Donald Douglas and I have had it out on the cause of the Civil War. We had a debate. I think I won pretty convincingly. However, that's not for me to decide, that's for you. Read the debate and decide for yourself. In any case, it is way past time we had these debates. I will continue my assault on the huge Northern lie about why they invaded the South in 1861-1865. Eventually, the truth will come out, though it may not be in the near future.
I am feeling rather radicalized today. Whenever I get like this, I am open to a paradigm shift -- a radical alteration to my current viewpoint. I think I am almost at that point today.
If this is America, I want out. You can have it.
My anger will smolder for a few days, then cool with the realization that America is over. Our freedoms are lost, and they aren't coming back. So, there is nothing to be gained by anger or depression. Perhaps the only thing left for us is acceptance of our fate.
Our goal now must be to find ways to survive in a post-American world. Voting Republican is futile. Voting Democratic is suicidal.
Wednesday, June 24, 2015
Black Conservative Makes Sense on the Confederate Flag
Mychal Massie writes:
Mychal has other thoughts on the controversy. Read it all here.
The Assault on Southern Heritage: "A Cultural and Political Atrocity"
Concerning the modern assault on Southern history and culture, the esteemed historian Eugene D. Genovese writes:
To speak positively about any part of this Southern tradition is to invite charges of being a racist and an apologist for slavery and segregation. We are witnessing a cultural and political atrocity -- an increasingly successful campaign by the media and an academic elite to strip young white Southerners, and arguably black Southerners as well, of their heritage, and therefore their identity. They are being taught to forget their forebears or to remember them with shame.
--The Southern Tradition, the Achievements and Limitations of American Conservatism, Harvard University Press, 1994; as quoted by Gene Kizer, Jr. in his recent book Slavery Was Not the Cause of the War Between the States
To speak positively about any part of this Southern tradition is to invite charges of being a racist and an apologist for slavery and segregation. We are witnessing a cultural and political atrocity -- an increasingly successful campaign by the media and an academic elite to strip young white Southerners, and arguably black Southerners as well, of their heritage, and therefore their identity. They are being taught to forget their forebears or to remember them with shame.
--The Southern Tradition, the Achievements and Limitations of American Conservatism, Harvard University Press, 1994; as quoted by Gene Kizer, Jr. in his recent book Slavery Was Not the Cause of the War Between the States
I am a Confederate
This latest brouhaha over the Confederate flag has made me realize one thing: I am a Confederate first, and an American second. I am a Confederate first, and a conservative third. I am not even sure I am a Republican anymore.
At least the increasingly virulent attacks on the symbols of my nation have clarified that for me. I now have a better idea of who I am. And who I am not.
The Confederate flag is my flag. The United States flag is not. I have psychologically seceded from the Union.
Northerners hate our guts. We hate their guts. You want no part of us. We want no part of you. Let us separate, as we should have done back in 1861.
At least the increasingly virulent attacks on the symbols of my nation have clarified that for me. I now have a better idea of who I am. And who I am not.
The Confederate flag is my flag. The United States flag is not. I have psychologically seceded from the Union.
Northerners hate our guts. We hate their guts. You want no part of us. We want no part of you. Let us separate, as we should have done back in 1861.
Tuesday, June 23, 2015
A Point by Point Rebuttal of Donald Douglas on "Why the Civil War Was Not About Slavery"
Donald Douglas at American Power has read the essay by Professor Donald Livingston on ""Why the Civil War Was Not About Slavery" and has attempted to rebut it. I now consider his points and offer a counter-rebuttal. Since his screed is quite long, I will ignore his ad hominem attacks on Dr. Livingston and other forays into irrelevance, and concentrate on his salient points.
My responses to each of his points are in blue text.
There's a couple of ways to respond to Livingston's essay. The first way, and more professional, is to pick apart the essay's historical and logical arguments, highlighting especially Livingston's egregious logical fallacies, historical inaccuracies, and frankly, outright lies.
Good luck with that. He has no logical fallacies, inaccuracies or lies. Your venture into ad hominem attacks merely showcases the weaknesses of your arguments.
The second way, more partisan and bloggy, is to attack Livingston as a rank ideological hack, driven by fringe ideological tendencies with about as much mainstream acceptance as Holocaust denial. Purportedly a reputable historian, Professor Livingston's professional biography includes links to some rather steamy Southern revisionist outfits --- the kind of organizations with which I'd never associate and of which I lend very little professional credence. Seriously, the guy comes off as rather a crank.
More ad hominem attacks. Not only is this unethical, but rather juvenile to boot. I am not surprised that you would never associate with any organizations that do not support your preconceived notions and prejudices. Most people with a closed mind feel the same way.
But more about that later. Let's look at a number of problems with his essay from a straightforward historical and political analysis.
First, Livingston argues that to correctly understand the debate on Southern slavery is to expand the playing field to include the entire United States, and to go back to the Founding of 1787 to grasp the universal acceptance of slavery --- with the concomitant national ideology of white supremacy --- in the Northern states, in New England America especially, shortly after the overthrow of British colonialism. By doing this, one can see that slavery as an ideological system of political, social, and economic racial domination wasn't unique to the American South, but rather was a nationwide phenomenon with uniquely Northern characteristics.
The problem with this argument is that it's an extremely simplistic straw man. I mean, I don't claim to have anything nearing a scholarly familiarity with the historical scholarship on antebellum America, North and South. But just frankly from my wide reading of history and my professional teaching of the Founding, the Constitutional Convention, and the growth of slavery throughout the 19th century, to say that slavery was a "national enormity, an American sin for which every section of the Union bore some responsibility," and to use this as an argument against those who attack the South, is simply irrelevant. Of course slavery was a national institution. Slavery was a thoroughgoing institution in all the 13 colonies by the end of the 17th century. Who argues otherwise? Slavery developed in the colonies and after the Constitution of 1787 for almost 150 years. It did break down into regional varieties, as part of the economic regionalism that took hold in the country. For example, by the early- to mid-1800s, rural agrarianism came to be predominantly associated with the South, and with the invention of the cotton gin, the Southern economy become increasingly the locus of cotton production in the U.S., on the backs of slave laborers.
So the North's huge culpability in the institution of slavery is a "straw man?" Nonsense. Livingston pointing this out accomplishes two things: (1) It demolishes the myth that the South was alone guilty of slavery, and (2) substantiates his argument that ending slavery was the obligation of the entire country, not merely the South alone. He is right in this.
The debate we're having today is the persistence of racial supremacy symbolism in the present day South, like the Confederate Flag, hardly a sign of Northern white supremacy. But the "national enormity" argument is a logical diversion, a fallacy that's easily exposed.
I have already disproved your statement above. The fact of Northern guilt and profit in slaves is not a logical diversion or fallacy, and you have exposed nothing. If the Confederate flag is to be forever associated with slavery, then so should the American flag, which flew over Northern slave ships, and represents the USA, which grew rich off of slave produced staples and taxes generated by them. It is you who are attempting a diversion, and it isn't working.
Second, Livingston argues that in antebellum American "no nation" had developed, in the sense of the national unification seen contemporaneously among the European continental states as Britain and France. Further, he claims that the national government couldn't interfere with slavery in the states, that "Congress simply had no constitutional authority to interfere with slavery in the States." This is just a bunch of ideological hooey. It is true that the U.S. remained a largely agrarian, decentralized nation-state in the early 19th century, but the argument ignores monumental developments in constitutional law that created the foundations for what legal and political analysts identify as national supremacy within the system of political federalism. Crucially, majestic Supreme Court cases such as McCulloch v. Maryland expounded nationalist doctrines that placed federal authority as supreme to conflicting state power. Of course the debate on federalism wasn't (practically) resolved until decades later, perhaps not even until the 20th century. But it's absurd to claim that there was no national ideology or national consensus on federal power in the years before the Civil War. Indeed, why would the Southern states bother developing doctrines of nullification and so forth if no national culture and constitutional power had developed?
You really are confused. Livingston is correct in stating that in 1860, the United States was a collection of sovereign states over which Congress had limited power; each resident of individual states saw his state as his country. Livingston is explaining why Congress did nothing about ending slavery before the war, and is merely giving background material that is not controversial. So why do you even bring it up?
Prior to the Civil War, people said "the United States are" and after the war, "the United States is," which illustrates the consolidation of these states into one nation. You use a lot of words to prove nothing. Livingston is right, you are wrong and way out in left field.
Livingston goes on, "Since Congress had no power over slavery, and did not want such power, the only way to abolish slavery would be through individual state action or by an amendment to the Constitution." This makes no sense. While any individual state could abolish slavery within its boundaries, all the 27 amendments to the Constitution have been passed by Congress and ratified by the states, including the 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery. Further, major congressional action on slavery took place in 1808 with abolition of the international slave trade, in 1820 with the Missouri Compromise, and in 1854 with the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Frankly, Congress was at the center of regulatory activity involving slavery right up to the Civil War. Maybe from the perspective of radical states rights' theory Congress "had no power over slavery," but in reality Congress did have such power and passed consequential legislation that shaped national events over decades of time.
Not only does it make sense, it is historically accurate and makes plenty of sense. Livingston is explaining why Congress did nothing about ending slavery prior to the Civil War. He explains that Congress had limited power over slavery in the states, and did not even want the power. He cites the Corwin Amendment as proof. Congress passed it on March 2, 1862, making it illegal for Congress to ever interfere in the domestic institutions (i.e. slavery) of the states. They hoped this would stop slave states from seceding, but it didn't. That's because preserving slavery was not the major reason for secession. The Corwin Amendment was never ratified. Your long discussion goes into Congressional power and amendments made after the Civil War, and are irrelevant to the discussion.
Third, Livingston makes a number of bizarre arguments regarding President Abraham Lincoln's positions on slavery, and some of these appear to be bald-faced lies. He argues, for example, that "Lincoln did not object to slavery as long as it was confined to the South." This is again a red herring, for it's widely recognized that Lincoln was no abolitionist and that even at the time of secession in 1861, Lincoln's fundamental war aims were the preservation of union.
How is this a red herring? Livingston's essay is meant for general audiences, and cannot assume that they know as much as you do about it. His comment is meant to illuminate the fact that Lincoln was not an abolitionist, and therefore the South had no reason to believe he was going to somehow emancipate their slaves without their consent. It undermines the Northern myth that the South seceded to protect slavery, when no threat to slavery existed.
Livingston goes on with a number of selective quotations in an attempt to paint Lincoln as pro-slavery as any Southern rebel.
Now who's lying? Livingston does nothing of the sort. I have read and reread this essay several times, and I never saw any evidence of this. You're wrong.
The reality is way more complicated, as any historical review of Lincoln political career would recognize. During the Lincoln-Douglas debates, for example, Lincoln made a clear distinction between his acquiescence to slavery in the North and his clearly foundational belief that the Declaration of Independence made all men equal in the eyes of God, and that in the long run the U.S. could not survive with slavery as an institution. When he said a "house divided upon itself cannot stand" it wasn't a political program of abolition as much as a recognition that at some point one side would prevail over the other, either the pro-slavery forces would prevail and slavery would win out over the land or the abolitionists would prevail and slavery would die out altogether.
Lincoln did believe that the rights described in the Declaration of Independence applied to all men, including Negroes. However, he was quite clear that Negroes could not enjoy those rights in America, but only "on their own soil." He proposed to send them back to Africa.
Livingston in fact lies about the meaning of Lincoln's statement that the United States as "the last best hope of earth." He claims that Lincoln supported colonization of American blacks back to Africa, and that "The 'last best hope of earth' referred to a purely white European polity free of racial strife, and not to a land of freedom for all as it is absurdly interpreted today." Actually, voluntary colonization of slaves and compensated emancipation were just policy alternatives that Lincoln included in his message to Congress in December 1862. A simple reading of the conclusion of his address reveals Lincoln's exceptionalism and his faith in Jefferson's ideals in the Declaration:
Livingston did not distort anything. Lincoln clearly saw slavery as immoral and contrary to natural law, as almost everyone, North or South, did. Livingston believes that Lincoln's "Best Hope" comment did not insinuate that Lincoln wanted to integrate the freed slaves into American society. Lincoln made it clear many times previous, in speeches and correspondence, that he did not want this at all. He wanted blacks out of America. If you like, I can shower you with quotations to that effect.
And it important to remember that we can't read present-day moral sentiments into history. That is, we cannot apply 21st century normative commitments to the political mores of the mid-19th century. Livingston in fact attacks his critics as adopting a presentist ideological agenda, but much of his essay employs the exact type of presentist commitments that he so decries.
I don't recall Livingston mentioning "presentist ideological agendas" anywhere. I think you are mistaken. In any case, how is that relevant to whether or not the Civil War was about slavery?
Finally, Livingston breaks down "the main anti-slavery episodes in the antebellum period," from the Constitutional Convention to the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. Again, there's a lot of arguments against straw men and even more tendentious connections to the historical record. I'm going to eschew a longer analysis simply to avoid repetition. Suffice it to say that Livingston provides completely decontextualized and selective interpretations of historical events, spurts of analysis that really add up to more of an ideological screed than a dispassionate historical critique.
And yet you cannot present a single example of this "ideological screed," because it isn't at all true. Further, there are no "straw men" in his arguments, no "decontextualized and selective interpretations," and you have not described any. Your comments are those of someone losing an argument, and knows it.
And that brings me to my second, more partisan and bloggy criticism of Professor Livingston. He is indeed a genuine scholar and is Professor Emeritus at Emory University and an expert on the writings of Scottish Enlightenment philosopher David Hume.
At this point, Donald launches into personal attacks on Livingston and attempts to discredit the man by calling him a radical with radical associations, etc etc. I won't bother to refute these, as they are irrelevant to whether Livingston's essay is accurate and factual -- which it is. Read it for yourself.
Conclusions: Donald's attempted rebuttal of Livingston's argument fails and fails badly. If he has made any salient points disproving Livingston, it isn't obvious to me.
My responses to each of his points are in blue text.
****
There's a couple of ways to respond to Livingston's essay. The first way, and more professional, is to pick apart the essay's historical and logical arguments, highlighting especially Livingston's egregious logical fallacies, historical inaccuracies, and frankly, outright lies.
Good luck with that. He has no logical fallacies, inaccuracies or lies. Your venture into ad hominem attacks merely showcases the weaknesses of your arguments.
The second way, more partisan and bloggy, is to attack Livingston as a rank ideological hack, driven by fringe ideological tendencies with about as much mainstream acceptance as Holocaust denial. Purportedly a reputable historian, Professor Livingston's professional biography includes links to some rather steamy Southern revisionist outfits --- the kind of organizations with which I'd never associate and of which I lend very little professional credence. Seriously, the guy comes off as rather a crank.
More ad hominem attacks. Not only is this unethical, but rather juvenile to boot. I am not surprised that you would never associate with any organizations that do not support your preconceived notions and prejudices. Most people with a closed mind feel the same way.
But more about that later. Let's look at a number of problems with his essay from a straightforward historical and political analysis.
First, Livingston argues that to correctly understand the debate on Southern slavery is to expand the playing field to include the entire United States, and to go back to the Founding of 1787 to grasp the universal acceptance of slavery --- with the concomitant national ideology of white supremacy --- in the Northern states, in New England America especially, shortly after the overthrow of British colonialism. By doing this, one can see that slavery as an ideological system of political, social, and economic racial domination wasn't unique to the American South, but rather was a nationwide phenomenon with uniquely Northern characteristics.
The problem with this argument is that it's an extremely simplistic straw man. I mean, I don't claim to have anything nearing a scholarly familiarity with the historical scholarship on antebellum America, North and South. But just frankly from my wide reading of history and my professional teaching of the Founding, the Constitutional Convention, and the growth of slavery throughout the 19th century, to say that slavery was a "national enormity, an American sin for which every section of the Union bore some responsibility," and to use this as an argument against those who attack the South, is simply irrelevant. Of course slavery was a national institution. Slavery was a thoroughgoing institution in all the 13 colonies by the end of the 17th century. Who argues otherwise? Slavery developed in the colonies and after the Constitution of 1787 for almost 150 years. It did break down into regional varieties, as part of the economic regionalism that took hold in the country. For example, by the early- to mid-1800s, rural agrarianism came to be predominantly associated with the South, and with the invention of the cotton gin, the Southern economy become increasingly the locus of cotton production in the U.S., on the backs of slave laborers.
So the North's huge culpability in the institution of slavery is a "straw man?" Nonsense. Livingston pointing this out accomplishes two things: (1) It demolishes the myth that the South was alone guilty of slavery, and (2) substantiates his argument that ending slavery was the obligation of the entire country, not merely the South alone. He is right in this.
The debate we're having today is the persistence of racial supremacy symbolism in the present day South, like the Confederate Flag, hardly a sign of Northern white supremacy. But the "national enormity" argument is a logical diversion, a fallacy that's easily exposed.
I have already disproved your statement above. The fact of Northern guilt and profit in slaves is not a logical diversion or fallacy, and you have exposed nothing. If the Confederate flag is to be forever associated with slavery, then so should the American flag, which flew over Northern slave ships, and represents the USA, which grew rich off of slave produced staples and taxes generated by them. It is you who are attempting a diversion, and it isn't working.
Second, Livingston argues that in antebellum American "no nation" had developed, in the sense of the national unification seen contemporaneously among the European continental states as Britain and France. Further, he claims that the national government couldn't interfere with slavery in the states, that "Congress simply had no constitutional authority to interfere with slavery in the States." This is just a bunch of ideological hooey. It is true that the U.S. remained a largely agrarian, decentralized nation-state in the early 19th century, but the argument ignores monumental developments in constitutional law that created the foundations for what legal and political analysts identify as national supremacy within the system of political federalism. Crucially, majestic Supreme Court cases such as McCulloch v. Maryland expounded nationalist doctrines that placed federal authority as supreme to conflicting state power. Of course the debate on federalism wasn't (practically) resolved until decades later, perhaps not even until the 20th century. But it's absurd to claim that there was no national ideology or national consensus on federal power in the years before the Civil War. Indeed, why would the Southern states bother developing doctrines of nullification and so forth if no national culture and constitutional power had developed?
You really are confused. Livingston is correct in stating that in 1860, the United States was a collection of sovereign states over which Congress had limited power; each resident of individual states saw his state as his country. Livingston is explaining why Congress did nothing about ending slavery before the war, and is merely giving background material that is not controversial. So why do you even bring it up?
Prior to the Civil War, people said "the United States are" and after the war, "the United States is," which illustrates the consolidation of these states into one nation. You use a lot of words to prove nothing. Livingston is right, you are wrong and way out in left field.
Livingston goes on, "Since Congress had no power over slavery, and did not want such power, the only way to abolish slavery would be through individual state action or by an amendment to the Constitution." This makes no sense. While any individual state could abolish slavery within its boundaries, all the 27 amendments to the Constitution have been passed by Congress and ratified by the states, including the 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery. Further, major congressional action on slavery took place in 1808 with abolition of the international slave trade, in 1820 with the Missouri Compromise, and in 1854 with the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Frankly, Congress was at the center of regulatory activity involving slavery right up to the Civil War. Maybe from the perspective of radical states rights' theory Congress "had no power over slavery," but in reality Congress did have such power and passed consequential legislation that shaped national events over decades of time.
Not only does it make sense, it is historically accurate and makes plenty of sense. Livingston is explaining why Congress did nothing about ending slavery prior to the Civil War. He explains that Congress had limited power over slavery in the states, and did not even want the power. He cites the Corwin Amendment as proof. Congress passed it on March 2, 1862, making it illegal for Congress to ever interfere in the domestic institutions (i.e. slavery) of the states. They hoped this would stop slave states from seceding, but it didn't. That's because preserving slavery was not the major reason for secession. The Corwin Amendment was never ratified. Your long discussion goes into Congressional power and amendments made after the Civil War, and are irrelevant to the discussion.
Third, Livingston makes a number of bizarre arguments regarding President Abraham Lincoln's positions on slavery, and some of these appear to be bald-faced lies. He argues, for example, that "Lincoln did not object to slavery as long as it was confined to the South." This is again a red herring, for it's widely recognized that Lincoln was no abolitionist and that even at the time of secession in 1861, Lincoln's fundamental war aims were the preservation of union.
How is this a red herring? Livingston's essay is meant for general audiences, and cannot assume that they know as much as you do about it. His comment is meant to illuminate the fact that Lincoln was not an abolitionist, and therefore the South had no reason to believe he was going to somehow emancipate their slaves without their consent. It undermines the Northern myth that the South seceded to protect slavery, when no threat to slavery existed.
Livingston goes on with a number of selective quotations in an attempt to paint Lincoln as pro-slavery as any Southern rebel.
Now who's lying? Livingston does nothing of the sort. I have read and reread this essay several times, and I never saw any evidence of this. You're wrong.
The reality is way more complicated, as any historical review of Lincoln political career would recognize. During the Lincoln-Douglas debates, for example, Lincoln made a clear distinction between his acquiescence to slavery in the North and his clearly foundational belief that the Declaration of Independence made all men equal in the eyes of God, and that in the long run the U.S. could not survive with slavery as an institution. When he said a "house divided upon itself cannot stand" it wasn't a political program of abolition as much as a recognition that at some point one side would prevail over the other, either the pro-slavery forces would prevail and slavery would win out over the land or the abolitionists would prevail and slavery would die out altogether.
Lincoln did believe that the rights described in the Declaration of Independence applied to all men, including Negroes. However, he was quite clear that Negroes could not enjoy those rights in America, but only "on their own soil." He proposed to send them back to Africa.
Livingston in fact lies about the meaning of Lincoln's statement that the United States as "the last best hope of earth." He claims that Lincoln supported colonization of American blacks back to Africa, and that "The 'last best hope of earth' referred to a purely white European polity free of racial strife, and not to a land of freedom for all as it is absurdly interpreted today." Actually, voluntary colonization of slaves and compensated emancipation were just policy alternatives that Lincoln included in his message to Congress in December 1862. A simple reading of the conclusion of his address reveals Lincoln's exceptionalism and his faith in Jefferson's ideals in the Declaration:
Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation. We say we are for the Union. The world will not forget that we say this. We know how to save the Union. The world knows we do know how to save it. We -- even we here -- hold the power, and bear the responsibility. In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free -- honorable alike in what we give, and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth. Other means may succeed; this could not fail. The way is plain, peaceful, generous, just -- a way which, if followed, the world will forever applaud, and God must forever bless.I don't know why Livingston would so blatantly distort what Lincoln actually said, other than to chalk it up to dishonesty. Lincoln's views were complicated and developed along with the political necessities of his day.
Livingston did not distort anything. Lincoln clearly saw slavery as immoral and contrary to natural law, as almost everyone, North or South, did. Livingston believes that Lincoln's "Best Hope" comment did not insinuate that Lincoln wanted to integrate the freed slaves into American society. Lincoln made it clear many times previous, in speeches and correspondence, that he did not want this at all. He wanted blacks out of America. If you like, I can shower you with quotations to that effect.
And it important to remember that we can't read present-day moral sentiments into history. That is, we cannot apply 21st century normative commitments to the political mores of the mid-19th century. Livingston in fact attacks his critics as adopting a presentist ideological agenda, but much of his essay employs the exact type of presentist commitments that he so decries.
I don't recall Livingston mentioning "presentist ideological agendas" anywhere. I think you are mistaken. In any case, how is that relevant to whether or not the Civil War was about slavery?
Finally, Livingston breaks down "the main anti-slavery episodes in the antebellum period," from the Constitutional Convention to the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. Again, there's a lot of arguments against straw men and even more tendentious connections to the historical record. I'm going to eschew a longer analysis simply to avoid repetition. Suffice it to say that Livingston provides completely decontextualized and selective interpretations of historical events, spurts of analysis that really add up to more of an ideological screed than a dispassionate historical critique.
And yet you cannot present a single example of this "ideological screed," because it isn't at all true. Further, there are no "straw men" in his arguments, no "decontextualized and selective interpretations," and you have not described any. Your comments are those of someone losing an argument, and knows it.
And that brings me to my second, more partisan and bloggy criticism of Professor Livingston. He is indeed a genuine scholar and is Professor Emeritus at Emory University and an expert on the writings of Scottish Enlightenment philosopher David Hume.
At this point, Donald launches into personal attacks on Livingston and attempts to discredit the man by calling him a radical with radical associations, etc etc. I won't bother to refute these, as they are irrelevant to whether Livingston's essay is accurate and factual -- which it is. Read it for yourself.
Conclusions: Donald's attempted rebuttal of Livingston's argument fails and fails badly. If he has made any salient points disproving Livingston, it isn't obvious to me.
Monday, June 22, 2015
I Challenge Jonathan Tobin of Commentary Magazine to Debate the Confederate Flag #Tobin #Commentary #Charleston
Jonathan Tobin has written the following screed at Commentary Magazine, about his opposition to the Confederate flag:
"For those who plan to respond, as they always do, to discussions about this topic with emails regurgitating neo-Confederate talking points about the Civil War being a conflict about state’s rights rather than slavery, let me state up front that I’m not buying it and neither is any other serious student of history. The Civil War did hinge in part on constitutional questions but the notion that slavery was incidental to the outbreak of the conflict is simply absurd. Without slavery, there would have been no war. The south seceded because it feared limits on the expansion of slavery would eventually doom the institution. To protect a heritage built on the uncompensated labor of slaves and their vast investment in human “property,” the states that formed the Confederacy waged a bloody war that costs hundreds of thousands of American lives and left the south in ruins. It would take a century for the region to recover completely."
"For those who plan to respond, as they always do, to discussions about this topic with emails regurgitating neo-Confederate talking points about the Civil War being a conflict about state’s rights rather than slavery, let me state up front that I’m not buying it and neither is any other serious student of history. The Civil War did hinge in part on constitutional questions but the notion that slavery was incidental to the outbreak of the conflict is simply absurd. Without slavery, there would have been no war. The south seceded because it feared limits on the expansion of slavery would eventually doom the institution. To protect a heritage built on the uncompensated labor of slaves and their vast investment in human “property,” the states that formed the Confederacy waged a bloody war that costs hundreds of thousands of American lives and left the south in ruins. It would take a century for the region to recover completely."
Tobin, you are not a serious student of history. You are a serious apologist for Northern aggression and are largely ignorant of the history of the Civil War. If you disagree, then I formally challenge you to debate the issue: RESOLVED, that the Civil War was not fought to end slavery. Stop hiding behind your masthead where you can't be held accountable for your error. I'll give you a few hints of your coming beat down in this article.
1. Without slavery there would have been no war. Not true. Without the Northern invasion, there would have been no war. Lincoln invaded, not because of slavery, but because if the South left the Union, it would end the North's protective tariffs on foreign goods, substantially damaging the Northern economy. Lincoln made it clear that slave emancipation was not his goal or his motivation:
My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. 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.--Letter to Horace Greeley" (August 22, 1862)
2. The south seceded because it feared limits on the expansion of slavery would eventually doom the institution. This statement is sheer nonsense. If the South seceded, it would no longer have access to the new western territories, and no place to expand slavery to. How do you explain that, genius? Was the South going to start plantations in the Atlantic Ocean?
3. To protect a heritage built on the uncompensated labor of slaves and their vast investment in human “property,” the states that formed the Confederacy waged a bloody war that costs hundreds of thousands of American lives and left the south in ruins. So much is wrong with this statement. I have these points in rebuttal:
a. Slave labor was not uncompensated. Slaves were given food, housing, clothing and medical care, even after they became too old to work. According to Fogel and Engerman's Time on the Cross, The Economics of American Negro Slavery (1974), slaves consumed 90% of everything they produced.
b. The South's "vast investment in human property" included many millions of dollars paid to Northern slave traders. The North had no qualms about selling Africans into slavery when it was enriching them, and they continued the slave trade in foreign markets when it was outlawed in the U.S. in 1808. For every slave Yankees sold to the South, they sold about 20 more to Cuba, Brazil and the West Indies. The North ended slavery in its states primarily by selling its slaves to the South, not by emancipating them. Further, slavery continued in states loyal to the North after the Civil War began, in Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and West Virginia. Tell me again, Tobin, about Yankee moral superiority.
c. The South waged a defensive war against a ruthless invader that made total war on the Southern population, who burned homes, farms, universities and public buildings to the ground, killed livestock and burned crops, used Confederate prisoners as human shields against artillery, and lobbed shells into downtown Charleston to randomly kill civilians. But you, Tobin, act as if the South started the war, instead of the other way around. The shame of the carnage is totally on the backs of the Northern invaders, and those who rationalize their aggression. There is absolutely NOTHING honorable about the Northern aggression on the South.
Conclusions:
You, Jonathan Tobin, really should read a long essay that deals with the subject thoroughly. It is "Why the Civil War Was Not About Slavery," by Professor Donald Livingston of Emory University. I'm sure you'll find it uncomfortable having all of your prized myths exploded before your very eyes. I am also sure that you will not be able to offer any serious rebuttal.
Let your education begin, Jonathan Tobin, at the following link.
And I'll be waiting to hear from you about that debate.
Note to Confederate Descendants: Don't Back Down on the Confederate Flag #Charleston #Confederate
Note to those who support the Confederate flag: DON'T BACK DOWN.
Don't be tepid or tentative in your support of the flag. Our opposition to Northern cultural bigotry and historical (and hysterical) ignorance must be firm and unflinching. We are right, and they are wrong. View the issue with the moral clarity it deserves.
Anti-Southern bigotry is possibly one of my biggest triggers. I wrote about that some time ago, in a previous post from 2010. In that post I noted that the Civil War was then, and this is now. I said that I wanted to work with Northerner conservatives in our modern political struggles, and not refight a war of 150 years ago. However, I noted that the Civil War (better described as The War for Southern Independence) tapped deep emotions in me, and had the power to make me hate. I stated that I don't like to hate and seek to avoid that emotion whenever possible, because happiness and hate cannot coexist. This week, however, I feel the negative emotion returning.
Why? Because Yankees, liberals and Southerners ignorant of their own history keep re-invading the South. They buy into the Northern Myth. Intellectually lazy, they go along with the popular mythology that casts the Confederates into the role of villain. They dishonor our Confederate ancestors and grossly misrepresent their cause. Now they want to finish the wishes of General Sherman to exterminate all Southerners completely, by insisting that the Confederate flag be relegated to museums, viewed only as a dishonorable artifact.
"We must show manners to those who find the flag objectionable," they write. Why is it that we must show manners but they do not? Why do their feelings count but not ours?
Arm yourselves with knowledge of Southern history. I suggest you can do that by reading a previously posted article by Professor Donald Livingston of Emory University, "Why the Civil War Was Not About Slavery."
Sunday, June 21, 2015
The Confederate Flag Stays: Deal With It
As a Confederate descendant who is well read on the history of the War for Southern Independence, I revere the Confederate flag. It is the flag of my country and my ancestors. In light of the Charleston murders, we are now seeing a lot of liberals and mainstream Republicans calling for the removal of the flag from public display.
Mitt Romney tweeted that the flag should come down. He tweets
Take down the #ConfederateFlag at the SC Capitol. To many, it is a symbol of racial hatred. Remove it now to honor #Charleston victims.
I answered him with this:
The point is, a flag means different things to different people. We Confederate descendants do not accept Mitt Romney's definition or our flag, nor that of the Daily Kos, Karl Rove, Jeb Bush or any other cultural bigot who wishes to bully us into accepting their skewed view of history and their narrow, superficial and ignorant opinion of what the flag means.
Here are the motivations of the flag haters:
1. Moral vanity. Nothing pleases a liberal more than asserting his alleged moral superiority over someone else. What is an easier way to pose and posture as a great humanitarian, then to further cultural bigotry against the South?
2. To legitimize the Northern Myth, the huge lie that the North invaded the South to free the slaves because they were just so morally righteous and broad minded and enlightened. The truth is that the North hated blacks, wanted them kept out of the new territories, made laws prohibiting their presence, and planned to deport them all back to Africa or elsewhere. They went to war to force the Southern states back into the Union for economic reasons; slavery had nothing or very little to do with it. An independent South would have free trade and open ports, thus ending the Northern tariff on imported goods. A massive relocation of jobs and revenues would quickly flow from the North to the South. This would have created an economic boom in the South, but would have impoverished the North, who depended on the South continuing to pay 80% of the taxes collected by the federal government, and whose dock workers, shipping companies, railroads, textile mills and warehouses would soon find themselves out of work. Yes, this is all well documented in the newspapers of the time. When asked why he would not simply let the South go, Lincoln exclaimed "Let the South go? Who will pay my tariff?"
3. To legitimize the consolidation of the once sovereign states into subordinate entities inferior to and controlled by the federal government. Today this is effectively being accomplished through federal courts, who overturn state laws and legislate from the bench.
4. To legitimize the federal government's "right" to invade the individual states and make war on their citizens, using force to impose its will. We are continually moving in that direction today. A nationalized police force is in the works. Once accomplished, all American states will be effectively occupied by the federal government.
Here's why we will never agree:
Taking down the flag would mean acquiescing to bullies who wish to force their viewpoint on us, a viewpoint that is erroneous, insulting, self-serving and false. It would mean replacing our superior knowledge of history with the superficial myths the flag-haters learned from popular media, Hollywood and Northern-biased textbooks. It would also require us to legitimize the slander that our flag represents racial hatred and is thus a dishonorable symbol. We will not allow knowledge to be replaced with ignorance, or truth with falsehood. We will never agree to your slander.
History, or what is alleged to be history, is a major political weapon. The fight over history will largely influence how current and future generations see the Republic: as a collection of sovereign states with the right to self-govern and even secede, or as consolidation of those states into an increasingly oppressive federal tyranny from which there is no refuge, remedy or escape.
Leave our flag alone.
Mitt Romney tweeted that the flag should come down. He tweets
Take down the #ConfederateFlag at the SC Capitol. To many, it is a symbol of racial hatred. Remove it now to honor #Charleston victims.
I answered him with this:
@MittRomney I regret voting for you Mitt. The flag stays. Take down the flag of Utah, it's a symbol of a false prophet and polygamy.
And of course, there's "Old Gorey" that many associate with invasion of the South, war on women and children, the genocide of the American Indian, the theft of Hawaii from its Queen and its people, and the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. Oh yes, and it flew over Northern slave ships who brought the slaves to America in the first place.
And of course, there's "Old Gorey" that many associate with invasion of the South, war on women and children, the genocide of the American Indian, the theft of Hawaii from its Queen and its people, and the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. Oh yes, and it flew over Northern slave ships who brought the slaves to America in the first place.
The point is, a flag means different things to different people. We Confederate descendants do not accept Mitt Romney's definition or our flag, nor that of the Daily Kos, Karl Rove, Jeb Bush or any other cultural bigot who wishes to bully us into accepting their skewed view of history and their narrow, superficial and ignorant opinion of what the flag means.
Here are the motivations of the flag haters:
1. Moral vanity. Nothing pleases a liberal more than asserting his alleged moral superiority over someone else. What is an easier way to pose and posture as a great humanitarian, then to further cultural bigotry against the South?
2. To legitimize the Northern Myth, the huge lie that the North invaded the South to free the slaves because they were just so morally righteous and broad minded and enlightened. The truth is that the North hated blacks, wanted them kept out of the new territories, made laws prohibiting their presence, and planned to deport them all back to Africa or elsewhere. They went to war to force the Southern states back into the Union for economic reasons; slavery had nothing or very little to do with it. An independent South would have free trade and open ports, thus ending the Northern tariff on imported goods. A massive relocation of jobs and revenues would quickly flow from the North to the South. This would have created an economic boom in the South, but would have impoverished the North, who depended on the South continuing to pay 80% of the taxes collected by the federal government, and whose dock workers, shipping companies, railroads, textile mills and warehouses would soon find themselves out of work. Yes, this is all well documented in the newspapers of the time. When asked why he would not simply let the South go, Lincoln exclaimed "Let the South go? Who will pay my tariff?"
3. To legitimize the consolidation of the once sovereign states into subordinate entities inferior to and controlled by the federal government. Today this is effectively being accomplished through federal courts, who overturn state laws and legislate from the bench.
4. To legitimize the federal government's "right" to invade the individual states and make war on their citizens, using force to impose its will. We are continually moving in that direction today. A nationalized police force is in the works. Once accomplished, all American states will be effectively occupied by the federal government.
Here's why we will never agree:
Taking down the flag would mean acquiescing to bullies who wish to force their viewpoint on us, a viewpoint that is erroneous, insulting, self-serving and false. It would mean replacing our superior knowledge of history with the superficial myths the flag-haters learned from popular media, Hollywood and Northern-biased textbooks. It would also require us to legitimize the slander that our flag represents racial hatred and is thus a dishonorable symbol. We will not allow knowledge to be replaced with ignorance, or truth with falsehood. We will never agree to your slander.
History, or what is alleged to be history, is a major political weapon. The fight over history will largely influence how current and future generations see the Republic: as a collection of sovereign states with the right to self-govern and even secede, or as consolidation of those states into an increasingly oppressive federal tyranny from which there is no refuge, remedy or escape.
Leave our flag alone.
The Vast Universe
I watched another YouTube video last night. This one was about the search for E.T., i.e. extraterrestrial life. One organization heavily involved in this research is SETI, which stands for Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence. SETI does this with huge dish antennae aimed at the stars. What they are looking for are radio wave patterns that might indicate a transmitter somewhere up there in the blue. This isn't easy, because space is already very noisy with radio waves, a virtual cacophony of background noise.
The universe is incredibly vast, huge beyond human comprehension. Many of the stars and constellations we see in the night sky are millions of light years away. What we are seeing is not how they look today, but how they looked millions of years ago. We are looking at the past.
If SETI detects transmissions from an intelligent presence somewhere in space, the transmission it receives may have been traveling through space for thousands or even millions of years. We may prove that "they" (E.T.) are out there, but due to the vast distances between us, we will never have a two-way conversation with them.
This brings up the question of E.T. visitations to earth -- the so-called UFO phenomenon. If aliens from space have been visiting earth, they would have had to come from far away, traveling hundreds or thousands of light years, to get here. If our understanding of the laws of physics are accurate, visitors from other star systems would be impossible, due to the distances involved.
This assumption, of course, is based on our current understanding of physics. Civilizations that are thousands of years more advanced than we may disagree. Their advanced technology may have found a way to traverse those incredible distances in a much faster way.
By the way, a light year is a measurement of distance. It is the distance that light travels in one year. Since light travels at 186,000 miles per second, a light year is 365.25 days x 24 hrs x 60 minutes x 60 seconds = 31,557,600 seconds in a year x 186,000 miles per second = 5,869,713,600,000 miles.
So a light year is a distance of 5.87 trillion miles, rounded off. Betty and Barney Hill reported that their alien abductors hailed from the star system called Zeta Reticuli, which is 39.17 light years from Earth. That's only a short hop by universe standards, but still an incomprehensible distance for human beings. It's 230 trillion miles.
How fast is the speed of light in miles per hour? It would be calculated as 186,000 x 60 x 60, or 669,600,000 miles per hour. Even so, if a radio signal were sent out from one side of our galaxy to the other, it would take around 100,000 years to make the trip.
(Damn, I love what you can do with Excel.)
The universe is incredibly vast, huge beyond human comprehension. Many of the stars and constellations we see in the night sky are millions of light years away. What we are seeing is not how they look today, but how they looked millions of years ago. We are looking at the past.
If SETI detects transmissions from an intelligent presence somewhere in space, the transmission it receives may have been traveling through space for thousands or even millions of years. We may prove that "they" (E.T.) are out there, but due to the vast distances between us, we will never have a two-way conversation with them.
This brings up the question of E.T. visitations to earth -- the so-called UFO phenomenon. If aliens from space have been visiting earth, they would have had to come from far away, traveling hundreds or thousands of light years, to get here. If our understanding of the laws of physics are accurate, visitors from other star systems would be impossible, due to the distances involved.
This assumption, of course, is based on our current understanding of physics. Civilizations that are thousands of years more advanced than we may disagree. Their advanced technology may have found a way to traverse those incredible distances in a much faster way.
By the way, a light year is a measurement of distance. It is the distance that light travels in one year. Since light travels at 186,000 miles per second, a light year is 365.25 days x 24 hrs x 60 minutes x 60 seconds = 31,557,600 seconds in a year x 186,000 miles per second = 5,869,713,600,000 miles.
So a light year is a distance of 5.87 trillion miles, rounded off. Betty and Barney Hill reported that their alien abductors hailed from the star system called Zeta Reticuli, which is 39.17 light years from Earth. That's only a short hop by universe standards, but still an incomprehensible distance for human beings. It's 230 trillion miles.
How fast is the speed of light in miles per hour? It would be calculated as 186,000 x 60 x 60, or 669,600,000 miles per hour. Even so, if a radio signal were sent out from one side of our galaxy to the other, it would take around 100,000 years to make the trip.
(Damn, I love what you can do with Excel.)
Stoking the Fires of Race Hatred
We have recently had our share of troubles here in the USA. Blacks burn down Ferguson and Baltimore. Racial hatred, particularly from blacks to everyone else, is white hot, no pun intended. Now the church shooting in Charleston has again raised the masses, both black and white, to a fever pitch.
Liberals, leftists, Democrats ruthlessly try to stoke the fires of division. Without a doubt, the hatreds and resentments of black America are largely a product of the Democratic Party and its job-killing, race baiting policies. Only if blacks are motivated by hatred, fear and revenge, will they show up at the polls to vote Democrat. So the Democratic campaign of propaganda must continue, i.e.: blacks are the incessant victims of virulent white racism, blacks can never get equal treatment in jobs, education or any walk of life, Republicans all hate you if you're black, and whenever you do anything destructive or damaging, it's not your fault.
What American blacks need is the sobering truth, told and retold: you are the authors of your own lives. Your failures, lack of life skills, unemployment, high crime rate, dysfunctional families, bad attitudes are all your own fault, nobody else's. Collectively, you are the biggest screw-ups in America, and the rest of Americans are less safe, less prosperous, less peaceful by your presence. It's time to stop being the problem child of the American family. Clean up your act. Change your rotten, hostile attitudes. From now on, you will be held accountable for your disastrous life choices, your failures, your dysfunctional communities. Get your shit together. Our patience with you grows thinner each day.
Let me lay it out for you, black folks:
1. Stay in school until you graduate.
2. Don't get anyone pregnant until you are old enough to marry them and support them and your child.
3. Don't commit crime: don't steal, rob, beat someone or kill anyone. Keep your record clean.
4. Stay off drugs.
5. Accept responsibility whenever you screw up and violate any of the first four items.
6. STFU about "racism." Accept the fact that it is your own rotten behavior and attitudes that cause the racial prejudice directed at you. You are major contributors to so-called racism. You are far from the innocent sheep you pretend to be. HINT: take a look at crime statistics by race. Guess who are the worst offenders?
7. Get a job. Learn job skills. Continually add to those skills with education and training. Stay off welfare.
8. Keep your family together, love your kids, teach them the civilizational skills they need to prosper: education, job training, basic manners, good citizenship, responsible parenthood, racial and religious tolerance, personal responsibility.
It ain't rocket science folks. Every other ethnic group in the country has long ago figured it out. Why can't you?
Liberals, leftists, Democrats ruthlessly try to stoke the fires of division. Without a doubt, the hatreds and resentments of black America are largely a product of the Democratic Party and its job-killing, race baiting policies. Only if blacks are motivated by hatred, fear and revenge, will they show up at the polls to vote Democrat. So the Democratic campaign of propaganda must continue, i.e.: blacks are the incessant victims of virulent white racism, blacks can never get equal treatment in jobs, education or any walk of life, Republicans all hate you if you're black, and whenever you do anything destructive or damaging, it's not your fault.
What American blacks need is the sobering truth, told and retold: you are the authors of your own lives. Your failures, lack of life skills, unemployment, high crime rate, dysfunctional families, bad attitudes are all your own fault, nobody else's. Collectively, you are the biggest screw-ups in America, and the rest of Americans are less safe, less prosperous, less peaceful by your presence. It's time to stop being the problem child of the American family. Clean up your act. Change your rotten, hostile attitudes. From now on, you will be held accountable for your disastrous life choices, your failures, your dysfunctional communities. Get your shit together. Our patience with you grows thinner each day.
Let me lay it out for you, black folks:
1. Stay in school until you graduate.
2. Don't get anyone pregnant until you are old enough to marry them and support them and your child.
3. Don't commit crime: don't steal, rob, beat someone or kill anyone. Keep your record clean.
4. Stay off drugs.
5. Accept responsibility whenever you screw up and violate any of the first four items.
6. STFU about "racism." Accept the fact that it is your own rotten behavior and attitudes that cause the racial prejudice directed at you. You are major contributors to so-called racism. You are far from the innocent sheep you pretend to be. HINT: take a look at crime statistics by race. Guess who are the worst offenders?
7. Get a job. Learn job skills. Continually add to those skills with education and training. Stay off welfare.
8. Keep your family together, love your kids, teach them the civilizational skills they need to prosper: education, job training, basic manners, good citizenship, responsible parenthood, racial and religious tolerance, personal responsibility.
It ain't rocket science folks. Every other ethnic group in the country has long ago figured it out. Why can't you?
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