Transforming the Union

Lincoln claimed the North was fighting to preserve the Union. However, fighting to preserve a voluntary Union is a contradiction since force is antithetical to voluntary consent. Alexander Hamilton noted: “To coerce the States is one of the maddest projects that was ever devised…Can any reasonable man be well disposed toward a government which makes war and carnage the only means of supporting itself; a government that can exist only by the sword?” The New England power structure did just that. The South, with its culture of individualism and dominant Christian faith, was to be subdued.

The Northern Government/Corporate alliance that opposed maintenance of the original voluntary federal republic of sovereign States was multi-faceted and included tactics/agendas that discourage, rather than encourage unity. Examples include:

Lincoln refused to negotiate peace. Every effort the South made for compromise before and during the war was rebuffed.

Lincoln and Grant introduced total war on American soil through William T. Sherman, Phil Sheridan, John Basil Turchin, and others. Making total war on women, children, and other noncombatants is barbaric as is slaughtering animals and stealing and/or destroying private property. President Harry Truman, a descendant of Missouri Confederates, was told by his mother to check the White House silverware because it was probably theirs (the Trumans).

Karl Marx, Frederich Engels and others philosophically similar supported Lincoln. The predominantly German Socialist “48ers” were thrown out of power in the 1840s. Many moved to the Midwest and became a powerful Republican voting bloc.

Lincoln violated the constitution in multiple ways: Coercion, Violation of International Law and constitutional laws of neutrality, illegal suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, blockading ports still claimed to be in the Union, the “war measure” known as the Emancipation Proclamation, the illegal creation of the State of West Virginia, violation of the First Amendment (shutting down anti-war newspapers and arresting American citizens for exercising their free speech rights), illegal invasion of the State of Maryland, and violation of the Fugitive Slave Law.

Lincoln’s government made medicine and medical supplies contraband of war. Thomas Bland Keys states: “From early 1861 throughout the war, the Lincoln Administration kept all medicines and medical supplies in the list of contraband of war, and would not permit their importation into the Confederacy, if it could prevent it. Even existing supplies in the hands of private physicians were destroyed when located. Not only did wounded and sick Confederate soldiers and civilians suffer terribly as a result, but so did thousands of Union soldiers held in Southern prison camps, including such prisons as Andersonville, Libby, Belle Isle, Salisbury, Florence, and others. It is interesting to note that such action today would be an atrocity.” (Department of the Army Field Manual No. 27-10 (July, 1956), The Law of Land Warfare, Para. 234.)

Although supplies were plentiful in most Union prisons, captured Confederates were abused. At Andersonville, Confederates received the same rations as the Yankee prisoners.

The Union recruited approximately half a million foreign immigrants and/or mercenaries. A “righteous cause” would not have to recruit foreigners. According to Robert C. Wood, the numbers were: “Germans 176,800; Irish 144,200; British-Americans 53,500; English 45,500; Others 74,900. This makes a total of 494,900.” Confederate troops commonly fought “Yankees” who did not speak English. (Confederate General Richard Taylor referenced this fact.) The 494,000 foreigners plus 186,017 Blacks (680,917), equaled almost the total Southern force, which was perhaps as high as 800,000. The South was often outnumbered three to one or worse.

No post-war redemption of currency. With Confederate money relegated to a worthless status, Southerners were further punished for the “crime” of believing in self-government and defending their homes against an invasion.

Lincoln, a corporate lawyer and mercantilist, stated in 1832: "My politics are short and sweet, like the old woman's dance…I am in favor of a national bank…the internal improvements system, and a high protective tariff." Those were the interests he served throughout his career.

It is alleged that Great Britain pushed for the U.S. to be split into two regions to dilute power. If true, that should have been an incentive for Lincoln to compromise and listen to Southern grievances instead of waging war. Post-war, the South received no “Marshall Plan” but was instead placed under martial law and a significant number of ex-Confederates were not allowed to vote. Taxes were raised and property devalued. Outside vultures (Carpetbaggers) and their equally sinister Southern counterparts (Scalawags) purchased depressed property and continued to pillage the South. The South’s generational hatred of the Republican Party is easy to understand.

Lincoln did not preserve the Union—he transformed it by centralizing the powers of the general government, diluting the power of the States, setting the precedent to invade and destroy any State seeking independence, and helping to create the “Imperial Presidency.”

Sources: Confederate Hand-Book, by Robert C. Wood; Union At All Costs: From Confederation to Consolidation, by John M. Taylor; Destroying the Republic: Jabez Curry and the Re-Education of the Old South, by John Chodes; and The Uncivil War: Union Army and Navy Excesses in the Official Records, by Thomas Bland Keys. Note: Lincoln claimed the States did not literally leave the Union. Massachusetts Abolitionist Lysander Spooner believed the South had a right to govern itself. In No Treason: The Constitution of No Authority, Spooner wrote about Northern bankers and corporations teaming with government cronies to consolidate power and profit handsomely. Also, Martha Ellen Young Truman despised Yankees for all of the theft and destruction done to her family’s Missouri farm by the criminal Kansas Jayhawkers and for her family’s eventual forced removal from their home.

THE VIEWS OF SUBMITTED EDITORIALS MAY NOT BE THE EXPRESS VIEWS OF THE ALABAMA GAZETTE.