How Libertarians Win Friends And Influence People With Their Positions on the Civil War - Page 27 - Politics and Economics

So you are in fact conflating "why the south seceded" with "why the north invaded" and "why white southerners fought" and all sorts of ****. I guess you have to in order to make the argument you're trying to make.

12-02-2009 , 07:00 PM

#652

SL__72

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Quote:

Originally Posted by DVaut1

So what's Rothbard, Rockwell, DiLorenzo, mises.org et al excuse for Southern apologetics?

They see what the CSA did to the USA as essentially the same thing as what the colonies did to GB.

12-02-2009 , 07:01 PM

#653

DVaut1

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Quote:

Originally Posted by DVaut1

I'm sure there are some poor white people in the South circa 1862 who got snowed and joined to fight their homeland. Okay? But we all know, as has been conceded numerous times now, including by you (I think), that the South and its leaders really seceded for slavery. So there's no real debate about this anymore.

So what's Rothbard, Rockwell, DiLorenzo, mises.org et al excuse for Southern apologetics?

I guess it might be interesting to note what some 19th century Southerners thought. But who cares?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Borodog

No. I'm not conflating that at all.

12-02-2009 , 07:02 PM

#654

AlexM

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Quote:

Originally Posted by DVaut1

Are we back to arguing that 1. the South didn't secede to preserve slavery here?

No one here has ever argued this that I know of.

12-02-2009 , 07:02 PM

#655

SL__72

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Quote:

Originally Posted by DVaut1

I'm not quibbling with the South's legal right to concede, I'm quibbling with contemporary libertarian scholars or whatever the **** mises.org, Rothbard, Rockwell, DiLorenzo et al call themselves and those who read them and quote them on this forum defending the South's secession aims. I hope I've made this clear over ~100 so posts of repeating myself but apparently not.

Come on... you've definitely been doing both. Not "legal right" specifically (although I didn't use those words either) but that post is part of this conversation:

Quote:

Originally Posted by DVaut1

My claim is that you can't divorce "supporting the South's secession in the middle of the 19th century" while consistently claiming to not "support" slavery.

12-02-2009 , 07:03 PM

#656

Wynton

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Quote:

Originally Posted by Double Eagle

The notion that Lincoln's disavowal of any interest in pursuing immediate abolition equaling the North's entry into the war not being about Slavery just completely ignores the fact that the Republican platform included both Free Soil and anti-Fugitive Slave Act planks, both of which were designed to hasten the end of Slavery and neither of which Lincoln offered to compromise on. As I've indicated earlier, the Republican threat to Slavery was very real (even if not immediate) and thus one cannot separate the aims of preserving the Union and ending Slavery as the South's reaction proves that they were in fact one and the same.

shhhh, you're ruining all the fun

12-02-2009 , 07:05 PM

#657

DVaut1

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Quote:

Originally Posted by SL__72

Come on... you've definitely been doing both. Not "legal right" specifically (although I didn't use those words either) but that post is part of this conversation:

No, I really haven't. I've been as clear as the English language allows on this. My claim that that you can't divorce "supporting the South's secession in the middle of the 19th century" while consistently claiming to not "support" slavery. It really has nothing to do with their legal rights. As I said to mjkidd, if the ONLY THING we're talking about is legal rights in isolation, then I think it consistent to say that you don't support slavery if you support secession. I can't be any clearer on this. Once you move onto "the South was right to secede in the middle of the 19th century from the Union to stop them from meddling in their affairs", you've moved beyond the goalposts and into "supporting slavery", even if you deny it for hundreds of posts.

I think of course that the debate is basically a red herring. It's as if Iraq War supporters point to Congressional authorization as to why we should have invaded Iraq; if you've got the legal right to do something, that's fascinating, but it doesn't mean you should do it. Let's be clear that many in the libertarian scholarly circles go way beyond just focusing on legal esoterica about secession.

12-02-2009 , 07:07 PM

#658

SenorKeeed

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Quote:

Originally Posted by DVaut1

Link to these guys defending the South's secession aims?

12-02-2009 , 07:08 PM

#659

MvdB

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Quote:

Originally Posted by Double Eagle

saying:

a) The North (the republicans / Lincoln) wanted to abolish slavery, preferably quickly and were prepared to go a long way

does not imply

b) They would be willing to fight a war over this issue

If slavery was the only issue, and there was no advantage to be gained for the North in preserving the Unioin, no way there would have been a war.

It is impossible to discuss this war (any war), if the real reasons they are fought are hidden behind nice rhetorics. Same goes for the real reasons behind the secession, in the case of the Civil War.

12-02-2009 , 07:09 PM

#660

SenorKeeed

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Quote:

Originally Posted by Double Eagle

You are assuming that once the South seceded war was a foregone conclusion.

12-02-2009 , 07:10 PM

#661

vixticator

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Quote:

Originally Posted by Borodog

It is absolutely stunning how you guys can so easily misconstrue every single statement from its most obvious and correct meaning to a bizarre one that can be interpreted as wrong.

Are you telling me, that you believe, that fighting against the northern invasion was sold to the common man as a defense of the institution of slavery, and not as a defense of his invaded "homeland"? Much less, as already pointed out, a defense against being hanged by the CSA?

Unreal.

The institution of slavery was supported, in the strongest possible way, by the common man. Seriously, this is BASIC INTRO history. I can link you to courses but I will not try to explain it itt. Only the most hardcore ardent neo-confederate apologist would ever refute this concept.

12-02-2009 , 07:11 PM

#662

mpethybridge

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Quote:

Originally Posted by FlyWf

South Carolina is in the UNITED STATES. That should be sufficient explanation.

P.S. Guess what you're doing.

South Carolina IS in the United States, but at the time the CSA fired on Ft. Sumter, whether it was in the U,S. was the question in dispute.

So you're actually the one doing what you say I'm doing.

12-02-2009 , 07:11 PM

#663

DVaut1

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Quote:

Originally Posted by mjkidd

Link to these guys defending the South's secession aims?

Thomas DiLorenzo: An Abolitionist Defends the South

Murray Rothbard: A Just War

To wit, quote Rothbard:

Quote:

For in this War Between the States, the South may have fought for its sacred honor, but the Northern war was the very opposite of honorable. We remember the care with which the civilized nations had developed classical international law. Above all, civilians must not be targeted; wars must be limited. But the North insisted on creating a conscript army, a nation in arms, and broke the 19th-century rules of war by specifically plundering and slaughtering civilians, by destroying civilian life and institutions so as to reduce the South to submission. Sherman’s infamous March through Georgia was one of the great war crimes, and crimes against humanity, of the past century-and-a-half. Because by targeting and butchering civilians, Lincoln and Grant and Sherman paved the way for all the genocidal honors of the monstrous 20th century. There has been a lot of talk in recent years about memory, about never forgetting about history as retroactive punishment for crimes of war and mass murder. As Lord Acton, the great libertarian historian, put it, the historian, in the last analysis, must be a moral judge. The muse of the historian, he wrote, is not Clio, but Rhadamanthus, the legendary avenger of innocent blood. In that spirit, we must always remember, we must never forget, we must put in the dock and hang higher than Haman, those who, in modern times, opened the Pandora’s Box of genocide and the extermination of civilians: Sherman, Grant, and Lincoln.

Perhaps, some day, their statues, like Lenin’s in Russia, will be toppled and melted down; their insignias and battle flags will be desecrated, their war songs tossed into the fire. And then Davis and Lee and Jackson and Forrest, and all the heroes of the South, "Dixie" and the Stars and Bars, will once again be truly honored and remembered. The classic comment on that meretricious TV series The Civil War was made by that marvelous and feisty Southern writer Florence King. Asked her views on the series, she replied: "I didn’t have time to watch The Civil War. I’m too busy getting ready for the next one." In that spirit, I am sure that one day, aided and abetted by Northerners like myself in the glorious "copperhead" tradition, the South shall rise again.

Sorry, the bolded **** is just way way beyond "they had the legal right to secede" and into straight up glorification of the Southern cause. This isn't even debatable.

Maybe you should take Boro's advice and actually READ some of this stuff one day.

12-02-2009 , 07:13 PM

#664

Borodog

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Quote:

Originally Posted by Wynton

shhhh, you're ruining all the fun

Lincoln supported a constitutional ammendment that passed the Senate and House overwhelmingly days before his inauguration, i.e. after secession, meaning they were passed by northern (i.e. Republican) legislators, that would have made slavery constitutionally inviolable in perpetuity. Lincoln personally wrote letters to the governors of every state imploring them to support this constitutional ammendment.

In other words, the issue of abolishing slavery was apparently of no importance to Lincoln or the Republican political apparatus whatsoever compared to keeping the south in the Union and the revenue coming in.

12-02-2009 , 07:14 PM

#665

SenorKeeed

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It is interesting to think what noted libertarian and neo-confederate Karl Marx thought on the subject of the American Civil War:

Quote:

The war between the North and the South is a tariff war. The war is further, not for any principle, does not touch the question of slavery, and in fact turns on the Northern lust for sovereignty.

12-02-2009 , 07:15 PM

#666

AlexM

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Quote:

Originally Posted by DVaut1

Your question is bogus. It's missing some important details, like that the foreign army invaded because you seceded to protect your institution of chattel slavery and that your leaders are saying you're fighting to protect that institution, not to prevent having tariffs collected from you. In that sense, no, it's not just to fight back to protect your country's vested and substantial stake in slavery.

But these were not the reasons that the North invaded, so they are irrelevant. You're doing the equivalent of defending the invasion of Iraq for humanitarian reasons, but that's not the reason we were there.

12-02-2009 , 07:16 PM

#667

DVaut1

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By the way, cue Boro "that quote is out of context" and the even more laughable "asking for Davis and Lee and Jackson and Forrest to have statues, and all the heroes of the South, and to sing "Dixie" and raise the Stars and Bars, and wishing for the South to rise against IS NOT SUPPORTING THE SOUTH'S SECESSIONARY AIMS" rant. Will be awesome, can't wait.

Off to eat dinner, will catch it sometime later tonight.

12-02-2009 , 07:16 PM

#668

DVaut1

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Quote:

Originally Posted by AlexM

But these were not the reasons that the North invaded, so they are irrelevant.

Makes sense. We should judge the South's secession aims based on why the North invaded.

AlexM ftw.

12-02-2009 , 07:17 PM

#669

Borodog

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Quote:

Originally Posted by DVaut1

Thomas DiLorenzo: An Abolitionist Defends the South

Murray Rothbard: A Just War

To wit, quote Rothbard:

Sorry, the bolded **** is just way way beyond "they had the legal right to secede" and into straight up glorification of the Southern cause. This isn't even debatable.

Maybe you should take Boro's advice and actually READ some of this stuff one day.

Again, you are trying to tie "fighting a war against an invading army" with "defending secession aims". Nice try, but it's sophistry.

12-02-2009 , 07:18 PM

#670

SL__72

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Quote:

Originally Posted by DVaut1

My claim that that you can't divorce "supporting the South's secession in the middle of the 19th century" while consistently claiming to not "support" slavery.

And I've been trying to tell you that you can if you view secession itself as a "good." And if you don't believe in government, how could you not? Decentralization is a logical step towards statelessness. Whats the word for the kind of statist who believes in making every decision at the most local level possible. Anarchists, in matters relating to the state, believe that. Given the precondition of statehood, the smaller the state the better.

12-02-2009 , 07:22 PM

#671

SenorKeeed

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Quote:

Originally Posted by DVaut1

I'd rather not. I haven't read any Rothbard and I don't plan on it. Sure, Rothbard was an idiot to say that Forrest, of all people, should be remembered as a hero. Perhaps he was even a racist. I have no idea and I don't care. It does seem that Rothbard and Rockwell made an attempt to reach out to the racist southern right during the period that piece was written. That's not a choice I'd choose to defend.

I've pretty much only read DiLorenzo on the topic and I've never seen him say anything remotely racist or objectionable.

12-02-2009 , 07:23 PM

#672

vixticator

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Quote:

Originally Posted by SL__72

lolllllll so what happens within the borders is irrelevant only that it be smaller than the previous state in geographic size? honestly, do you believe any of this stuff you are typing?

12-02-2009 , 07:23 PM

#673

AlexM

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Quote:

Originally Posted by Riverman

This is why libertarianism is where it is (nowhere). Supporters will argue endlessly about things like the true causes of the Civil War, Lincoln's performance as president, and alternative means of ending slavery but do pretty much nothing to engage the general population in debate about the issues those people actually care about.

This is completely and totally false. We argue endlessly about EVERY political issue that comes up.

12-02-2009 , 07:30 PM

#674

SL__72

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Quote:

Originally Posted by vixticator

lolllllll so what happens within the borders is irrelevant only that it be smaller than the previous state in geographic size? honestly, do you believe any of this stuff you are typing?

Are you kidding? Of course it isn't irrelevant. Where did you come up with that?

12-02-2009 , 07:33 PM

#675

SL__72

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DVaut1, did you read that DiLorenzo article you linked? Or the Kinsella one I linked a few pages ago?

The DiLorenzo one is actually pretty decent. The stuff about Lysander Spooner is especially good.

Quote:

Originally Posted by wikipedia

Spooner harshly condemned the Civil War and the Reconstruction period that followed. Though he approved of the fact that black slavery was abolished, he criticized the North for failing to make this the purpose of their cause. Instead of fighting to abolish slavery, they fought to "preserve the union" and, according to Spooner, to bolster business interests behind that union. Spooner believed a war of this type was hypocritical and dishonest, especially on the part of Radical Republicans like Sumner who were by then claiming to be abolitionist heroes for ending slavery. Spooner also argued that the war came at a great cost to liberty and proved that the rights expressed in the Declaration of Independence no longer held true - the people could not "dissolve the political bands" that tie them to a government that "becomes destructive" of the consent of the governed because if they did so, as Spooner believed the south had attempted to do, they would be met by the bayonet to enforce their obedience to the former government.

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