Celebrating Secession

By CzechRebel

What’s all the fuss about?

December 20, 2010 is the sesquicentennial of the adoption of the Ordinance of Secession of the State of South Carolina, featuring the display of the Ordinance of Secession and a Secession Ball in Charleston. Any attempt by those disfavored by the leftist elite—such as white Southern Americans—to celebrate their own heritage, predictably brings the self-anointed enforcers of “political correctness” [click here to view all posts on that topic] out of the woodwork in force. As always, the false accusation of “Racism!” is their weapon of choice.

Then, as now, an elaborate pretense of concern for the downtrodden soon becomes nothing more than a tool for the centralized government to use for impoverishing and enslaving everyone of all races.

South Carolina’s Original Ordinance of Secession on Display

12/20/2010

Location: The Charleston Museum
Address: 360 Meeting Street Charleston, SC 29403
Phone: 843.722.2996
Web Site: http://charlestonmuseum.org

As part of its commemoration of the Sesquicentennial of the Civil War, The Charleston Museum is pleased to announce it will exhibit South Carolina’s original Ordinance of Secession on Monday, December 20. This date marks the 150th anniversary of the signing of the document in Charleston. In the Ordinance, the state declared that the union existing between it and the other states was dissolved. South Carolina had seceded from the United States.

Read the rest.

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“Secession Ball” in Charleston commemorates Civil War, stirs protest by civil rights group

The Confederate Heritage Trust, which scheduled the dance in Charleston near where the secession document was signed, says it wants to honor the Southern men who were willing to sacrifice their lives for their homes and their vision of states’ rights. Guests will have a chance to see the original Ordinance of Secession, which has been preserved by the state.

Leaders of the NAACP say it makes no sense to honor men who committed treason against their own nation for the sake of a system that kept black men and women in bondage as slaves.

As the Charleston event kicks off more than four years of 150th anniversary Civil War commemorations, it also frames persisting questions. Chief among them: How does a nation remember the time when 11 of its states tried unsuccessfully to break away?

The $100-a-person Secession Ball falls on one end of the spectrum. It is partly sponsored by the Sons of Confederate Veterans, whose central purpose is to preserve the history and legacy of the South’s “citizen-soldiers.”

Read the rest.

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A most unlikely source of truth

It is an interesting development in the marketplace of truth to see Fox News and CNBC constantly at war. In a funny way, it forces out the truth. Ironically, more of the truth that I need to find seems to worm its way out through CNBC, especially from their half-witted “anchor” Keith Olbermann on his week-night show, Countdown.

No, I don’t think that Olbermann has any intention of revealing the truth to movement conservatives, libertarians, or Tea Partiers. He is merely trying to energize his old-line, hardcore Communist base. Made up to look like a talking corpse, Olbermann, on his show, dons the trappings of mid-1950s left-wing extremism. Using ancient versions of the NBC Peacock and recycling the music and news rhetoric of the time, I would not be surprised if he flashed over to old, grainy footage of an “embedded reporter” ready to interview a young Fidel Castro hidden away in the Cuban hillside with his Brigade troops.

While Fox News dances around the records of the candidates that they favor, which makes them look far too middle-of-the-road for the bulk of Americans who are trying to identify and support the opponents of big government, Olbermann inadvertently reveals some of the data that these voters are seeking. For example, when was the last time that Fox News disclosed any of their guests’ positions that support either pro-life or pro-Second Amendment views? Olbermann, on the other hand, is quick to label anyone who values human life as “anti-abortion”—which helpfully lets us know that they are pro-life and therefore deserve our support in that regard.

Take My Stand to Live and Die in Dixie

Early this December, Olbernmann graciously informed us of the December 20 sesquicentennial celebration of secession in Charleston, South Carolina. South Carolina was the first State to leave the Union and reestablish itself as in an independent sovereign entity. Of course, Olbermann’s spin amounted to over-simplified Yankee propaganda that might have sufficed for a third-grade class, but was an insult to the American public.

However, Olbermann is a dyed-in-the-wool Stalinsque (or Hitlersque, take your pick) totalitarian. His show, Countdown, is dedicated to promoting left-wing totalitarianism. In the dishonorable tradition of Pot, Meet Kettle, Olbermann disingenuously bandies about words like “treason”, “slavery”, “racism,” and the like.

What was secession really about?

In 1860, would the mainstream pillars of the community in South Carolina have openly engaged in what they considered to be an act of treason? Unlike the misfits, malcontents, and ne’er-do-wells from which the likes of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara drew upon to form the radical band of Cuban guerrillas that the Keith Olbermanns of the mid-twentieth century so openly supported, the delegates in antebellum South Carolina had every reason to believe that law and custom were on their side. On December 20, 1860, the mainstream people of South Carolina merely left the union in the same orderly manner by which they had originally joined it.

We must remember that the peculiar institution was legal in 1860. A major position of the citizenry in the newly-elected Republican regime was in favor of preserving the status quo in regards to existing State laws in that regard. Besides, the precedent for using federal law to override long-standing State law was all but nonexistent at that time. Oh, I am sure that there were a few people—with crystal balls in hands—who envisioned what we would call a “slippery slope” leading to federally-mandated abolition of chattel slavery in the next thirty to fifty years. Because so few Americans had bonded servants, chattel slavery was not a major issue to most Americans. Nor would it have occurred to very many Americans of that era to take the radical step of ending chattel slavery, or for that matter, making any other major change to the fabric of society, through federal legislation. There was simply no precedent for that degree of centralization.

Racism? From a historical viewpoint, that epithet does not even pass the straight-face test. What we call “racism” today would have been the norm throughout North America and Europe. Perhaps a few of the most radical and secular humanistic abolitionists could have passed for “non-racist” in modern society—unless, of course, someone asked them whether they would “want their daughter to marry one.”

What’s wrong with the new President from Illinois?

The winner of the last presidential election was a tall, thin, fast-taking Illinois lawyer. He had gotten national attention when he ran for the US Senate. He had been a known quantity; as a seeming shoo-in for his party’s nomination, he had shown his true radical colors to anyone willing to take notice. Just to put icing on the cake, despite the fact that that this particular nogoodnick was not someone the American people would support, the former frontrunner for the presidency—a proven tyrant—was given position of Secretary of State, the highest unelected position in the federal government.

The people of South Carolina felt totally disenfranchised. Their only opportunity seemed to be finding a way to opt out of that new administration. Hmm, is the reader doing a double take? Did the author say “1860 election” or “2008 election”? Are we talking about the Tea Party, or about the secessionists of a much earlier era?

So why did South Carolina decide to secede?

While issues were many, then as now, for most South Carolinians, the top issues were:

1. High taxes;
2. High taxes; &
3. High taxes!

In 1860, the nasty federal tax was known as a “tariff.” It was an extremely high tax imposed on goods imported to the United States. American-made manufactured goods, the vast majority of which came from the north, went untaxed; only the higher quality and more expensive goods that were imported from Europe were burdened with this extra cost.

In the North, these tariffs were viewed as a tax on the rich who could easily afford it. It was seen as a way of redistributing the wealth. Yankee factories could put out products at a more competitive price. Northern politicians used the money for the social spending of the day, which included make-work infrastructure projects, such as subsidized railroads, almost exclusively located in the North.

As always, this tax-the-rich scheme was anything but that in practice. The South was an agricultural society, but not in the way that you might envision. Yes, we hear so much about those few big plantations. We hear so much about the large cotton crops of the day. In truth, the vast majority of Southerners were yeoman farmers who lived off the land. Most yeoman farmers owned NO slaves; those who did, owned just a few. They hunted and fished and worked the land as subsistence farmers. The one thing they needed most, and could not produce for themselves, was high-quality farming equipment and other industrial products from Europe.

But that ran into the nasty tariff. While the large cotton plantation might have enough cash reserves to weather the storm of higher tariffs, this was not true of the small yeoman farmer, who had much less cash to operate with. If the price of tools and other manufactured necessities rose 50%, it could wipe out all of his liquid cash and then some. This would have had a devastating effect on small merchants who served the yeoman farming community, as well as other businesses and professions servicing the average Southerner. In addition, the high tariff on imported industrial products cut off foreign competition, allowing northern industrialists to charge far more for the products that they sold to the South.

Ironically, in the case of the larger plantations, the eventual alternative to slave labor would have been mechanization—the very thing that the high tariffs priced out of reach.

Clearly, high taxes and runaway federal government spending are nothing new. Likewise, everyday people in South Carolina who take exception to this federal tyranny also have deep roots. But then, the winners always write the history books (at least for the next century or two), and Yankee lies about the motives of those who struggle for freedom are nothing new.

Do those who hate the South have any point at all?

Ever since the Emancipation Proclamation, haters of the South, such as Keith Olbermann, have tried to argue that War Between the States was nothing more than a referendum on slavery. The fact is that, before the Emancipation Proclamation, the Yankee government consistently denied that slavery played any role in their ruthless invasion of the South.

Well, let’s see! Many of the top Confederate government and military leaders were open advocates of releasing bonded servants. Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee and James Longstreet were three noteworthy examples. And we are not talking about idle words. Jefferson Davis adopted an African-American as his son. Robert E. Lee released all his slaves, all of which he had inherited. So, the President of the Confederacy and the two top generals in the Army would be willing to prosecute a war to undermine their own heartfelt beliefs? I think not!

Those who actually went out and fought for the Confederacy, for the most part, agreed that they were not fighting a war to preserve slavery. Only a few of them saw it as a factor, albeit a secondary factor, in their motivation to fight.

Many African-Americans (both bonded and free) served in the Confederate military, some in actual combat roles. Clearly, those who did not serve, but stayed behind to work in agriculture, commerce, transportation, and manufacturing, surely knew they were helping the Southern war effort. Those who stayed must have had some reason to prefer a Southern victory.

The list goes on and on. Nonetheless, there was one problem with secession. There was one small, but important, group of people who could have derailed secession, and who might have had the motivation to do so.

The safe bet for the delegates

In 1860, there were a number of people who did worry about the consequences of the eventual abolition of slavery. While the group was small, its members did have considerable wealth and political influence, and they were part of the upper crust of society that had the time and the means to serve in the state government at that time. While other Southern issues may have influenced them, there were a few vocal supporters of the peculiar institution who might have done most anything to have their pro-slavery position cemented into a constitutional amendment.

Presumably, they would have loved to have a President that would support such an amendment. Perhaps some of them would eventually have sided with Yankee interests—for the time being—so as to etch their precious peculiar institution in stone. But where could they have found such a pro-slavery leader? Where would they have looked?

Stumped? Sorry, but this is a trick question. The new President-elect was surprisingly very pro-slavery.

Yes, Abraham Lincoln not only had slave-owning relatives, but he even favored his own Constitutional Amendment preserving slavery in every State where it was currently being practiced. Don’t believe me? OK, but read his inauguration speech first. Either Honest Abe was a serious liar or he intended his version of the 13th Amendment to preserve, NOT to outlaw, slavery.

The price that Lincoln demanded for this devil’s bargain was for the South to agree to the high tariffs on imported goods.

Keeping secession on track

So, how could the anti-tax and limited-government secessionist movement, which actually did elevate some emancipation-minded Southerners to power, have managed to garner and retain the support of those who feared such radical changes to their society? Well, the secessionists could allay their fears by agreeing to keep the peculiar institution intact for a while. But that raises the perennial question: how much can anyone trust the promises of a few politicians?

Putting it in writing

Let us look at the way South Carolinians thought at that time, not knowing what their future would be. While I seriously doubt that, back in 1860, very many people expected America to enter the 20th Century with the peculiar institution still intact, with or without a constitutional amendment keeping it in place, emancipation was not something that these fire-eaters were prepared to deal with anytime soon. For that reason, they needed some written assurance that their point of view would be part of South Carolinian (and Southern) secession.

Thus, woven into the “declarations of causes which justify the secession of South Carolina from the federal union,” a report written by a committee of delegates, were denunciations of northern interference with the institution of chattel slavery. This report was the document that Keith Olbermann and some others have evidently confused with the Articles of Secession.

No language regarding the motives for secession appeared in the Articles themselves. Closely tracking the standards set forth in the Declaration of Independence some 84 years earlier, the actions of the convention both satisfied the principles of Thomas Jefferson and alleviated the fears of those who feared that the secessionist movement might become the new Southern radical abolitionist movement.

This was not much of a move when you consider that Lincoln was, at that time, offering them a constitutional amendment to preserve slavery in return for staying in the union and submitting to the tariffs!

When you are losing the argument, just scream “Raaaaacism!”

Last spring and summer (2010), when the Tea Party was fight the federal tyranny of Obama, Reid and Pelosi, the left-wing tyrants and their left-wing (so-called “mainstream”) media screamed “Racism!” hoping to derail the freedom-minded. Right up to the eve of the 2010 elections, our leftist opponents continued to scream “Racism!” at the entire limited-government movement, with no grounds whatsoever.

In a way, it’s hard to blame them! For over a hundred years, the American public has been rolling over and playing dead whenever the far left screamed “Raaaaacism!”

We can only hope that we have finally reached the time when playing that shopworn “race card” will no longer work.

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Enacting the Articles of Secession

Charleston at War: A simple Ordinance of Secession

By Brian Hicks
bhicks@postandcourier.com
Sunday, December 19, 2010
[…]
South Carolina’s secession convention had dragged on for days.

At first, the delegates had been bogged down with trivial matters — what to do with federal employees working in the state, how to handle mail service. They even debated whether to allow reporters into the chamber. Rhett, himself a delegate, had no reason to be overly concerned with the Mercury’s access.

Although some protested, most delegates argued that barring newspapers from the room would look bad. It would appear they were ashamed of what they were doing, and they certainly were not ashamed.

They fully believed they were doing the will of the people.

For proof, they only had to look beyond South Carolina’s border. In the weeks following Lincoln’s election, several other Southern states — Mississippi, Alabama, Florida and Georgia among them — had begun planning their own separate conventions.

Representatives of at least two of those states were in the audience to assure the men that, if they seceded, they would not stand alone for long. Some of South Carolina’s delegates would be appointed to coordinate with these states. Already, there was talk of forming a confederacy with them.

At the same time, Rhett had been selected to join a delegation that would travel to Washington and negotiate a settlement of all debts between the state and the U.S. government.

Among other issues, these delegates would deliver terms for the government to turn over all federal forts in Charleston; the United States no longer would be welcome to hold property in South Carolina.

Of course, first there was the actual business of seceding.

The ordinance itself, which the delegation would carry to Washington, was so simple that the men gathered in St. Andrew’s Hall had little need to debate it. It read:

AN ORDINANCE to dissolve the union between the State of South Carolina and other States united with her under the compact entitled ‘The Constitution of the United States of America.’

We, the people of the State of South Carolina, in convention assembled, do declare and ordain, and it is hereby declared and ordained, That the ordinance adopted by us in convention on the twenty-third day of May, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-eight, whereby the Constitution of the United States of America was ratified, and also all acts and parts of acts of the General Assembly of this State ratifying amendments of the said Constitution, are hereby repealed; and that the union now subsisting between South Carolina and other States, under the name of the ‘United States of America,’ is hereby dissolved.

Done at Charleston the twentieth day of December, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty.

Read the rest.

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