Lincoln's Legacy

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Lincoln’s Legacy

2009.02.14 by Steven Greffenius

The more you learn about Abraham Lincoln, the more you learn to admire him. He deserves his praise. Today is the two hundredth anniversary of his birth day, February 12, 1809. February 12, 2009, is only twenty-three days after another leader from Illinois stepped into Lincoln’s large shoes.

We all know that Lincoln managed to hold the Union together through victory in a protracted civil war. The standard stories often don’t relate how much that outcome depended on Lincoln’s determination and tenacity. Right up to the fall of 1864, when Atlanta fell, people pressed Lincoln to negotiate with the South to end the war. They even suggested that he retract the Emancipation Proclamation to conciliate the South.

Outcomes of war look inevitable in retrospect, but they don’t look so certain when you still have to fight for them. When we praise Lincoln now, and thank him, we recognize the material part he played to keep the United States one country and all free. The house did not divide and it did stand.

Interestingly, Lincoln’s ambition to lead brought the sectional crisis over slavery to a turning point. The country split because of his election, though Lincoln himself never recognized the separate status of the Confederate states. He regarded the Confederacy’s call to arms as a rebellion that had to be defeated. With wisdom and force of character, he succeeded.

Thank you, Mr. Lincoln, for the continuation of this great experiment. We may feel somewhat pessimistic about our prospects right now, but we have reasons to be hopeful, too. If Mr. Obama follows your example of leadership, as he wants to do, our hope may have some foundation.

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Posted in history, Uncategorized | Tagged Abraham Lincoln | 79 Comments

79 Responses

on 2009.02.14 at 18.19.53 virginiaconservative

With all due respect, if I understand your “about paulie cannoli” section correctly, I am a bit confused how someone so involved with the Libertarian Party would hold President Lincoln in such high regard. In terms of promoting liberty, personal responsibility, and limited governance, Lincoln easily ranks as one of the worst, if not the worst, President in our history. Although I am not a libertarian myself, I know quite a few of them and none of them have a lot of praise for Lincoln.
on 2009.02.14 at 18.33.54 pauliecannoli

VirginiaConservative and others, please watch the byline. This is a group blog. I did not write this.

This article is by Steve Greffenius, not by me. That said, Mr. Greffenius is in fact an LP activist, in Massachusetts.

Personally, I don’t hold Lincoln in high regard at all. I told him that this would likely be the reaction of many readers here, but also that this blog is open for a variety of viewpoints from different libertarians.

If libertarians who wish to write anti-Lincoln articles wish to sign up as bloggers here, I can sign them up. It requires having, or setting up, a wordpress account.

The comment section is, of course, open to opinions from anyone, with or without a wordpress account, and libertarian or otherwise.

The only things which are banned are commercial spam, credible death threats, and revealing personal information about other people without their consent. Otherwise, have at it, no matter what your opinions on this or other issues.

Civility is appreciated, but not required.
on 2009.02.14 at 22.51.08 virginiaconservative

Thanks for clearing that point up. Would the author of the post have a reply?
on 2009.02.16 at 23.21.08 sgreffenius

Thanks for your note! Here’s the background on that post. I just signed up to write for Next Free Voice not long before we celebrated Lincoln’s two hundredth birthday. I hadn’t written anything to my own list, The Last Jeffersonian, for some time. So with the bicentennial coming along, I figured I would break out of that silence and write something about Lincoln. Having written it, I figured it would be a good short piece to post at NFV, to test things out there.

With that, I do admire Lincoln a lot. Everything’s connected in one way or another, and that rules out consistency in one’s beliefs. The world is too contradictory for consistency. One correspondent wrote to object to my last sentence about Obama. Our current president is a good illustration of contradictory assessments. I certainly don’t think much of Obama’s policy directions, but he has qualities of leadership that I like. Bush’s leadership was so poor that having someone with Obama’s leadership skills in office is a big improvement.

Similarly, I wouldn’t rate Lincoln on the basis of his placement on the Nolan chart. I don’t care much about whether he’s libertarian or anti-libertarian. He was a great leader, and his leadership had good outcomes. I’m glad that our country didn’t fall apart for good in 1860. That’s the spirit behind my short post.

Paulie mentioned that people might wonder why a post in praise of Lincoln would appear at NFV. But we should try to mix things up a little. Otherwise, libertarians talk only with each other, Democrats talk only with each other, evangelicals talk only with each other… and so on.

Thanks again for your comment!
on 2009.02.16 at 23.30.14 pauliecannoli

Bush’s leadership was so poor that having someone with Obama’s leadership skills in office is a big improvement.

While I’m certainly no fan of Bush .. “great leaders” scare me.
on 2009.02.17 at 00.48.34 pauliecannoli

I’m glad that our country didn’t fall apart for good in 1860.

Why?
on 2009.02.17 at 01.32.13 pauliecannoli

Thank you, Mr. Lincoln, for the continuation of this great experiment. We may feel somewhat pessimistic about our prospects right now, but we have reasons to be hopeful, too. If Mr. Obama follows your example of leadership, as he wants to do, our hope may have some foundation.

I think it is entirely possible that Obama will follow Lincoln’s example, but it doesn’t make me very optimistic.

Things he might do which Lincoln did: arrest newspaper editors (nowadays we can include other media) and state legislators that criticize him and his administration; institute a major new tax while raising existing taxes; issue a worthless new currency; forcibly draft many Americans into military service; start a war that kills millions of Americans and leaves chunks of the country destroyed; criminalize opposition to his regime; imprison numerous Americans without trial, suspend habeas corpus, and spend money not appropriated by Congress.

Wikipedia:

Civil liberties suspended

During the Civil War, Lincoln appropriated powers no previous President had wielded: he used his war powers to proclaim a blockade, suspended the writ of habeas corpus, spent money before Congress appropriated it, and imprisoned 18,000 suspected Confederate sympathizers without trial.

Domestic measures

Lincoln believed in the Whig theory of the presidency, which left Congress to write the laws while he signed them, vetoing only those bills that threatened his war powers. Thus, he signed the Homestead Act in 1862, making millions of acres of government-held land in the West available for purchase at very low cost. The Morrill Land-Grant Colleges Act, also signed in 1862, provided government grants for agricultural universities in each state. The Pacific Railway Acts of 1862 and 1864 granted federal support for the construction of the United States’ First Transcontinental Railroad, which was completed in 1869. Other important legislation involved economic matters, including the first income tax and higher tariffs. Also included was the creation of the system of national banks by the National Banking Acts of 1863, 1864, and 1865, which allowed the creation of a strong national financial system. Congress created and Lincoln approved the Department of Agriculture in 1862, although that institution would not become a Cabinet-level department until 1889.

The Legal Tender Act of 1862 established the United States Note, the first paper currency in United States history. This was done to increase the money supply to pay for fighting the war.

During the war, Lincoln’s Treasury Department effectively controlled all cotton trade in the occupied South — the most dramatic incursion of federal controls on the economy.

In 1862, Lincoln sent a senior general, John Pope, to put down the “Sioux Uprising” in Minnesota. Presented with 303 death warrants for convicted Santee Dakota who were accused of killing innocent farmers; Lincoln affirmed 39 of these for execution (one was later reprieved).
on 2009.02.17 at 08.06.52 George Phillies

Steve,

As always, very well said. As Tom Knapp notes with some frequency on his blog, Dixiecrats are not Libertarians. The War might best be described as the Southern War against secession, namely the right of African Americans to secede from the labor contracts that had been violently forced on their grandparents. Of course, if southerners had allowed the right of their slaves to secede from slavery, they would have had to give up the fruits of those contracts, notably their opportunity to fornicate their 12 year old (mostly girl) slaves whenever they wished.

As to whether the war was over slavery or not, I refer you to the period secession ordnances and the associated statements of justification, usually much longer and clearer on the matter), not to mention period statements by southern politicians. There is no doubt in the matter.

Slavery was the American Holocaust, differing largely in that it did not occur to the Germans to breed Jews so that future generations of Germans could torture them. Slavery was ended by Abraham Lincoln, not every bit all at once, but ended. Note, for example, Sherman’s march through Georgia, his army being followed by an even larger host of freed slaves, free now and forever thanks to Lincoln. The people who claim that the War of the Slaveholder’s Rebellion was not over slavery are not significantly morally different than the World War 2 holocaust deniers, except that the latter are stinking antisemites and the former are stinking racists.

The contrary position is espoused by decidedly non-libertarian “Austrian economics” think tanks in Paulie’s Alabama, organizations that should be spurned by every decent libertarian, indeed, every decent human being.

George Phillies
on 2009.02.17 at 09.59.34 pauliecannoli

Everything’s connected in one way or another, and that rules out consistency in one’s beliefs. The world is too contradictory for consistency.

This corresponds in an interesting way with a point Sean Hastings makes on another thread:

http://pauliecannoli.wordpress.com/2009/02/15/rethinking-alan-greenspan/#comment-6398
on 2009.02.17 at 10.42.34 pauliecannoli

As Tom Knapp notes with some frequency on his blog, Dixiecrats are not Libertarians.

I’d be curious as to whether he also has a libertarian defense of Lincoln. I think those are two separate points. For instance, I agree with him about Dixiecrats.

The War might best be described as the Southern War against secession, namely the right of African Americans to secede from the labor contracts that had been violently forced on their grandparents.

I am no partisan of the southern cause – they did many things wrong, and continuing to uphold slavery was just one of them. In point of fact, had the CSA seceded, slavery would have been doomed for a whole host of reasons. For one thing, both major prospective markets for their cotton – USA and Europe – would have increasingly rejected trade with them for moral reasons as time went on. For another, non-enforcement of fugitive slave laws in the USA, by itself, would have created a lot more slave escapes, and the institution would have crumbled.

The confederates were very stupid to continue to defend slavery, and they would not have been able to defend it, independent or not.

On the other hand, Lincoln proposed an amendment to the Constitution, prior to the secession of the southern states, to make the “right” to own slaves irrevocable.

Of course, if southerners had allowed the right of their slaves to secede from slavery, they would have had to give up the fruits of those contracts, notably their opportunity to fornicate their 12 year old (mostly girl) slaves whenever they wished.

Which they would have had to do in any case.

As to whether the war was over slavery or not, I refer you to the period secession ordnances and the associated statements of justification, usually much longer and clearer on the matter), not to mention period statements by southern politicians. There is no doubt in the matter.

Certainly, slavery was one of the reasons for secession. But to deny that protective tariffs – essentially, the north’s attempt to lock in southern cotton at an uneconomic price and keep Europe’s factories from competing for it on an open market – was another is missing a major part of the picture.

From the perspective of some in the North and West, it was about their hope of keeping African-Americans out of the western states, or even shipping them en masse to Africa (not “back” to Africa, as most had been born in the US by then) – something Lincoln himself also proposed.

Centralization of power at the federal level was also an issue in itself.

You have a good point about the ordinances of secession, but that point is incomplete. The stated reason for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are that their prior regimes allegedly harbored radical Islamic terrorists. The true reasons include things which are rarely stated, such as the perpetuation of the weapons industries, among many other things.

Slavery was ended in every nation of the Americas, at around the same time. Most countries did not fight a war over it; only Haiti and the US did. If Mr. Lincoln’s true (yet, at the time, unstated!) aim in pursuing the war was to end slavery, he did not go about it in the best way.

One need not be a neo-confederate to point out the many anti-liberty aspects of Mr. Lincoln’s career. For example, see Charles W. Johnson (radgeek) in the comments on his own post.

http://radgeek.com/gt/2005/01/03/robert_e/

If you want to argue about the talents of Lee vis-a-vis other military commanders you should take it up with someone who cares; I don’t, because I believe that the Civil War was like most wars in history—a senseless bloodbath—and that we would be much better off if we stopped obsessing about Great Generals and studied how to beat swords into plowshares instead. If you want to know what I think about Abraham Lincoln, I hint at it in GT 2004-12-17: The Hand of DiLorenzo?; to be more explicit, I think that he was a shameless opportunist, one of the closest things this country has ever had to a dictator, and a mass murderer.

See the rest of that post and following discussion to see what Charles thinks of the confederacy. The problem with the approach, illustrated by Dr. Phillies here…..

Slavery was the American Holocaust, differing largely in that it did not occur to the Germans to breed Jews so that future generations of Germans could torture them. Slavery was ended by Abraham Lincoln, not every bit all at once, but ended. Note, for example, Sherman’s march through Georgia, his army being followed by an even larger host of freed slaves, free now and forever thanks to Lincoln. The people who claim that the War of the Slaveholder’s Rebellion was not over slavery are not significantly morally different than the World War 2 holocaust deniers, except that the latter are stinking antisemites and the former are stinking racists.

…..is the fallacy of the excluded middle, where the path of peace generally lies. As Charles says in that same comment,

. The endless diatribes against Lincoln (for example) that I am treated to whenever I try to state simple facts about things that Lee (for example) did that were wrong are just a change of subject.

George goes on to say,

decidedly non-libertarian “Austrian economics” think tanks in Paulie’s Alabama

Their economic and foreign policy views are most certainly libertarian; although many of them do wish to use government to enforce some social views, many do not.
on 2009.02.17 at 11.17.14 pauliecannoli

One additional point.

I’m probably reading too much into this, as I did not even notice it at first, and thus it may well have also been unintentional on Dr. Phillies’ part;

When he refers to “Austrian economics” think tanks in the plural, which other think tank(s) does he mean besides the Mises Institute?

http://mises.org/

Does George mean to include the Molinari Institute

http://praxeology.net/molinari.htm

In his panoply of execrable neo-confederates, does he have some other think I haven’t considered in mind, or was a simple error of pluralizing a singular entity?

I should point out, for anyone who does not know, that there are in fact some differences between the Molinari and Mises institutes – and that in those, I generally side with the Molinari folks.
on 2009.02.18 at 06.47.45 Robert Capozzi

I pretty much agree with George, although I’m a bit more forgiving of the neo-Confederates L s than he is. I do think they miss the forest for the trees, however.

I do find when they cite the fact about Lincoln that he suspended habeas corpus that they generally fail to note the context. Washington was being surrounded by Confederate Elite forces. Maryland itself was on the cusp of joining the Confederacy. I do believe Congress was out of session, so while the Constitution allows for HC suspension by the Congress, the circumstances were highly exigent.

I find that contextual omission to be dishonest.
on 2009.02.27 at 00.01.52 Jeff Standish

Yes, context is everything.

“Elite” Confederate forces? “Surrounding” DC? The South didn’t have the manpower to surround DC or seriously threaten the North, and both sides knew it. And what “elite” forces?

The South fought because the Feds refused to admit the Constitution was a voluntary Federation and it could be dissolved voluntarily by any individual state — a notion that was widely believed and openly debated at the time. In fact it was the main reason Southerners felt they had a *right* to secede if they wished. Many at the time thought the Revolution and the Declaration of Independence supported their view.

Perhaps if the Feds had simply let the states go that decided to end their Fellowship of the Ring Around DC, a half a million people wouldn’t have been slaughtered and a couple of million wouldn’t have been maimed.

Get real. Wars aren’t about ideas. They are about money. The UnCivil War was no different. It was all about a stupid government wanting to preserve its taxing turf; and governments only want tax turf because it brings them power. Not for some higher, more noble purpose.

One of the main wellsprings of southern anger was the refusal of Lincoln’s predecessor, President Buchanan, to surrender federal forts in the seceding states. Now, a libertarian would generally advocate for the closing of government agencies that are unnecessary, and auctioning off the property to the highest bidder – a solution that probably would have mollified the southerners. But the federal government wanted its bases deep in foreign territory (sounds familiar!), so that wasn’t going to happen. So, southern troops seized them; among them, Fort Sumter. This of course gave the Feds the excuse they needed to conduct additional provocations and also to whip their slaves (tax subjects) into a nationalistic froth.

Let’s not forget the naval blockade of the southern states. Blockades have long been recognized as acts of war.

Almost all of the early military incursions across the Union/Confederate border were by Feds. Take Arlington, VA for instance. Occupying territory of a neighbor has always been considered an act of war. What did Lincoln do when Virginia voted to secede? He sent federal troops to invade and occupy Arlington and other cities along the border. Just to spit in the eye of its enemy, the Union immediately seized the 1,100 acre Lee family estate and erected military installations on it, including Fort Whipple (now Fort Myer) and Fort McPherson (now Section 11).

And Arlington was by no means an isolated example. You’ve heard the phrase “the bloody borders of Islam“? Well, the beginnings of the UnCivil War were steeped in the “bloody borders of the Union”. Notice what states most of the below skirmishes were in:

- May 18-19 Sewell’s Point VA
- May 29-June 1 Aquia Creek VA
- June 1 Fairfax Court House VA
- June 3 Philippi / Philippi Races WV
- June 10 Big Bethel/ Bethel Church/ Great Bethel VA
- June 13 Romney WV
- June 17 Boonville MO
- June 17 Vienna VA
- June 18-19 Camp Cole/Cole Camp MO
- June 19 New Creek WV
- June 26 Patterson Creek/Kelly’s Island, VA
- June 27 Matthia’s Point VA
- July 2 Hoke’s Run / Falling Waters / Hainesville VA
- July 5 Newport News VA
- July 5 Carthage MO
- July 6 Middle Creek Fork/Buckhannon WV
- July 8 Laurel Hill/Bealington WV
- July 9-11 Monroe Station MO
- July 11 Rich Mountain/Laurel Hill VA
- July 12 Beverly WV
- July 14 Carrick’s Ford WV
- July 15-17 Millsville/Wentzville MO
- July 17 Fulton MO
- July 18 Bull Run/Blackburn’s Ford VA
- July 18-19 Harrisonville/Parkersville MO
- July 21 First Manassas (First Bull Run) VA

At first, the southern leadership willfully avoided any suggestion of sending its military into the Union for any reason. They didn’t want a war, they wanted to secede and go their own way. Even in the face of repeated violent provocation, the south refused to contest much of the Feds’ incursions into southern territory.

Lincoln used open military threats in, and sent political infiltrators to, Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri, to foment internal disruption and thereby keep them in the Union.

Lastly, does anyone really need to be reminded that slavery in the form of the draft was instituted by Lincoln, and to this day the possibility of it still hangs over every young man’s head? A good book on the subject is Jeff Hummell’s “Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men”.
on 2009.02.27 at 05.53.20 Robert Capozzi

in 1862, there was Antietam. That, sir, is in MD!!!

Perhaps you don’t know US geography. VA is south of DC. MD is north of DC.

The first state to attempt to secede was SC. SC’s population was more than half slave. The Elites of SC made up an extra-Constitutional “right” of secession without consulting the rest of the population.

I’m quite familiar with the revisionist argument. I don’t buy it. The Union did many things that I do not support. But my take is the match the lit the fuse was the States of the Confederacy were mostly motivated by the desire to maintain slavery in perpetuity. Read the Ordnances and transcripts from their sham “Secession Conventions” and report back your findings!

In a just world, there would have been no Civil War, because slavery enabled the Calhounists to deny slaves representation.

If you find that Hummel, DiLorenzo, and Rothbard’s interpretation is correct, good luck with that tack. I believe it misses the forest for the trees.
on 2009.02.27 at 07.01.17 pauliecannoli

I do find when they cite the fact about Lincoln that he suspended habeas corpus that they generally fail to note the context.

Please refer back to my previous comments in the thread; this was far from the only violation of previously understood civil, constitutional and economic liberties.

Washington was being surrounded by Confederate Elite forces. Maryland itself was on the cusp of joining the Confederacy.

And what if it had? The federal district had previously been in New York and Philadelphia. There is no reason it could not have been moved again.

Again, wikipedia:

“During the Civil War, Lincoln appropriated powers no previous President had wielded: he used his war powers to proclaim a blockade, suspended the writ of habeas corpus, spent money before Congress appropriated it, and imprisoned 18,000 suspected Confederate sympathizers without trial.”

I don’t think that was all in Maryland or while Congress was out of session. Also,

“Other important legislation involved economic matters, including the first income tax and higher tariffs. Also included was the creation of the system of national banks by the National Banking Acts of 1863, 1864, and 1865, which allowed the creation of a strong national financial system. [..] The Legal Tender Act of 1862 established the United States Note, the first paper currency in United States history. This was done to increase the money supply to pay for fighting the war.

During the war, Lincoln’s Treasury Department effectively controlled all cotton trade in the occupied South — the most dramatic incursion of federal controls on the economy.”

See especially post above at

2009.02.17 at 10.42.34 pauliecannoli
on 2009.02.27 at 07.08.29 pauliecannoli

Perhaps you don’t know US geography. VA is south of DC. MD is north of DC.

Parts of Maryland are south of DC, although I’m not sure of the relevance of this.

The Elites of SC made up an extra-Constitutional “right” of secession

Ninth and Tenth amendment rights, affirming the theory of the Declaration of Independence and subsequent writings of Jefferson (if I recall correctly), frequently also discussed by New England states in the antebellum period;

Also, explicitly reserved as a right by several states in forming the union, and by Texas in joining it later.

But my take is the match the lit the fuse was the States of the Confederacy were mostly motivated by the desire to maintain slavery in perpetuity. Read the Ordnances and transcripts from their sham “Secession Conventions” and report back your findings!

Point addressed in previous comments above.
on 2009.02.27 at 07.18.06 Robert Capozzi

Paulie, as I said, the Union overreached in LOTS of things. It was in war-time. Just “moving” to NY from DC in the 19th century when transport was primitive? Puu-leeeease. There was a real threat that DC would be surrounded by the Elites, propelled by slave money.

Antietam IS north of DC, ok. Yes, parts of MD are S of DC, sorry I didn’t completely lay that geographic fact out for all so that technical (and irrelevant) points could not have been “scored.”

You read the 9th and 10th as you will. I see nothing in the text that implies that the contract could be broken unilaterally, especially NOT by Elites wishing to maintain slavery.

I do wonder: Are you REALLY interested in reaching out to the left? Approach the left with revisionism seems an EXCELLENT way to not only alienate them, but to trigger massive revulsion to the ideas of liberty.

Honestly!
on 2009.02.27 at 08.34.22 Jeff Standish

in 1862, there was Antietam. That, sir, is in MD!!!

Yes, and in 1863, there was Gettysburg. Is there something wrong with your reading comprehension? Did you miss the “early” word in this sentence: “Almost all of the early military incursions across the Union/Confederate border were by Feds.” I listed most known engagements that occurred until the first really major battle (First Bull Run). Oh, and that was on Virginia soil, but don’t let a massive invading federal host of well-armed storm troopers cloud your view.

Let’s see now. 1) Nation A occupies the territory of Nation B, 2) terrorizes the civilian population of Nation B in the occupied territory, 3) starts jailing and hanging enemy “sympathizers” in the occupied territory, 4) refuses to give up its occupying force military bases within Nation B, and 4) blockades the entire coastline of Nation B. It does all this for a good portion of a year, and shows no sign of ending its beliigerent, provocative actions.

The Confederacy lay prostrate before Union action for almost a full year before it decided enough was enough, and decided it was time for payback.

I know of no other nation that would have exercised so much relative restraint for such a long period.

Thus, Antietam, Gettysburg, and others.

Perhaps you don’t know US geography. VA is south of DC. MD is north of DC.

Perhaps you don’t understand the word “early”.

I understand geography probably better than you, having been a fascinated student of it for the better part of a half-century. Do you have it in your head where the kingdom of Bactria once lay? Do you know what Tanu Tuva was? Without looking them up? I do, and have since high school (even have a postage stamp from the latter that I bought in 1976 while still in HS). Can you draw a reasonably accurate line depicting the territory controlled by German armies on the Russian Front during WWII? I can. So maybe you should refrain from suggesting you’re smarter or more knowledgeable than I.

The first state to attempt to secede was SC. SC’s population was more than half slave. The Elites of SC made up an extra-Constitutional “right” of secession without consulting the rest of the population.

Oh. You mean like how those million or so Americans were “consulted” about their servitude before they were sent off to slaughter or be slaughtered through military slavery (the “draft”)? Do you mean how the millions of Americans were “consulted” about their servitude to the tax collector after the imposition of the income tax and other taxes to pay for warmaking? Do you mean how these same individuals were “consulted” before they were jailed, beaten, robbed, and hung for speaking out against said servitude and warmaking?

I’m quite familiar with the revisionist argument. I don’t buy it. The Union did many things that I do not support. But my take is the match the lit the fuse was the States of the Confederacy were mostly motivated by the desire to maintain slavery in perpetuity. Read the Ordnances and transcripts from their sham “Secession Conventions” and report back your findings!

Thanks for the reading assignment & book report demand. No thanks. Already read all of that, and I don’t report to you.

In a just world, there would have been no Civil War, because slavery enabled the Calhounists to deny slaves representation.

Indeed. More importantly, in a just world, states (and communities and individuals) would be free to secede from any political union for whatever reasons they desire.

For that matter, allowing the southern states to secede might have laid a foundation for the slaves to set up independent communities themselves, and secede from the Confederacy in turn.

If you find that Hummel, DiLorenzo, and Rothbard’s interpretation is correct, good luck with that tack. I believe it misses the forest for the trees.

You know what happens when you make assumptions.

I frankly have no idea what Rothbard’s interpretation is, nor do I care. I have read Hummel and DiLorenzo.

It’s unfortunate you excuse state aggression based on “spoils of the victor” rationalizations for mass slaughter. Sloppy thinking leads to poor politics leads to state expansion. Follow that path at your own peril.
on 2009.02.27 at 10.05.54 robert capozzi

jeff, you are likely much smarter than I am. So was Rothbard. So was Marx. But I cede to no one my judgment, and would suggest that tack to others, including you.

Did not the suspension of habeas happen DURING the Confederate Insurrectionist’s incursion into MD? That would appear to set the context…for me, at least.

You seem to buy that the Civil War was between 2 nations. I don’t. I view it as a most unfortunate Insurrection, put down by authority vested in the Constitution. Horrors happened, no doubt, on both sides.

The slaver forces had some legitimate grievances. But, at day’s end, the means they used to “secede” were cowardly. If they’d first attempted to make the power to secede explicit in the Constitution, I’d have a higher opinion of them. Or, if they’d have freed the slaves and then seceded, ditto.

Given the sequence of events, I have no sympathy for the Confederate cause.
on 2009.02.27 at 14.06.09 robert capozzi

jeff, btw, I’ve no idea where or how you conclude that I “rationalize” my view through “spoils of the victor.” I’m curious how you reached THAT take on my take.

My actual take is simple: The Civil War was an insurrection, put down using Constitutional and unconstitutional means. The insurrectionists were not justified in their actions, which was the proximate cause and prime mover of events.
on 2009.02.27 at 15.39.06 robert capozzi

pc, btw, parts of VA are N of DC. Even more of 1860 VA was N of DC if one counts WV.
on 2009.02.27 at 15.51.20 robert capozzi

pc, also, the signers of the Constitution did attempt to attach riders to the contract. The riders weren’t counter-signed.

TX…not sure. Perhaps there’s a counter-signed treaty…is there one? If there IS one, there should be terms…will research later.

What’s clear is it ain’t in the Constitution.
on 2009.02.27 at 20.46.13 Robert Capozzi

pc, ok, my initial research indicates that the Insurrection clause in the Constitution applies to TX, too.

I’m open to your case.

What is it?
on 2009.02.28 at 06.09.09 Robert Capozzi

pc, oh, yes, on the matter of New England states CONSIDERING seceding over slavery: So what? They didn’t do it.

If anything, it makes my point STRONGER. They considered seceding, but realized it was inappropriate.

I will concede that secession in that context wasn’t off the hook. There WAS confusion about whether the US was one nation or a confederation, or some sort of hybrid.

My analysis of a Patrick Henry quote makes a strong case that it actually WAS one nation under the Constitution:

http://www.freeliberal.com/blog/archives/001696.php
on 2009.02.28 at 08.24.36 Robert Capozzi

PC, oh yes, here’s 9 and 10:

9. The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

10. 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.

No process for secession here, agreed? “The people” would have to include slaves. They weren’t consulted.

“[p]owers” are obviously “powers WITHIN the Constitution,” not outside of it. Secession is clearly outside the Constitution.

By way of analogy, the rules of the road (the Constitution) were, say, 55 mph. The Feds can’t tell us we can’t sing while driving. Nor can the Feds tell the States they can’t impose a rule intra-State that we can’t ban singing while driving.

The CSA was an attempt to drive off the road at 100 mph.

That’s an insurrection.
on 2009.02.28 at 11.15.04 Darren

http://www.opednews.com/articles/The-Evil-Lincoln-by-Darren-Wolfe-090214-839.html

The Evil Lincoln

With Abraham Lincoln’s birthday just passed on February 12th the media was replete with praise for him. Unfortunately, this whitewashed view of him is misguided. Rather than being the honest and resolute knight in shining armor that he is made out to be, on closer inspection he turns out to be one of the worst politicians Illinois has produced.

Lincoln the Racist

On this subject his own words condemn him. During the Lincoln-Douglas debates in Ottowa, Illinois on August 21, 1858 he said:

I have no disposition to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races. There is a physical difference between the two, which in my judgment will probably forever forbid their living together on terms of respect, social and political equality, and inasmuch as it becomes a necessity that there should be a superiority somewhere, I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position;

He repeated the same idea at Charleston, Illinois on September 18, 1858:

I will say then, that I am not nor have ever been in favor of bringing about in any way, the social and political equality of the white and black races, that I am not, nor have I ever been in favor of making voters of the negroes, or jurors, or qualifying them to hold office, or having them to marry with white people…there must be the position of superior and inferior, that I as much as any other man am in favor of the superior position being assigned to the white man.

His idea of what to do with freed blacks was to have them leave the US. He stated so very plainly on August 14, 1862 in “Address on Colonization to a Committee of Colored Men, Washington, D.C.”

He was obviously no friend of the black race.

Lincoln the Corporatist

Much is made of a false quote, which I will not repeat here, in which Lincoln warns of the dangers corporations pose to the country. Our friends at Snopes debunk it.

Lincoln was the Illinois Central Railroad Company’s lawyer right up to his taking office as president. His whole career in politics revolved around serving the northern industrialists’ and bankers’ interests. From the beginning of his time in the Illinois legislature he lined the railroad companies pockets with taxpayer money. The details can be read here and here.

Lincoln the Mass Murderer

The question then comes up of why did Lincoln wage the Civil War? It wasn’t to end slavery, he said so himself, “If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that…”. So, he wanted to preserve the Union. To many that may seem a lofty goal, but is it?

A clause allowing the use of force against states by the federal government was deliberately left out of the Constitution. At the Constitutional Convention James Madison opposed it:

Mr. MADISON, observed that the more he reflected on the use of force, the more he doubted the practicability, the justice and the efficacy of it when applied to people collectively and not individually. -A union of the States containing such an ingredient seemed to provide for its own destruction. The use of force agst. a State, would look more like a declaration of war, than an infliction of punishment, and would probably be considered by the party attacked as a dissolution of all previous compacts by which it might be bound. He hoped that such a system would be framed as might render this recourse [FN12] unnecessary, and moved that the clause be postponed. This motion was agreed to nem. con.

Since the Constitution doesn’t prohibit the states from seceding and it also doesn’t empower the federal government to stop them from doing so, it would seem that given the 10th Amendment states can secede.

Secession was not unheard of in Lincoln’s time. There had already been secessionist movements in New England and the Mid-Atlantic states. They considered that they had such a right. So why not the South?

Ultimately, Lincoln waged the Civil War to keep the South as a captive market and as taxpayers to loot. The North’s intentions were obvious starting with the 1828 “Tariff of Abominations”. That and Lincoln’s history of subsidizing his corporate buddies with taxpayer money gave the South every reason to fear being ravaged by the new Republican administration.

Slavery was an issue too, of course. While Lincoln was no abolitionist, the South no doubt saw a threat to that horrible institution in the stronger federal government that the Republicans promised. So while ending slavery was a great thing the loss of one million lives to do so was unnecessary. Slavery was everywhere in retreat, and with few exceptions peacefully so. All of the Northern states had abolished slavery by 1858. Most other countries ended the practice peacefully. There is every reason to think that slavery could have been completely ended here peacefully too.

That is why the title of this section is Lincoln the Mass Murderer. He got all those people killed to stop the South from doing what they had a right to do, secede from the Union. He was not interested in ending slavery as the mythology about him says.

It is important to understand the true meaning of Lincoln’s presidency. He marked the end of the republic of the Founders. After the Civil War no longer was “the consent of the governed”, to quote the Declaration of Independence, necessary. As the abolitionist Lysander Spooner put it in 1867 in No Treason:

The principle, on which the war was waged by the North, was simply this: That men may rightfully be compelled to submit to, and support, a government that they do not want; and that resistance, on their part, makes them traitors and criminals.

No principle, that is possible to be named, can be more self-evidently false than this; or more self-evidently fatal to all political freedom. Yet it triumphed in the field, and is now assumed to be established. If it really be established, the number of slaves, instead of having been diminished by the war, has been greatly increased; for a man, thus subjected to a government that he does not want, is a slave. And there is no difference, in principle — but only in degree — between political and chattel slavery. The former, no less than the latter, denies a man’s ownership of himself and the products of his labor; and [*iv] asserts that other men may own him, and dispose of him and his property, for their uses, and at their pleasure.

Let’s remember Lincoln for what he really did, destroy the republic and one million lives in the process.
on 2009.02.28 at 11.34.22 Robert Capozzi

darren: Ultimately, Lincoln waged the Civil War to keep the South as a captive market and as taxpayers to loot. The North’s intentions were obvious starting with the 1828 “Tariff of Abominations”.

me: i’d suggest you conflate MANY points here. While I agree with many of the critiques of Lincoln, please show us where this was his – and the Union’s – motive in putting down the CSA.

My take is that the Union was simply putting down an insurrection. They wanted to maintain the Union and the Constitution.

Lincoln himself came into office with some of the S states ALREADY had seceeded. Lincoln himself didn’t want secession, he inherited it.

Revisionists put the Civil War on Lincoln, but he wasn’t acting alone. It appears that anyone who believes that the Union was justified under the Constitution to put down the Insurrection make straw man argument…”Lincoln was this evil figure, therefore the CSA was justified in its actions.”

I’m quite critical of Lincoln, but his history and views were largely beside the point.
on 2009.03.01 at 07.47.52 Robert Capozzi

Here’s another way to think of secession:

Say tomorrow the Mafia takes over RI. They control the governor and legislature. They enslave anyone with a Portuguese surname — a large percentage of the pop.

They then have a “Secession Convention” and secede from the US.

Would the revisionists here say what RI is doing is justified? If the Feds stepped in and stopped the “secession,” would they be unjustified?

I’m sympathetic to the notion of self determination. But the process matters as much as the outcome.
on 2009.03.01 at 15.43.54 Jeff Standish

Interesting discussion.

Personally, I think secession, even if for bad reasons, always — and I do mean always — ends up being a Good Thing for liberty.

I hold this position for the plain and simple reason that it turns large nations with a lot of power into smaller nations with much less power.

In the words of my grandfather, when asked what he was hammering on in his basement workshop, “I’m making small ones out of big ones!”

There is an argument to be made that at least a few of the southern states — had there not been the fear of violence from the centralists — would have remained as entirely independent nations, as many of the Founders originally intended them to be. Mississippi is just one that I know of where the debate in the legislature leaned heavily towards remaining independent of either CSA or USA — the argument being they didn’t want to mess with seceding only to jump into another marriage with another central government.

Just like the presence of foreign troops in any nation sends quarreling native groups into each others’ arms for the purpose of expelling the invaders, the fact that everyone assumed the north would invade forced the southern states into their alliance as the CSA.

So, had the threat of violence not been in the air, there is a very credible case to be made that the south would have ended up as three or four — or more — separate, relatively powerless, independent nations.

In addition, it is also likely that the south — whether in the form of a unified confederation or as two or more independent units — by itself could not have controlled its large slave population for very long. It took the overwhelming military, economic, and legal strength of the entire USA to enforce slavery up until 1861. I agree with Paulie, that had the CSA seceded, slavery would have been not long for the dustbin anyway, likely with less bloodshed.

I am pro-secession, first and foremost. I also advocate peaceful resistance and noncompliance. If some of you don’t know the difference between that and being a “neo-confederate”, it only reveals a lack of ability or desire to see beyond one’s own intellectual laziness.

To paraphrase Hummell, a slave cannot be freed by enslaving a free man. You only wind up with two slaves.

I agree — the process matters as much as the outcome. But that general rule should be applied to our hindsight view of the Union as well as the Confederacy.
on 2009.03.01 at 17.00.12 Robert Capozzi

It’s pro-right to secede. I do get that. In fact, I am, too. I’d first suggest that a Constitutional process be put in place, so it can be done peacefully.

Even if your view of the constitution on this point is correct, Lincoln undisputably violated other parts of the constitution. Why would this be any different?
on 2009.03.01 at 19.16.52 jeffstandish

I’d first suggest that a Constitutional process be put in place, so it can be done peacefully.

You assume that had there been such a clause, Lincoln and the northern nationalists, centralists, and imperialists who formed his “fuck them and kill them” backup band would have abided by it.

I say “fat chance”.

In 1860, the sentiment about secession was out there, and most people in America agreed that states voluntarily joined to the Union could voluntarily leave. It was only after the fighting began and people started losing sons and husbands (plus the cumulative effect of endless state propagandizing) that public attitudes started to whipsaw in the other direction.
on 2009.03.01 at 19.51.47 Robert Capozzi

jeff, if they’d at least made the effort to make it explicit, I’d say the CSA made their best effort, and I’d assess their secession conventions in a more favorable light.

as for the majority agreeing, I’d like to see your evidence that “most people” believed the States could voluntarily leave the US. the Patrick Henry quote I referenced earlier in this thread suggests otherwise.

even if they agreed in general, I’d submit that the majority of people in SC would have opposed secession, mostly because the majority in SC were SLAVES.

there was NO attempt that I’m aware of to secede in an amicable way. federal property was confiscated without compensation. way, way uncool, in my book.
on 2009.03.02 at 12.50.47 jeffstandish

if they’d at least made the effort to make it explicit, I’d say the CSA made their best effort, and I’d assess their secession conventions in a more favorable light.

Oh come off it. Nothing would have ever made the centralists happy with secession. Likewise, no efforts the secessionists did make to sell their position by persuasion would make you happy, either. The truth is that those who supported secession made a diligent effort to persuade everyone they could. But at some point, everyone involved understands there is nothing left to talk about.

As I said, centralists wanted to retain their tax turf. No argument was going to persuade them to give up that power. At some point, either massive peaceful resistance forces a change, or the cartridge box will have its day.

Every action has consequences.

For over half a century, the south was the target of mercantilist & protectionist regulations, many of which discouraged investment in manufacturing — which kept the south dependent on labor-intensive agriculture, with predictable side effects for slavery). Punitive taxes were also directed at southern states.

Again, every action has consequences.

Congress simply wasn’t listening to the concerns of southerners. All this “I don’t hear you” bullshit simply primed southerners to want to leave by 1860. I’ve never denied that slavery factored heavily into the mix; but centralists prefer to remain deaf, blind and dumb about all of the other reasons why southerners wanted out.

This century’s interventions by the United States in various theatre conflicts around the globe should serve to illustrate the “kick the hornet’s nest” syndrome: if you fuck around with people enough, eventually you’re going to get stung. That’s exactly what the Feds were doing to southerners for over half a century until finally enough was enough.

federal property was confiscated without compensation. way, way uncool, in my book.

Are you kidding me? Did you write that with a straight face?

Government property almost by definition is stolen property. No government owns its property, because it was either stolen outright via eminent domain or the resources to buy it quasi-”honestly” were stolen from taxpayers.

Check your premises. A disproportionate share of federal revenue was paid by southerners, almost from the beginning of the Republic.

At best, the Feds should have sold the property at auction and sent checks to taxpayers of record, to any extent possible, reflecting their last few years’ worth of “contributions” to the federal treasury.

Perhaps that would be in the form of refunds of tariffs to the bodies that paid them, or taxes apportioned among the states.

As I said, I believe secession is always — ultimately — a good thing, even if done for what you think are bad reasons.

As an aside, I’ve always thought that abolitionists could probably have done much better by proposing & supporting legislation to buy slaves out of bondage for market prices, rather than expecting to leave the primary money-producing sector (agriculture) left to the south abruptly without labor. It would have been far cheaper than the war was.
on 2009.03.02 at 20.06.09 Robert Capozzi

Jeff, despite the fact that we’ve established that you are FAR more intelligent than I am, I’d not realized that you also have the ability to read minds. Good for you! Still, I’ve indicated I’m somewhat inclined toward decentralism, so I’m not sure why you wish to brand me a “centralist.”

As for whether the Union would have gone along with a change to the Constitution, your guess seems fine to me. The Union probably would not have acceded to the move. My only point is that the CSA exhibited extreme ill-will IMO for not exhausting other, less radical measures than breaking the Constitutional contract unilaterally. Mine was a thought experiment about how I personally might assess the historical record had things happened differently.

I’m not sure EVERY action has consequences, at least not clear, discernable ones. But, yes, that the CSA states chose to break the contract unilaterally in order to maintain slavery and to get out from under unfair tariffs had quite substantial consequences.

In some ways, I agree that on some theoretical levels all government property is “stolen.” That would also apply to the CSA, yes? It’s not real obvious what your point is. Perhaps the concerns that the Union expressed that the CSA “gang” took the US “gang’s” property is of no weight in your assessment of history, but it has some in mine. US taxpayers paid for property that was being taken without agreement, no matter how one slices it. I’d call that theft, too.

Maybe the US could have had a fire sale EXCEPT for one little wrinkle: Some of the CSA went into insurrection mode during the Buchanan administration, and Buchanan was a lame duck, waiting out his term. The insurrection spread in the Lincoln administration, and the Union invoked the insurrection clause of the Constitution to put that action down.

But, yes, if you believe secession is THE magic-bullet toward liberty, I do believe I understand your perspective on history. I don’t. I’m pro self-determination within the constraints of the rule of law. I suspect the vast majority of slaves – N and S – at the time would agree with me.

North Korea doesn’t seem to be on a path to liberty, but hope springs eternal.

And, whether the abolitionists should’ve paid for freeing the slaves vs. the costs of the Civil War, I find that a grandiose assumption. The information costs were prohibitive. The costs of the war/insurrection suppression were completely unknown in 1861.

Strikes me that the CSA Elites could have made similar calculations, and didn’t. This shouldn’t surprise us. It was, after all, the 19th century. Like Cannoli, who thinks the Union could have “just moved” the capital from DC to NY to avoid the Elite Pincer movement, hindsight is 20/20, looked at through a 21st century lens. Assuming perfect information is a rather basic error in analysis of all sorts.

Relax your mind.
on 2009.03.03 at 00.33.48 sgreffenius

I’m gratified by all the excellent comments to Lincoln’s Legacy. Thank you! I’d like to leave a longer response, but can’t now. I’m happy to see the thread continue right up to the present.
on 2009.03.03 at 00.37.35 jeffstandish

if you believe secession is THE magic-bullet toward liberty, I do believe I understand your perspective on history.

First you accuse me of reading your mind and then you put words in my mouth. Nowhere did I say that secession is “THE magic bullet” toward liberty. You said that, not me. I would say it is merely “one bullet” towards liberty; one of many.

On the other hand, war is one of the absolute best “magic bullets” to enlarge and empower The State. Put another way, War is the Health of the State.

I don’t. I’m pro self-determination within the constraints of the rule of law.

Hmmm. OK, now this statement begs the obvious question. So under what circumstances – since German law didn’t allow it, and you’re a law-and-order kinda guy – would the Jews and gays and other minorities within WWII German territory have had a right to engage in self-determination, in your opinion? After all, everything that was being done to those minorities was legal under German law. What legal recourse were they to use?

Your “ask for permission to leave” requirement reminds me of a movie I watched about the Warsaw ghetto uprising many years ago. The story revolved around a young Jewish man’s efforts to get a hold of a pistol. Later in the movie, as the Germans were starving the Jews to death, he and others tried to get the older people to fight what was happening to them, and they refused. “We cannot disobey the law. We will go to the authorities and tell them what is happening to us, and ask for their help…” one of the older guys said.

Compare that to: “…. when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.” Nowhere in there is there a hint that those who feel they are oppressed should grovel and scrape before the king to beg to be let go. The United States won its independence using those words. Southerners rightly believed they had every right to invoke them again.

I reject your position that when a government becomes tyrannical, that the people it is grinding into the earth must patiently sit around waiting for their oppressors to change some obscure law that might allow them redress. That way lies ethnic cleansing.

I think this entire discussion has overlooked the fact that while the Union was doing god’s work slaughtering secessionists, it was also slaughtering Indians.

Like Paulie said:

sgreffenius: “I’m glad that our country didn’t fall apart for good in 1860.”

pauliecannoli: “Why?”

You suggest we’d be living in a bunch of little North Koreas. I don’t believe that would be the case; but I do wonder — did the United States ever really earn its right to exist, given its history of slaughter and suppression of minorities? The American flag was the flag of slavery for over three-quarters of a century, from 1783 to late 1865 when the last “servants” (they were slaves in all but name) were released from service to GENERAL GRANT).

What makes the Union so special and sacrosanct to you?
on 2009.03.03 at 04.37.50 Robert Capozzi

Jeff, sorry, but you did say:

“Personally, I think secession, even if for bad reasons, always — and I do mean always — ends up being a Good Thing for liberty.”

Yes, I take your point, I slightly overstated. That surely sounds to me like “a” magic bullet, but, sure, not quite “THE” magic bullet. My apologies for the overstatement.

War may well be the health of the State. I’d say the institution of slavery was a form of war. Holding people in absolute bondage is a war, as I see it. I don’t care to rationalize the CSA as part of an “always” good process of shrinking the State’s geographic size. I agree it CAN be good, depending on a number of factors.

On balance, no, I don’t care to point to the Insurrection as a blow for liberty. We apparently should agree to disagree on this matter.

If the Jews had seceded from Germany, I’d say that would have been a blow for liberty. If the slaves had seceded from the USA or the CSA, I’d say that was a blow for liberty. I’d associate the Nazi German regime more with the CSA Elites than with freedom fighters. They explicitly wanted to maintain slavery. Even if they had some positive motives, the maintain-slavery motive was far, far to over-the-line for this hombre.

All things considered, I really can’t imagine how you can make this statement: “Southerners rightly believed they had every right to invoke … [the Declaration's words] again.” In isolation, the CSA probably did. They apparently also thought slavery was AOK. Nazis thought the Final Solution was OK, too. I consider the source. I find neither credible. For me, your analysis misses the forest for the trees.

But I definitely agree with you that the US’s trail of tears with the Native Americans was horrific. That’s one of the reasons that I take the view that American history (and history generally) is not dualistic. Dualistic thinking seeks out “Good Guys” and “Bad Guys,” but we mostly find “Gray Guys,” in truth. So, for ex., I can praise Jefferson for a lot of virtue, but I never forget that he was a slaver.

Did I ever say the Union was sacrosanct? Seems you’re projecting. So, I’ll repeat my take:

The Civil War was an insurrection, put down using Constitutional and unconstitutional means. The insurrectionists were not justified in their actions, which was the proximate cause and prime mover of events.

It’s a pretty narrow, all-things-considered view. It’s not Lincoln idolatry. It’s not undiluted Unionism. It simply recognizes there was a contract in place, one that had conflict-resolution procedures, procedures that the CSA chose to not even TRY to use fully, all in their desire to maintain slavery. The contract has an Insurrection clause, one that the Union invoked. A lot of people died tragically in the wake of the CSA’s refusal to follow the contract. Horrible. A lot of people were freed from slavery in the wake of putting down the Insurrection. Good. Another case of non-dualistic analysis on my part.

That’s my truth, as best I can discern. If you are an absolutist that secession is “always” virtuous, that’s your truth, despite the empirical evidence that smaller nations are sometimes more tyrannical than larger ones (e.g., North Korea vs. most other larger nations on Earth), then, again, we’d simply need to agree to disagree. I guess we’re watching a different movie.

Personally, I’m neither “glad” nor “sad” that the Insurrection of 1861 was put down. It simply was put down per terms of the contract. I am glad that chattel slavery was ended in the US in 1865.

The Constitution is not perfect, nor was it ever suggested to be. It does allow for modification to its credit. I can imagine virtuous causes to break the contract unilaterally. The CSA was not such a cause in my book. If it was only a tax revolt, I might have a different take. We seem to agree it wasn’t.
on 2009.03.04 at 17.59.36 pauliecannoli

You read the 9th and 10th as you will. I see nothing in the text that implies that the contract could be broken unilaterally

There was nothing to imply that it couldn’t. Thus, logically, it was a right reserved by the states and people thereof.

I do wonder: Are you REALLY interested in reaching out to the left?

Absolutely. And I intend to do so honestly.

I don’t think centralizing government power is a good way of achieving leftist goals, although I do agree with their goals.

For instance, I agree that ending slavery was a worthwhile goal; I don’t agree that a war was needed to achieve that goal, or that it was the best way of doing so.

I don’t agree that slavery would have survived in perpetuity had the South seceded. In fact, without the fugitive slave laws, and facing the probability of morally-based boycotts of its cotton both by the USA and Europe, an independent south would likely have abandoned slavery within five years or less.

I think, in general, a strongly centralized government is bad for liberty, bad for the poor, bad for the environment, and bad for every other goal I share with the left.
on 2009.03.04 at 18.07.03 pauliecannoli

If they’d first attempted to make the power to secede explicit in the Constitution

I think this is a backwards view of how the Constitution works. If the power to prevent secession is not explicit in the constitution (and it isn’t), then the federal government does not have it, if it abides by that document (which, of course, it doesn’t, and never did).

Or, if they’d have freed the slaves and then seceded, ditto.

Same for the American revolution of the 18th century?
on 2009.03.04 at 18.09.13 pauliecannoli

TX…not sure. Perhaps there’s a counter-signed treaty…is there one? If there IS one, there should be terms…will research later.

What’s clear is it ain’t in the Constitution.

Is there a counter-signed treaty that the US is allowed to leave the UN?
on 2009.03.04 at 18.10.20 pauliecannoli

btw, parts of VA are N of DC. Even more of 1860 VA was N of DC if one counts WV.

Thanks, I knew that.
on 2009.03.04 at 18.17.48 pauliecannoli

9. The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

10. 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.

No process for secession here, agreed?

There is no enumerated power to prevent secession; thus, it appears to be a right under the constitution.
on 2009.03.04 at 18.26.00 pauliecannoli

darren: Ultimately, Lincoln waged the Civil War to keep the South as a captive market and as taxpayers to loot. The North’s intentions were obvious starting with the 1828 “Tariff of Abominations”.

rc: i’d suggest you conflate MANY points here. While I agree with many of the critiques of Lincoln, please show us where this was his – and the Union’s – motive in putting down the CSA.

If I remember my reading correctly, one of the first things the Republicans did upon taking office was to pass a massive tariff. Much of the motivation of the union side was to monopolize the market for southern cotton (against European competitors for the most part). Another was to centralize government power in general. The market for weapons always interests the weaponmakers, as well.

My take is that the Union was simply putting down an insurrection. They wanted to maintain the Union and the Constitution.

Union, yes.

Constitution, not so much.

Of course, I am not a neo-confederate, but a fan of radical abolitionist Lysander Spooner. Who, incidentally, supported that the north separate from the south.
on 2009.03.04 at 18.32.09 pauliecannoli

straw man argument…”Lincoln was this evil figure, therefore the CSA was justified in its actions.”

I’m quite critical of Lincoln, but his history and views were largely beside the point.

Actually, his history and views are the subject of this discussion. This may not be apparent from the way the discussion has gone, using the opposite strawman that he was justified in everything he did by the evils of southern slavery.

In point of fact, I think both the USA and CSA governments were evil, and neither justified the other.

Additionally, I believe slave insurrections were entirely justified.
on 2009.03.04 at 18.37.14 pauliecannoli

Here’s another way to think of secession:

Say tomorrow the Mafia takes over RI. They control the governor and legislature. They enslave anyone with a Portuguese surname — a large percentage of the pop.

They then have a “Secession Convention” and secede from the US.

Would the revisionists here say what RI is doing is justified? If the Feds stepped in and stopped the “secession,” would they be unjustified?

I’m sympathetic to the notion of self determination. But the process matters as much as the outcome.

I think the following would be a closer analogy:

Say tomorrow the United Nations passes animal rights and global taxation.

The US says no, but other nations say yes, and finance a global army to invade the US for its brutal treatment of companion animals and the mass exploitation and slaughter of animals for food, clothing, and other uses.

Would the US be right to resist the global onslaught?

This is a separate question from whether animal rights advocates are morally correct.

For that matter, if I was an American animal rights advocate in such a situation, I would see myself more readily fighting against global government – as many southerners who never owned slaves and had no desire to ever own slaves fought against the north.
on 2009.03.04 at 18.41.31 pauliecannoli

So, had the threat of violence not been in the air, there is a very credible case to be made that the south would have ended up as three or four — or more — separate, relatively powerless, independent nations.

More than that, I think. West Virginia was not the only part of a state to secede; for example, in Alabama, Winston County seceded from the state. Winston, in the northern part of Alabama, was not cotton country, and had few or no slaves.

I think secessions by counties from slave states were justified.
on 2009.03.04 at 18.49.22 pauliecannoli

My apologies.

I accidentally edited Robert’s comment at

http://pauliecannoli.wordpress.com/2009/02/14/lincolns-legacy/#comment-6449

rather than responding to it.

What you see there is my response to a part of that comment. If anyone saved the original, please repost it.
on 2009.03.04 at 18.57.58 pauliecannoli

Check your premises. A disproportionate share of federal revenue was paid by southerners, almost from the beginning of the Republic.

Using slave labor, however.
on 2009.03.04 at 19.01.44 pauliecannoli

As an aside, I’ve always thought that abolitionists could probably have done much better by proposing & supporting legislation to buy slaves out of bondage for market prices, rather than expecting to leave the primary money-producing sector (agriculture) left to the south abruptly without labor. It would have been far cheaper than the war was.

While I agree that it would have been cheaper than the war, I think it would have been better yet to have massive civil disobedience of fugitive slave laws, and more formenting of slave rebellions. Slavery would have quickly become too expensive to maintain.
on 2009.03.04 at 19.07.31 pauliecannoli

But, yes, that the CSA states chose to break the contract unilaterally in order to maintain slavery and to get out from under unfair tariffs had quite substantial consequences.

OK, some progress here, I think.

You’ve now agreed that tariffs were part of the reason for secession, and we’ve agreed that slavery was as well.

We’ve all agreed that on balance, breaking up larger states into smaller ones is generally best.

There is some disagreement as to which side is more constitutionally correct, although I should be clear that I am not primarily a constutionalist.

So, we aren’t that far apart on this.
on 2009.03.04 at 19.12.11 pauliecannoli

In some ways, I agree that on some theoretical levels all government property is “stolen.” That would also apply to the CSA, yes?

Yes.
on 2009.03.04 at 20.16.57 Robert Capozzi

Paulie, the US/UN relationship is a treaty. The US had/has a binding Constitution. Interestingly, Spooner thought so, too. He read “We the people” the same way I do. It was one nation. I grant he reversed himself somewhat during the Insurrection.

Oddly enough, so did Patrick Henry:

http://www.freeliberal.com/blog/archives/001696.php

Breaking treaties and breaking Constitutions are different in my book.

I’d be REAL interested to hear you explain your take to a liberal, and then you listen to me explainig my take to them. Methinks I’d be more persuasive, given the typical progressive.

Your truth is your truth, and I’m not suggesting you change it, but you might consider avoiding the subject until you build a LOT of trust. Effectively taking the side of the slave-oriented CSA is highly unlikely to win you points, I suspect.

I’m not a “Constitutionalist,” either, but I am a moderate when it comes to the rule of law. Part of the jurisprudential tradition is to consider “mitigating circumstances,” and I’d say the desire to maintain slavery is a huge one.

Even if you buy Hummel’s whither away argument, to blithely accept — what — generations of slavery’s continuation seems ghoulish to me.

Finally, back to PR, many — including me — associate things like the Klan and neo-Nazis as abhorrent. Many of them buy this revisionist line. I sort of buy some of it, too, but my goodness I distance myself from the hard right every chance I get. Be careful with your approach. We saw what happened with Ron Paul on this stuff.
on 2009.03.04 at 20.25.28 Robert Capozzi

And, actually, I’d say we’re VERY far apart, in practice. We’re having a chat among libertarians, and while I count the Rockwell crowd in the tent, their obsession with Lincoln and the CSA is dysfunctional. They promote this obscure, albeit interesting, perspective, but I do wish they’d stop.

It’s very, very counterproductive when trying to reach out to the general population. Libertarians?, they might say, aren’t you people against Lincoln and for slavery? Ba-bye.

Most people don’t have the patience for this sort of dialog, in my experience. Talk about secession = pro Dixie.

Maybe that plays in some parts of the South…maybe. It definitely don’t play in the ‘hood. It don’t play on the coasts. It don’t play on campus.
on 2009.03.04 at 23.02.43 pauliecannoli

Effectively taking the side of the slave-oriented CSA is highly unlikely to win you points, I suspect.

Well, yes – if that’s the side I took.

But I don’t think Lysander Spooner was a partisan of the CSA. Look up what he thought of Lincoln some time.

I’d be REAL interested to hear you explain your take to a liberal, and then you listen to me explainig my take to them. Methinks I’d be more persuasive, given the typical progressive.

It depends how open minded a person I am talking to.

Decentralism is a key Green value, for example. It’s not a key value of most Obama/Clinton types, necessarily. I accepted the goal/idea of decentralism well before I became a libertarian.

“Think small”/”small is beautiful” was a 1960s countercultural meme. So, there are clearly segments of the left open to the ideas of decentralization.

As a matter of fact, there were people on the left who discussed the “blue states” seceding from the US and/or joining Canada during the Bush Jr. era.

Certainly, finding non-military solutions to social problems is an accepted value among many on the left. So, the idea that there could have been a non-military approach to ending slavery is not something an intelligent progressive would dismiss without due consideration.

There are certainly many on the left who oppose suspensions of civil liberties, even in the case of wars they support, such as the internment of the Japanese in WWII.
Pointing out Lincoln’s suspensions of civil liberties is not taking the side of the confederacy, any more than opposing Japanese internment is taking the side of the Japanese Empire or Hitler.

Even if you buy Hummel’s whither away argument, to blithely accept — what — generations of slavery’s continuation seems ghoulish to me.

Generations? No, I would say it would have been less than five years. And it was Spooner’s view as well. Google Lincoln Spooner and see for yourself.

Finally, back to PR, many — including me — associate things like the Klan and neo-Nazis as abhorrent.

Well, certainly they are. But in what way is criticizing Lincoln make me any less opposed to the Klan and nazis?

my goodness I distance myself from the hard right every chance I get.

The enemy of my enemy is not always my friend. The nazis fought the Soviets; that does not make me an admirer of either.

Be careful with your approach. We saw what happened with Ron Paul on this stuff.

My approach to these issues is a good deal different from Ron Paul.
on 2009.03.04 at 23.51.25 pauliecannoli

I count the Rockwell crowd in the tent, their obsession with Lincoln and the CSA is dysfunctional.

They do cross the line into neo-confederate territory.

I don’t.

Similarly, there was a difference between those who opposed US involvement in the Vietnam war and those who cheered for a North Vietnamese victory, although some of the latter could be found among the former.

Most people don’t have the patience for this sort of dialog, in my experience. Talk about secession = pro Dixie.

You may have missed the point of this discussion. See the original post for context, and my earliest comments.

Again; I’m not a defender of the confederacy.

I do, however, oppose the canonization of Lincoln.

Look up radgeek lincoln or see

http://aaeblog.com/2008/02/05/smearbund-funnies/

Maybe that plays in some parts of the South…maybe. It definitely don’t play in the ‘hood. It don’t play on the coasts. It don’t play on campus.

I don’t think my support for slave uprisings counts as something that would “play in the south, not in the hood.”
And I don’t think the tradition of relying on the (federal, especially) government as savior that it created has been good for the hood – as some, including Malcolm X, realize(d).

As for the coasts, I remember “US out of Humboldt” stickers on car bumpers when I lived in Northern California. I don’t think they were KKK members or sympathizers. Nor does this strike me in such a light either:

http://secession.net/

Finally, as to campus: while not everyone there is intellectual in disposition, what better place to find people who treat ideas seriously?

Dualistic approaches such as seeing anyone who criticizes Lincoln as a champion of the confederacy are a pervasive form of fallacy among many, including some on the left, certainly.

But in fact, by excluding the middle (where the path of peace usually is), dualistic mindsets lead to conflict, bloodshed and tyranny – not exactly liberal or leftist goals.
on 2009.03.05 at 05.08.19 Robert Capozzi

pc, yes, I”ve encountered the small is beautiful left, too. my sense is they are outliers, a small number in the left universe.

it’s one thing to buy into dualisms, and another to recognize that most are dualistic. i’m critical of Lincoln, but mostly I keep my own counsel on that one.

hmm, 5 years probably WOULD have been a good tradeoff vs. putting down the Insurrection. whether that’s a good estimate, I doubt. Still, the Constitution DID/DOES have the Insurrection Clause. Expecting the Union to adopt your 5-year assumption asks a lot of them. The Abolitionists had been fighting against slavery for decades.

personally, i think it’s a mistake to base historical analysis on a series of speculations…if X, Y and Z happened differently, the outcome would be K. I’m a Hayekian, and the number of variables involves leads to massive uncertainty about outcomes.

that’s why i suggest a more humble take on the civil war: Union had the Constitutional power to invoke the Insurrection Clause. Union (and CSA) overstepped on many fronts. Glad slavery ended. Sad many died.

keeps things tidy.
on 2009.03.05 at 06.39.14 Robert Capozzi

btw, when I was on Platcom, I led the charge to entirely delete the “Secession” plank. That went back and forth, but we compromised by changing the title to “Self Determination.”

I’m OK with the current plank. I’m OK with self-determination, and sort of OK with secession. But, for a platform to be in favor of the right to “secede” rhetorically alienates large percentages of the population.

IMO, self determination alienates no one.

rhetoric and packaging matters…a lot, I’d say.
on 2009.03.05 at 08.48.43 pauliecannoli

, I”ve encountered the small is beautiful left, too. my sense is they are outliers, a small number in the left universe.

I think they are the ones who are most convertible to libertarian views.

The Abolitionists had been fighting against slavery for decades.

The aim of abolition was grafted on to the union’s war aims mid way through the war. Even then, the emancipation proclamation specifically did not free the slaves in areas the union controlled.

And before then, Lincoln specifically offered to preserve slavery if it would save the union.

Many abolitionists, including Spooner, opposed Lincoln’s war.

Still, the Constitution DID/DOES have the Insurrection Clause.

I prefer the Declaration of Independence on this point. And, as I’ve said, my interpretation here differs, since perpetual union is not among the enumerated powers.

personally, i think it’s a mistake to base historical analysis on a series of speculations…if X, Y and Z happened differently, the outcome would be K.

Actually, it’s logic and economics. Slavery would have been untenable without the enabling actions of the north within a union with the south. In drafting their ordnances of secession, the southern aristocracy were stubbornly stupid in trying to hang on to an advantage which they were about to lose anyway, regardless of whether they seceded.

What’s more, had they not seceded, they could have maintained slavery longer, and probably ended it with much more of their slave-produced wealth intact. Had they taken Lincoln’s offer to perpetuate slavery in the constitution in order to stay in the union, they may have been able to keep it for another 30-40 years until the US would become such a pariah nation as to be unable to carry on international commerce.

Of course, most union men were not fighting with the aim of ending slavery, and most confederate soldiers were not fighting with the goal of preserving it. The fight was, for most of them, the same as it was in the American Revolution 80 or so years earlier, with the northerners taking the place of the redcoats. Britain abolished slavery well before the US did, so if the American revolutionaries had been defeated, we’d have ended slavery earlier in North America.

In the 18th century, too, the secessionists had slaves. And in the Texas secession from Mexico which led to the Mexican-American war, the Anglos fought to preserve slavery against the Mexicans who had abolished it.

Going forward to the Spanish-American war, the world wars, and beyond, it was the union of the north and south in a preserved USA which allowed it to become an aggressive imperialist world power – southern military culture combined with northern industrial might. And it was the US intervention late in WWI which kept it from being fought to a stalemate, with the peace treaties already being in the works. the US intervention was what created the conditions that led to the Bolsheviks as well as Hitler coming to power.

Lincoln’s war created many bad precedents which were later used again: the draft, the revival of the central bank, paper money, suspension of civil liberties in wartime, the income tax, total war.

It did end up ending chattel slavery, although that was not why the north went to war, and the sharecropping/Jim Crow system was not very different in practice from slavery for many former slaves and their descendants for several generations.

Union (and CSA) overstepped on many fronts. Glad slavery ended. Sad many died.

There, we agree.
on 2009.03.05 at 08.59.05 pauliecannoli

btw, when I was on Platcom, I led the charge to entirely delete the “Secession” plank. That went back and forth, but we compromised by changing the title to “Self Determination.”

I’m OK with the current plank. I’m OK with self-determination, and sort of OK with secession. But, for a platform to be in favor of the right to “secede” rhetorically alienates large percentages of the population.

IMO, self determination alienates no one.

rhetoric and packaging matters…a lot, I’d say.

3.7 Self-Determination

Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of individual liberty, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to agree to such new governance as to them shall seem most likely to protect their liberty.

Good point. This does preserve the essence while packaging it in a better way.

But, we’re still off on a tangent.

The issue in the article we are commenting on is whether Lincoln was praiseworthy. You say,

i’m critical of Lincoln

I say I’m critical of the confederacy, as well.

So we are reduced to arguing over whether the constitution permitted secession; a relatively minor point to me, since I am with Spooner on the general issue of the constitution as well as on preferred strategy for ending slavery and opinion of Lincoln and his war, and many other things besides.
on 2009.03.05 at 09.32.28 robert capozzi

on whether Lincoln was “praiseworthy,” I’d say as President he did his job of upholding the Constitution well, given extremely trying conditions.

In that process, he used some unConstitutional methods. One of them I give him a pass on – HC suspension when the Elite Pinser movement threatened to put committed slavers in charge of all the US.

Lincoln had a mixed record. Don’t we all?
on 2009.03.05 at 09.39.54 pauliecannoli

I’d say as President he did his job of upholding the Constitution well, given extremely trying conditions.

I can’t say I agree with that.

In that process, he used some unConstitutional methods. One of them I give him a pass on – HC suspension

The jailing of many thousands of northerners who opposed the draft, the war, and Lincoln’s government publicly was by no means confined to Maryland.

Elite Pinser movement threatened to put committed slavers in charge of all the US.

Now that’s some revisionist history. Do you have any indication whatsoever that the CSA wanted to rule the north? I’ve seen zero evidence of this. Capturing DC would not have meant they would have wanted to rule New York, Boston, etc.; it means the USA may well have had to relocate its seat of government, though.
on 2009.03.05 at 09.58.10 robert capozzi

I said “threatened.” I don’t care to speculate on what might have happened if the Elites captured DC. That ONE case of HC suspension made exigent sense. I believe the others were approved by Congress. Rioting during wartime could be viewed as another exigent circumstance. Near as I can tell, it was Constitutional, however.

To be clear, I definitely don’t think the draft was justified. I can’t think of a case where it would be.
on 2009.03.05 at 10.11.27 pauliecannoli

I said “threatened.” I don’t care to speculate on what might have happened if the Elites captured DC.

The threat here appears to me to be illusory. The south had no interest in occupying and ruling the north. Nor did they have the manpower and resources to make such an occupation even remotely feasible even if they had had such intentions.

They would have had to fight for, capture and hold each and every one of the union states. There was no support for that in the south, and there would easily have been overwhelming resistance in the north.

I don’t see the great catastrophe you do if the union had been forced to move its capital; they had done so several times earlier, with no more technology than existed during Lincoln’s war.

I believe the others were approved by Congress.

Where did Congress get such powers?

And, if a Congress controlled by the president’s party passes the president’s proposals (assuming that congress signed off on it at all – I haven’t gone back to check on it), which he then signs into law and directs the executive branch to enforce, the president can not be entirely blameless for what they passed.

Rioting during wartime could be viewed as another exigent circumstance.

Down that path, any manner of tyranny can be excused by exigency.

Near as I can tell, it was Constitutional, however.

Quite a few things Lincoln did were in no way constitutional.
on 2009.03.05 at 10.26.52 robert capozzi

paulie, clarifying…the Elite forces plunged into DC. The city was on the brink of falling. Perhaps all official DC might’ve been taken hostage. I’d call that exigent.

Reread the Constitution’s HC provisions…
on 2009.03.05 at 12.02.39 pauliecannoli

Perhaps all official DC might’ve been taken hostage.

I rather doubt it. In return for what?
on 2009.03.05 at 12.42.30 robert capozzi

poor word choice

“captured,” not “hostage”

picky!!!
on 2009.03.05 at 13.04.01 pauliecannoli

LOL. I think we are reduced to arguing about multi-tangents.

I’ll let some other people have a crack at it.
on 2009.03.06 at 05.44.08 Robert Capozzi

btw, Article 1, Section 9 says this:

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.

Art. 1 is all about legislative powers.

Section 8 says this:

To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;
on 2009.03.06 at 05.54.36 Robert Capozzi

while I’m at it, I do find the Rockwell crowd a bit conflicted on the Constitution and Spooner. If one is an anarchist, and one views EVERYTHING through the anarcho lens, then, sure, the Constitution is “illegitimate,” as consent’s not EXPLICITLY been given by all.

But then they also seem to be strict constructionists.

But, in the end, I’m kinda of with them. I do think one can analyze situations based on the level they are at.

So, if the Constitution’s text says X, I apply that. Hence, Sections 8 and 9 seem very appropos.

Yet, Spooner’s correct on a more theoretical level. There is no explicit consent, the whole thing is flawed.

It’s the beauty of being a theoretical asymptotic anarchist/applied lessarchist. My goal is to be relevant to the level of analysis we’re confronted with. I can justify historical events in context, even if ultimately I’d like to see the State (nearly?) whither away. I’m not holding my breath on the latter.
on 2009.03.11 at 03.05.52 pauliecannoli

btw, Article 1, Section 9 says this:

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.

Art. 1 is all about legislative powers.

Section 8 says this:

To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;

This is only relevant if one agrees with your assessment that secession is not a right under the 9th and 10th amendments, and not a pre-existing right based on the logic of the Declaration of Independence, as well as not a right reserved by several state legislatures as a specific condition of approving the Constitution and/or joining the union.

As previously stated, I do not share this assessment.

while I’m at it, I do find the Rockwell crowd a bit conflicted on the Constitution and Spooner. If one is an anarchist, and one views EVERYTHING through the anarcho lens, then, sure, the Constitution is “illegitimate,” as consent’s not EXPLICITLY been given by all.

But then they also seem to be strict constructionists.

But, in the end, I’m kinda of with them. I do think one can analyze situations based on the level they are at.

I don’t think it’s a conflict.

Our purpose is to limit government as much as possible – ultimately, more so than the constitution does, but in the meantime, strict construction would limit government more than loose construction (or strict deconstruction?).

So, if the Constitution’s text says X, I apply that. Hence, Sections 8 and 9 seem very appropos.

Same here, except that I find the 9th and 10th, particularly with the D of I for context, more appropos here.

My goal is to be relevant to the level of analysis we’re confronted with. I can justify historical events in context, even if ultimately I’d like to see the State (nearly?) whither away. I’m not holding my breath on the latter.

Agreed for the most part.

I’m a bit more optimistic on the wither away aspect, although I’m not holding my breath either.

I’m not a fan of either Lincoln or the Confederacy; a pox on both their graves, if anything.

The CSA regime was guilty of most, perhaps even all, of the abuses that Lincoln was guilty of, including forcibly preventing secession.

Contrary to what you may glean from LewRockwell.com, US imperialism did not start with the war between the states – the Mexican-American war, Indian wars such as those waged by Andrew Jackson, and much else predated it.

The CSA’s failure to realize that chattel slavery was economically and morally unsustainable cost them the war, IMO. If they were able to concede that point, they could have had the support of much of Europe, and would have won independence and unfettered access to European markets for cotton.

The Jim Crow/sharecropping system would probably have existed either way. Subsequent US imperialism and the harm it has caused, directly and indirectly, on the world stage would have been curtailed by the US being split into more than one country.

I still say that in a vote between Lincoln and Davis, I’m writing in Spooner.
on 2009.03.11 at 03.59.57 Robert Capozzi

pc, I don’t believe you’ve addressed my point about a Mafia secession here:

2009.03.01 at 07.47.52

I can sorta see a right to exit the Constitution implicit in 9 and 10A and the D of I, but the cause would have to be righteous, more or less.

When I balance that against the EXPLICIT words in Article 1, my assessment comes down on the explicit powers in the C to suppress an insurrection that was motivated to continue slavery.

Surely you don’t believe any unit that CLAIMS secession, even with criminal intent, is justified, do you? Flip it around, then. Surely you don’t believe that NO secession can be legitimately suppressed?

It strikes me that my position is the strict constitutional view. Mine is explicit. Yours and the LRC view is inferred.
on 2009.03.11 at 15.45.10 pauliecannoli

I don’t believe you’ve addressed my point about a Mafia secession here:

2009.03.01 at 07.47.52

Actually, I did.

http://pauliecannoli.wordpress.com/2009/02/14/lincolns-legacy/#comment-6470

I think the following would be a closer analogy:

Say tomorrow the United Nations passes animal rights and global taxation.

The US says no, but other nations say yes, and finance a global army to invade the US for its brutal treatment of companion animals and the mass exploitation and slaughter of animals for food, clothing, and other uses.

Would the US be right to resist the global onslaught?

This is a separate question from whether animal rights advocates are morally correct.

For that matter, if I was an American animal rights advocate in such a situation, I would see myself more readily fighting against global government – as many southerners who never owned slaves and had no desire to ever own slaves fought against the north.

It’s what the counterexample of the UN enforcing animal rights, and preventing the US from seceding, was meant to do.

And again, that’s not to say anything for or against the idea of animal rights.

Let’s try again.

Say tomorrow the Mafia takes over RI. They control the governor and legislature. They enslave anyone with a Portuguese surname — a large percentage of the pop.

They then have a “Secession Convention” and secede from the US.

Would the revisionists here say what RI is doing is justified? If the Feds stepped in and stopped the “secession,” would they be unjustified?

Would they be justified in seceding from the US? Absolutely.

Would they be justified in enslaving anyone? Absolutely not.

The question, then, is what should be done about it if they did. I would absolutely support private citizens organizing efforts to arms the enslaved population of that territory, and help them rebel and/or escape.

I’d back efforts by portions of that territory to secede from it. I’d back private citizens organizing to overthrow that regime.

I would not, however, back the federal regime, or the UN, sending in troops to prevent secession.

In the long run, larger territorial governments with the power to decide what is right and wrong and enforce it are more dangerous than more localized tyrannies. They can concentrate greater amounts of power, less accountably, at a higher level, further removed from the impact of their decisions.

Although, localized tyrannies can certainly be brutal and horrible, and often are, they are relatively speaking easier to escape. The more broken-up and localized the better.

Using a larger state to suppress a smaller state may seem good in the short run, but in the long run it empowers that larger state to be even bigger and more dangerous.

I can sorta see a right to exit the Constitution implicit in 9 and 10A and the D of I, but the cause would have to be righteous, more or less.

Not necessarily. I think secession in and of itself is a righteous cause.

People have the right of self-determination, somewhat. I don’t want a UN or US that is big and powerful enough to suppress every tyranny in the world, because in the long run that can only lead to one gigantic global tyranny.

I don’t trust monopolies formed and maintained by force. The bigger they are, the less I trust them.

I do favor people fighting to overthrow tyrannies. I do favor people helping people in other countries to overthrow tyrannies – but only through voluntary organization.

As to the specifics of southern secession, some of the causes (preserving slavery) were wrong, while others (opposing restrictive tariffs) were right.

Yes, slavery did need to be ended. No, I don’t agree that the means used to do so in this case were the best way to do so.

Given that Lincoln offered to make slavery perpetual to save the union, it seems clear that ending slavery was not his prime motivation.

Given that many other countries ended slavery around the same time without a bloody war, it seems that a peaceful solution may have been possible.

When I balance that against the EXPLICIT words in Article 1, my assessment comes down on the explicit powers in the C to suppress an insurrection that was motivated to continue slavery.

I don’t think that the natural right to secede depends on what motivates people to secede. It is a right, and should always be a right.

And, yes, it does scale: in answer to what someone – I think you – said somewhere way above, yes, slaves did have the right to secede from their plantations, and should have been encouraged to do so, including by northerners – just not through the federal government.

I don’t believe the ends of ending slavery justified Lincoln’s means. I believe the victory was pyrrhic, and set much of the precedent and basis for much enslavement, war, tyranny and imperialism that has taken place since then.

But, I do believe that ending slavery, including by violent means if necessary, was justified.

Surely you don’t believe any unit that CLAIMS secession, even with criminal intent, is justified, do you? Flip it around, then. Surely you don’t believe that NO secession can be legitimately suppressed?

Why can’t I believe that? It’s only the same right of self-determination that you helped write into the LP platform.

The people of Iraq had the right not to be occupied by the US. Did they have the right to be free of Saddam? Yes. But it did not justify the means. I don’t think the ends justified Lincoln any more than they justified W.
on 2009.03.11 at 18.44.42 Robert Capozzi

pc, thanks for answering more directly. in my mafia ex., I’m a-OK with stopping that secession.

I prefer the US to living in the smaller N. Korea. Therefore, I can’t say I agree with your take on secession.

Self determination, for me, may be a tool for liberty, but I’m more interesting in maximing liberty for the most, regardless of State size.
on 2009.03.13 at 09.46.10 pauliecannoli

I prefer the US to living in the smaller N. Korea. Therefore, I can’t say I agree with your take on secession.

I also prefer living in the US to living in North Korea. What I’m more concerned with, though, is living in the US (or entire world under the UN) turned into North Korea. If you agree that absolute power corrupts absolutely, that is the end result of a large government that gets to decide what is wrong and what is right for the whole world (and to a lesser, but still great extent, the end result of one that gets to decide what is wrong and what is right for a large portion of the world).

Self determination, for me, may be a tool for liberty, but I’m more interesting in maximing liberty for the most, regardless of State size.

So am I. I may think state size is a larger factor in maximizing liberty than you do, but I agree with the overall goal. In terms of this goal, I think Lincoln in the broader analysis decreased overall long term liberty in the world, although a by-product of his administration was greater liberty for several million people.
on 2009.03.14 at 15.29.00 Robert Capozzi

I don’t actually agree that “absolute power” corrupts absolutely. Technically, I believe “absolute power” is unsustainable.

My reasoning is here:

http://www.freeliberal.com/archives/001180.html

As for whether “Lincoln” decreased overall LT liberty, I can’t say. Lincoln wasn’t acting alone. Demonizing Lincoln misses the forest.

I make a narrow point: The Union put down the insurrection constitutionally, period. I grant that there may have been meta-constitutional issues, and I’d say they are blurry. The insurrection clause is reasonably clear, by contrast.

By 1865, chattel slavery was ended. 100% coercion was ended. The Union’s actions may well have set some poor precedents, but I’d say 1865-1913 were more peaceful years than 1787-1860, on balance.

So, I guess I disagree on this one.
on 2009.03.14 at 15.55.37 Robert Capozzi

appending: The Union put down the insurrection constitutionally, sometimes using non and extra constitutional means…to be clear.
on 2009.03.23 at 17.15.02 pauliecannoli

I don’t actually agree that “absolute power” corrupts absolutely. Technically, I believe “absolute power” is unsustainable.

Probably so, but I meant this directionally.

As for whether “Lincoln” decreased overall LT liberty, I can’t say. Lincoln wasn’t acting alone. Demonizing Lincoln misses the forest.

None of history’s tyrants acted alone.

I make a narrow point: The Union put down the insurrection constitutionally, period. I grant that there may have been meta-constitutional issues, and I’d say they are blurry. The insurrection clause is reasonably clear, by contrast.

I disagree that it applied.

I’d say 1865-1913 were more peaceful years than 1787-1860, on balance.

I’m not so sure I have enough information to make such a determination.
on 2009.03.24 at 11.58.42 Robert Capozzi

it’s an easy one for me. slavery of a large percentage of the pop dwarfs tariffs and temporary income taxes.
on 2009.03.25 at 15.04.02 pauliecannoli

Tariffs and income taxes were only a small part of the equation.

And the Jim Crow/sharecropping system retained many of the characteristics of slavery.

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- Ed Flynn: Milwaukee Crime Lord, Citizen Disarmament Advocate 2013.02.28 William N. Grigg
- "No Hesitation" 2013.02.21 William N. Grigg
- Officer Safety Uber Alles: Christopher Dorner and the "Rickoverian Paradox" 2013.02.11 William N. Grigg
- "Gun Violence": The "National Conversation" We Won't Have 2013.01.31 William N. Grigg
- Why is it a “Crime” to Disarm a Uniformed Aggressor? 2013.01.28 William N. Grigg
- Put Not Your Trust In Federalized Sheriffs 2013.01.20 William N. Grigg
FKN Newz
- Bilderberg are running the world rss@www.fknnewz.com(bjchela)
- FKN CHRISTMAS MESSAGE rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- A CLIMATE TAX CAROL - By Deek Jackson rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- HAPPY CHRIST DELUSION rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- WAR ON MORONS - Be An Astronomers fight the war on Moron rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- THE WAY IT IS ? rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- CLIMATE VOODOO rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- VOODOO CLIMATE DENIAL rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- MASONS ABUSED BY SEXY KIDS rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- ARAB DICTATOR REVOLUTION LOL rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- SAY YES TO UN INTERNET CONTROL rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- LORD KENYON PEDO MASON COVER UP rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- GAZA CEASELIAR rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- 2012 PROPHECIES - FKN Newz Dec 2011 rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- JEWS HOLOCAUST GAZA rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- JEWLANDERS KILL ARABSTINIANS rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- POPPY BURNING HERO - OR HATE CRIME CRIMINAL rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- FLUSH MY SHIT AWAY - Live Stand up AV4 2010 - Deek Jackson rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- GLOBAL WTF? NEWZ rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
- GROWTH DEBT & SLAVERY rss@www.fknnewz.com(FKNNewz)
The Agitator
- I’ve Moved 2012.11.20 Radley Balko
- Saturday Links 2012.11.17 Radley Balko
- Scenes from Militarized America 2012.11.16 Radley Balko
- Morning Links 2012.11.15 Radley Balko
- Is America Getting Less Punitive? 2012.11.14 Radley Balko
- Morning Links 2012.11.14 Radley Balko
- Not a War on Patients 2012.11.14 Radley Balko
- World Press Photos of the Year 2012.11.12 Radley Balko
- It Isn’t a Crime When the Government Does It 2012.11.12 Radley Balko
- Headlines 2012.11.12 Radley Balko
- Milton Friedman, the War on Drugs, and Last Tuesday Night 2012.11.09 Radley Balko
- The New Professionalism 2012.11.09 Radley Balko
- Morning Links 2012.11.09 Radley Balko
- Steven Hayne Admits to Perjury 2012.11.06 Radley Balko
- Morning Links 2012.11.06 Radley Balko
- Mountain Barking 2012.11.05 Radley Balko
- Reminder: The Media Isn’t Liberal, It’s Statist 2012.11.05 Radley Balko
- Prediction 2012.11.03 Radley Balko
- Five-Star Fridays: Another Saturday Edition 2012.11.03 Radley Balko
- New at HuffPost: SCOTUS Goes to the Dogs 2012.11.02 Radley Balko
Loretta Nall
- Compliance through pain 2012.06.11 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Fringe candidates party on beyond the mainstream 2012.03.09 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- A frightening picture of drug war reality 2012.02.03 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Untitled 2012.01.22 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Medical Marijuana bill filed in Alabama House 2012.01.13 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- The Lucifer Pig 2011.10.11 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- When bullies get bullied 2011.10.07 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Is it school or prison? 2011.10.06 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Don't Touch Me 2011.10.05 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Fake Reefer Madness 2011.09.30 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Alabama Should drug test lawmakers, not Medicaid patients 2011.08.26 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- ANTISEC Destroys Some Alabama Law Enforcement Servers 2011.07.31 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Favorite Music Moment Ever 2011.07.27 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Damn you Auto Correct 2011.07.22 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Shouldn't Drug Court be for Drug Users? 2011.07.11 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Drug addiction is a health issue 2011.07.10 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Goat Electric 2011.07.07 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Back from Lu-Z-Anner 2011.07.04 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Federal Marijuana Legalization Bill Introduced in US House 2011.06.24 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
- Books you HAVE to read 2011.06.06 noreply@blogger.com (Loretta Nall)
Hit & Run
- Who Likes Your Lousy Driver's License Photo? The Cops! 2013.06.17 J.D. Tuccille
- Special Interests and Governments Will Screw Up EU-US Trade Deal 2013.06.17 Matthew Feeney
- No, I Didn't Criticize Sesame Street For Having a Muppet Whose Dad Is in Prison 2013.06.17 Mike Riggs
- Scandals Having Impact on Obama’s Support, Arizona Can’t Demand Citizenship Proof to Vote, Google Working to Delete Child Porn from Internet: P.M. Links 2013.06.17 Scott Shackford
- This Week Marks the One-Year Anniversary of Julian Assange Seeking Asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London 2013.06.17 Zenon Evans
- Supreme Court Rules Fifth Amendment Has to Actually Be Invoked 2013.06.17 Scott Shackford
- Rand Paul Learns from His Mistakes 2013.06.17 Jesse Walker
- Putin Took My Super Bowl Ring, Patriots Owner Says 2013.06.17 Ed Krayewski
- Analyst Says Rebel Group Fighting Assad is Best Equipped Al Qaeda Affiliate in the World 2013.06.17 Matthew Feeney
- Police At DUI Checkpoint "Unloading like Super Trigger Happy...Just Blasting this Car to Pieces" 2013.06.17 Brian Doherty
- Ira Stoll on Andrew Cuomo’s Misleading Plan for a “Tax Free New York” 2013.06.17
- Video: "Father of Video Games" Nolan Bushnell on Learning through Gaming 2013.06.17 Tracy Oppenheimer
- Julian Sanchez Rebuts Pilon & Epstein's NSA Defense 2013.06.17 Jacob Sullum
- Past NSA Whistleblowers Praise Snowden, Say They Tried and Failed With the Legal Route 2013.06.17 J.D. Tuccille
- A. Barton Hinkle on Why the NSA Scandal Is Just the Tip of the Iceberg 2013.06.17
- NSA Leaker Edward Snowden: "The U.S. Government is not going to be able to cover this up by jailing or murdering me." 2013.06.17 Mike Riggs
- Clarence Thomas Joins Supreme Court’s Liberals in Securing Jury Trial Rights for Criminal Defendants 2013.06.17 Damon W. Root
- Poll: 66 Percent OK With Obama Administration Collecting Internet Data 2013.06.17 Matthew Feeney
- How Rand Paul Bent the GOP in a More Libertarian Direction 2013.06.17 Matt Welch
- Peter Suderman on Obamanomics 2.0 2013.06.17
The Beacon
- The Stalinization of Amerika 2013.06.17 Mary Theroux
- Hospital Care That Is Priceless 2013.06.17 John C. Goodman
- Robert William Fogel (July 1, 1926 – June 11, 2013) 2013.06.16 Robert Higgs
- Note to Gov. Brown on Medical Liability Law: If It Ain’t Broken, Don’t Operate 2013.06.12 Lawrence J. McQuillan
- Doctors Should Rethink “Costless” Medical Ethics 2013.06.12 John C. Goodman
- President Obama’s Database: Information on Everyone 2013.06.11 Randall Holcombe
- Modern Communications Technology—Savior or Soma? 2013.06.11 Robert Higgs
- What the State Fears Most—Revelations of the Truth about the State 2013.06.10 Robert Higgs
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KN@PPSTER
- Why Do They Lie Like That? 2013.06.18 KN@PPSTER
- Suggestion for Feinstein, Nelson ... 2013.06.10 KN@PPSTER
- Google. Feh. 2013.06.10 KN@PPSTER
- Too Light for a Paperweight, Isn't It? 2013.06.04 KN@PPSTER
- It Took Seven Months 2013.05.30 KN@PPSTER
- I Saw The Light 2013.05.30 KN@PPSTER
- A Snail, Crawling on the Edge of a Straight Razor ... 2013.05.29 KN@PPSTER
- The Chrome Extension I'd Like to See 2013.05.24 KN@PPSTER
- For a Good Cause ... 2013.05.23 KN@PPSTER
- More ... 2013.05.23 KN@PPSTER
- My Objections to "Papers, Please" 2013.05.21 KN@PPSTER
- Handy Fact #3,129 2013.05.15 KN@PPSTER
- Glad ... 2013.05.10 KN@PPSTER
- Which Part of "the Genie is Out of the Bottle" Does the State Department not Understand? 2013.05.10 KN@PPSTER
- My Latest Florida Discovery 2013.05.07 KN@PPSTER
- Game Over for the Gun-Grabbers 2013.05.07 KN@PPSTER
- There Oughtta Be A Law ... 2013.05.02 KN@PPSTER
- Sarin Wrap 2013.05.01 KN@PPSTER
- Idiot Pol of the Month 2013.04.28 KN@PPSTER
- OK, Now It Is Real Transportation 2013.04.26 KN@PPSTER
The Delaware Libertarian
- President Obama auditions for SNL as parody of himself 2013.06.18 Steve Newton
- What the rush toward Obamacare means to Delaware patients with spinal problems 2013.06.18 Steve Newton
- Educating the wealthy at public expense: what the United States is good at 2013.06.18 Steve Newton
- Let's just buy the News Journal a big, fuzzy 1970s style pimp hat ... 2013.06.17 Steve Newton
- Who knew? Jake of "Body by Jake" has a libertarian philanthropic streak ... 2013.06.16 Steve Newton
- Government regulations reducing your safety on the road ... 2013.06.16 Steve Newton
- Governor Markell creates private working group to execute puppies ... 2013.06.16 Steve Newton
- "Right to work" doesn't mean what you think when the government is involved 2013.06.15 Steve Newton
- Pentagon afraid the Bradley Manning leaked videos will teach Al Qaeda how to kill Reuters journalists like we do 2013.06.14 Steve Newton
- New Journal so far in the tank for Markell that they no longer even see the bubbles rise 2013.06.14 Steve Newton
- Why you need to subscribe to send the Libertarian Party of Delaware $10 a month 2013.06.14 Steve Newton
- Libertarians: support Delaware midwives! 2013.06.13 Steve Newton
- Delaware: Making people pay for political speech 2013.06.13 Steve Newton
- Surprise, surprise (not): Jack Markell wants $80 million in new (regressive) taxes 2013.06.13 Steve Newton
- The only bi-partisan agreement in Washington ... 2013.06.12 Steve Newton
- Comment rescue from citizen: Earl Jaques continues to be a stranger to the truth 2013.06.11 Steve Newton
- And the lobbying for HB 165 continues .... 2013.06.11 Steve Newton
- Women are from Venus, Men are from Home Depot 2013.06.06 Steve Newton
- Time to start thinking seriously about saving Delaware's universities 2013.06.05 Steve Newton
- On why we don't have School Resource Officers paid for out of state funds any more 2013.06.05 Steve Newton
Strike-The-Root: A Journal Of Liberty
- Front page date 2009.11.04 strike
- Guest Editor 2009.09.13 strike
Classically Liberal
- Paranoid Parents and the Fear of Walking to School 2012.04.21 blog owner
- America's worst DA stripped of law license. 2012.04.12 blog owner
- Commenting Still Screwed UP 2012.04.12 blog owner
- Apologies 2012.04.12 blog owner
- A Caveat About the Election for Libertarians 2012.03.09 blog owner
- God's Own Party Run Amok 2012.03.06 blog owner
- Charles Koch and His Threat to Libertarianism 2012.03.02 blog owner
- That Selfish, Greedy Ayn Rand Does It Again. 2012.03.01 blog owner
- Woman Calls Cops on Scam—They Kill Her Dog Instead 2012.02.28 blog owner
- Separation of Church and State Makes Santorum Vomit 2012.02.26 blog owner
- Faked Scandal Against Warming Skeptics Backfires Badly. 2012.02.21 blog owner
- The Mind-Boggling Standards of Modern Catholicism 2012.02.20 blog owner
- Conservatives Shouldn't Drink and Drive Gay 2012.02.16 blog owner
- Sad numbers prove Religious Right wrong. 2012.02.14 blog owner
- Beware, diabetes cause police brutality. 2012.02.09 blog owner
- The Little Engine That Couldn't 2012.02.02 blog owner
- Marriage by the numbers. 2012.02.01 blog owner
- Monkey Sex Senator Refuses to Back Down 2012.01.28 blog owner
- Republican Blames Monkey Sex for AIDS 2012.01.26 blog owner
- Radio Hosts Imply a Lot in Dumb Statement 2012.01.18 blog owner
Ballot Access News
- Huffington Post Carries Lament that Many Voters Don’t Understand that Petitions are Needed for Candidates to get on Ballots 2013.06.18 Richard Winger
- New Jersey Bill, Requiring Governor to Fill U.S. Senate Vacancies With Member of Same Party, is Constitutionally Flawed 2013.06.17 Richard Winger
- U.S. Supreme Court Decision in Arizona v Inter Tribal Council of Arizona Strengthens “Elections Clause” of U.S. Constitution 2013.06.17 Richard Winger
- New Centrist Party Attempts to Qualify in South Carolina; Uses Name “American Party” 2013.06.16 Richard Winger
- South Carolina Republican Party Executive Director Says State Party Still Supports Lawsuit Against Open Primary 2013.06.16 Richard Winger
- Toledo Blade Editorializes Against Ohio’s Current System of Judicial Elections 2013.06.16 Richard Winger
- Idaho Republican Party Rejects Plan to Limit Access to Party’s Primary Ballot 2013.06.16 Richard Winger
- North Carolina Bill to Abolish State Income Tax Check-off for Political Parties Moves Ahead 2013.06.15 Richard Winger
- Idaho Republican State Central Committee to Vote Today on Plan to Limit Primary Ballot Access to Candidates Approved by Party Leaders 2013.06.15 Richard Winger
- New Jersey Supreme Court Accepts Appeal in Case Over Date of Special U.S. Senate Election 2013.06.14 Richard Winger
Homeland Stupidity
- Government Spying: Should We Be Shocked? 2013.06.10 Ron Paul
- Iraq Collapse Shows Bankruptcy of Interventionism 2013.06.02 Ron Paul
- ‘Common Core’ Nationalizes and Dumbs Down Public School Curriculum 2013.05.27 Ron Paul
- The IRS’s Job Is To Violate Our Liberties 2013.05.20 Ron Paul
- What No One Wants to Hear About Benghazi 2013.05.13 Ron Paul
- Federal Reserve Blows More Bubbles 2013.05.07 Ron Paul
- Liberty Was Also Attacked in Boston 2013.04.28 Ron Paul
- Why Can’t We All Travel To Cuba? 2013.04.14 Ron Paul
- Homeschooling: The Future of Liberty 2013.04.07 Ron Paul
- A Republic, Not a Democracy 2012.09.11 Ron Paul
Free Talk Live
- FTL2013-06-16 2013.06.17
  Live from PorcFest X!
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-15 2013.06.16
  NSA Spying :: Do we get the government we deserve? :: Americans think spying is OK if it's your party. :: Shutting Down Guantanamo :: Privacy :: John Stossel Advocates for NSA :: Peaceful Evolution vs Violence :: Benghazi Theory :: Declaration of Independence :: Syria :: Grand Jury :: Telephone Switch :: Legalization
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-14 2013.06.15
  Polyamory :: Wiretapping Charge Dropped :: Porcupine 411 :: Facebook Three Day Ban :: Human Sexual Nature :: Peace News Now :: Selling Physical Bitcoins :: Difficulty of Polyamory :: Underwear Bomber :: Privatizing Marriage :: Happy Birthday Owed Sued :: Vernon Hershberger Update
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-13 2013.06.14
  Post Office Annoyance :: Private Mailbox :: College Experience :: Eustace Conway Mountain Man Update :: Raw Milk Dealer Sentenced to No Jail :: American Exceptionalism :: Responsible Heroin Addict? :: Communicating Liberty :: Diamonds are a sham. :: How the diamond obsession started. :: Cop Shoots Five Kittens, Is Exonerated
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- Edgington Post; Radley Balko 2013-06-13 2013.06.13
  Radley Balko teases his new book Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America's Police Forces. Pre-order now! http://www.amazon.com/Rise-Warrior-Cop-Militarization-Americas/dp/1610392116/ref=pd_sim_sbs_b_1&tag=freetalklive-20
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-12 2013.06.13
  Pastry Gun Update :: FTL Facebook Ban :: Facebook Prude :: FTL on Google Plus :: Tortuous Interference :: Don't Play in Traffic :: Darryl Wins A Parking Ticket Trial :: Enforcers vs Politicians :: Aura of Legitimacy :: Soldiers and Murderers :: The Long View :: Trusting Junkies :: Junkie Stories :: Snitch App
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- Edgington Post; Joe Quirk 2013-06-12 2013.06.12
  Joe Quirk of Sea Steading talks about upcoming plans for a book! http://www.seasteading.org/
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-11 2013.06.12
  Robin Hood :: Police Quotas :: Speeding and Red Light Cameras :: Departmental Average :: Counter-Suing :: Petty Bailiffs :: Mental Institutions :: California Mental Ward :: Passport with no Social Security Number :: Sexy Meter Maids Under Attack :: Freedom to Travel :: Privacy Discussion :: Shocking Story from the Arab Spring :: Fascist Country
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-10 2013.06.11
  Edward Snowden, Heroic Former Agent For the NSA Reveals Secrets, Now on the Run :: Fear of Standing Up :: Media Control :: What are you willing to risk for liberty? :: Snowden Hater Article :: Corporations and the State :: Take to the Streets? :: Protecting Rights
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-09 2013.06.10
  PRISM government spying scandal :: Marc Emery in solitary confinement :: Hypochondria :: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy :: Edward Snowden blows whistle on the NSA :: Online privacy :: NSA spying :: Computer security :: PorcFest :: Common cognitive distortions :: Confessions of a former drone pilot
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-08 2013.06.09
  Heroic Jury Nullification Activist Mark Schmidter Joins us Fresh Out of Jail :: Free Speech and Jury Nullification :: George Bush Mission Accomplished Banner Hanger Calls In :: FIJA Outreach :: Adam Kokesh Arrested for Smoking Up in Front of White House - He Joins Us Fresh Out of Custody :: Rich Paul Sentenced :: FBI Investigating Free State Project :: Ridic […]
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-07 2013.06.08
  Rich Paul joins us live from jail, post sentencing. :: Gateway Drug Fallacy :: Drug Court :: Public Speaking :: Grand Jury Refuses to Indict Teen Rapper :: Vermont Decriminalizes Cannabis :: Cannabis Cancer Cure? :: Legalization and Prices in California :: Drone Operator Tells His Story :: Heroic, Sexy Meter Maids :: Terrorism and Blowback
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-06 2013.06.07
  Free Talk Live with Julia, Johnson, Puke & Jay
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-05 2013.06.06
  Wife of State Senator Posts "Warning to Women" on Facebook :: Baby Sex Cakes :: "Vision of a Restorative State" :: Organ Transplants :: Wyoming Teen Builds Nuclear Reactor for Science Fair :: NY Law Would Make it Illegal to "Annoy" A Cop :: NSA Collecting Data from Verizon
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- Ian Interviewed on Armstrong and Getty 2013-06-05 2013.06.05
  Ian joins Armstrong and Getty on their morning show in California - including San Francisco, San Diego, and Sacremento - to discuss Robin Hooding!
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-04 2013.06.05
  Libertarianism and Voluntarism :: Cannabis Civil Disobedience :: Hypocritical Robin Hood Opponents :: Tracker Dave Ridley? :: Conspiracy Theory Guy :: Bible Fiction :: Bradley Manning Trial Thoughts from Julian Assange :: Reasons to Move to NH :: The Enemy of the US is Us :: Insanity of Violence :: XXXX Games :: JRGOTW
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- Edgington Post; Brian McNicoll 2013-06-04 2013.06.04
  Brian McNicoll of the Competitive Enterprise Institute tells all about EPA Director Jackson's internet sock-puppet!
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-03 2013.06.04
  Raw Milk Farmer Hershberger Threatened With Bail Revokage :: Agriculture Bureaucrat Calls In :: Regulatory Gray Area :: Should Derrick J File Criminal Charges? :: Student Loans :: Masked Driving :: Magic Court Words Theory :: Rich Paul Live From Jail :: Drug Court :: What is happening in Istanbul? :: School Iris Scans
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-02 2013.06.03
  College Degrees :: Student Debt :: Contracts :: Homesteading :: Cell Phone Contracts :: Cell Phone Towers Killing Bees! :: Women’s Libido :: Crazy Weather :: Robotoki’s Call of Duty’s Ghost in stand off with LAPD :: US incarcerates more people than Stalin
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
- FTL2013-06-01 2013.06.02
  Judge Prevents Woman With Child From Having Girlfriend Stay Over :: Morality Clauses :: Discrimination Against Gays :: No State Marriage :: Couples and Immigration :: Judge Elections :: Decimate :: Armed Bureaucrat :: Fear of Attack by City Aggressors :: Mayor Urges Jury Nullification :: Judge Recall in MT :: 501C3 :: Move Over Law :: Professional Drivers an […]
  ian@freetalklive.com (The FTL Crew)
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February 2009
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Leave the Gun Take the (paulie) Cannoli

Lincoln’s Legacy

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