Re: Some May Call It Treason. My Last Post on this topic - Mike
Subject: Re: Some May Call It Treason. My Last Post on this topic
From: Mike
Date: October 18, 1999

Sylvia,  first of all I apologize for not signing my name, an oversight,
the 'Deo Vindice' was a signature and also thank you for your enlightened
response to my post.

You stated:
>In creating your picture of the South both before and after the
> Civil War, you have created a North that is a stereotype as well.

My intent was not to stereotype but to present issues that are rarely
presented in textbooks or in history classrooms, which leads to the South
being stereotyped.   My attempt was to communicate that there was and is an
historical myth about the War for Southern Independence and  has been for
almost 140 years of a 'northern savior' that needed to come and defeat an
'evil South'.

  I agree with you that copies of the Constitution were being burned
> in the streets of some northern cities, primarily because the arsonists
> saw it as a document which supported the slavery they condemned.  Those
> very same people were in a minority there.

I don't believe either that all Northerners were burning copies the
Constitution.  But the ones that were of this group  would later have great
influence on Lincoln.  Though Lincoln abhorred the abolitionist, he would
accept them as a part of his strategy to defeat the South.  Though a
minority, they were very influential in how the South was perceived in the
North and how the North was perceived in the South.

As for Robert E. Lee, he opposed secession and he did free his
> slaves.  He is a man I very much admire--more so than Grant; but that
> doesn't mean what he did was right and that it wasn't treason.  Giving
> aid and comfort to the enemy and fighting against the United States is
> defined as treason.

Again, I respectfully disagree.  There are two reasons why this view might
be held.    1.  One must accept the federal government at that time as
legitimate and 2.  Deny that the Confederate States of America(CSA) was a
separate nation.  I disagree on both counts.  Nor do I believe, if the
Founding Fathers were alive at that time that they would  have agreed
either, for this reason.  The country was not chronologically  distant from
its break with England. This break was due to the tyranny( the abuse of
centralized power, kingship) that the colonies endured and thus the
Revolutionary War. Though the United States did not have a king, the federal
powers were becoming stronger.  The very thing that many of the Founding
Fathers feared and did not want to see happen.  The Constitution severely
limited federal power for that reason, the fear of tyranny.  Just because
the federal government still held the name 'United States of America' in
1860 didn't mean it was the same institution as when it began in 1776 even
though the governmental form was still  the same.   Instead of a 'nation of
sovereign States'  as the Constitution states we are, the country was
becoming more and more a nation of states as it is today, a radical
departure from when the nation started and how the Founding Fathers viewed
the relationship between the States and the federal government.  Though
without a king, the power was becoming more and more centralized into the
hands of the few federalist. We must view the Constitution through the eyes
of its writers, its historical context, in order to understand what the
Founding Fathers meant when they wrote it, not through our modern cultural
interpretation.

The South sought to put back into place in the Southern Confederacy(stronger
state powers) the very thing it believed had been diminished by the federal
government's desire for stronger centralization of power.  Also, keep in
mind that it was some of the northern states that first threatened to secede
From the union earlier in the 19th century.  They surely felt they were
justified in their grievances(or why would have they chosen to begin the
venture of secession) and no doubt would not have called this secessionist
venture an act of treason, they felt justified and believed the Constitution
gave them the legal right, which it did.  They never did secede but the fact
 they believed they had a legal right to do so speaks volumes. Now some
forty years later when the Southern States opted to secede it was deemed
wrong.


As for the Emancipation  Proclamation, it freed very few slaves, if any.
It was essentially a
> propaganda document aimed at keeping France and Great Britain from
> intervening.

(From a moral point).....  Lincoln chose only to 'emancipate' Southern
slaves.  If the North cared so much about the issue of slavery, which is
what the North stated as the primary reason for the War, then why did
Lincoln announce an executive edict  made only to Southern slaves and not to
all slaves both North and South, when, in their eyes, the ENTIRE institution
of slavery was what needed to be destroyed?  As an executive edict the LAW
of the United States said, slaves under Confederate control were free, those
under federal control  would maintain their slave status as before.

      Do you imagine that there was such a thing as the Solid South, that
> every person in the south at the time of the Civil War supported se
> cession.  The vote for secession was close in many of the southern
> states.

Agreed,  but once the War began most Southerners viewed northern aggression
as an attack on their homeland and it galvanized many Southerners to defend
their States and the South.

      I agree with you that slavery was changing because of the
> Industrial Revolution but whether that meant an end to slavery or not is
> a open question.

Historically slavery was being eliminated.  It would end by the late 1800s
though out the Americas.  There was disagreement in the South over what to
do about slavery.  In 1841-2 Virginia voted on whether to emancipate slaves.
They found one of the problems in emancipation was, what were they going to
do with the slaves once freed.  If the North was so concerned about the
emancipation of Southern slaves, which we now know as a whole they were not,
then where were they when some Southern States, such as Virginia,  were
trying to deal with this problem.  Many northern states were passing laws
undermining attempts to deal with the slave issue by not allowing slaves to
reside in their Northern states.  Many Northerners feared emancipation and
the intrusion of slaves into their lives. Criticism on one hand and no
desire to help on the other.    My point is that there was no one belief
system about slavery in the South neither was there in the North.   In areas
of the South attitudes were changing about slavery because of political,
social and economic changes.  The historical push to end slavery was
underway worldwide.  It was only a mater of time before it ended in the
South.  So was it necessary for 600,000 men to die on the battlefield or
could it have been avoided and the slavery issue handled as well? To answer
my own question, yes it could have been handled differently and more justly.
But I do not believe it would have stop the War because the War was fought
over two more fundamental issues than slavery, 1. Rival of cultures which
includes religious views and 2. Which section of the country was the true
heirs of the Founding Fathers and the upholders of the ideals they spelled
out in the Constitution.

Most Sincerely,

Mike

[email protected]

==== SCROOTS Mailing List ====




Go To:  #,  A,  B,  C,  D,  E,  F,  G,  H,  I,  J,  K,  L,  M,  N,  O,  P,  Q,  R,  S,  T,  U,  V,  W,  X,  Y,  Z,  Main