From the Burn The Confederate Flag Day website:
Burn the Confederate Flag Day is a protest against the right’s exploitation of racial prejudice for political gain. We urge you to burn the Confederate flag, a long-time symbol of racial hatred, on Sept 12, the date when the racially-divisive Tea Party holds its annual hate fest.
Ways to get involved:
Host a flag-burning party on Sept. 12.
- Tell us where and when you’re holding it, and we’ll publish a list of events.
- Send us photos of the event. We’ll post them here.
- Upload a video of the event onto YouTube. We’ll embed it or link to it.
Let them know we’re watching. Dress up like a clown and take a partially burned flag to a local tea party event (Don’t burn a flag at the event unless local laws allow it.)
Spread the word via Facebook (here’s our Facebook group), Twitter, and other social media.
Submit your own ideas, below in the comments. We’ll use them to update this list.
Connect:
I freakin’ hate those coc# suckers, and I’m completely in.
Sounds great! Make a video & upload it to YouTube with commentary. The southern flag to me is about secession from the Union, about thumbing one’s nose at the govt. because you think you are better. Rather than making deals to work out differences. It’s less about independence and more about “we think we are better, so f-ck you”.
If the South wanted to win the Civil War, it should have not tried to battle the north on its territories. That implies they wanted to take over the North. A war of defense is a hell of a lot different than a war of offense.
Stereotyping all tea party members as racist is bad enough, but associating the Confederate flag with them is even worse. Quit sterotyping!
In regards to the reason the Civil War was fought (from NotOneForRacism above). The main reason it was fought was because of the industrialized North (that was influenced by the ever-growing power of corporations) and their desire to move into the South to obtain their resources and open up industrialized operations there. Once the Civil War was over, the big corporations moved into the South, set up shop, then moved West (hence the Indian wars). Corporations sell stock in the public market to raise capital, and shareholders expect profits to be made. Corporations expanded their operations in order to earn profits.
Once the Indian wars were over and the Indians were on reservations, the corporation-backed industiralized North expaned overseas to annex Hawaii andlater to acquire the territories of the Philippines, Guam, Cuba, and Puerto Rico as a result of the Spanish-American War.
Today these coprorations have become multinational corporations with operations around the world. The Cold War resulted in proxy wars fought in places like South Korea and South Vietnam to resist communist forces of China, North Korea, Russia, and North Vietnam. Today multinational corporations operate in all of those countries except North Korea, and many American jobs have been outsourced to these cheap-labor countries along with other countries in the 3rd World. These big multinationals have practically become countries in themselves, and have loyalties only to their profits and not to any country (including the United States).
To me, the Confederate flag represents a struggle against the growing power of corporations and the desire of the Confederate states to govern themselves according to the principles of the United States Constitution in its original
form (having more states’ rights and less federal interference in states’ affairs). Although slavery was an issue in the Civil War, it was not the main issue (and slavery was allowed in all the United States at the time of the Civil War, not just the Southern states).
Jay – Sorry, but the idea that the war was fought to stave off industrialization by the North is nonsense. The Southern planters had plenty of capital and if they had been smart they would have industrialized the region themselves, as the Cannons and others in the North Carolina Piedmont did in the late 19th century.
The root problem was that the antebellum South was an oligarchy. The planters represented just a tiny percentage of the population, but they controlled nearly 100 percent of the economy. The war was about protecting their investment in their means of production — human slaves — from forced divestiture by the U.S. government. The Confederate states produced more cotton before the war than all other countries in the world combined and the total value of the oligarchs’ human “property” is said to have been $3.5 billion in 1860 dollars, so would likely to be over $1 trillion today.
That’s what the war was about, protecting that investment. Everything else was a smoke screen.
Correct, Jon, and many on the right have done a very good job of deflecting from the fact that the right to keep humans enslaved to fuel the southern economy was a major motivator of the secessionist movement and the resulting Civil War.
The re-education campaign has shifted the focus from the issue of slavery to one of states’ rights, but it still begs the question, was it right for one man to enslave another and treat him as an economic commodity in opposition to the words Jefferson states in the Declaration of Independence?
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness…”
It seems hypocritical to me for one to say one believes and reveres these words and then act in a manner that strips them of all meaning.
As someone who grew up in the deep south during “Jim Crow” you’d better believe that the “message” of the Confederate flag was pure Racism, as was the slogan that accompanied it: “The South Shall Rise Again.”
If you go to Stone Mountain, home of the revival of the KKK in the early part of the twentieth century, you will see the second largest sculpture in america, with Lee, Jackson and Davis marching across on horseback, the Confederate flag waving at their backs!
Stone Mountain, home not only to Klan rallies but to lynching and mutilation of Americans of African descent, is now a busy, moneymaking THEME PARK! and you can guess what the theme is! I am all for anything that clarifies what the flag stands for, and stops inane lies meant to mislead and obstruct it’s meaning. Count me in!
By the way, I hit “post” for posting this idea on my fb page and it didn’t work.
join the sons confederate veterans.
Apparently, many on this blog and in the anti-Tea Party crowd conveniently forget that slavery existed before 1776 and all the way until 1865 in the United States. The Confederacy is a convenient scapegoat for all the sins of slavery, but if you want to burn a symbol of slavery and oppression on this continent, burn a U.S. flag. That is the flag that flew over all the slave ships and slave auctions for almost one hundred years! My ancestors fought for the Confederacy and they didn’t own slaves or fight for them. They fought against an invading oppressive totalitarian out-of-control federal government, kinda like the one we have now…
I WILL NOT DO ANYTHING TO HELP THE TEA PARTY I LOVE HISTORY READ THE TRUE FACTS ABOUT THE FLAG. THE US FLAG FLEW ON MORE SLAVE SHIPS.THE SOLDIERS FLAG WAS NEVER FLOWN ON A SLAVE SHIP.I AM A SOUTHERN BORN MAN 68YRS OLD
The North was slave country for over a hundred years (colonies and states), and they outlawed slavery. Did they free their slaves? No. They sold most of them to the south so they wouldn’t lose their investment. Some kept their slaves until December 1865, months after the War ended. Ulysses S. Grant was one, justifying his ownership of human beings with, “Good help is so hard to find these days.” Point your fingers everywhere they need to be pointed, and let up on the South a bit until you know more facts.
hmmm…Isn’t that a form of racism also??? I’m just sayin’! If any other flag was burned at a Tea Party event you people would trample each other to death trying to get to your freaking cameras and computers! What’s the saying about the kettle and the pot???? Again, I’m just sayin’!
Everyone has a right to heritage. Why you guys so bitter against the South.
I’m from the South and never owned a slave. No one in my family ever owned a slave.
I have five grandfathers who fought in the War for Southern Independence. Not one of them owned a slave.
I agree with Bob. If you want to burn a slave symbol flag, burn the US flag. The Confederate flag never flew on a slave ship.
Buy a flag, burn it, it’s your right. But remember 93,000 blacks fought for that flag, on their oun free will. Slavery was only used under the confederate flag for(4)yrs. The civil war was about economics, that is why England and France were for the South. The North used the souths resorces, sold them to England, with a large mark up on prices. North was getting about 70% verses the souths 30%, the south was mearly cutting out the middle man,(North). Our resources, their profits, wonder why we had so many allies in the South? We could sell our resources cheaper.NOT SLAVES. Simple econamics.
Burn the Confederate flag? This means you have to buy a Confederate flag. Then you’re supporting the companies who make the flag. Sounds great. I love a free market and an ignorant regressive, er progressive.
Welcome to the 21st century, folks. This has nothing to do with the Civil War, slavery or anything that happened in past centuries. That flag ceased to be a symbol of the Confederacy, for better or worse, many years ago. It has become nothing but the logo of modern-day racism. If you don’t like that fact, don’t blame liberals. Blame the KKK and their fellow travelers in the GOP-Tea Party.
And for the record, I’m an ex-pat now but my roots are 100 percent Southern. My family, on both sides, has lived in the South since way before the Revolution. Like others who have commented here, my ancestors fought in the Civil War, and I am also old enough to have experienced the Jim Crow era. With those credentials, I am more than entitled to make the observation that that flag is roughly equivalent to the swastika, and burning is too good for it.
When it comes to the so-called Confederate flag, you have two choices. If you’re not a racist, wise up. If you are a racist, keep defending it.
Jon Ponder:
Can you explain the Jim Crow law that applied to all blacks entering the State of Indiana before the War for Southern Independence.
Yep, your Jim Crow law required ANY black person entering the State of Indiana to post a $1,000 bond before he could enter the state. Of course no one, much less a black person, had $1,000 in 1860.
Last time I looked Indiana was a northern state. What were you saying about Jim Crow laws???
Terry, as I said above, this is not about the past. This is about the fact that 21st century racists in the GOP Tea Party have adopted the so-called Confederate flag as the logo for their hatred and bigotry. It’s debatable how significant that particular flag was in the 19th century. In the 20th century, its meaning changed when it became swag for the movie “Gone with the Wind” and, from that, a imaginary memento from an idealized version of a society that was cruel to slaves but also harsh to the 90 percent of the population that was poor and white. In the 21st century, the flag has become a de facto swastika. Neither you nor I can change that fact.
This so sad, once again people have been taught wrong, I am from the south. I am proud of my heritage, and find it very offensive for others to believe the horse crap they are feed through the media, through re-written history books. My ancestors were Irish indentured servants and native American and they never even owned slaves! they still fought for the South, why? Because their rights was being taken away from them…because they believed in what was written in the constitution! If people would really look up the true history of slavery, they may be surprised to find out that the first slave that was a legal slave was because a Black man named Johnson in Virginia took to court another Black man, claiming he was his slave for life that he was his property. Because he bought and paid for him….buying him from another Black man that was a slaver by trade! if you go research this, you will find it to be true. This instance set the legal standard Here in America to own another human being. Slavery was going on for over 500 years here before the Civil War! And not just in the South, but in the North also! It was always funny to me that Lincoln freed the slaves of the South, but he never Freed the ones in the North, Oops people are not suppose to know that!! Lincoln had Black servants, that was not paid..oops, another thing that history did not want us to know..wow!! History is always written by the victor, so therefor the true history behind the civil war was forever buried, unless you have the guts to do some real digging and discover for yourself what the real truth is, instead of automatically believing what someone tells you! I am not against Blacks, I have no reason to dislike them… my best friends are Black….what I am against is people hating my heritage without knowing the truth, the real truth. There is no reason for racism, it is what government and the media want, it keep it alive, to keep it growing! I accept your heritage, regardless of race, color or creed, I do not get on TV and spout words of hate and how I want to burn flags or kill. And if you do that, then you are a racist, you do not have to be a certain color of skin to be a racist. I have found they come in all Colors, race and creed. If you burn the confederate flag then you are a racist. It is time to put aside the Hate…it is time for us to stand together. Or continue to feed the hate and believe a lie? the choice is yours?
Oh, one more thing…the kkk was dis-assembled here in the south right after the war, because of what it was turning too, general Forrest never meant it as a means to be racist, just a means of law and order. It was then revived in the NORTH, many years later….Yearly Dues of a member of the KKK is sent to a Northern state?? Can you guess which State the main Branch of government for the KKK is Located…OOPs…something else the government and media does not want you to know??
Annette — Your historical facts are simply incorrect, as I suspect you know. The KKK was not founded until after the Civil War. It was started in Pulaski, Tennessee, in 1865. Lincoln did not have a chance to free all the slaves, not because he didn’t want to, but because he was killed by a right-wing domestic terrorist named John Wilkes Booth. There were African-American workers in the Lincoln White House, but they weren’t slaves.
Lincoln’s party, the then-liberal Republican Party, controlled Congress then. It was they who ratified amendments freeing the slaves and giving them full citizenship — including the 14th amendment that the now right-wing racist Republican Party is trying to overturn.
As I said earlier, my people came to the South way before yours did, and my poverty-stricken ancestors were duped into fighting that war to supposedly protect their rights too. That was a lie. That war was about one right and one right only — the right of the wealthy few not to have their human “property,” which had a value of about $1 trillion in today’s money, divested from them involuntarily by the liberals who took control of the US government in the election of 1860. The sacrifice of my ancestors, just like yours, was nothing but a tragic waste.
But, again, the issue of the so-called Confederate flag today has nothing to do with any of that, or anything from the past. This is about what it has become now — a logo for 21st century GOP Tea Party racism.
Please people get your facts straight about the Confederate Flag. The Confederate flag does not represent slavery, as much as certain people would like you to believe. In fact, remember that the Union flag flew over many ships bringing slaves to this country and it also flew over slave states for more than 80 years.
The Confederate flag today, and in the past, represents the seceding of the southern states from the United States. The reasons why the South wanted to secede were because they did not want high taxation and they were not very happy with the present government.
The Flag did never at one time did it fly over a slavery ship. You need to get your facts right. If you going to burn a flag then burn the American Flag. It flew over slave ships over many years. Get your facts right before you start burning flags.
Allan, get your own facts straight. The United States Navy never included slave ships, anymore than the Confederate navy, such as it was, did. That’s ridiculous. In any case, the international slave trade was made illegal by U.S. and Great Britain in 1808, so no slaves were legally brought in on U.S. merchant ships after that.
But all of this irrelevant to the issue at hand. Please read this carefully: No one is burning the so-called Confederate flag because of slavery or Jim Crow. They’re burning it because it is a symbol of 21st century racism in the Republican Tea Party.
When I see a Confederate Battle Flag burning, it is as though the person holding it has placed a beacon over his/her own head. The beacon is saying “look at me. I am ignorant of history! I am proud to wallow in that ignorance. I do not care who knows of my ignorance because I am too ignorant to recognize my ignorance for what it is. I am a product of the indoctrination mills that permeate this country. And above all else, while I DEMAND that you respect my rights, my culture and my heritage, I will NOT respond in kind because at my core, I am an intolerant demagogue, and a hypocritical, bigotted hater of all whose opinions differ from my own.”
There you have it folks. That is what your actions tell me.
For the record though-
1) The Confederate Battle flag NEVER, EVER flew over the institution of slavery because it was NEVER a government flag. It was a military flag carried by soldiers much like the flags of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines of today. It never even adorned a single slave ship.
2) The KKK did not, and cannot, change the meaning of the Confederate Flag because they do not own it. It is owned by the Confederate Soldier who carried it, who bled for it and who died beneath it. Saying that the klan changed it’s meaning is akin to saying that Mexico can change the meaning of the Canadian flag. It’s really a stupid premise if you think about it. But, you won’t.
3) The Confederate Soldier by and large was not a slave owner. He was, in the majority of cases, too poor to own slaves. He fought the yankees, not to defend slavery, but because he saw them as an invading army.
Go ahead, disrespect his flag. Attempt to besmirch his honor if you wish. It is your “right” to do so. But, you do not bring dishonor on him, because, just like the klan, you cannot, and do not, speak for him. Your actions are your own. They speak only for you.
In attempting to insult, demean and disrespect my Heritage as the descendent of Confederate soldiers, you accomplish one, and only one, thing. You identify yourselves as the real racists, the real bigots, and the real tyrants that you are. You are an alternate version of the klowns parading around in white sheets misprepresenting historical fact. Do as you wish……and know that thinking people see you as idiots. I hope it brings you great satisfaction to expose yourselves as you are. Wallow in your own collective ignorance and prove to the world that you are, above all else, self-loathing, servile, and collectivist myrmidons who lack the investigative capacity to study and consider facts over fallacy. Facts which may have assisted you in arriving at a coherent thought, rather than a reactionary and physical display of supreme idiocy.
I am really sorry to see that someone has this much hatred in their heart. To promote hate in this way, in these times is appalling.
We have troops fighting for our country right now under our American Flag. Isn’t the present situation of our country more important. I say instead spending all your time trying to promote hate, why don’t you figure out a way to help our own men and women fighting for US now!
I also believe you might need a history lesson….but for now how about you STOP THE HATE!!!!
Folks, go to your local librarys and do your research before posting your Radical Hate on the internet. And you all think that we southerners are the ignorant ones. You had better pay attention to current events in the news instead of dissing history.
if you burn the confederate flag rap yourself in it first, OK.
I would like to compliment Carl on his well thought out and articulate response posted above.
Now to address those that have raised the issue at hand…you may find comfort in the fact that I am a DEMOCRAT and I have been all of my life. I was raised and educated in northern Illinois. Like many of you, I was taught the adulterated version of history that has been perpetuated by the victors in the War Between the States. I strongly suggest that those of you that view the Confederate flag as a symbol of hate try to educate yourselves instead of believing everything that you hear. Use your own power of reason and research the reasons behind the conflict between the northern and southern states. After you do some unbiased research with an open mind, you may change your opinion of the Confederate flag.
By burning the Confederate flag, the only thing that you will accomplish is to bring attention to the very hate groups that you despise. Your goals might be better served by FLYING a Confederate flag. The more that this flag is displayed away from a hatefull and racist environment, the sooner it will be accepted for it’s true meaning. I fly the third national flag of the Confederacy in front of my home for this very purpose.
I am capable of independent thought, I am a democrat, and I am a proud member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans.
I agree with Carl. He made very good points. Long ago, I gave up and just let the idiots make a mockery of the Confederate soldiers flag. The North was very guilty when it came to slaves, also, they needed the slaves also to produce cotton for their mills where children worked in marchboxes. What I hate most is that the true history of the flag has been lost and now, it seems that it has become a symbol of hate. This deeply concerns me because the flag has been so misused and now belongs to hate groups. I am so proud to be from the South, but we have allowed the ignorant to fly the Confederate soldiers flag. It is a shame.
Jon Ponder, in all of his infinite wisdom says the following:
“No one is burning the so-called Confederate flag because of slavery or Jim Crow. They’re burning it because it is a symbol of 21st century racism in the Republican Tea Party.”
Tell me, how do you know that is what it is a symbol of? Are you clairevoyant? Nope. More likely, you are stereotyping. Is the black man who is a member of my Sons of Confederate Veterans Camp a “racist?” Is he? Are you willing to stereotype him? What about HK Edgerton, or Nelson Winbush? Google those two names. You may be surprised. Are they “racists?”
Bigotry encompasses the wilful ignorance required to jugde a person, not on their individual character (as Dr. King said), but on their collective affiliation. This is called stereotyping and it is indicative of prejudice.
Read the posts Mr. Ponder. It is evident to me who the real bigot here is.
I’m sorry, Carl, that you can’t see past your nose into the 21st century, but that flag has become a logo of racism just like the swastika. It doesn’t matter who flies it. It’s no different than the logo for a product like Coca-Cola or Pepsi. To the vast majority of people in the United States the Confederate flag is a symbol of racism.
I know you’re new to the site, but here’s a short history of the Confederate flag that I wrote two years ago.
Look, the fact that the Confederate flag has become the equivalent of the swastika in the minds of the vast majority of Americans is not my fault. Even if you were to somehow convince me — presumably by calling me a bigot because I oppose racism — that you’re right, that the Confederate flag has nothing whatsoever to do with racism, that it is really nothing but a noble symbol of the blood sacrifice our ancestors made on the altar of the Southern planter oligarchy — even if I agreed with that, it wouldn’t change the consensus view among regular Americans that the Confederate flag stands for something EVIL.
We deserved to lose that war, Carl. We were wrong to insist on allowing our overlord class, the 5 percent of Southerners who held 99 percent the wealth, to keep millions of our fellow countrymen in bondage. That was EVIL.
The South would be a much worse place today if we had won. We’d be just another Third World country on the doorstep of the United States. We had no industrial infrastructure whatsoever. The war had bankrupted our overlord planter class. The only wealth left was the slaves themselves, but there was no money to feed them or the poor whites or the shopkeeper-teacher-tradesman class like my ancestors. Think about it: If the South had won the war, you’d still be living under Jim Crow today, not even separate but equal, more like Haiti — or who knows, there might even still be slavery in benighted places like South Carolina and Mississippi. Before you howl — think about it. I’m from there, have deep, deep roots there. You know it’s true.
I can’t change what the Confederate flag has come to represent and neither can you. The difference is, I accepted the change long ago — maybe because I left the South when I was 30 years old, which was 25 years ago.
But let’s pursue your argument for a minute — that it is a good thing, a laudable thing, for Americans who live in parts of the United States that were once held by other countries to fly the flag of those countries, even though the United States defeated them, fair and square, in war.
I assume that you and the other neo-Confederates here would stand up and cheer if U.S. citizens in California, Nevada, Arizona and Utah flew the Mexican flag, right?
Jon,
1) You’re correct that the vast majority of Americans view the Confederate Flag as “racist.” That is because the vast majority of Americans have been dumbed down and told what tothink in the (unConstitutional) government indoctrination mills. Think about it- The klan uses the united States flag as much, if not more, than the Confederate Battle flag. The united States flag flew over a vast majority of slave ships. It, being a government flag (unlike the CBF), also flew over the institution of slavery. In fact, the Constitution of the government that the united States flag represents protected slavery. As well, America’s most celebrated President (Lincoln)offered in his First Innaugural Address the Corwin Amendment which would have protected slavery forever. He said he’d be in favor of making it “express and irrevocable.” These views, these representations and American history itself would show clearly that the united States flag is far more representative of “racism” than the soldiers flag which you seek to burn. The “reality” that you point out is based, not on thought or reason, but on perception. You are playing on the ignorance of those who you are trying to persuade in an effort to pursue your own agenda. It is the myrmidons who follow you who cannot see past their own nose……….and you are happy to mislead them.
You said: “The South would be a much worse place today if we had won. We’d be just another Third World country on the doorstep of the United States. We had no industrial infrastructure whatsoever.”
Really? You show your ignorance of economics. Tell me, prior to industrialization, what was the majority of the North? There was no industry, so how did they make a living? By planting? Slavery existed in ALL 13 colonies. The North ended it towards a peaceful movement towards industrialization and only after slavery became no longer profitable for them. They did this by choice, and they left the planter based economy for the purpose of pursuing industry by freedom of choice, and without armed conflict. What you’re telling me is that while they, and numerous other countries throughout history, were capable of this the South was not. The South had to be “conquered” in order to be put on the “right” path. Is that your argument? If it is, then you should be supporting the Republican party who believes in using the same “force” to bring “stability” to all of the other “wayward” countries around the world. You have just stated that “peace and prosperity are spread at gunpoint.” Are you SURE that you’re not a “conservative” Jon?
You said: “But let’s pursue your argument for a minute — that it is a good thing, a laudable thing, for Americans who live in parts of the United States that were once held by other countries to fly the flag of those countries, even though the United States defeated them, fair and square, in war.”
Your argument consists of two parts: (Not to mention that you are back on the conservative mantra of “might makes right.”)
1) You assume that my connction to the South is “geographical.” It is not. Yes, it is my geographical home. But more than that, the South embodies my blood ancestory, my culture and my history.
2) Prior to Lincoln’s war, the South was not “held” by any country. The Southern States, like the Northern, were sovereign. They entered into a voluntary union and adopted a compact with the other States. The Declaration of Independence recognized the right to self-government, and it recognized the right to separate from government that had become destructive of the ends for which it was created. Would you deny this right? Would you take up arms to prevent the separation of a people who no longer wanted to be bound to you? If so, why? Why would YOU advocate “slavery” in this manner? Again, are you certain that you’re not a Republican?
To answer your question- I have no problem with people proudly remembering their Heritage in any way that they see fit. I do not see a Hispanic waving a Mexican flag, or a black man waving the flag of his native ancestry and automatically presume that he is a “racist.” He is proud of his people and his Heritage. What is wrong with that? Again, by presuming to know my answer you have displayed your willingness to stereotype and have once again shown your own propensity towards bigotry. You are making my argument for me.
By the way Jon, you never answered my question- Are black members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans “racists”?
Carl, Are you getting your Civil War history from Fox News?
Industrialization began in the North in the early 19th century and was well underway when the war started. It didn’t become widespread in the the South until well into the 20th century. That is historical fact.
Why was that? Why did it take the South almost a century longer than the North (and most of Europe) to industrialize?
You’re just flat wrong that the southern states were sovereign separate from the United States before the war. There was a time when the states were sovereign, but that was the brief post-colonial period when the Articles of Confederation were in effect. The Articles were found to be unworkable because they allowed state sovereignty. The Constitution was drafted in the late 1780s to fix that by imposing the federal system.
It is also incorrect that the Declaration guaranteed state sovereignty. It was written in 1776 and was directed toward Great Britain. It provided no legal framework for the inner workings of the United States, nor was it intended to.
And calling it “Lincoln’s war” is just silly. No one forced the South to secede, especially not Lincoln. If anything, it was South Carolina’s war. Lincoln was elected in November 1860. South Carolina seceded about six weeks later, on Dec. 20, 1860. By the time Lincoln was inaugurated on March 4, 1861, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, and Louisiana had followed South Carolina off the cliff.
We lost the Civil War fair and square, Carl — 145 years ago. It’s time you and the rest of the neo-Confederates stopped living in a fantasy. There was nothing romantic about life in the plantation South. It was a hard existence for everyone but the tiny cadre of elites who lived off the blood and sweat of the impoverished and enslaved minions.
The early planters, c. 1690s to 1840s, were obviously smart and industrious but their descendants — the ones who had inherited control of the South by the 1850s — were generally as obnoxious and belligerent as they were lazy and useless. When their slaves were forcibly divested by the federal government after 1865, instead of picking themselves up and moving into the Industrial Era they simply gave up and spent the rest of their lives yearning for the past. When they finally faded away, they left nothing for the next generations but ruination, poverty, ignorance and, more than anything else, trouble.
That’s our heritage from them, Carl. Their South is indeed gone with the wind, and good riddance.
And, to answer your question, it does not matter who waves the Confederate flag, or even who wears it as a bikini. It is a symbol of racism in the 21st century. You can call me names and argue with me until the cows come home, but you can’t change that fact.
See, there you go stereotyping again. For the record, I do not watch Fox News. I canno stand Hannity, O’Reilly nor Glenn Beck. I am not a neocon. But, in your bigotted mind, it must be that anyone who disagrees with you must be a “Fox News viewer.” Wrong again. That stereotyping is causing you to find yourself way off base.
As expected, you miss my point. I did not say “when” the North began industrialization. I said they began their move away from slavery around the time of industrialization, because slavery was no longer useful to them. My point was that they began this process through economic choice. By your logic I suppose someone should have “forced” it on them sooner. BTW, in your previous post you said there was “no industrialization in the South.” Really? What is iron manufacturing? We have three antebellum iron manufacturing plants within twent miles of the Birmingham area. The iron which CSS Tennessee was forged at one of them. What about the CSS Hunley? Did invention of this require industrialization? How about the iron clads? The point is that,yes, the South was BEHIND the North in industrialization, but it was not completely devoid of it. which tells me that WHEN DECIDED by a free market economy (not an invading Army) the South could have and would have moved towards that economic system.
You act as though military invasion was necessary to bring it about. Again, are you Republican? This is the same mind-set that justifies (in their mind) the invasion of Iraq. If the shoe fits…….
I did not say that the Declaration of Independence was a legal document. I said that it recognized the right to self government and separation. The Constitution was built around that basic framework.
I’m flat wrong on the sovereignty of the Southern States? Are you sure? This would be news to Thomas Jefferson who in his Kentucky Resolution of 1798 said the following:
“Resolved, that the several States composing the United States of America, are not united on the principles of unlimited submission to their General Government; but that by compact under the style and title of a Constitution For the United States and of amendments thereto, they constituted a General Government for special purposes, delegated to that Government certain definite powers, reserving each State to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self Government; and that whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force.”
Likewise, each State in ratifying (notice I said STATES Ratifying, not the “whole people”) did so with the agreement that a Bill of Rights, and specifically the 9th & 10th Amendments, would be added. This was to ensure the retention of State sovereignty. Without the promise of the 10th Amendment specifically, and the Bill of Rights in general, not a single State would have ratified the Constitution.
New York and Virginia stated in their Ratification Agreements that they retained the right to withdraw from the union if remaining a part of it became injurious to their people.
Every Commander of the Union Army who graduated West Point was taught from a book By William Rawles (A View of the Constitution) that membership in the union was voluntary, and that secession was a right.
Abraham Lincoln himself said the following in Congress in 1848:
“Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right – a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world. Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people, that can, may revolutionize, and make their own of so much of the territory as they inhabit.”
Above and beyond all of this, you would have me to believe that the same founders who departed England by act of separation then turned around and created a national union from which they had no departure? Do you think they had learned NOTHING from their own experiences?
In your recollection of the States seceding you left something out- Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina and Arkansas had decided NOT to secede. They changed their position when Lincoln called for 75,000 troops for the purpose of invading the South and forcing them back into the union. They wbere incensed, as were many Northerners, that a president would deny this fundamental right.
The States entered a voluntary union. A few short decades later, they chose to separate. Their history, their Founders, their ratification documents, and even the incoming President had indicated that doing so was their right. They sought peaceful relations with the united States. they even offered to purchase the federal forts still in their territory. They desired self government. By attempting to attain it, they were invaded by a foreign Army. And when asked by Horace Greely “Why not let the South go in peace” Lincoln replied “I cannot let them go. who would pay for the government.” Yes, I’d say it was Lincoln’s war.
Let’s consider this from another angle-
Do you lament the departure of Poland, Georgia, East Germany, and others from the “soviet” union? If not, why not? If so, then you would agree with me that they had a right to self-government and sovereignty. Why then would you deny this to ANY OTHER country?
As to your last paragraph- No, to YOU it is a symbol of racism. You would have me to simply accept YOUR definition and move on. It is not my choice to do so. But, rather than allow me the freedom of choice to honor and acknowlege my own history, you would seek to demean my choice, burn the symbol of my heritage, lampoon my opinion and besmirch my heritage…….because YOU don’t like it. Again sir, it is readily apparent who the bigot is in this conversation.