Replying to a message of Bob Klahn to Bob Ackley:

 BA>>>> Replying to a message of Earl Croasmun to Bob Ackley:

 EC>>>>> Since the Emancipation Proclamation was issued as
an executive
 EC>>>>> order, I would still feel that they have been
around for a while.

 BA>>>> That proclamation was only in effect for those areas not
 BA>>>> under the control of the US government.  It did not affect
 BA>>>> slaves in Maryland, for instance.  It was also
 BA>>>> unConstitutional - as was Mr. Lincoln's war.

 BK>>>  Was it? Where is it forbidden?

 BA>> There is *nothing* in the Constitution that requires *any*
 BA>> state to remain in the union.  The act of forcing any state
 BA>> to remain in the union has no support in the Constitution.
 BA>> This country has not had a federal government since 1865,
 BA>> it has had a *national* government - and there's a whale of
 BA>> a difference between the two.

 BK>  You ever think about this? There is no constitutional standard
 BK>  for what is a basis for war. All it takes is a congressional
 BK>  declaration.

 BK>  And once the South left the union the Union had the
 BK>  constitutional right to declare war for any reason they chose.
 BK>  But to do that they would have to recognize that the South had
 BK>  effectively left the union.

Point is that the north claimed that the southern states could not leave the
union.  Therefore under that reasoning, after the southern states' senators
and representatives left Washington the congress could not convene a quorum,
and nothing they did was Constitutional.

Not many people comment on that or on the fact that those states that could
not leave the union were required to apply to be readmitted to that same union
after they lost the war.  A logical absurdity.

 BK>  So, the war was not unconstitutional, if it was declared. And if  the
 BK> south was merely in rebellion, and war was not declared,  then it was
 BK> not unconstitutional, as it was suppression of  rebellion, not war.

Since by its own words (that states could not leave the union) the congress did
not have a quorum, any such declaration is invalid.

Also note that the southern states were not in rebellion, that pesky Tenth Amendment
reserves to the states the power to walk away from the feds.

 BK>  Since the constitution does provide for the suppression of
 BK>  insurrection, then if the South was held to be in insurrection,
 BK>  then the suppression was constitutional. The 14th amendment
 BK>  makes clear that the secession was considered an insurrection.

The 14th Amendment was passed after the north won.

 BK>>>  Arguing whether it's constitutional is often a way of avoiding
 BK>>>  the question of was it the right thing to do.

Slavery is inherently uneconomical and would have died out by the end of the
1800s, because most of the jobs slaves had been doing were being done by 
machines by then.  Freeing the slaves would have happened anyway, Lincoln's
unConstitutional little war only speeded it up by 35-40 years, and killed 300,000
people in the process - and also resulted in 150 (and counting) years of enmity
in some areas.

--- FleetStreet 1.19+