Much more acceptable, although I'd add partly due to slavery.Cybrweez wrote:Oh, I guess to be clear, the south seceded due to slavery, the north fought to keep the union.
Unless the agreement preserves the power of individuals or organizations subject to the agreement to withdraw. Because States had the power to withdraw from the Union when the Constitution was created and because that power was not withdrawn from the States the power is reserved to the States under the 10th Amendment.Cybrweez wrote:Well, I said earlier, the government didn't even say they couldn't have their slaves, and Lincoln had no plans to abolish slavery. So they didn't even have to say they'll let them keep slaves, they never said they couldn't. The southern states seceded b/c they didn't like Lincoln, and thought he wanted to abolish slavery in the territories.
So, if you sign an agreement, then try to void it b/c you don't like the results, I say you're out of luck, unless you have the ability to resist the other side forcing you to keep the agreement.
Both of those suffer from the same contradictory problem, though:SerScot wrote: First, at the time of the late Unpleasantness the "bill of rights" did not apply to the State Governments or State Government Actions. It was only protection against actions by the Federal Government. This was also pre-entitlement so it's not like the citizens of the seceding States were going to lose their juicy government benefit checks or lose some protection from the State Governments because that protection didn't exist until after the 14th Amendment was passed.
Second, how are you going to get around the reservation of powers in the 10th Amendment? States had the inherent power to choose to join the Union or leave the Union when they ratified the Constitution (otherwise it would have had force and effect over all the States once 9 had ratified it). That power is not taken from the States, therefore, the power to leave is retained under the express terms of the 10th Amendment.
It was not until the passage of the 14th Amendment that individual portions of the Bill of Rights were "incorporated" to apply against the power of the several States. That took most of the 20th Century to individually apply each provision. The last (the 2nd amendment) was just last year held to apply to State power.We are of opinion, that the provision in the fifth amendment to the constitution, declaring that private property shall not be taken for public use, without just compensation, is intended solely as a limitation on the exercise of power by the *251 government of the United States, and is not applicable to the legislation of the states.
Yes, but the States wouldn't have joined in the first place if they were going to leave on a whim. As long as they remained in the Union the terms of the Supremecy clause applied and the Federal Government and Federal law (that was within Federal Power to pass) was supreme over State Law. However, if as I contend, the Union was a voluntary pact then The States could leave where and when they wished.If a state has the power to leave whenever it wishes, the Feds have no authority at all over the states.
None of which is to say the Feds don't over-reach.
When the States ratified the Constitution of 1787, they pledged that they would accept the results of elections conducted according to its rules. In violation of this pledge, the Southern States seceded because they did not like the outcome of the election of 1860. Thus secession is the interruption of the constitutional operation of republican government, substituting the rule of the minority for that of the majority.
In his July 4 address to Congress, Lincoln observed that the American "experiment" in popular government had passed two of three tests — the successful establishing and the successful administering of it. One test remained. Could popular government in America maintain itself against a "formidable internal attempt to overthrow it." It had yet to be proved, said Lincoln, that ballots were "the rightful and peaceful successors to bullets" and that "when ballots have fairly and constitutionally decided, there can be no successful appeal back to bullets."
As William Freehling has argued, the supposed right to break up the government when the minority does not get its way is really nothing but blackmail. The attempted dissolution of the Union in 1860 and 1861 was the final act in a drama that had been under way since the 1830s, only this time the blackmailers' bluff was called.
In 1833, the minority threatened secession over the tariff. The majority gave in. In 1835, it threatened secession if Congress did not prohibit discussions of slavery during its own proceedings. The majority gave in and passed a "Gag Rule." In 1850, the minority threatened secession unless Congress forced the return of fugitive slaves without a prior jury trial. The majority agreed to pass a Fugitive Slave Act. In 1854 the minority threatened secession unless the Missouri Compromise was repealed, opening Kansas to slavery. Again, the majority acquiesced rather than see the Union smashed.
But the majority could only go so far in permitting minority blackmail to override the constitutional will of the majority. At the Democratic Convention in Charleston, held in April 1860, the majority finally refused the blackmailers' demand — for a federal guarantee of slave property in all US territories (my italics). The delegates from the deep South walked out, splitting the Democratic Party and ensuring that Lincoln would be elected by a plurality.
There are two ironies here. The first is that the real "secession" was that of the South from the Democratic Party. The resulting split in the Democratic Party was instrumental in bringing about the election of Lincoln, which the South then used as the excuse for smashing the Union. The second is that the South's demand at Charleston, far from having anything to do with States' rights, was instead a call for an unprecedented expansion of federal power.
Please elaborate. You can't refer back to the Articles of Confederation. The AoC required unanimous consent to amend any provision. The Constitution was given force and effect when 9 of the 13 States ratified the document but only for those States who had ratified. Therefore, the Constitution itself was a direct abrogation of that earlier attempt to orgainize a national government.Cybrweez wrote:I think he has, by stating the idea of the Constitution was to replace Articles, which were not good enough for national govt. I think it was understood you couldn't pull out for anything, but at the very least, you had no basis to pull out when the Constitution expressly permitted something.
Nothing formal. There was talk of New England Seceeding during the war of 1812. It really hurt their shipping business.I'm curious, was the secession, due to slavery, the first time the idea came up? Maybe during the nullification debates over the tariff, although the nullify theory was different than secession, it may have be threatened as well. Anything earlier? There were certainly disagreements b/w states earlier.
And yet almost all of my post had nothing to do with the good/moral choice.SerScot wrote:Vraith,
I do not, and have never, contended that the choice to secede was a good or moral choice. It wasn't. Choosing to own people was and is wrong. My contention is that the choice of a State, a political entity that retains sovreignty, to voluntarly leave the Union was legal and Constitutional regardless of the morality or wisdom of the cause that prompted such a choice.
No, I don't see the problem. I've never argued that the right to privacy doesn't exist because it is not mentioned. I've pointed out the 9th amendment expressly states that the inumeration of rights in the Bill of Rights does not mean those rights so enumerated are the only rights possessed by citizens of the US and that it is a solid place to latch a textual argument in favor of the existence of a "right to privacy".Secession rights exist because the constitution doesn't mention it.
Privacy rights don't exist because the constitutions doesn't mention them.
