Confederate Flag: Pride or Bigotry?

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
121

So where is the proof that tariffs sparked secession? I’ll tell you what – one of you neo-Confederates need to dig through the declarations of secession from the various states and count up the number of times ‘tariff’ comes up and then count up the number of times ‘slavery’ comes up. Hint: have a pencil ready when you are looking for slavery. If tariffs were such an outrage to the secessionists, they must have brought it up hundreds of times, correct? It must have been a big secret.

92% of the net tariff ($52,300,000) collected in 1860 was collected in Northern ports; only 7.6% ($4,000,000) was collected in Southern ports. New York paid more duties than the top 10 Southern ports combined. The tariff rate of 1857 – which was the rate at the time of secession – was the lowest in 20 years.

If you were to take the population of 1860 and divide it by the tariff revenue, it comes out to about $1.65 per person a year.

No tariffs were collected on goods from the North shipped to and sold in the South prior to secession. The federal government realized a tiny fraction of 1% of its total revenues from Charleston, South Carolina imports.

Slavery sparked secession. The Slave Power feared that the restriction of slavery in the territories would be the catalyst that would ultimately lead to, what Jefferson Davis said in his speech, ‘rendering property in slaves so insecure as to be completely worthless’ and they would lose three billion dollars worth of what they called ‘their property’. The tariff rates were a minor point of friction between sections (North and South, East and West) and nothing more.

By the way, the Federal government lost millions of dollars delivering mail in the South prior to the war because of their antiquated infrastructure and transportation system.

122

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Headhunter wrote:

The only error in anything you wrote was that the tariff was being raised from 18% to 47%, to pay for a transcontinental railroad, which would go nowhere near the South.

Was the upwards adjustment on the tariff rate you complain of above prior to the Civil War? Let’s see a source, because in 1857, tariffs were lowered.

And, of course, none of this is particularly relevant - the Slave Power didn’t secede because of the tariff.[/quote]

"The Morrill Tariff passed the House of Representatives in the 1859 session, before Lincolnâ??s nomination and before any serious movement toward secession. In the First Inaugural Lincoln clearly stated that it was his obligation as president to “collect the duties and imposts,” but beyond that “there will be no invasion of any state.” He was telling the South: “We are going to economically plunder you by doubling and tripling the tariff rate (the main source of federal revenue at the time), and if you refuse to collect the higher tariffs, as the South Carolinians did with the 1828 “Tariff of Abominations,” there will be an invasion. That is, there will be mass killing, mayhem, and total war.”

“Why was the tariff so important â?? even more important than the issue of slavery in the eyes of Abraham Lincoln? Because tariff revenues comprised about 90 percent of federal revenue, and if the Southern states seceded they would no longer pay the federal tariff. All the grandiose plans of building a transcontinental railroad with taxpayer subsidies and creating a continental empire would be destroyed, and along with them the political career of Abraham Lincoln and, possibly, the Republican Party itself. The union was “saved” geographically but destroyed philosophically by the waging of total war on the civilian population of the South, a war in which nearly one half of the adult white male population was either killed or mutilated.”

123

[quote]kaaleppi wrote:
Big Boss wrote earlier in this thread:

“Another perspective is that some peoplev iew the flag as simply a symbol of rebellion. My wife even has told me that people waved the Confederate flag when the Berlin wall was being torn down. I’ve seen pictures of freedom fighters in Africa waving the flag as well.”

That spurred me to comment. I think it is true that outside of the US that flag is more a sign of rebellion than slavery. Now, you seem to want this to be a discussion about right and wrong, so if you are are right and I am wrong, then those people waving the flag on the Berlin wall were actually giving a resounding yes for slavery?[/quote]

Sigh. This thread is about people in the USA using the Confederate flag, not Germany (or NZ before you feel compelled to bring that up again). The USA has more of a negative connotation attached to the flag, so it would make sense that people would be offended. Only inbred retarded rednecks and hillbillies will truly believe that they can be white and fly a confederate flag in the southern states and NOBODY will think that it has a racist connotation.

124

DAMN you, Jack Dempsey!!!

Damn you to hell!!!

Why you wanna’ go destroy this discussion…with FACTS???

Mufasa

125

[quote]Mufasa wrote:
DAMN you, Jack Dempsey!!!

Damn you to hell!!!

Why you wanna’ go destroy this discussion…with FACTS???

Mufasa

[/quote]

Facts in politics? BLASPHEMY!

126

[quote]Mufasa wrote:
DAMN you, Jack Dempsey!!!

Damn you to hell!!!

Why you wanna’ go destroy this discussion…with FACTS???

Mufasa

[/quote]

We can debate how the secession was sold in the south but to automatically conclude that the alleged reason that something is done is the real reason is naive at best.

I don’t know if you noticed but “facts” are next to useless in a democratic decision making process and I think it is fair to assume that that was no different in the 19th century.

127

Orion:

I’m all for searching for the “real” reason things were done.

And maybe I am wearing the Tin Foil and drinking the Yankee Kool-Aide…but this whole idea that Lincoln did what he did mainly for money and because he was a patsy of Northern Industrialist is revisionism at its worst.

Mufasa

128

[quote]Mufasa wrote:
Orion:

I’m all for searching for the “real” reason things were done.

And maybe I am wearing the Tin Foil and drinking the Yankee Kool-Aide…but this whole idea that Lincoln did what he did mainly for money and because he was a patsy of Northern Industrialist is revisionism at its worst.

Mufasa[/quote]

There is such a clever rhyme in German…

Wth,

“Weil, so schlieÃ?t er messerscharf, nicht sein kann was nicht sein darf”.

Meaning, “because, he concludes as aharp as a knife, what ought not be, cannot be”.

What would be next, an ex presidential candidate trying to make billions by stirring a climate hysteria?

I honestly think that that is exactly how the world works and how it worked 150 years ago. You do not have to agree with me but I would at least allow for the possibility that I am right every now and then.

129

Uh-oh!

Misstep!

I haven’t read this whole tread IN DETAIL, Orion…

But it appears that you think that what I said was directed at you…and it wasn’t!

It really was not directed at anyone in particular…

Mufasa

130

[quote]Mufasa wrote:
Uh-oh!

Misstep!

I haven’t read this whole tread IN DETAIL, Orion…

But it appears that you think that what I said was directed at you…and it wasn’t!

It really was not directed at anyone in particular…

Mufasa[/quote]

The “Orion:” might have misled me…

My mistake :-)…

131

[quote]Headhunter wrote:

"The Morrill Tariff passed the House of Representatives in the 1859 session, before Lincolnâ??s nomination and before any serious movement toward secession. In the First Inaugural Lincoln clearly stated that it was his obligation as president to “collect the duties and imposts,” but beyond that “there will be no invasion of any state.” He was telling the South: “We are going to economically plunder you by doubling and tripling the tariff rate (the main source of federal revenue at the time), and if you refuse to collect the higher tariffs, as the South Carolinians did with the 1828 “Tariff of Abominations,” there will be an invasion. That is, there will be mass killing, mayhem, and total war.”

“Why was the tariff so important â?? even more important than the issue of slavery in the eyes of Abraham Lincoln? Because tariff revenues comprised about 90 percent of federal revenue, and if the Southern states seceded they would no longer pay the federal tariff. All the grandiose plans of building a transcontinental railroad with taxpayer subsidies and creating a continental empire would be destroyed, and along with them the political career of Abraham Lincoln and, possibly, the Republican Party itself. The union was “saved” geographically but destroyed philosophically by the waging of total war on the civilian population of the South, a war in which nearly one half of the adult white male population was either killed or mutilated.”

http://www.lewrockwell.com/dilorenzo/dilorenzo53.html[/quote]

More cut-and-pasting of worthless drivel from a discredited hack. I’d say “you can’t make this stuff up”, but apparently you can.

  1. Of course there no serious movement toward secession around that time - no one had won the election of 1860 on a platform of preventing slavery into the Federal Territories. If the tariff had truly been that bad, there would have been talk to secession prior to the passing of the bill. There wasn’t.

  2. Despite the tariff apparently being the revolutionary issue (and not slavery), only two seceding states even mentioned it in passing (Georgia and South Carolina).

As Jack Dempsey has asked over and over, if the tariff was the issue, why were the seceding states basically silent on the tariff in their declarations of secession?

Still…no answer.

  1. The Confederacy passed its own tariff after organizing.

  2. The Morrill Tariff was actually lower than the Tariff of Abominations.

  3. And Lincoln’s stock language about collecting “duties and imposts” - meaning federal operations would continue - was a veiled threat to wage economic war on the South? This might be the silliest claim of all.

Headhunter, amateur hour is over. Man up with something decent or find yourself at the kids’ table with the other Lew Rockwell children.

132

[quote]orion wrote:

We can debate how the secession was sold in the south but to automatically conclude that the alleged reason that something is done is the real reason is naive at best.[/quote]

There is no “automatic conclusion” - it is a conclusion based on the complete picture of information.

On the other hand, we have you - ignorant of the facts, and unschooled in any of the history - and yet, you find a way to conclusions you like, despite knowing next to nothing about the subject.

No thanks, I think most of us - Lew Rockwellian twerps aside - will take the facts-based approach in lieu of making it up as we go. We’re picky that way.

133

[quote]jsbrook wrote:
Gregus wrote:
Professor X wrote:
SSC wrote:
Gregus wrote:
SSC wrote:
D3HT09 wrote:
I’ve found it to be a symbol of southern heritege (sp?). There is really nothing racist about it.

P.S. I’m a northern boy

Sometimes… But I’ve also seen them used in highly antagonizing ways against minority communities, just to provoke reactions and hostility. It’s a big “Fuck You,” as far as I’m concerned.

And seriously, what do people in the south have to be proud about? That it’s hot? That Mississippi is like the worst state in the nation (sans Indiana.) Or maybe that they have the best conference in college football?

I don’t get it. They [i]LOST[/i] the war. It’d be like romping around down in Vietnam with an American flag, sticking our tongues out at them. Whaa?

So my answer: It’s niether pride nor bigotry. It’s hillbilly-ism.

You’re being ignorant of someone else’s culture right there. You also assume that because some idiots use it to antagonize minorities it must be a racist symbol. It is a racist symbol only to them, if you know what i’m saying.

No, I’m not being ignorant. I come from a hick area. No one around here is from the south, yet the rock their Confederate flags. Most people (I KNOW) who have them know damn well the underlying connotations the flag represents, and are perfectly fine with it. Most of these people also drive big ‘ol trucks, and have huntin’ and fishin’ decals on there, and most of them probably have a can of Skoal or twelve in their glove compartments. So again, I’ll answer again. It’s niether pride nor bigotry - It’s HILLBILLYISM.

What people from the South don’t realize is that we do the EXACT same shit up here. Except it’s really fucking cold for half of the year. It’s not a “Southern” lifestyle.

But if I’m wrong, please, enlighten me. What does the almighty Confederate flag represent? (If you’re a Southerner, I’m serious. I’m truly interested.) I’d be really surprised to hear that all those folks are truly proud of losing a war in which they defended slavery.

In the South it is commonly understood that there is some racist connotation to the more current use of that symbol. I am not sure why people try to deny this or act like it doesn’t matter.

No, most black people today don’t give a shit and it will take more than that to piss someone off…

Commonly understood by who? People of like mindedness? You state that people act like it does not matter, and then go on to say how to black people it indeed does not matter. So if it does not matter to anyone then it should be good to go.

And once again, the civil war was not fought over slavery. Attaching the flag to this issue is a stupid stereotype, one where you will be able to find and support your dislike for it. Much like a black kid wearing a shirt with a big “X” on it. Wouldn’t it be stereotypical of me to assume he hates whites and partakes in militant Islam?

Just because the civil war wasn’t fought over slavery (or at least predominately with the goal of liberation as a moral imperative) doesn’t mean that the Confederte flag hasn’t been used as a racist symbol and to subjugate blacks in the 150+ years since then. To a very large extent it has.

Back at my college, KA hung confederate flags off their house and pointed a canon at the black frat. Just “coincidentally,” it was the annivesary of Grant’s surrender when they did this. They were kicked off campus. Now, of course many don’t use the Confederate flag in this manner and may simply be expressing pride in Southern heritage, but it certainly has thse conotations. And that is because of the way it has been used and celebrated by many.

I also wonder how it is an appropriate symbol of pride in Southern heritage in the any case. Just what is it celebrating? A government that does not exist? Secession? The disolution of the Union?[/quote]

Everyone likes to pick and choose what symbols they see as racists, just like the Hindu’s still claim the swat and people associate white hoods to the KKK. But how about the American flag?

134

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
orion wrote:

We can debate how the secession was sold in the south but to automatically conclude that the alleged reason that something is done is the real reason is naive at best.

There is no “automatic conclusion” - it is a conclusion based on the complete picture of information.

On the other hand, we have you - ignorant of the facts, and unschooled in any of the history - and yet, you find a way to conclusions you like, despite knowing next to nothing about the subject.

No thanks, I think most of us - Lew Rockwellian twerps aside - will take the facts-based approach in lieu of making it up as we go. We’re picky that way.
[/quote]

Dude, you ignore your own posts if you have changed your mind one page later.

Dont lecture me on intellectual integrity.

Or respect for truth or facts or accuracy. We are as we do and you Sir are not a shining example for the love of truth .

A philosopher you are not.

Id rather try to make sense out of this world with my limited intellectual abiltiies than trust a mans judgment who can not even admit when he wrote the most blatant BS even though it is glaringly obvious.

Aight?

135

[quote]orion wrote:

Dude, you ignore your own posts if you have changed your mind one page later.

Dont lecture me on intellectual integrity.

Or respect for truth or facts or accuracy. We are as we do and you Sir are not a shining example for the love of truth .

A philosopher you are not.

Id rather try to make sense out of this world with my limited intellectual abiltiies than trust a mans judgment who can not even admit when he wrote the most blatant BS even though it is glaringly obvious.

Aight? [/quote]

Throwaway jibberish. Your post doesn’t even make sense.

You don’t “make sense” of anything, and you don’t even try - you wander in with conclusions you like and get humiliated when it’s clear you don’t know a damn thing about the subject you are pretending to opine on.

I do get tired of scraping you off my shoe here - but if you don’t mind everyone having an entertaining time watching your failures, I am the sporting type.

136

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Headhunter wrote:

"The Morrill Tariff passed the House of Representatives in the 1859 session, before LincolnÃ?¢??s nomination and before any serious movement toward secession. In the First Inaugural Lincoln clearly stated that it was his obligation as president to “collect the duties and imposts,” but beyond that “there will be no invasion of any state.” He was telling the South: “We are going to economically plunder you by doubling and tripling the tariff rate (the main source of federal revenue at the time), and if you refuse to collect the higher tariffs, as the South Carolinians did with the 1828 “Tariff of Abominations,” there will be an invasion. That is, there will be mass killing, mayhem, and total war.”

“Why was the tariff so important Ã?¢?? even more important than the issue of slavery in the eyes of Abraham Lincoln? Because tariff revenues comprised about 90 percent of federal revenue, and if the Southern states seceded they would no longer pay the federal tariff. All the grandiose plans of building a transcontinental railroad with taxpayer subsidies and creating a continental empire would be destroyed, and along with them the political career of Abraham Lincoln and, possibly, the Republican Party itself. The union was “saved” geographically but destroyed philosophically by the waging of total war on the civilian population of the South, a war in which nearly one half of the adult white male population was either killed or mutilated.”

More cut-and-pasting of worthless drivel from a discredited hack. I’d say “you can’t make this stuff up”, but apparently you can.

  1. Of course there no serious movement toward secession around that time - no one had won the election of 1860 on a platform of preventing slavery into the Federal Territories. If the tariff had truly been that bad, there would have been talk to secession prior to the passing of the bill. There wasn’t.

  2. Despite the tariff apparently being the revolutionary issue (and not slavery), only two seceding states even mentioned it in passing (Georgia and South Carolina).

As Jack Dempsey has asked over and over, if the tariff was the issue, why were the seceding states basically silent on the tariff in their declarations of secession?

Still…no answer.

  1. The Confederacy passed its own tariff after organizing.

  2. The Morrill Tariff was actually lower than the Tariff of Abominations.

  3. And Lincoln’s stock language about collecting “duties and imposts” - meaning federal operations would continue - was a veiled threat to wage economic war on the South? This might be the silliest claim of all.

Headhunter, amateur hour is over. Man up with something decent or find yourself at the kids’ table with the other Lew Rockwell children.[/quote]

Good post. The Morrill tariff was urged by President Buchanan and was a moderate revising of the Tariff of 1857 to the rates of 1846 with more protection on wool and iron. It passed the House well before the war with bipartisan support. Southern senators could have blocked it in early 1861 but they had already flown the coop when Abolitionist Abe was elected president.

Also not mentioned by neo-Confederates at Lew Rockwell is the fact that the tariff rates didn’t skyrocket until the North realized the war wouldn’t be a quick one and that they would need additional revenues to pay for it. No secession, no firing on Ft Sumter, no skyrocketing tariff.

137

[quote]Jack_Dempsey wrote:

Good post. The Morrill tariff was urged by President Buchanan and was a moderate revising of the Tariff of 1857 to the rates of 1846 with more protection on wool and iron. It passed the House well before the war with bipartisan support. Southern senators could have blocked it in early 1861 but they had already flown the coop when Abolitionist Abe was elected president.

Also not mentioned by neo-Confederates at Lew Rockwell is the fact that the tariff rates didn’t skyrocket until the North realized the war wouldn’t be a quick one and that they would need additional revenues to pay for it. No secession, no firing on Ft Sumter, no skyrocketing tariff.[/quote]

Great stuff.

And, it doesn’t even make common sense to blame the tariff for secession. Tax rates go up and down, and there was never a “threshold issue” - a proverbial point of no return - for something like a tariff, which bounced around politically for years.

Slavery, on the other hand, was a threshold issue - its very survival became a political issue in the late 1850s. A tariff can be lowered - a law beginning the extinction of the peculiar institution would not be reversed.

The Slave Power knew secession would lead to war, so the issue over which they seceded would have to be worth a war. Tariffs? Of course not. Slavery - that was worth a war. Read anything from the declarations of secession to anything written by Alexander Stephens, and that much was clear.

138

If you think the flag isn’t a racist symbol you should try telling that to the Northerners who use it as such to this day. Or to the Southerners who did and still do. The OPs anecdote is instructive, but hardly unique.

[quote]Big_Boss wrote:
DixiesFinest wrote:
Its heritage. A symbol of a people who said “fuck off” to a federal government that was imposing taxation on them, taxation that crippled their economy. A symbol of a people who said that a government cannot tell people how they should live their lives if those in power have not walked a mile in their shoes. After all, what does a new yorker know about farming in the Deep South?

Well I think the problem is the fact of what the backbone of Southern economy(and politics) was at the time. Negative connotations will always be attached to that particular flag because of that fact. [/quote]

Yup. To make the Civil War about economics and then ignore that the driving engine of the Southern economy was slave labor is to lie by omission.

[quote]Therizza wrote:
DixiesFinest wrote:
Riddle me this, why is it ok, justified even, for thirteen colonies to violently break away from their rightful Monarch, but not ok for 11 states to leave a Union they voluntarily joined?

Because the Union got more weapons and soldiers and won. Monopoly on violence, Locke and all that. Also, if the CSA had taken the Little Round Top at Gettysburg, they might have turned the Union flank and won the war soon after.[/quote]

Weber, not Locke.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Good Lord.

  1. Tariffs were not the catalyst of the Southern secession in 1861. Slavery was.

  2. While modern neo-Confederate revisionists love to whine that the Civil War was instigated by “big gummint”, the Slave Power wanted a platform that included federal legislation that would have forced federal territories to recognize slave ownership, which would have been the…wait for it…larget expansion of federal government prior to the New Deal.

Because the Slave Power couldn’t get it, they split the party, and handed the Republicans the electoral victory in 1860. The Slave Power only championed “states’ rights” when it helped them - and they championed expanding federal power likewise…when it helped them.

  1. The Southern states seceded, and there was no constitutional right to do so. As such, the Southern states were in rebellion. The federal government enforced the law against the insurrectionists.

And, to the OP - the flag is a bit of both. I think it doesn’t have to be a symbol of racism, but unfortunately occasionally is because the bearer of the flag wants to be.

Again, it doesn’t have to be - the pre-war South is defined by much more than the “peculiar institution”.[/quote]

100% correct. Thank you. You’ve been completely on point throughout the thread.

edit: Thanks to Jack Dempsey as well for dropping knowledge. You two have far more patience–and to be frank, detailed knowledge of the time period–than I.

139

[quote]Jack_Dempsey wrote:
thunderbolt23 wrote:
Headhunter wrote:

"The Morrill Tariff passed the House of Representatives in the 1859 session, before LincolnÃ??Ã?¢??s nomination and before any serious movement toward secession. In the First Inaugural Lincoln clearly stated that it was his obligation as president to “collect the duties and imposts,” but beyond that “there will be no invasion of any state.” He was telling the South: “We are going to economically plunder you by doubling and tripling the tariff rate (the main source of federal revenue at the time), and if you refuse to collect the higher tariffs, as the South Carolinians did with the 1828 “Tariff of Abominations,” there will be an invasion. That is, there will be mass killing, mayhem, and total war.”

“Why was the tariff so important Ã??Ã?¢?? even more important than the issue of slavery in the eyes of Abraham Lincoln? Because tariff revenues comprised about 90 percent of federal revenue, and if the Southern states seceded they would no longer pay the federal tariff. All the grandiose plans of building a transcontinental railroad with taxpayer subsidies and creating a continental empire would be destroyed, and along with them the political career of Abraham Lincoln and, possibly, the Republican Party itself. The union was “saved” geographically but destroyed philosophically by the waging of total war on the civilian population of the South, a war in which nearly one half of the adult white male population was either killed or mutilated.”

More cut-and-pasting of worthless drivel from a discredited hack. I’d say “you can’t make this stuff up”, but apparently you can.

  1. Of course there no serious movement toward secession around that time - no one had won the election of 1860 on a platform of preventing slavery into the Federal Territories. If the tariff had truly been that bad, there would have been talk to secession prior to the passing of the bill. There wasn’t.

  2. Despite the tariff apparently being the revolutionary issue (and not slavery), only two seceding states even mentioned it in passing (Georgia and South Carolina).

As Jack Dempsey has asked over and over, if the tariff was the issue, why were the seceding states basically silent on the tariff in their declarations of secession?

Still…no answer.

  1. The Confederacy passed its own tariff after organizing.

  2. The Morrill Tariff was actually lower than the Tariff of Abominations.

  3. And Lincoln’s stock language about collecting “duties and imposts” - meaning federal operations would continue - was a veiled threat to wage economic war on the South? This might be the silliest claim of all.

Headhunter, amateur hour is over. Man up with something decent or find yourself at the kids’ table with the other Lew Rockwell children.

Good post. The Morrill tariff was urged by President Buchanan and was a moderate revising of the Tariff of 1857 to the rates of 1846 with more protection on wool and iron. It passed the House well before the war with bipartisan support. Southern senators could have blocked it in early 1861 but they had already flown the coop when Abolitionist Abe was elected president.

Also not mentioned by neo-Confederates at Lew Rockwell is the fact that the tariff rates didn’t skyrocket until the North realized the war wouldn’t be a quick one and that they would need additional revenues to pay for it. No secession, no firing on Ft Sumter, no skyrocketing tariff.

[/quote]

David Donald is regarded as a Lincoln historian of the first rank.

"One place to begin is the gem of a book by Pulitzer prize-winning Lincoln biographer David Donald entitled Lincoln Reconsidered. In a particularly important passage Donald quotes Senator John Sherman of Ohio, the brother of General William Tecumseh Sherman and Republican Party powerhouse from the 1860s to the 1890s who was chairman of the U.S Senate Finance Committee during the Lincoln administration, on why the Republican Party nominated and elected Abraham Lincoln.

“Those who elected Mr. Lincoln expect him . . . to secure to free labor its just right to the Territories of the United States; to protect . . . by wise revenue laws, the labor of our people; to secure the public lands to actual settlers . . . ; to develop the internal resources of the country by opening new means of communication between the Atlantic and Pacific.”

Donald then claims to translate this statement “from the politicianâ??s idiom” into plain English. Lincoln and the Republican Party “intended to enact a high protective tariff that mothered monopoly, to pass a homestead law that invited speculators to loot the public domain, and to subsidize a transcontinental railroad that afforded infinite opportunities for jobbery.”

This is what is so refreshing about David Donald, the best and most honest of all the mainstream “Lincoln scholars.” He understood that “wise revenue laws” meant a 47 percent tariff on imports that would plunder the Southern states especially severely; he understood that “free labor” meant white labor, and protecting the white raceâ??s “just right to the territories” meant disallowing labor market competition from either slaves or free blacks. At the time, the small number of free blacks in the North had no real citizenship rights and some states, like Lincolnâ??s Illinois, had amended their constitutions to make it illegal for blacks to move into the state."

— from the Rockwell link

140

[quote]orion wrote:
Mufasa wrote:
Orion:

I’m all for searching for the “real” reason things were done.

And maybe I am wearing the Tin Foil and drinking the Yankee Kool-Aide…but this whole idea that Lincoln did what he did mainly for money and because he was a patsy of Northern Industrialist is revisionism at its worst.

Mufasa

There is such a clever rhyme in German…

Wth,

“Weil, so schlieÃ??t er messerscharf, nicht sein kann was nicht sein darf”.

Meaning, “because, he concludes as aharp as a knife, what ought not be, cannot be”.

What would be next, an ex presidential candidate trying to make billions by stirring a climate hysteria?

I honestly think that that is exactly how the world works and how it worked 150 years ago. You do not have to agree with me but I would at least allow for the possibility that I am right every now and then. [/quote]

What would be next? How about a Ph.D. candidate sticking to his ideology despite what the evidence says? If you watch, you might even see a denial of global warming (not a statement that it’s not man-made, or a questioning of extent, but a flat out denial…slightly veiled of course).