confederacy that will secure to us and our remotest posterity the great blessings its authors designed in the Federal Union. With the social balance wheel of slavery to regulate its machinery, we may fondly indulge the hope that our Southern government will be perpetual."

He seemed pretty intent on the fact that slavery was a key issue as to whether Texas should secede from the Union. How about Alabama? This is from a speech of E.S. Dargan at the Secession Convention of Alabama

January 11, 1861:

I wish, Mr. President, to express the feelings with which I vote for the secession of Alabama from the Government of the United States; and to state, in a few words, the reasons that impel me to this act.

I feel impelled, Mr. President, to vote for this Ordinance by an overruling necessity. Years ago I was convinced that the Southern States would be compelled either to separate from the North, by dissolving the Federal Government, or they would be compelled to abolish the institution of African Slavery. This, in my judgment, was the only alternative; and I foresaw that the South would be compelled, at some day, to make her selection. The day is now come, and Alabama must make her selection, either to secede from the Union, and assume the position of a sovereign, independent State, or she must submit to a system of policy on the part of the Federal Government that, in a short time, will compel her to abolish African Slavery.

Mr. President, if pecuniary loss alone were involved in the abolition of slavery, I should hesitate long before I would give the vote I now intend to give. If the destruction of slavery entailed on us poverty alone, I could bear it, for I have seen poverty and felt its sting. But poverty, Mr. President, would be one of the least of the evils that would befall us from the abolition of African slavery. There are now in the slaveholding States over four millions of slaves; dissolve the relation of master and slave, and what, I ask, would become of that race? To remove them from amongst us is impossible. History gives us no account of the exodus of such a number of persons. We neither have a place to which to remove them, nor the means of such removal. They therefore must remain with us; and if the relation of master and slave be dissolved, and our slaves turned loose amongst us without restraint, they would either be destroyed by our own hands-- the hands to which they look, and look with confidence, for protection-- or we ourselves would become demoralized and degraded.

Well, how humanitarian of Mr. Dargan. He says Alabama needs to preserve slavery, not so much for monetary gain, but, because of the social ramifications of releasing them.

How about Tennessee Governor Isham Harris, speaking to the Tennessee Secession Convention on January 7, 1861:

The States entered the Union upon terms of perfect political equality, each delegating certain powers to the General Government, but neither deterring any power to the other to interfere with its reserved rights or domestic affairs; hence, there is no power on earth which can rightfully determine whether slavery shall or shall not exist within the limits of any State, except the people thereof acting in their highest sovereign capacity.

As slavery receded from the North, it was followed by the most violent and fanatical opposition. At first the anti-slavery cloud, which now overshadows the nation, was no larger than a man's hand. Most of you can remember, with vivid distinctness, those days of brotlierhood,.when throughout the whole North, the abolitionist was justly regarded as an enemy of his country. Weak, diminutive and contemptible as was this part in the purer days of the Republic, it has now grown to collossal proportions, and its recent rapid strides to power, have given it possession of the.present House of Representatives, and elected one of its leaders to the Presidency of the United States; and in the progress of events, the Senate and Supreme Court must also soon pass into the hands of this party--a party upon whose revolutionary banner is inscribed, "No more slave States, no more slave Territory, no return of the fugitive to his master"--an "irrepressible conflict" between the Free and Slave States; "and whether it, be long or short, peaceful or bloody, the struggle shall go on, until the sun shall not rise upon a master or set upon a slave

Plain and unmistakable as is the duty of each State to deliver up the fugitive slave to his owner, yet the attempt to reclaim is at the peril of the master's life. These evils can be obviated to a great extent, if not entirely, by the following amendments to the Constitution:

Ist. Establish a line upon the northern boundary of the present Slave States, and extend it through the Territories to the Pacific Ocean, upon such parallel of latitude as will divide them equitably between the North-and South, expressly providing that all the territory now owned, or that may be hereafter acquired North of that line, shall be forever free, and all South of it forever slave. This will remove the question of existence or nonexistence of slavery in our States and Territories entirely and forever from the arena of politics. The question being settled by the Constitution, is no longer open for the politician to ride into position by appealing to fanatical prejudices, or assailing the rights of his neighbors.

2d. In addition to the fugitive slave clause provide, that when slave has been demanded of the executive authority of the State to which he has fled, if lie is not delivered, and the owner permitted to carry him out of the State in peace, that the State so failing to deliver, shall pay to the owner double the value of such slave, and secure his right of action in the Supreme Court of the United States. This will secure the return of the slave to his owner, or his value, with a sufficient sum to indemnify him for the expenses necessarily incident to the recovery.

3d. Provide for the protection of the owner in the peaceable possession of his slave while in transitoin, or temporarily sojourning in any of the States of the Confederacy; and in the event of the slave's escape or being taken from the owner, require the State to return, or account for him as in case of the furitive.

4th. Expressly prohibit Congress from abolishing slavery in the District of Colimbia, in any dock yard, navy yard, arsenal, or district of any character whatever, within the limits of any slave State.

5th. That these provisions shall never be changed, except by the consent of all the slave States.

With these amendments to the Constitution, I should feel that our rights Were reasonably secure, not only in theory, but in fact, and should indulge the hope of living in the Union in peace. Without these, or some other amendments, which promise an equal amount and certainty of security, there is no hope of peace or security in the government.

If the non-slaveholding States refuse to comply with a demand so just and reasonable ; refuse to abandon at once and forever their unjust war upon us, our institutions, and our rights ; refuse, as they have heretofore done, to perform, in good faith, the obligations of the compact of union, much as we may appreciate the power, prosperity, greatness and glory of this government; deeply as we deplore the existence of causes which have already driven one State from the Union ; much as we may regret the imperative necessity which they have wantonly and wickedly forced upon us, every consideration of self-respect require that we should assert and maintain our "equality in the Union, or independence out of it."

In my opinion, the only mode left us of perpetuating the Union upon the principles of justice and equality, upon which it was originally established, is by the Southern States, identified as they are in interest, sentiment, and feeling, and must, in the natural course of events, share a common destiny, uniting in the expression of a fixed and unalterable resolve, that the rights guaranteed by the Constitution must be respected, and fully and perfectly secured in the present government, or asserted and maintained in a homogeneous Confederacy of Southern States.

Sounds like he thought that slavery was on the outs and, to preserve it, secession was necessary.

Mississippi, the land of Jefferson Davis, had this to say in its Declaration of Causes for Seceding States:

Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin.

Slavery: the greatest material interest in the world. They wanted to perpetuate slavery because only black people can work in the hot sun.

The Georgia Declaration of Clauses to Secede:

The prohibition of slavery in the Territories, hostility to it everywhere, the equality of the black and white races, disregard of all constitutional guarantees in its favor, were boldly proclaimed by its leaders and applauded by its followers.

With these principles on their banners and these utterances on their lips the majority of the people of the North demand that we shall receive them as our rulers.

The prohibition of slavery in the Territories is the cardinal principle of this organization.

For forty years this question has been considered and debated in the halls of Congress, before the people, by the press, and before the tribunals of justice. The majority of the people of the North in 1860 decided it in their own favor. We refuse to submit to that judgment, and in vindication of our refusal we offer the Constitution of our country and point to the total absence of any express power to exclude us. We offer the practice of our Government for the first thirty years of its existence in complete refutation of the position that any such power is either necessary or proper to the execution of any other power in relation to the Territories. We offer the judgment of a large minority of the people of the North, amounting to more than one-third, who united with the unanimous voice of the South against this usurpation; and, finally, we offer the judgment of the Supreme Court of the United States, the highest judicial tribunal of our country, in our favor. This evidence ought to be conclusive that we have never surrendered this right. The conduct of our adversaries admonishes us that if we had surrendered it, it is time to resume it.

They seceded because of slavery, too. What about the CSA's Constitution? Well, it reads much like the one that they claimed they had no obligation to abide by with some exceptions. The first eight sections talk about what powers go to who, who makes up the House and the Senate and so on. But, when you get to section 9, some interesting rules come about:

Section 9. 1-The importation of negroes of the African race from any foreign country other than the slaveholding States or Territories of the United States of America, is hereby forbidden; and Congress is required to pass such laws as shall effectually prevent the same.

2-Congress shall also have power to prohibit the introduction of slaves from any State not a member of, or Territory not belonging to, this Confederacy.

3-The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it.

4-No bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves shall be passed.

Three of the first four dealt with slaves.

Nah, slavery wasn't an issue to the south. They were just good ol' boys, never meaning no harm, right? They were fighting for freedom and states' rights, huh?

Question is, whose freedom and whose rights? Not the slaves. Slavery was big business and big money and by ending it, the south stood to lose big so the only choice was to secede. You should've paid more attention in school instead of listening to mental contortionists who try every trick they know to avoid seeing the elephant in their living room. But, please, hang on to your confederate gear. It makes you and yours more readily identifiable.

[rexbo 104]

Even though I was raised in Montgomery, the first Capital of the Confederacy, and told my whole life that the Civil War was about 'States Rights' and not about slavery, I always had that simple doubt that any youngster would have, slavery before the war, no slavery after the war, therefore Civil War ended slavery. That is a fact, and once you can accept that, it doesn't take a genius to see that most of if not all of the differences between the north and the south at that time in our history were due to the disagreement over slavery. While Lincoln didn't declare war on the successionist States with the statement "end slavery or we will defeat you", there can be no doubt from any elementary study of American History that the slavery issue was the reason the southern States succeeded, leading to the Civil War when Lincoln tried to bring them back in.

While personally I am a great believer in 'States Rights' and a smaller Federal Government, there is no doubt that Lincoln did the right thing in 1860 to reunite the United States; and to end the horrible centuries long practice of slavery in North America.

[CCTAU 3,536]

Keep reading the revised version of history and pretty soon you too will be all aboard for slave reparations. Like the man said, history will be re-written by the victors. Lincoln didn't care about slaves, the US didn't care about slaves, nobody did. They were the last reason. The people you quote repesented only about 10% of the population of the south. You act like everybody had a slave. In 10 years time slavery would have been abolished anyway. Industrialization and the cost of operating in that type of society would have ended it.

So Lincoln didn't sign that proclamation before secession, huh? Did you even go look in the archives. For you people always looking for a victim, there will always be slavery.

The south was being taxed more than the north. Just like most civil wars, it was about economics. I and many other know that slavery was JUST another issue, not THE issue. But you keep believing that.

And oh yeah, there was slavery before the war and not after. Yeah that sums it up. Sounds like an elementary school argument also.

Here is another intelligent look at the causeS of the war not THE cause.

LINK

[rexbo 104]

Keep reading the revised version of history and pretty soon you too will be all aboard for slave reparations.

Just like most civil wars, it was about economics. I and many other know that slavery was JUST another issue, not THE issue.

I am one of the most conservative people on this board, I would move to Mexico, or Iraq or just about anywhere before 1 cent of my money went to pay any reparations, but I am also smart enough to study history and see that there was a huge conflict in this country in the mid 1800s and it was due primarily to slavery. And you are right, it was economics, ending slavery would have destroyed the economy of the south, that is why they left the Union. To quote directly from your linked article;

Convinced that Lincoln would ruin the South economically, possibly by freeing the slaves, the heartland of the South withdrew from the Union.

I have argued long and hard with TigerAl on this board, but this is one we have no disagreement with.

To say the Civil War and slavery are not connected is like saying that the Iraqi War was not connected to terrorism and the threat of weapons of mass destruction. Saying the Civil War was only about slavery is also incorrect, it is more complicated than that, just like saying the Iraqi War was only about freeing the Iraqis and stopping the filling of the mass graves.