Carthage and the United States

Carthage and the United States

Thomas Allen

[Editor’s note: This article was submitted in 1988 for the “Southern National Newsletter” of the Southern National Party.]

[Since this article was written, the roles have been reversed. The United States are now Rome, and Russia is Carthage. Unlike disarmed Carthage, Russia possesses a large arsenal of nuclear weapons against which the United States seem to possess no defense. While Russia has a large-scale civil defense system to protect its civilians, the United States have none except for the oligarchs and high-ranking politicians and bureaucrats — it was abolished to appease the Soviet Union.]

As post-World War II history demonstrates, the United States are following the path that Carthage followed more than 2100 years ago. If the United States go the way of Carthage, the South will too, if it remains part of the present union.

By the second century B. C., the primary foreign policy of Rome had become the annihilation of Carthage, for Rome envied the prosperity of Carthage. After Rome defeated Carthage in the Second Punic War, Carthage agreed not to engage in war with any ally of Rome. If a Roman ally attacked Carthage, Carthage was to appeal to Rome to settle the dispute. Numidia, which was an ally of Rome, took advantage of Carthage’s predicament and attacked her. Carthage appealed to Rome to end the conflict. Rome resolved the conflict unfairly in favor of Numidia. The next time Numidia attacked Carthage, Carthage defended herself instead of appealing to Rome. She knew that Rome would not provide any aid or justice. Carthage feared that Rome would use this conflict as a pretext for war, and events soon proved her right. Fearing reprisal from Rome, Carthage sought appeasement. She inquired of Rome about the conditions necessary to secure peace. Rome demanded and received three hundred children of noble birth to hold as hostages. With the hostages in hand, Rome then demanded that Carthage surrender all weapons of war. Hoping to win Rome to clemency, Carthage complied. After the weapons were surrendered, Rome then demanded the city itself. The inhabitants were told that they could march ten miles inland and build a new city, but Carthage had to be destroyed. With this demand, Carthage finally realized the perfidy and baseness of her enemy. Without weapons, she prepared for war. The Carthaginians were able to manufacture enough weapons to resist the Roman siege for four years. In 146 B. C., Carthage finally fell to the Roman army. Rome utterly destroyed her. The city was burned and leveled. Carthage was no more.

Just as Rome’s foreign policy was to destroy Carthage, so is the Soviet Union’s foreign policy to destroy the United States. Ever since the days of Lenin, the foreign policy of the Soviet Union has been the destruction of the United States. Just as Rome expanded and absorbed all those around her, so has the Soviet Union. Following the path of Carthage, the United States have met the Soviet threat with appeasement. They seek to appease their Rome, the envious Soviet Union. With rhetoric, the United States mildly object to Soviet expansion. With deeds, they restrain and hamper those who seek to defend themselves from Soviet imperialism. Whereas Carthage was forced to prostrate herself before Rome as a result of defeat in war and entered into a one-sided treaty that favored Rome, the United States have voluntarily entered into one treaty after another that favors their enemy, the Soviet Union. The United States have entered into several arms-control treaties with the Soviet Union. However, the Soviet Union abides by these treaties only as long as it suits its purposes and ignores them when convenient. The United States abide by these treaties even if they have never been ratified. Now, the United States are going down the road of disarmament with a known liar and deceiver. Whereas Rome held only three hundred Carthaginians hostage, the Soviet Union is rapidly approaching the point where she will hold 240,000,000 Americans hostage. The Soviet Union has an effective civil defense and antimissile system. Yet, the United States have neither and are determined to acquire neither. The day may soon come when the Soviet Union will demand that the United States disarm themselves completely or be destroyed. If the United States resist, most likely war will result. If they do as Carthage did and disarm, they will perish as Carthage did. (Envy is a powerfully destructive force.) However, the United States will not have the luxury of rearming and making a last stand as Carthage did. Just as an envious Rome achieved her objective of obliterating prosperous Carthage, so will an envious Soviet Union achieve hers of obliterating the prosperous United States.

If the Southern States wish to avoid the fate of Carthage, they must separate from the present union. To remain part of the United States is to die. The United States no longer have the will to defend themselves. They desire only to appease their enemy. Only in an independent South can Southerners ever hope to build a civil defense and antimissile system to protect themselves from Soviet blackmail. Only in an independent South can Southerners ever hope to live in peace. The time has come for a free and independent confederation of Southern States.

As paradoxical as it may appear, an independent South may be the only way that the United States can be saved from the Soviet Union. An independent South would seek to defend itself from Soviet aggression and thus retard that aggression. Not only that, but the trauma of losing their Southern colonies may destroy the lethargy of the United States, force them to recognize their vulnerability and cause them to defend themselves from Soviet aggression, which would totally thwart her potential threats and prevent war.

[Fortunately, under President Reagan’s leadership, the United States woke up and thwarted the Soviet threat so greatly that the Soviet Union collapsed. Now, the Marxist mantle of destroying the United States has passed to China. However, Marxists within the United States are giving China stiff competition, which is un-Marxist, to bring down America. Like good Marxists, these American Marxists are destroying the history of the country by starting with the removal of anything about the Confederacy or the antebellum era. They push disarmament of the people and other Marxist laws to enslave Americans — many in the name of the war on terrorism. Unlike the United States, at least, traitors within her gates did not control Carthage.]

Copyright © 1988, 2025 by Thomas C. Allen.

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Rothbard on Lincoln’s War

Rothbard on Lincoln’s War

Thomas Allen

In “Just War,” which is based on a talk given in May 1994 and posted in March 2012 (https://www.lewrockwell.com/1970/01/murray-n-rothbard/whats-a-just-war/), Murray Rothbard explains that the War for Southern Independence (Lincoln’s War) was a just war on the part of the South and an unjust war on the part of the North. (Rothbard [1926-1995] was a libertarian economist of the Austrian School, economic historian, and political theorist. He was a proponent of anarcho-capitalism and part of the post-World War II Old Right.)

Rothbard states that “a just war exists when a people tries to ward off the threat of coercive domination by another people, or to overthrow an already-existing domination. A war is unjust, on the other hand, when a people try to impose domination on another people, or try to retain an already existing coercive rule over them.” He identifies two just wars that Americans fought: the American Revolution and the War for Southern Independence.

The South was trying to free itself from the North’s oppressive domination — therefore, a just war on the part of the South. On the other hand, the North was trying to maintain its dominance over the South — therefore, an unjust war on the part of the North.

Before Lincoln’s War, a chief principle of war was not to target civilians. Sherman, Sheridan, and other Northern generals targeted civilians. The Union army often looted and deliberately destroyed civilian property that had no military value. When Lee’s army invaded the North, he ordered his troops not to molest civilians.

Like Americans during the American Revolution, Southerners believed that sovereignty resided in the people. They delegated certain sovereign powers to the governing authority, and their delegation was voluntary and contractual. As such, they could withdraw that sovereignty anytime that the governing authority had violated its trust. Thus, government was a contractual arrangement — “consent of the governed.” Some divine hand from above did not impose it. When the 13 States, whose governments had been created by the people thereof, ratified the Constitution of 1789, they did not bind themselves perpetually to it or the Union formed under it. Being sovereign republics, they reserved the right to withdraw from the Union if they found that the government created by the Constitution continuously violated it.

After years of the federal government threatening and assaulting Southern institutions, the Southern States “exercise their natural, contractual, and constitutional right to withdraw, to ‘secede’ from that Union.” Then, as sovereign republics, they contracted with other Southern States to form the Confederate States of America. Thus, just as the American Revolution was just, so was the War for Southern Independence. For the same reasons that the American colonies seceded from the British Empire, so did the Southern States secede from the Union formed under the Constitution of 1789.

Just as the American colonies rebelled against “the taxing power: the systematic plunder of their property by the British government,” so did the Southern States rebel against the systematic plunder of their property by the federal government. A principal grievance of the South was the protective tariffs that the North had imposed. These tariffs were used to protect inefficient Northern industries. Consequently, they forced Southerners to pay higher prices for manufactured goods. Also, these tariffs threaten to reduce Southern exports. Moreover, the South paid most of the tariffs, and the North received most of the appropriations and monopolistic Northern industries.

Not only did most Northerners want to continue plundering the South via tariffs, but others, the Yankees, also wanted to purge the South and remake it in the Yankee image. Yankees had a Puritan mentality and were driven by postmillennialism. (Before Christ returns, “man must set up a thousand-year Kingdom of God on Earth.”) Consequently, Yankees must cleanse society of sin and create a perfect society. “Moreover, if you didn’t try your darndest to stamp out sin by force you yourself would not be saved.” Further, the coercive power of government was an essential tool in cleansing the world of sin. For these Yankees, sin was anything “which might interfere with a person’s free will to embrace salvation.” They were abolitionists and prohibitionists and opposed Catholicism. Governments must stamp out the evils of slavery, alcohol and tobacco, gambling, most entertainment, and Catholicism.[1] Thus, they promoted paternalistic government at the federal, State, and local levels.

Like most Northerners, Yankees promoted governmental paternalism in economic affairs. They supported “the Whig program of statism and big government: protective tariffs, subsidies to big business, strong central government, large-scale public works, and cheap credit spurred by government.”

Also, Yankees opposed personal liberties, States’ rights, minimal government, free markets, and free trade — the basic principles of the Democratic Party at that time. Consequently, they supported the Republican Party, which was the “party of great moral ideas,” i.e., the stamping-out of sin.

To the delight of the Yankees, “The Northern war against slavery partook of fanatical millennialist fervor, of a cheerful willingness to uproot institutions, to commit mayhem and mass murder, to plunder and loot and destroy, all in the name of high moral principle and the birth of a perfect world.” Thus, the North fought “to maintain their coercive and unwanted rule over” the South.

Then, Rothbard compares the British during the American Revolution to the North during Lincoln’s War. “The British, at least, were fighting on behalf of a cause which, even if wrong and unjust, was coherent and intelligible: that is, the sovereignty of a hereditary monarch.” What was the North’s excuse? It had no allegiance to a real, actual person like a king. Its allegiance was “to a nonexistent, mystical, quasi-divine alleged entity, ‘the Union.’” Unlike a king, one cannot evaluate a Union’s deeds, and the Union is accountable to no one. Thus, Northerners replaced the Union formed under the Constitution of 1789, which was “a contractual institution that can either be cleaved to or scrapped,” with “a divinized entity, which must be worshipped, and which must be permanent, unquestioned, all-powerful.”

Using the cause of “human rights,” modern-day supporters of Lincoln’s War support and glorify his war. Lincoln “goes forth and rights the wrong of slavery, doing so through mass murder, the destruction of institutions and property, and the wreaking of havoc which has still not disappeared.” Yet, all other countries ended slavery without war.

Endnote

1. Most of the sins on which Yankees focused were vices. (Vice sins are sins that injure the sinner and his family but do not generally injure others.) For the most part, they not only ignored but also often supported sins that injured others, such as homicide (offensive wars), looting the public treasury (subsidies), and forcing the common people to pay higher prices (tariffs), often for lower quality goods. Many frequently supported business dealings where merchants took advantage of ignorant customers. Most did not object to debtors cheating creditors with depreciating fiat money — then the two largest debtors were banks and governments. As for slavery, they objected to the ownership of slaves. However, they had little issue with transporting and selling slaves, as many Yankees became rich trafficking slaves. Moreover, when the Northern States emancipated slaves, most Yankees sold their slaves instead of freeing them.

Copyright © 2025 by Thomas Coley Allen.

More Southern issues articles.

A Nullification That Failed

A Nullification That Failed

Thomas Allen

From the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s, the Southern States failed in their attempt to nullify federal acts that forced desegregation and integration, following the recommendations of Madison, which the Tenth Amendment Center (TAC) endorses. Not only did the Southern States dislike these acts,  but most of them were unconstitutional. 

In Brown v. Board of Education (1954), the US Supreme Court based its desegregation ruling primarily on personal biases, sociology, and politics, with the US Constitution playing only an insignificant role. When Congress proposed the Fourteenth Amendment, it did not intend for it to apply to schools. Shortly after its ratification, Congress established a racially segregated school system for the District of Columbia.

According to TAC, Madison identified four appropriate methods that a State and “we the people” of that State could use to oppose and nullify an unconstitutional federal act or even a disliked federal act. A discussion of these four follows.

1. Popular protest by the people. “We the people” of a State may vigorously and vociferously protest against an unconstitutional or even disliked federal act. Southerners protested resolutely and vehemently against forced federal integration acts, but the federal government successfully suppressed their protest. Their protest did nothing more than bring more federal oppression and less liberty.

2. Refuse to cooperate with the federal government. Wholeheartedly, the Southern States not only refused to cooperate with the federal government, but they also interfered with its enforcement of federal integration acts. With great fervor, they opposed federal integration acts. Their disobedience and lack of cooperation did nothing except invigorate the federal government’s resolve to become more tyrannical and oppressive.

3. Formal protest by the governor. Few governors have ever protested unconstitutional acts of the federal government as did Governor Faubus of Arkansas and Governor Wallace of Alabama. All their protest did was cause the federal government to use military force against Arkansas and Alabama to quell their protest. Other governors protested, but to no avail. Their protest led to more subjection and despotism.

4. Legislative action. Legislative action includes resolutions formally protesting the federal government’s usurpation and unconstitutional acts. Legislatures may forbid agents of the State and its local governments from cooperating with the federal government in enforcing the federal act. It may even include interfering to prevent the federal government from enforcing an unconstitutional federal act. However, legislative action does not extend to preventing federal agents from enforcing unconstitutional federal acts with imprisonment or fines. State legislatures of the Southern States took actions to thwart the enforcement of federal integration acts, short of jailing federal agents. Again, the results were the same: more oppression, tyranny, and loss of liberty.

Madison believed that if adjoining States protested against a federal act and sought to nullify it with the aforementioned actions, their actions would cause the federal act to become void. Madison was wrong. The Southern States were unified in their protest of the federal government’s integration acts. Yet, their unity did nothing to stop the federal government’s tyranny.

The Southern States did not resort to jailing federal agents attempting to enforce school integration. However, this action would have also failed because the philosophy of "might makes right" dominated the country. (With the possible exceptions of the Cleveland, Harding, and Coolidge administrations, this philosophy has been the dominant governing principle of the federal government since 1861 — even superseding the Constitution.) Since the federal government used military force against Arkansas and Alabama in response to much milder forms of nullification, it would have used even greater force against a State that jailed its agents. (If a State had nullified these federal acts following Calhoun’s philosophy instead of Madison’s, these acts would not have applied in the nullifying States. Consequently, the federal government could not have lawfully used the military to enforce them because they did not exist in the nullifying States. However, since the federal government ceased following the Constitution in 1861, it would have used troops anyway.)

As a result of the Southern States’ failure to nullify the federal government’s integration acts, America’s education has deteriorated significantly. Worse, their defeat gave birth to racial quotas, political correctness, diversity-equity-inclusion, wokeism, and ultimately the death of the White race, Christianity, and Western Civilization. Such has been the goal of the Puritan Yankees since the mid-nineteenth century. Only the South stood in the way of this goal; that is why Lincoln and the Republicans had to destroy the South.

Madison may have wept over the utter defeat of the Southern States’ failure to nullify these unconstitutional federal acts. However, based on inferences from its writings, TAC has not.

However, the Southern States’ attempted nullification did lead to two of the three wars that the United States have won since World War II: Eisenhower’s war against Arkansas, Kennedy’s war against Alabama, and Reagan’s war against Grenada. Defeating these three world superpowers is the height of US military prowess in the post-World War II era.

Since Lincoln’s War, States have been highly successful at nullifying federal acts against vice, e.g., prohibition, which the Constitution authorized the federal government to prohibit the manufacturing, sale, and transportation of intoxicating liquors, and marijuana, which the federal government has no constitutional authority to outlaw or regulate. However, the nullification of most unconstitutional federal acts has been highly unsuccessful. The only nullifying acts that States are allowed are unenforceable protests and resolutions, and not participating with the federal government in enforcing federal laws (even this one seems to be fading under Trump).

Copyright © 2025 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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The 1860 Presidential Election Caused the South to Seceded

The 1860 Presidential Election Caused the South to Secede

Thomas Allen, editor

In The United States Unmasked: A Search into the Causes of the Rise and Progress of These States, and an Exposure Of Their Present Material and Moral Condition (London, Ontario: J. H. Vivian, 1878), pages 92–94, G. Manigault explains how the 1860 presidential election led to the South seceding. He writes:

An election of President of the United States was to come on late in 1860, and the whole Union was greatly agitated by the canvass. The anti-slavery party chose for their candidate [Abraham Lincoln] an until lately obscure man — of little capacity or attainments, except as what is called a stump orator. He had a genius for diverting a rude Western crowd with funny stories and coarse witticisms. Some able speeches were delivered by him, but they were prepared by another man. His own serious efforts only proved his ignorance and shallowness. But he was popular in the great North-west, and was a man whom the party knew how to use for their purposes. Another party which expressly disclaimed for the Federal government any right to interfere with slavery in the States, but claimed for it the right to prohibit it in the common territories, nominated for their candidate an eminent Northwestern politician [Stephen A. Douglas], the zealous expounder of “Squatter Sovereignty.” A third party of no definite views, except peace at any price, brought out their candidate [John Bell]. And a fourth, consisting of the people of the Southern States and such people in the North as maintained the permanence and sanctity of the terms, on which the Union had been formed, and the limitations on the powers of the Federal government, nominated their candidate [John C. Breckinridge]. The result was that the anti-slavery party carried every Northern State, and the election — the fourth party carried every Southern State, and the other parties were nowhere.  

The people of the Southern States now found that they were living under a government completely in the hands of their enemies, utterly hostile to their rights and interests, and claiming a right not only to surround and hedge them out from all right in the common territories, and reduce them to complete and hopeless subjection, but to revolutionize their internal political and social organization. This was not the confederation into which they had entered; this was not the government which they had joined in creating. Unless they could submit to be revolutionized by external enemies, and become mere tributary provinces to them, it was high time to break off all connection with utterly faithless confederates, whom the most solemn treaty could not bind. The Southern States began to secede from the Union in rapid succession, and war was made upon the South to force them back into it.

More Southern articles.

The Effects of Tariffs on the South

The Effects of Tariffs on the South

Thomas Allen, editor

In The United States Unmasked: A Search into the Causes of the Rise and Progress of These States, and an Exposure Of Their Present Material and Moral Condition (London, Ontario: J. H. Vivian, 1878), pages 33–35, G. Manigault explains the effects of tariffs on the South.

Has the reader ever considered what is the origin and true nature of that offence which is called smuggling? Stealing, and robbery, and the destruction of your neighbour’s property, and a multitude of other acts, are crimes in their very nature, and were criminal before any human law undertook to punish them. But there is in nature no such offence as smuggling. An important ingredient in your natural liberty is the right to carry the proceeds of your industry, or any part of your portable property, to the best market you can find for it; and, when you have exchanged it for other commodities, you have naturally an equal right to carry your new acquisitions home with you. They are as much yours as that was, which you gave for them. These are the natural and justifiable acts out of which governments have manufactured the offence of smuggling. They create the crime by legislation; they provide for its punishment by further legislation. 

The United States affords a striking example of these abuses. The people of the Northern States, having a majority of the votes in Congress, they had, when united among themselves, the control of the government, and sought to use it to their exclusive profit. In raising a revenue for the government, they, by the ingenious arrangements of their tariff acts, threw the burden of taxation on the South. In expending that revenue they bestowed a benefit on the North. They lowered the value of Southern produce by impairing the foreigner’s means of paying for it; and they raised the price of Northern manufactures by shutting out the competition of foreign goods. They used the whole machinery of government as if it had been designed for impoverishing the South and enriching the North. 

This method of plundering the South met with earnest protest and strenuous opposition from that quarter; and the tariffs for revenue and protection underwent many fluctuations. The fact is, that there is an essential incompatibility between the two objects of revenue and protection. Just so far as a duty protects home manufacturers, it fails to yield any revenue; for it keeps out foreign goods: and just so far as a duty yields a revenue from foreign goods imported, it fails to afford protection to the home manufacturer. There were many people at the North, to whom the raising of a large revenue by the government was of vital interest, for they profited by its expenditures. They were opposed to duties so high as to cut off revenue from the government, while affording protection to the manufacturer, by shutting out the goods of his foreign competitor. The representatives of the Southern States, by combining with this class of plunderers, were more than once enabled to foil the measures of that worse class of plunderers, who advocated protective duties so high as to shut out foreign goods.

More Southern articles.

Critique of Achtenberg’s Speech on Fair Housing

Critique of Achtenberg’s Speech on Fair Housing

Thomas Allen

[Editor’s note: This article was submitted in 1994 for the “Southern National Newsletter” of the Southern National Party. It has been slightly edited.]

A speech delivered by Roberta Achtenberg, Assistant Secretary for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), illustrates how much the United States have deteriorated and how much deterioration will accelerate in the future. This speech illustrates the desperate need for the Southern States to secede and form a free and independent confederation of free and independent Southern States.

Achtenberg delivered this speech at the first (and hopefully the last) National Fair Housing Summit. It was a gathering sponsored by the federal government to discuss the state of fair housing and to decry the lack thereof. “Fair housing” is a euphemism that means that a landlord or homeowner has no right to rent or sell or not to rent or sell his property to whomever he pleases for whatever reason he pleases. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss ways to take away even the few rights and freedoms remaining and to discuss how to finish destroying what remains of Western Civilization in the United States.

She points out, correctly so, that where a person lives is a most important factor in determining the quality of one’s life. Thus, she concludes that all neighborhoods should be thoroughly integrated with the lowest stratum of society. There should be equality in the quality of life. “[T]he right to choose where we live is as important as the right to equal educational and employment opportunity and the right to vote.” Just as the power of the federal government has been used to destroy public education, to weaken the economy, and to corrupt the political process, it will now be used to ruin neighborhoods — or more correctly, ruin neighborhoods at an accelerated rate.

Then, she complains about the government not being more tyrannical in destroying the rights of the people in their use of their property. She praises the “advocates for the disabled, advocates for woman and for families with children, and industry leaders” for leading the fight to destroy these rights. Ah! But, thanks to the Clinton administration, a new day has dawned. The federal government will now become an active partner in the destruction of these rights (as though it has not been an active partner in destroying these rights since before the “civil rights” movement).

Moreover, she and her cohorts will lead the charge to destroy what remains of these rights, for she claims what the government does best is to lead. (Unreconstructed Southerners know differently. They know that what the government does best is to destroy.) She promises severe penalties for homeowners and landlords who do not kowtow before the fair housing overlords. Woe unto him who stands up for his rights.

Furthermore, she promises accelerated growth in the power of the federal government in housing (which really means accelerated growth of the federal government in controlling people). Programs to destroy the rights of homeowners and landlords will be instituted by every means available. The death and utter destruction of these rights are the legacy that she promises that the Clinton administration will leave America.

Also, she advocates affirmative action in housing. Yet she denies that affirmative action will lead to quotas and reverse discrimination. As anyone who has even cursorily looked at other affirmative action programs knows that affirmative action has always led to quotas and reverse discrimination. No matter how much the advocates of such affirmative action programs have denied that quotas and reverse discrimination would not occur, they always have. She fails to explain why affirmative action in housing will not result in the same.

Then, she says that “it’s time for government to act affirmatively to guarantee every American’s right to choose freely where they live.” To guarantee this so-called right means more than denying landlords the right to rent their property to whomever they please and denying homeowners the right to sell their houses to whomever they please. It also means providing people money to buy or rent in neighborhoods that they cannot afford. As a result, the politically powerful will compel the many serfs to support the privileged few. She hints that such a subsidy program is envisioned. Moreover, she equates separation by income with separation by race or ethnicity.

Next, she proceeds to inform her audience that the fair housing laws will be used to end segregated neighborhoods. Neighborhoods are to be integrated in spite of what the people in those neighborhoods think or want. Integration for integration’s sake! (As always, this integration flows only in one direction. White neighborhoods will be forcibly integrated. Black neighborhoods will not.)

Continuing, she informs her audience that integrated housing and neighborhoods are the last great unconquered frontiers for the civil rights movement. She is determined to conquer this frontier and bring it to ruin just as the civil rights movement has ruined all else that it has conquered. Yet, she fails to inform her audience of the results of the fair housing laws if they are as fully and forcibly implemented as she desires. The results are deteriorating neighborhoods, poorer housing, greater racial tension and hatred, ever-higher taxes, the loss of freedom, and a bigger government.

Her agency, HUD, is already attacking the banking industry. Banks are not to place the interest of their stockholders, owners, and depositors first. They are to place the social programs of the federal government first. They are to lend to whomever the federal government tells them to lend to — no matter how risky the loan.

Furthermore, the weight of the federal government is to be used against States and locales to coerce, extort, and bribe them into adopting analogous fair housing laws and enforcement programs. The federal government will make State and local governments coconspirators in the destruction of housing in the United States.

Finally, she comments on affordable housing and bemoans the lack of affordable housing. She claims that “there is [not] enough affordable housing, in enough neighborhoods and communities to enable people to actually make free choices about where they will live.” She does not identify the principal cause of the lack of affordable housing, which is governmental intervention, manipulation, and control of the housing market. On the contrary, she advocates more governmental intervention, manipulation, and control of the housing market. What she fails (or perhaps refuses) to realize is that her agency, HUD, and other agencies of the federal government are the cause of much of the housing problem about which she is carping.

Throughout her speech, she brags about the enforcement activities of her agency. She brags that the enforcement activities of her agency need to be increased and expanded. She brags about how the extent, domain, and coverage of her agency are to be increased and expanded. She brags about how much more intrusive into business and private affairs of all Americans her agency is to become. Never does she mention the constitutionality of what she advocates — probably because everything she advocates is unconstitutional.

The time has come for all good Southerners to free themselves from the despotism and tyranny of the megalomaniacs of HUD. They are only one example, and a small one at that, of the despotic and tyrannical rule of the United States over the Southern States. The time has come for a free and independent confederation of free and independent Southern States.

Copyright © 1995, 2025 by Thomas C. Allen.

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Three Facts About the South

Three Facts About the South

Thomas Allen

Discussed below are the States’ right of secession, music, and the South was right.

States’ Right of Secession

Nowhere does the Constitution deny a State the right to secede. Secession is not expressly stated in the Constitution because the States reserved that right in the Tenth Amendment. 

Each of the original 13 States had seceded twice when they ratified the Constitution of 1787. First, they had seceded from Great Britain, and then they seceded from the Union formed by the Articles of Confederation. That the States would deny themselves the right to secede from the Union formed by the Constitution of 1787 is absurd — especially since the Constitution did not expressly deny them this right. Even New York and Virginia declared in their ratification that they retained the right to secede. Further, the New England States claimed that they had the right to secede. Moreover, the Declaration of Independence asserted that the States (the colonies) had the right to secede. Thus, the Southern States had the right to secede in 1861.

Besides, when the States drafted the Constitution of 1787 and joined the federation created by that Constitution, they retained their sovereignty. (Because the States were republics and the Constitution guaranteed each State a republican form of government, the States could not surrender their sovereignty and still remain republics. [See “Returning Republican Governments to the States” by Thomas Allen.]) Sovereigns have the power to secede from any union or federation to which they have acceded.

When the Southern States seceded, they were merely exercising their right as sovereigns to leave the Union peacefully as the States did from the Union created by the Articles of Confederation. The Tenth Amendment guaranteed the right of secession.

For a more detailed discussion of a State’s right to secede, see Constitutional View of the Late War Between the States: Its Causes, Character, Conduct, and Results, volume 1, by Alexander H. Stephens, 1868.

Music

How long will it be before American music is outlawed? Why should American music be outlawed? Because, with rare exception, all neoconservatives, establishment conservatives, liberals, progressives, and libertarians are Dixiephobes. They loathe the South and Southerners. Therefore, they disdain everything Southern.

What does this have to do with music? All significant genres or styles of American music of any significance originated in the South. Thus, American music is the product of slavocracy, Jim Crow, White supremacy, and their descendants. Rock ‘n roll, jazz (including ragtime, boogie-woogie, Dixieland, and swing), blues, country, bluegrass, rhythm and blues, soul, funk, Tejano, Cajun, zydeco, gospel, spiritual, sacred harp, barbershop, and more are Southern. All of them came out of the South.

Because of their hatred of the South, neoconservatives, establishment conservatives, liberals, progressives, and libertarians seek to destroy everything that is Southern. Consequently, American music, which is really Southern music, must be destroyed. They have to destroy Southern music before it completely contaminates the virtues of Yankeedom.

(Reference: Daniel, Tom. “Academy of Southern Music.” Abbeville Institute: The Abbeville Blog, June 1, 2021. https://www.abbevilleinstitute.org/bthe log/academy-of-southern-music/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=d073b88d-f677-448c-9c41-191b5e0c631f accessed June 2, 2021.)

The South Was Right

In “The Power of the Powerless” (November 4, 2020), James Rutledge Roesch provides an excellent description of the Puritan Yankee mentality that wars against the South, which proves that the South was right (https://www.abbevilleinstitute.org/blog/the-power-of-the-powerless/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=c24f9d1b-a791-4b69-be6a-ca8b5d96ed4b):

In the meantime, however, we can take some bittersweet solace in the fact that despite the sadistic iconoclasm against the symbols of the American South, the polarisation/radicalisation of American politics, the dysfunction of the American system of government, the corruption of the American party system, the degeneracy of American culture, and the disintegration of American society represents the ultimate vindication of the Southern critique of American millenarianism (i.e. “The City Upon A Hill” and “The Last, Best Hope for Mankind”), American gnosticism (i.e. “The More Perfect Union” and “The Indissoluble Union”), American teleocracy (i.e. “The Proposition Nation” and “The Redeemer Nation”), American hubris (i.e. “The Exceptional Nation” and “The Indispensable Nation”), and other Hebraic-Puritan “isms” and “ologies” from the Left and the Right to which our compatriots up north have proven so susceptible throughout our country’s very young life.

Copyright © 2025 by Thomas Coley Allen.

More Southern articles.

Cussons on the Hypocrisy of the Puritan Yankee

Cussons on the Hypocrisy 

of the Puritan Yankee

Thomas Allen

In  United States “History” as the Yankee Makes and Takes It (1900, third edition) pages 68–69,  John Cussons describes the hypocrisy of the Puritan Yankee. His description fits today’s neoconservatives and especially progressives and wokesters. His description follows.

These new rulers [Puritan Yankees of the 1850s] had chiefly distinguished themselves as the enemies of existing institutions — their political and social creed being, in effect, “Whatever is, is wrong.” They were fond of execrating the Union as “a league with hell,” and denouncing the Constitution as “a covenant with death.” They derided the highest courts of the land as “crimping houses of iniquity,” and vilified the old flag as “a flaunting lie!”

But on coming into power they threw off all disguise, and shamelessly started a war of conquest in pretended defence [sic] of the very principles and symbols which they had so bitterly reviled.

With paralyzing logic they mutilated the States on the plea that the States were “indestructible”; they debarred them from the Union while declaring the Union to be “indissoluble,” and they tore the Constitution to tatters while pretending that they were the only class who reverenced its “inviolability.” Having thus approved themselves the only true champions of “the sacred principle of government by consent,” they rounded out their perfect work by converting the States into satrapies, and holding them under bayonet rule until the conquered peoples consented to ratify the whole of their rump performances.

Puritan Yankees favored secession and nullification until the Southern States used them. For most of the Jefferson and Madison administrations, the New England States, the home base of the Puritan Yankee, threatened secession. Massachusetts threatened to secede because of the Louisiana Purchase and argued that it had the right to secede. When Jefferson attempted to embargo trade with Europe during the Napoleonic War, the New England States threatened to secede. Several New England States discussed secession during the War of 1812. Connecticut and Massachusetts nullified Congress’ call for State militias.

Moreover, Puritan Yankees did not oppose slavery until the importation of slaves became illegal after 1808. Yankees had been the primary importers of slaves. Later, many Yankees became ardent abolitionists. As a result, like many other Northern States, the New England States nullified fugitive slave laws.

However, when the Southern States seceded and ended the “league with hell,” these abolitionists did not want to let them go. By then, the Puritan Yankees had gained control of the federal government. Now, they were going to use their newfound power to force their utopia on the world, starting with the South. They were going to save Southerners from their evil, heathen ways and convert them into the image of the Puritan Yankee. They started their conversion in the South and have metastasized across the world. America’s attempt to create American hegemony across the world is nothing more than the Puritan Yankee trying to remake the world in his own image.

One thing that Cussons seemed not to have anticipated was that most Southern leaders would lose their moral fortitude. Most Southern political, business, academic, and religious leaders would become scalawags. They would sell their souls to the Puritan Yankee and then genocide the Southerner, their own people. What the scalawags have not done, the carpetbaggers have. The genocide of the Southerner is mostly completed. (This genocide has been mostly cultural instead of physical. However, the United Nations considers the deliberate destruction of a people’s culture to be genocide. Destroying an ethnicity’s culture destroys the ethnicity.)

Copyright © 2023 by Thomas Coley Allen.

More social issues articles.

Another Discussion with the Imbecile

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. 

Copyright © 2024 by Thomas Coley Allen.

More Southern issues articles.

Review of Facts and Falsehoods – Part 1

Review of Facts and Falsehoods – Part 1

Thomas Allen

Facts and Falsehoods Concerning the War on the South 1861-1865 (Memphis, Tennessee: A. R. Taylor & Co., 1904) by George Edmonds is an excellent book and worth reading. Edmonds reveals the real Abraham Lincoln before he was deified.

Before Lincoln’s deification, most Republicans, including his cabinet, did not respect him, and many despised him. Further, they perceived him as incompetent, opportunistic, and indecisive and as a political hack and a politician in the worst sense of the word. Fame was what Lincoln wanted. Assassination was the best thing to ever happen to him, for it brought him the fame for which he lusted and his deification.

Edmonds shows that the founding principles of the Republican Party were hatred of the Constitution and Southerners, disunion, and the concentration of political power in the federal government. Being a White man’s party, the Republican Party had little use for Blacks — free or slave. 

He discusses the hatred of the South that many Republican leaders possessed from Lincoln’s War to 1904 when he published his book. This hatred of the South still exists today albeit in a milder form when conservatives, e.g., Beck and Coulter, express it. This hatred reveals itself in the left’s destruction of Southern culture, history, and memorials with the support of scalawags including most Southern Republican and Democratic governors, and the complacency of most conservatives.

The following are some excerpts from his book.

Comparison of Buchanan with Lincoln

Edmonds quotes the Lemars (Iowa) Sentinel, 1879, which fearlessly propounded Republican doctrines, “No reasonable man will say that President Buchanan was wrong when he said that the North had no constitutional right to coerce seceding States, but what of that? Up jumped Abraham Lincoln, the rail-splitter, and kicked the Constitution into the Capitol cellar, and called for 75,000 armed men to march down and conquer the South, and when the 75,000 proved not enough, the rail splitter called for more, and more, until he had over 2,000,000 armed men, and he sent ’em down to burn and pillage, to kill, conquer or annihilate traitors to our glorious Union, the Constitution all the while in the Capitol cellar." (pp. 23-24)

About Rebellion

Edmonds writes, “The history of man’s struggle for freedom shows that rebellions have won for mankind all the freedom they possess. Did ever any ruler on earth, of his own will, loosen his grip on the liberties of those he ruled? Every inch of liberty the English-speaking people now have was gained by rebellions. The colonies of ’76 won freedom by rebellion. Rebellion means resistance to lawful rule. George III was the lawful King of the Colonies. At no period in the existence of this Union has one State or group of States held lawful rule over any other State or group of States. The most stupendous falsehood ever told on this continent is the falsehood that the Southern people rebelled. There can be no rebellion except against lawful rulers. The Republican party of the 6o’s was guilty of the monstrous crime of usurping the power to rule the Southern States. Not only did Republicans pour out the virulence of hate on the South’s men, her women came in for a share, and a large share they received.” (p. 245)

Lincoln’s Response to Medill’s Protest to Lincoln’s Order for More Troops

About Lincoln rebuking Joseph Medill, editor of the Chicago Tribune and Republican politician, when he protested Lincoln ordering more troops from Chicago, Edmonds cites Ida Tarbell, who wrote a biography of Lincoln. Miss Tarbell relates what Medill told her about this incident, “In 1864 when the call for extra troops came, Chicago revolted. Chicago had sent 22,000 and was drained. There were no young men to go, no aliens except what was already bought. The citizens held a mass meeting and appointed three men, of whom I (Medill) was one, to go to Washington and ask Stanton (the War Secretary) to give Cook County a new enrollment. On reaching Washington we went to Stanton with our statement. He refused. Then we went to President Lincoln. ‘I cannot do it,’ said Lincoln, ‘but I will go with you to Stanton and hear the arguments of both sides.’ So we all went over to the War Department together. Stanton and General Frye were there, and they both contended that the quota should not be changed. The argument went on for some time, and was finally referred to Lincoln, who had been silently listening. When appealed to, Lincoln turned to us with a black and frowning face: ‘Gentlemen.’ he said, with a voice full of bitterness, ‘after Boston, Chicago has been the chief instrument in bringing this war on the country. The Northwest opposed the South, as New England opposed the South. It is you, Medill, who is largely responsible for making blood flow as it has. You called for war until you had it. I have given it to you. What you have asked for you have had. Now you come here begging to be let off from the call for more men, which I have made to carry on the war you demanded. You ought to be ashamed of yourselves. Go home and raise your 6,000 men. And you, Medill, you and your Tribune have had more influence than any other paper in the Northwest in making this war. Go home and send me those men I want.’

“Medill says that he and his companions, feeling guilty, left without further argument. They returned to Chicago, and 6,000 more men from the working classes were dragged from their homes, their families, forced into the ranks to risk limbs and lives in a war they had no part in making, while the men that forced that war on an unwilling people remained at home in comfort and safety, and made enormous fortunes by the war.” (p. 162)

To this, Edmonds adds, “Is it any wonder educated workingmen often become anarchists and hate all governments?” (p. 163)

Lincoln on Courts

About Lincoln’s preference for using military courts instead of civil courts, Edmonds writes, “Daniel Webster objected to military courts because, as he said, ‘military courts are organized to convict.’ The so-called humane Lincoln objected to civil courts because one member of the jury might be more ready to hang the panel than to hang the man! Lincoln seems to assume that men arrested by military officials must be guilty, therefore should have no chance of escaping conviction by trial in a Civil court. Lincoln also objects to civil courts because they only convict on charges of crime well defined by law. Military courts convict on the most frivolous pretexts, or no pretext at all. The chief thing necessary to military conviction is that some man in high place should desire the man to be convicted and put out of his way. In the Albany address reference was made to the suspension of the habeas corpus. To this Mr. Lincoln replied as follows: ‘The suspension of the habeas corpus was for the purpose that men may be arrested and held in prison who cannot be proved guilty of any defined crime.’” (p. 212)

Continuing, Edmonds writes that the above declaration is not Lincoln's worst. Then, he quotes Lincoln’s comment to the Albany committee of Democrats, “Arrests are not made so much for what has been done as for what possibly might be done. The man who stands by and says nothing when the peril of his Government is discussed cannot be misunderstood. If not hindered (by arrest, imprisonment, or death) he is sure to help the enemy.” (p. 212).

Then, Edmonds writes, “Is it any wonder under rulings like this that 38,000 arbitrary arrests threw 38,000 innocent men and women into American bastiles [sic] to languish for months or years, and many therein to die?” (p. 212.)

Moreover, Edmonds writes, “Under Lincoln’s definition silence became an act of treason. A man with a sore throat, unable to talk aloud, if he happened to be present when the Lincoln Government was discussed, was liable to arrest and imprisonment in the most distant fortress in the land.” (p. 212).

Next, Edmonds quotes Lincoln writing, “Much more if a man talks ambiguously, talks with ‘buts’ and ‘ifs’ and ‘ands’ he cannot be misunderstood. If not hindered (by imprisonment or death) this man will actively commit treason. Arbitrary arrests are not made for the treason defined in the Constitution, but to prevent treason.” About this quotation, Edmonds comments, “That is to prevent the sort of treason never before known on earth — the treason of ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’ and ‘ands’ — the treason made and invented by Abraham Lincoln, the first President of the Republican party.” (pp. 212-213.)

Seward’s Character

To describe the character of William H. Seward, Lincoln’s Secretary of State, Edmonds quotes General Piatt, a personal friend and great admirer of Seward, “Seward began life as a school teacher in the South. He had been treated with condescending indifference by the unenlightened masters, which treatment he never forgot. Seward looked down on the white men of the South in the same cynical way that he did upon the slaves. He had no pity for the slaves, and no dislike for the master. He was a great favorite with the last named. He had contempt for them, which he concealed as carefully as he did his contempt for the United States Constitution. Seward had trained himself to believe that worldly wickedness indicated ability. He thought to be bad was to be clever. He thought that devotion to wine, women and infidelity gave proof of superior intelligence. He affected a wickedness he did not feel, because such wickedness, in his estimation, was good form.” To this description, Edmonds asks, “Was it spite that made Seward so vindictive toward the Southern people?” (p. 158)

Copyright © 2022 by Thomas Coley Allen.

Part 2.

More Southern articles.

Defending the South

Defending the South

Thomas Allen

[Editor’s note: This article was written in 1989.]

    Many Southerners who might otherwise favor or be indifferent to an independent South oppose independence because they believe that the United States armed forces are the only thing stopping Soviet domination. Many Northerners, primarily conservatives, who might otherwise be indifferent to Southern independence oppose independence because they rightfully see the South as the bulwark of conservatism in the United States. They also see the South as a primary source of soldiers, officers, and materiel in the war against communism. (In spite of their platitudes about self-government, Northern liberals oppose Southern independence because they have an insatiable compulsion to rule, reform, rape, and rifle the South.) That the United States are defending the South from Soviet militarism and that the South needs the United States to defend her against the Soviet Union is one of the great myths of the latter half of the twentieth century.
    Ninety miles from Florida is one of the largest military camps in the world. Soviet bombers routinely fly along and occasionally over the coast of the eastern Southern States. What kind of defense does the United States provide the South against this threat? None! No effective anti-aircraft defense system is protecting the South. There are no anti-aircraft missile batteries. Very few fighters are available to intercept the Soviet bombers. The few available fighter squadrons are mostly part of the national guard, and only a few of them have the most recent fighters. There are not even any AWACS to observe this Soviet threat. If the Soviet Union were serious about dropping nuclear bombs on major Southern cities, they would meet little opposition. Would an independent South stand so naked before such an awesome foe? No!
    Coastal defense is perhaps even more dismal than air defense. With the largest Soviet base outside the Soviet Union just ninety miles from Florida, one would think that a significant part of the United States navy would be in the Gulf of Mexico and along the southeast Atlantic coast. But where is the bulk of the United States navy? It is in the North Atlantic, Mediterranean Sea, Pacific Ocean, South China Sea, and Arabian Sea. If the Soviets were determined, they probably could land several divisions along the Gulf Coast encountering nothing more threatening than a Coast Guard cutter or two hunting drug smugglers. Again, would an independent South stand so naked before such an awesome foe? Again, the answer is no.
    One of the most terrifying aspects of the latter half of the twentieth century has been the potential for nuclear war. What have the United States done to protect the South from nuclear war? Nothing! There is no civil defense system. There is no antimissile system. While the Soviet Union has built an elaborate civil defense system, the United States plan to rely on an untried, unworkable mass evacuation of panic-stricken city dwellers into the countryside where no shelter, food, or other provisions await them. While the Soviet Union has developed and placed in the field antimissile defense systems, the United States continues to draw elaborate schemes on paper. In short, the United States’ defense against Soviet missiles is to hold the South hostage to nuclear annihilation. Would an independent South have ever made herself so vulnerable? Of course not!
    The United States government is striving to turn Central America and Mexico into Soviet colonies. (Southerners will be fortunate if Congress prevails over the President. Perhaps then Southern blood will not have to soak the grounds of Central America before it becomes part of the Soviet Empire.) If (when?) Mexico were to become a Soviet colony, would the United States increase and improve their defense of the Mexican border? If it did, such increases and improvements would be mostly for a show with little substance. Most likely they would do nothing.
    The United States have virtually no control over their southern border now. There is little hope that they would be able to control it as millions of Americans from Central America and Mexico flee their Soviet conquerors. Along with the refugees will come Soviet agents, who will come as saboteurs, terrorist, and spies. Would an independent South have lost control of her border with Mexico as have the United States? No! Certainly, an independent South would put forth more effort to defend herself from a communist force in Mexico than the United States ever would. [Editor’s note. By substituting agents of drug dealers, Chinese Communists, and Middle Eastern terrorists for Soviet agents, one has a good description of what is happening today along the Mexican border.]
    History of the twentieth century has shown that the United States are no threat to communism in general and none to the Soviet Union in particular. The United States entered World War I to make Russia safe for communism. In World War II, the United States made Eastern Europe safe for communism. (One of the ironies of World War II is that one of the professed reasons for fighting the war was to rid the world of fascism. All of the noncommunist countries that fought Germany and Italy had already adopted a semi-fascist economic system and have since adopted a semi-fascist social system.) The Korean War and Vietnam War were fought to make China and Indo-China safe for communism. (These statements of fact are not intended to castigate the brave soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen who fought or thought that they were fighting to defend their homes and loved ones and for what they considered noble ideals. They are intended to castigate their political leaders, who knew that the real purpose of these wars was to advance communism.) Now it appears that the United States are trying to start a war to make the Middle East safe for communism. First, they tried to goad Lybia into war. Now they are trying with Iran. If they can succeed in getting Iran to sink one or two United States warships, they will have the old “Remember Fort Sumter, the Maine, and Pearl Harbor; they fired the first shot; we are innocent” battle cry that has been used so successfully so many times to dupe the gullible American into useless war.
    Even a cursory review of how the United States have treated in the past and continues to this day treat anticommunist governments shows that the United States have no animosity toward the Soviet Union or communism. The United States have tried to overthrow nearly every anticommunist government there is. They have probably overthrown more than the Soviet Union has. The more an anticommunist country has tried to be friendly with the United States, the harder the United States have endeavored to overthrow the government of that country and to turn that country into a Soviet colony or an impoverished socialist dictatorship allied with the Soviet Union.
    With such a record of defending against Soviet aggression and communism, can the South really depend upon the United States to defend her? Only a fool or someone oblivious to the history of the twentieth century could possibly believe that the United States would defend the South. The only hope that the South has of defending herself against communism and the Soviet Union lay in a free and independent confederation of free and independent Southern States.

Copyright © 1989 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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A Letter: Tariffs

A Letter: Tariffs

Thomas Allen

[Editor’s note: The following is a letter written in 1986 responding to two articles published in The New American magazine, which is associated with the John Birch Society.]

    There seems to be some disagreement between two articles in your April 21 issue. Chamberlain argues correctly that tariffs, especially protective tariffs, are detrimental to the economy. Lockman, apparently in agreement with Ellis and Kurowski, whose book he reviews, argues in favor of tariffs as a primary source of revenue for the U. S. government. He evens favors protective tariffs.
    Lockman surely favors taxing imported oil heavily to subsidize domestic oil producers. U.S. industry and military run on oil. They certainly should not rely on foreign supplies. Let us have autarky for everything that the U.S. government considers essential — especially chrome, platinum, and other strategic metals for which there is little or no domestic sources.
    Certainly, not all the Founding Fathers favored protective tariffs. John Taylor of Caroline and many other leading Southern statesmen and agriculturalists realized that tariffs made the farmer a serf and the agricultural Southern States colonies of the Northern bankers and industrialists.
    To rely on Hamilton’s arguments in The Federalist Papers is to rely on the representative of the bankers and industrialists. Hamilton, the author of the federal deficit, was part of what the JBS [John Birch Society] would call the Insiders.
    Another fallacy of Lockman is that tariffs on imports are paid by foreigners. Tariffs on imports are no more paid by foreigners than sales taxes are paid by retailers. If the objective is to get foreigners to support the U.S. government, an impost on exports would be much more effective.
    Tariffs may be an acceptable source of revenue for government — as long as the tariff is uniform without favor to product or country and is no more than about five percent. Once a tariff becomes protective in nature, it subsidizes inefficiency, incompetence, and the politically powerful. It injures the economy in the ways Chamberlain points out — and worse.
    The Southern colonies have but one hope of regaining their lost liberties, free trade, and low taxes. That hope is to follow the example of the Founding Fathers, who seceded from England. The time has come for a free and independent confederation of free and independent Southern States.

Copyright © 1986 by Thomas C. Allen.

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