The Legality of Secession in Antebellum America

[Tolkien R.R.J]

Secession

“Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right—a right which, we hope and believe, is to liberate the world. Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people that can may revolutionize, and make their own of so much of the territory as they inhabit. More than this, a majority of any portion of such people may revolutionize, putting down a minority, intermingled with, or near about them, who may oppose their movement. Such minority was precisely the case of the Tories of our own Revolution. It is a quality of revolutions not to go by old lines, or old laws; but to break up both, and make new ones.”
-Abraham Lincoln The War With Mexico: Speech in the United States House of Representatives 1848

“The tree of liberty must refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”
-Thomas Jefferson

“The South maintained with the depth of religious conviction that the Union formed under the Constitution was a Union of consent and not of force; that the original States were not the creatures but the creators of the Union; that these States had gained their independence, their freedom, and their sovereignty from the mother country, and had not surrendered these on entering the Union; that by the express terms of the Constitution all rights and powers not delegated were reserved to the States; and the South challenged the North to find one trace of authority in that Constitution for invading and coercing a sovereign State.-the one for liberty in the union of the States, the other for liberty in the independence of the States.”
-John B Gordon Confederate General Reminiscences of the Civil War


The right to self govern is maybe the most fundamental American right there is. It is what led to the revolution. America prior to 1860 maintained a confederation of sovereign states. These states were self governing and independent. The right to succession has been a fundamental right of sovereign states in American history. It has been more common of northern states in America prior to 1860, to discuss or threatened succession. Lincoln turned history on its head and declared the nation created the states and states had no right to leave the union. He also declared the entire people [not the states simple democracy] created the union.

“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
— That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government” -Declaration of Independence

The declaration of Independence says “These colonies are, and ought to be free and independent States.” The deceleration is itself a succession document. When the revolution ended the king of England made a peace treaty with each and every state, not with one American nation. Under the articles of confederation article 1 section 2. “Each state retains its sovereignty freedom and Independence.” This is at odds with Lincolns view. Madison said “The truth is, that the great principle of the Constitution proposed by the convention may be considered less as absolutely new, than as the expansion of principles which are found in the articles of Confederation.” but even so, some will say the peoples of the states gave up sovereignty when they ratified the Constitution.

"The Union was formed by the voluntary agreement of the states; and these, in uniting together, have not forfeited their nationality, nor have they been reduced to the condition of one and the same people. If one of the states chooses to withdraw from the compact, it would be difficult to disapprove its right of doing so, and
the Federal Government would have no means of maintaining its claims directly either by force or right.
-Alexis de Tocqueville Democracy in America

The first draft of the preamble to the constitution read “we the people of the states of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode island etc.. when they realized not all states might adopt it, they left out the states to ratify as they chose to. The constitution was than ratified by the states, not the American people. During the Virginia ratification Patrick Henry [anti federalist] warned “we the people” instead of “we the states” would lead to a consolidated national government. Federalist Governor Edmund Randolf [and later federalist Madison and Pendelton] assured him “we the people was to be understood as “we the people of each ratifying state.” and saw his objection as trivial since it would be assumed the people of the states were those referred to.

“It will be a federal and not a national act... the act of the people, as forming so many independent states, not as forming one aggregate nation, is obvious from this single consideration, that it is the result neither from the decision of a majority of the people of the union, nor from the majority of states.”
-James Madison

John Randolph of Roanoke said in a speech in congress in 1823 “gentlemen may say what they please of the preamble of the Constitution, but this Constitution is not the work of the amalgamated population of then existing confederacy, but the offspring of the states.” The self governing sovereign people of the individual states appointed representative from each state to ratify the constitution it was not a majority vote nor the Philadelphia convention that ratified the Constitution.

“We thew people does not constitute a people separate from the states, for the same reason that the peoples of the representative states do not exist independent of the national community.”
--Marshall L Derosa the Confederate Constitution of 1861 University of Missouri Press 1991

“The power to coerce a State into obedience to the federal authority, was distinctly proposed in the convention which framed the Constitution of the United States, to be a part of the Constitution, and it was as distincly rejected. Such a power was totally inconsistent with the whole theory of the Constitution, which was — that the Constitution was a compact between the States.”
-Report on the confederate committee of foreign affairs 1861

The states existed prior to and created the constitution out of their own free will. In federalist #39 James Madison “The father of the constitution” said the constitution was ratified by the people “Not as individuals composing one entire nation, but as composing the distinct and independent states to which they respectively belong” “states were considered a sovereign body, independent of all others, and only bound by its own voluntary act.” Virginia, New York and Rhode Island reserved the right to succeed from the union before ratifying the constitution.

“The laws of Congress are restricted to a certain sphere, and when they depart from this sphere, they are no longer supreme or binding.”
-New York’s ratifying convention

They also declared the right for other states, the others assumed this was the case. In the constitution “united states” is always in plural, not the way we use it today as to refer to one nation. When the constitution was formed, the states had to seceded from the articles of confederation to do so. Federally founded West Point taught the right to secession in its textbook “a view of the constitution of the united states of america by William Rawle.”

"It depends on the state itself...weather it will continue a member of the union. To deny this right would be inconstant with the principles on witch all our political systems are founded, which is, that the people are in all cases a right to determined how they will be governed...the states then may wholly withdraw from the union."

The constitution nowhere outlaws secession. The constitution established where the federal government has been delegated authority. The rest is reserved to the states. Secession than is a state issue. Nothing is authorized to the states in the constitution [secession or otherwise] since the purpose of the constitution is federal powers.

“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”
-10th amendment U.S Constitution


Thomas Jefferson

“Resolved, That the several States composing, the United States of America, are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their general government; but that, by a compact under the style and title of a Constitution for the United States, and of amendments thereto, they constituted a general government for special purposes — delegated to that government certain definite powers, reserving, each State to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self-government; and that whensoever the general government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force: that to this compact each State acceded as a State, and is an integral part, its co-States forming, as to itself, the other party: that the government created by this compact was not made the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to itself; since that would have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of its powers; but that, as in all other cases of compact among powers having no common judge, each party has an equal right to judge for itself...each party has equal right to judge for itself”
-Kentucky Resolutions of 1798 written by Thomas Jefferson

“Sever ourselves from the union we so much value, rather than give up the rights of self government which we have reserved, and in which alone we see liberty, safety and happiness”
-Thomas Jefferson to James Madison 1799

“Whether we remain in one confederacy, or form into Atlantic and Mississippi confederacies, I believe not very important to the happiness of either part. Those of the western confederacy will be as much our children & descendants as those of the eastern, and I feel myself as much identified with that country, in future time, as with this; and did I now foresee a separation at some future day, yet I should feel the duty & the desire to promote the western interests as zealously as the eastern, doing all the good for both portions of our future family which should fall within my power.”
–Letter from President Thomas Jefferson to Dr. Joseph Priestly, Jan. 29, 1804

Jefferson predicted the western states would form a confederacy in 17 86 after the jay-Gardoquit treaty. He said “the moment they resolve to do this the point is settled” “Forced connection is neither our interest nor within our power.” Jefferson wished to “confederate with those alone witch are for peace and agriculture opposed to unlimited commerce and war [federalists]

Hartford convention

At the convention the New England states debated whether they should leave the union. No one questioned the legality, simply if it should be done. In 1801 Thomas Jefferson as president said “If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this union or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed.” Jefferson said alittel rebellion is “a medicine necessary for the sound health of government.” When as president the New England federalist were considering succession Jefferson said “If any state in the union will declare that it prefers separation...let us separate”

Other Founders

“But the indissoluble link of union between the people of the several states of this confederated nation, is after all, not in the right, but in the heart. If the day should ever come, (may Heaven avert it,) when the affections of the people of these states shall be alienated from each other; when the fraternal spirit shall give away to cold indifference, or collisions of interest shall fester into hatred, the bands of political association will not long hold together parties no longer attracted by the magnetism of conciliated interests and kindly sympathies; and far better will it be for the people of the disunited states, to part in friendship from each other, than to be held together by constraint. Then will be the time for reverting to the precedents which occurred at the formation and adoption of the Constitution, to form again a more perfect union, by dissolving that which could no longer bind, and to leave the separated parts to be reunited by the law of political gravitation to the centre”
-John Quincy Adams Northern federalist 1839

Northern federalist Daniel Webster said in 1851 that if the north would not comply with the fugitive slave law, “The south would no longer be bound to observe the compact. A bargain can not be broken on one side, and still bind the other side” There was talk of civil war in 1800 but Jefferson won election, had he not, we might have split long before.

“The thirteen states are thirteen sovereign bodies”
-Oliver Ellsworth

“The states are nations”
-Daniel Webster Commentaries on the Constitution

“If the union was formed by the accession of states then the union may be dissolved by the secession of states”
-Daniel Webster U.S senate Feb 15 1833

“The attributes of sovereignty are now enjoyed by every state in the union”
-Alexander Hamilton

“The first thing I have at heart is American liberty, the second thing is American union
-Patrick Henry

“The Union, next to our liberties most dear.”
-John C. Calhoun

“Had Buchanan in 1860 sent armed forces to prevent the nullification of the fugitive slave law, as Andrew Jackson thretned to do so in 1833, there would have been a secession of fifteen northern states instead of thirteen southern states. Had the democrats won in 1860 the northern states would have been the seceding states not the southern.”
-George Lunt of Massachusetts Origin of the Late war

“It is in the power of the states to extinguish this government at a blow”
-John Randolph of Roanoke 1823

By 1860 clearly the southern states saw secession as legal but so did most in the north and many leading newspapers. West Virginia during the civil war seceded from the confederacy and the state of Virginia. f

“the leading and most influncial papers of the union believe that any state of the union has a right to secede”
-Davenport Iowa Democrat and news 11/17/60

“opposing secession changes the nature of government “from a voluntary one, in which the people are sovereigns, to a despotism were one part of the people are slaves”
- New York Journal of commerce 1/12/61

“The great principles embodied by Jefferson in the declaration is... that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed” Therefore if the southern states wish to secede, “they have a clear right to do so”
-New York tribune 2/5/61

Secession is “the very germ of liberty...the right of secession inheres to the people of every sovereign state”
-Kenosha Wisconsin Democrat 1/11/61

If for any cause the Government...should become inimical to the rights and interests of the people, instead of affording protection to their persons and property, and securing the happiness and prosperity, to attain which it was established, it is the natural right of the people to change the Government regardless of Constitutions.

What then is the South to do? Suffer the compact which brought them into the Union to be violated with impunity, and without means of redress; submit to incursions into their territory and trespass upon their property by northern abolitionists?...Who expects, who desires the South to submit to all this?
-Dubuque Iowa Herald 1860

 

[Tolkien R.R.J]

Treason

Article 3 section 3 of the constitution says

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court.

This is what Abraham Lincoln did in the American civil war, he waged war against the southern states.

“To coerce the states is one of the maddest projects that was ever devised... a complying state at war with a non complying state. Congress marching the troops of one state into the bosom of another? Here is a nation at war with itself. Can any reasonable man be well disposed toward a government which makes war and carnage the only means of supporting itself- a government that can exists only by the sword”.
-Alexander Hamilton Northern federalist

“Before the war a union a collection of states... after the war we began to speak of a nation”
-Ken Burns


But southerns would also say the south was not leaving the original American republic, but establishing it. That is why before the war the south often thought the north should succeed.

"All that the South has ever desired was the Union as established by our forefathers should be preserved and that the government as originally organized should be administered in purity and truth."
Gen. Robert E. Lee Quoted in The enduring Relevance of Robert E Lee

Also being called a traitor is not automatically a bad thing, our nations greatest heroes IMO were traitors. The declaration of Independence was a secession document of sovereign states choosing separation from England's tyrannical government. From Great Britans point of view, they were the loyalist and Americans the traitors. The difference is the north won the war. Had America lost its war for independence, they would have taught the founders as traitors and rebels in textbooks in America. During the revolution “loyalist” like Benedict Arnold were the traitors. John Brown is celebrated in the north yet he formed his own constitution, left the union and created a nation “the republic of liberated slaves”

“If the declaration justified the secession of 3 million colonists in 1776 then why did it not justify the secession of 5 million southerns from the union in 1861”
Horce Greeley

“Rebellion if successful, is sacred, if not, is treason”
Proverb

 

[Lazarus Short]

The Yankees preserved the Union, but lost the Republic.

 

[Tolkien R.R.J]

The Yankees preserved the Union, but lost the Republic.

indeed

From Confederation to Consolidation the Political Effects of the Civil war

 

[USincognito]

Lost Cause apologia is so 1965.

 

[Tolkien R.R.J]

Lost Cause apologia is so 1965.

baseless unsupported bigoted post are never had a good year for them.

 

[USincognito]

baseless unsupported bigoted post are never had a good year for them.

Your post is dripping with as much irony as the slavers whip was dripping with blood.

Ride on Knight of the South!

 

[Tolkien R.R.J]

Your post is dripping with as much irony as the slavers whip was dripping with blood.

Ride on Knight of the South!

more baseless unsupported assumptions. do you wish to engage in a discussion on the historical slavery that existed in america? or on any other issue related to the south. Or just post unsupported comments about what you believe is true.

 

[USincognito]

more baseless unsupported assumptions. do you wish to engage in a discussion on the historical slavery that existed in america? or on any other issue related to the south. Or just post unsupported comments about what you believe is true.

This vacuous rhetoric tells me attempting to engage in productive discourse with you on this subject will be as futile and fruitless and doing so regarding evolution. Someone who spams walls of text and is impervious to correction is not worth the effort beyond the few sentences with which I have graced this thread.

 

[SoldierOfTheKing]

The basis of the post-Reconstruction United States was that the North would acknowledge the honor and valor of the Southern cause, and respect the South's devotion to its memory, in return for the South acceptance that America was one, even while continuing to expand westward. Those were the terms on which North and South were reconciled, the terms on which the fratricidal bloodshed was stopped, and on which peace was kept for generations to come.

 

[JacobKStarkey]

Please, SoldierOfTheKing, point out where is that "basis" for reunification of the States was ratified.

 

[Tolkien R.R.J]

This vacuous rhetoric tells me attempting to engage in productive discourse with you on this subject will be as futile and fruitless and doing so regarding evolution. Someone who spams walls of text and is impervious to correction is not worth the effort beyond the few sentences with which I have graced this thread.

n other words no discussion you claim to want, will be had by yourself. I am more than willing if you change your mind. In fact we can 1v1 in many places. Let me know.

 

[JacobKStarkey]

Lost Cause myth debates long ago ended on the side of the North and Lincoln and slavery.

 

[Tolkien R.R.J]

Lost Cause myth debates long ago ended on the side of the North and Lincoln and slavery.

Its a wonderful belief you have, but i dont have faith unjustified by works. I dont believe in a blind faith. I must see support and justification for my beliefs. Could you please support your position?

 

[JacobKStarkey]

This has been decided already for the North, Lincoln, and slavery as you well know.

You can open it again by presenting an affirmative argument.

If you use your own works as arguments, please identify them.

 

[Tolkien R.R.J]

This has been decided already for the North, Lincoln, and slavery as you well know.

You can open it again by present an affirmative argument.

If you use your own works as arguments, please identify them.

ok lets start with the legality of secession since that is the thread topic. Please see my first two posts. Hard to miss them.

 

[JacobKStarkey]

Common knowledge is that the Lost Cause myth argument has already been defeated.

Please open with an affirmation platform: assertion, evidence that supports the assertion without bias, and then an emphatic conclusion as to why your assertion is worth our time reading it.

If you refuse, your argument does lose.

 

[Tolkien R.R.J]

Common knowledge is that the Lost Cause myth argument has already been defeated.

Please open with an affirmation platform: assertion, evidence that supports the assertion without bias, and then an emphatic conclusion as to why your assertion is worth our time reading it.

If you refuse, your argument does lose.

So in other words you ignore my op since you cannot defend your views historically and resort to more logical fallacies. One thing the pro north poster never does, debate history.



“The abuse never discusses evidence, only denounces what is called “Neo-Confederate” and “Lost Cause” mythology. These are both political terms of abuse that have no real meaning and are designed to silence your enemy unheard...In fact, no great historical question can ever be closed off by a slogan as long as we are free to think.”
Clyde Wilson is a distinguished Professor Emeritus of History at the University of South Carolina


“He who joyfully marches in rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would suffice.”
- Albert Einstein

“Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.”
― Mark Twain


In logic, an argumentum ad populum (Latin for "appeal to the people") is a fallacious argument that concludes a proposition to be true because many or most people believe it. In other words, the basic idea of the argument is: "If many believe so, it is so."

“[P]eople are always more loyal to their tribal group than to any abstract notion of “truth”
— scientists especially. If not they are unemployable. It is professional suicide to continually contradict one’s teachers or social leaders”

-Lynn Margulis

“powerful human erge to belong inside the group to think like the majority...and to win the groups approval by trashing dissenters conformity and group think are attitudes of particular danger in science. Because progression depends on overturning established wisdom”
new york times 23 july 2009

 

[JacobKStarkey]

The Southern Lost Cause argument is a Southern argument of tribalism, nothing more.

Twain knew the South was wrong and ran away to the West rather than participate in the CW.

Margulls and Einstein would not agree with the Lost Cause mythology, but the OP can try to find something.

 

[Tolkien R.R.J]

The Southern Lost Cause argument is a Southern argument of tribalism, nothing more.

Twain knew the South was wrong and ran away to the West rather than participate in the CW.

Margulls and Einstein would not agree with the Lost Cause mythology, but the OP can try to find something.

---Staff Edit--- I need support and justification. Please support your views. Lets start with secession the topic of the thread. If you refuse to debate with history as the judge, you prove those "lost cause" writers true.

“The abuse never discusses evidence, only denounces what is called “Neo-Confederate” and “Lost Cause” mythology. These are both political terms of abuse that have no real meaning and are designed to silence your enemy unheard...In fact, no great historical question can ever be closed off by a slogan as long as we are free to think.”
Clyde Wilson is a distinguished Professor Emeritus of History at the University of South Carolina