Another Discussion with the Imbecile
Thomas Allen
I responded to a comment to an article titled “Supreme Court Sides With Biden Over Border Crisis, Here Are The Conservative Justices Who FLIPPED” by Anthony T (https://wltreport.com/2024/01/22/supreme-court-sides-biden-border-crisis-here-are/). [Note: If you go to this site, you will not see my comments because it has banned me. Apparently, I objected too much about it censoring my comments telling the truth about God’s chosen people and their political movement.] A commenter wrote that federal law trumping State law was a myth. I responded to his comment, “Under Lincoln’s constitution, which is the constitution that we have now, federal law always trumps State law because the States are to the federal government what counties are to State governments.” Then the imbecile responded to my comment claiming that I was using revisionist history and that I loved slavery (see the appendix for my discussion with the imbecile).
This imbecile is enthralled with slavery. Except for Blacks trying to extort money from wimpy, woke politicians, I have never encountered anyone who is obsessed with slavery as much as he is. Obviously, he envies the antebellum slave owners and desiderates a 100,000-acre plantation with 1000 slaves. Because he cannot fulfill his dream, he has become Confederaphobic, Dixiephobic, and probably Albusphobic.
First, I will discuss revisionist history, which the imbecile despises, and its meaning. Next, I will discuss the causes of Lincoln’s War and the unimportance of slavery as a cause. Finally, I will close with a discussion of phobia.
Revisionist History
A revisionist history is a history that disagrees with the standard orthodox establishment history. It is a historical account based on facts or a perspective that differs from the standard orthodox establishment history, which emphasizes a particular narrative or agenda instead of objective facts. That is, the primary purpose of the standard orthodox establishment history is to declare that the victors had the moral high ground and were not at fault or to advance an agenda of the establishment. More often than not, revisionist history is closer to the truth than is the standard orthodox establishment history.
When it comes to Lincoln’s War, the imbecile is a firm believer in the standard orthodox establishment history: The war was fought over slavery and for no other reason. The South fought to preserve slavery, and the North fought to free the slaves. Furthermore, the South started the war by firing on Fort Sumpter.
According to the imbecile, I am a victim of revisionist history. Admittedly, I do rely more on revisionist histories of Lincoln, Lincoln’s War, the Confederacy, and the South because they are closer to the truth than the standard orthodox establishment history, which idolizes Lincoln and demonizes the Confederacy and the South. To the imbecile’s small mind (if he has one), revisionist history is any history with which he disagrees. The truth is irrelevant. He ignores any facts that conflict with his historical view.
Slavery and the Cause of Lincoln’s War
The imbecile firmly believes that Lincoln’s War was fought over slavery and that the South started the war when it fired on Fort Sumter. Contrary to what the imbecile believes, slavery was much better protected within the Union than without.
With the Compromise of 1850, the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, and the Dred Scott decision in 1857, Southerners had won their right to settle in the territories with their slaves. Outside the Union, Southerners would not have this right. The importation of slaves into the United States was illegal. If, as often claimed, slavery needed to expand into the territories to survive, then secession would have destroyed slavery without a war.
If the Southern States remained in the Union, the United States government would have apprehended runaway slaves and returned them to their owners. The most efficient and effective fugitive slave laws in the history of the United States were in force on the eve of secession. If the Southern States were an independent country, slaveholders would lack this guarantee. That the United States would enter into a treaty with the Confederacy to return runaway slaves was doubtful.
Those who claim that slavery was the cause of the War never explain why the Southern States would secede to protect slavery when slavery was better protected within the Union than without. Even the “Great Emancipator” Lincoln said in his inaugural address on March 4, 1861, “I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the states where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.”[1]
Congress did not perceive that the war was, at least at its beginning, a war to free slaves. In January of 1861, Congress adopted a resolution declaring that it recognized: “Slavery as now existing in fifteen of the United States, by the usage and laws of those states, and we recognize no authority, legal or otherwise, outside of a state where it exists, to interfere with slaves or slavery in such states."[2]
To make perfectly clear that it did not intend to abolish slavery, Congress adopted the following constitutional amendment:
Article 13. No amendment shall be made to the constitution which shall authorize or give to Congress the power to abolish, or to interfere within any state, with the domestic institution thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said state.[3]
People who believe that Lincoln’s War was fought over slavery need to explain away the questions that H.V. Traywick, Jr. raises in “What Was the War About?” (abbevilleinstitute.org/what-was-the-war-about):
If the North was fighting a Crusade of Liberation, why didn’t she wage war on New York and Boston, the largest African Slave-trading ports in the world in 1861? Or on Africa herself and her slave-raiders — such as the Kingdom of Dahomey — the largest exporters of African slaves in the world? Or on New England and her manufacturing profits gleaned from slave-picked cotton, and from rum manufactured from slave-harvested sugar cane and distilled for trading along the African coast for more slaves?
Thus, slavery was at best a minor issue. (For more about slavery not being the cause of Lincoln’s War, see “Slavery Not the Reason” by Thomas Allen.)
The primary cause of secession was taxation via a protective tariff. Charles Adams cogently argues in his book Good and Evil, The Impact of Taxes on the Course of Civilization that taxation, not slavery, was the primary cause for Southern secession. Freedom from oppressive taxation is what the Southern States sought through secession and not the preservation of slavery. Adams writes, “Southerners saw themselves as tribute-paying vassals of the North every time they bought Northern goods or paid import taxes.”[4]
The Republicans wanted to raise tariffs to protect Northern industries. This was accomplished in 1861 when President Lincoln signed the Morrill Tariff, which doubled the existing rate. Southerners had to make a choice. They could choose to pay excessive prices for Northern goods — thus, fatting the pockets of Northern industrialists. They could choose to buy foreign goods and pay the tariff — thus, fatting the federal treasury that Northern industrialists controlled. Accordingly, they could choose to transfer their wealth to the North (“federal taxation had an economic effect of shifting wealth from the South to the North,”[5] as Adams writes), or they could do as their forefathers had done in 1776 and choose independence.
In his summary of Adam's book, Pat Buchanan writes:
Adams thesis: Lincoln could not stand before the bar of history and say he had bathed his country in blood to deny Southerners the same right to go free their fathers had invoked 85 years before. He could not say Vicksburg and Antietam had been about taxes. So Lincoln made the abolition of slavery his great moral crusade — but only as an afterthought.[6]
As important as, if not more important than, the political, economic, and social issues, were the theological issues. The theological differences separating the North and South were extensive. The most vocal group in the North was the Unitarian Transcendentalists — man can save himself. The predominant religious belief in the South was Old School Calvinism — man is totally dependent on God for salvation. The North saw man in the abstract. The South saw man as he really was. The difference between these two religious views could not, and cannot, be made compatible. Southern clergymen vigorously supported secession to protect their theology. They were convinced that the North was becoming a godless land.
The London Times saw the war as a lust for empire by the North and a desire for independence by the South. It wrote, “The contest is really for empire on the side of the North and for independence on that of the South, and in that respect we recognize an exact analogy between the North and the government of George III, and the South and the thirteen revolted provinces.”[7]
To his dying day, President Davis insisted that the war was fought over two basic issues. The first was whether the federal government should be limited (the South’s position) or an unlimited government (the North’s position). Second was whether a free people had a right to withdraw from a union that they had voluntarily entered (the South’s position) or should be forced to remain in a union that they no longer desired to be a part of (the North’s position).
In summary, the North started the War not to free slaves, but to enslave Southerners. (See “Southern History: The War” by Thomas Allen.)
About who started Lincoln’s War, the imbecile also errs. Following the standard orthodox establishment history, he asserts that the South started the war because it fired the first shot on Fort Sumpter. A Confederate prison guard adequately refuted this fallacious charge when a Union officer whom he was guarding attempted to blame the South for the war by asking, “Who fired the first gun of this war?” The Confederate private responded like a sage, “John Brown at Harper’s Ferry, sir. He fired the first gun. And Mr. Lincoln, in attempting to reinforce Sumter, fired the second gun. And the Confederates have acted on the defensive all of the time. We did not invade your country, but you invaded ours; you go home and attend to your own business and leave us to ours, and the war will close at once.”[8] Once more, the imbecile shows his ignorance, or, more correctly, he shows his stupidity because he is incapable of learning.
Phobia
“Phobia” not only means to be afraid, but it also means a strong dislike of or aversion to something. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition, defines “phobia” as “a strong fear, dislike, or aversion.” Merriam-Webster defines it as “intolerance or aversion for.” Dictionary.com defines “phobia” as “an aversion toward, dislike of, or disrespect for a thing, idea, person, or group.”
I do not accuse the imbecile of being afraid of the Confederacy, the South, or Whites. He gives no indication of such fear. However, his comments show that he obviously has an intolerance for, an aversion toward, a dislike of, and a disrespect for the Confederacy and the South.
Most people believe that staunch, diehard Confederates and Southerners are right-wingers. They are wrong. I have on good authority, the imbecile himself, that they are left-wingers.
Appendix
Original comment: Mythology: “Federal law trumps state law.”
This mythology contributes to a growth never ending of federal power. (It actually goes back to George Washington who secretly funded the newspapers calling for a very strong federal government.)
Truth: The states merely delegated small select powers to the federal government.
The federal------really the small government of the collective confederacy of states (conFEDERAcy=FEDERal)-----accepted responsibilities of the compact of the confederacy...in essence a contract...on border protection. Joe says, “give me more money” and I’ll do that job. It’s extortion in that it doesn’t relieve the federal government from its obligation to perform that unto itself formed the reason for its (federal) existence.
Me to Original comment: Under Lincoln’s constitution, which is the constitution that we have now, federal law always trumps State law because the States are to the federal government what counties are to State governments.
Imbecile to Me: Would you PLEASE just STOP the revisionist history already? There is no “Lincoln Constitution” that is DIFFERENT from the Constitution ratified in 1789! If you’re referring to LEGAL AMENDMENTS, the ones pertaining to the SLAVERY you so love were ratified AFTER Lincoln wss [sic] murdered by one of your southern compatriots!
Me to Imbecile: Since you reject revisionist history, that means you believe the official story of the Kennedy assassination and the official governmental conspiracy theory of 9-11.
If Lincoln did not change the Constitution, why did people refer to the United States using a plural verb before his war and a singular verb afterward? Before Lincoln’s War, the United States were a federation of sovereign nations. After his war, the United States became a consolidated empire with an all-powerful federal government, and the States were reduced to provinces. That required a significant change in the constitution even if its words did not change.
By the way, slavery ended in the Confederate States before it ended in the Union States.
Imbecile to Me: Your last comment proves your insanity! The ONLY states that had slavery after it was abolished in the North were southern states! It’s true that four “border” states that allowed slavery did NOT join the confederates and slavery did not end in those states until a constitutional amendment prohibiting slavery in the entire nation was ratified after the war, but to imply that ALL the Union states had slavery after it was abolished in the confederate states is shear lunacy! The way you say things, how do you account for parts of TEXAS, where slavery continued AFTER the war ended until the so-called “Junetenth” [sic] freedom for the remaining slaves occured [sic]? As for your insistence on calling the Civil War “Lincoln’s war,” again, shear LUNACY since it is well documented that the confederates started the war by attacking Fort Sumpter! You REALLY need to get your facts straight! [Editor's note: Juneteenth occurred on June 19, 1865; the Thirteenth Amendment was ratified in December 1865. Consequently, Juneteenth occurred before the Thirteenth Amendment became effective. Furthermore, the war did not end until June 23, 1865, when Cherokee Confederate General Stand Waite surrendered, which occurred four days after Juneteenth.]
Imbecile to Me: You are nuttsiecookoo! [sic] The difference between revisionist history and getting the facts straight are like night and day! Finding out the TRUTH and disclosing it such as with the Kennedy assassination or 9/11 is NOT revisionist history! It’s simply getting the facts straight! Revisionist history is when actual facts are TWISTED to serve the writer’s agenda! YOU constantly engage in revisionist history such as when you call the Civil War “Lincoln's war” when it is well documented that the confederates started the war by attacking Fort Sumpter! As for your insane claim in your last comment, slavery was outlawed in the North for YEARS before the Civil War! Only the 4 “border states” that allowed slavery but had NOT joined the confederates still had slavery after the war, but that was quickly eliminated by Constitutional Amendment. Trying to equate these four anamolous [sic] states with the ENTIRE North is beyond STUPID!
Me to Imbecile: You are too stupid to learn.
Imbecile to Me: IF you had any actual FACTS to teach then maybe someone could learn from you, but alas, you have NOTHING but sour grapes over LOSING an UNJUST WAR that was started and fought by the confederates to keep SLAVERY intact!
Me to Imbecile: Except for Blacks trying to extort money from wimpy, woke politicians, I have never encountered anyone who is obsessed with slavery as much as you are. Obviously, you envy the antebellum slave owner and desiderate a 100,000-acre plantation with 1000 slaves. Because you cannot fulfill your dream, you have become Confederaphobic, Dixiephobic, and probably Albusphobic.
Imbecile to Me: Now I KNOW for a fact you are a braindead lefty because only they call anyone who disagrees with their stupidity “phobic,” which basically means “afraid,” and I am not afraid of your revisionist LIES any more than I’m afraid of fairies, tran-nies [sic], vmuslimes [sic], illegal border crossers [sic], cross dressers, or any of the other perverted people out there!
THE END
Endnotes
1. Beverly B. Munford, Virginia’s Attitude Toward Slavery and Secession (Richmond, 1909), pp. 193-194.
2. Ibid., p. 194.
3. Ibid., p. 195.
4. Charles Adams, For Good and Evil: The Impact of Taxes on the Course of Civilization (Lanham, 1993), p. 328.
5. Ibid., p. 337.
6. Pat Buchanan, “Abolition of Slavery Was Only an Afterthought,” Citizen Informer (Spring, 1994), p. 9.
7. Charles L. C. Minor, The Real Lincoln from the Testimony of His Contemporaries (1928, reprinted 1992) p. 112.
8. Michael A. Grissom, The Last Rebel Yell, (Nashville, 1991), p. 313.
