Nowhere in the Constitution is there any mention of the union of the states being permanent.
Riiight. You would do better than to rely upon neo-confederate hacks for sources and instead appeal to better authorities. But since you are obviously so easily impressed, you’ll be quite utterly convinced by the fact that nowhere in the Constitution is there any mention of the union of the states being temporary.
The fact is, as Lincoln said to Congress on July 4, 1861 “The States have their status in the Union, and they have no other legal status. If they break from this they can only do so against law and by revolution.”
Lincoln understood that both Articles VI and X: Section 1 established contractual obligation to the Union on the part of states, with Article VI establishing the Constitution as the supreme law of the land that can by no means be overridden by state resolution. Since Article X: Section 1 clearly establishes both that no state can make any law hindering contractual obligations and that no state can form interstate alliances without congressional approval, then with Article VI the Union relationship between states is by default permanent.
The Confederates attempted to break both Constitutional Articles, breaking Article VI by passing and then enforcing a state ruling to override the Union contract, and then establishing an interstate confederation thereby breaking Article X: Section 1
That is the law and we cannot get around it by childishly claiming contracts must contain the word “permanent” in them to be permanent. If the contract contains rules that are to be followed in order to alter it, then the contract cannot be legally altered until those rules are followed. That means it remains intact and unaltered until such a time as the parties involved in it deem otherwise.
This was not an oversight by any means. Indeed, when New York, Rhode Island, and Virginia ratified the Constitution, they specifically stated that they reserved the right to resume the governmental powers granted to the United States.
Your neo-confederate hack has misread the resolutions, certainly in the case of Virginia. In accepting the Constitution Virginia merely restated the tenets of the Declaration of Independence, to wit: that since governments exist to protect human rights, then should a government fail to do its duty here, becoming injurious to those rights, the people have a right to “interpose” or even abolish the government. A pure doctrine of secession is not made here. Moreover, as Lincoln himself accurately put it “…It follows....that no State, upon its own mere motion, can lawfully get out of the Union; that resolves and ordinances to that effect are legally void…”
In his book Life of Webster Sen. Henry Cabot Lodge writes, "It is safe to say that there was not a man in the country, from Washington and Hamilton to Clinton and Mason, who did not regard the new system as an experiment from which each and every State had a right to peaceably withdraw."
Well this bogus quote will not get us far, and besides, opinion of a little guy like Lodge is certainly nothing when compared with the clear law of the United States Constitution.
A textbook used at West Point before the Civil War, A View of the Constitution, written by Judge William Rawle, states, "The secession of a State depends on the will of the people of such a State."
Surely, Laz, you can do better than this neo-confederate hack. Dear me. This sort of thing should be embarrassing to you. A fantasized textbook, written by a fantasized judge is no support for your position. Indeed even were these items real they are yet nothing at all because a little judge does not law make. This is certainly true of a textbook, even one formerly used at West Point.
Fascinating Fact: It is significant that no Confederate leader was ever brought to trial for treason. A trial would have brought a verdict on the constitutional legality of secession.
This is no argument either, but mere conjecture. I could as easily say that Lincoln, having saved the Union after a long, brutal war, did not wish to prolong the war in the courts by torturing defeated men who many Americans at the time indeed wished to charge with treason.
Try avoiding such claptrap from civilwar bluegrass and the like. civilwar.bluegrass.net
Nonsense. Commonly, a state can withdraw from an international treaty legally. France withdrew from most of the NATO Treaty. North Korea has withdrawn from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Pact. The US could unilaterally withdraw from the WTO or NAFTA if it chose.
The fallacy here is that the Constitution is no mere treaty, but rather is the legal contract whereby the United States exists and came into being as equal states, all of which possess the same essential power and mutual contractual obligation to the same government.
Quebec could legally withdraw from the Canadian Confederation:
This ain’ Quebec…
Czechoslovaskia split into Slovakia and the Czech Republic.
This ain’ Checkoslovockya eitha…
[Lincoln] told us flatly that slavery was OK by him if the Union could be kept intact with slavery in it.
Indeed he did, because, once again, the issue with him was not slavery in pure, but slavery’s westward expansion. He certainly would have allowed slavery. But he did not wish it to expand. We know this because he said it – repeatedly.
Let me remind you that the war did NOT start because of any state's secession. It started because Lincoln claimed property rights to federal installations in Confederate states. That was unacceptable to the SOuthern states.
Riiiight. Those “property rights” existed long before there was a Confederacy. Everyone knows it is wrong to sign a contract, take money from everyone on the basis of the contract to build mutually shared facilities, and then allow one party to unilaterally break the contract so he can steal the once mutually shared facilities. The fact is, the South was wrong and any right thinking person will readily see it. No need for complex arguments here. This is just Universal Law.
In particular, Fort Sumter commanded Charleston harbor, one of the South's most important ports. The Southerners fired on it. That started the war. Not secession.
Hehe. Good to see you at least got a liddle dang sense. Shiloh has been runnin’ around here whining that secession itself started the war, and I been tellin’ him ova and dang ova again that the South’s firing on Sumter started it, not secession.
In fact, Lincoln at that time made NO claim that the Southern states had no right to secede. Such a claim would have been considered ridiculous. All he claimed was that the property of the Northern Federal gov't remained its property.
(sigh) The South fired on Sumter on April 12, 1861. Here is Lincoln on March 4, 1861:
“I hold that, in contemplation of universal law, and of the Constitution, the union of these States is perpetual....It follows....that no State, upon its own mere motion, can lawfully get out of the Union; that resolves and ordinances to that effect are legally void; and that acts of violence, within any State or States, against the authority of the United States, are insurrectionary or revolutionary, according to circumstances. I, therefore, consider that, in view of the Constitution and the laws, the Union is unbroken. (First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861)http://www.nps.gov/liho/s03.htm |
