Confederate Flag (stickers etc...boo)

[rkmsuf]

what is there to be proud about...they lost.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Bo Jackson's Hip

The main thing that I'd like to broach here is that all of us that support what the flag means to us (meaning JoninMiddleGA and some others) are not a bunch of knuckledragging, jean short wearing, Red Man chewing necks. I just refuse to not honor my ancestors because they supposedly were treasonous as some here have said. Blood is thicker than water. I wish I lived in a world that people were taken at face value, instead of stereotypes that try to impose their will upon me and make me ashamed of things that I'm clearly not of.

Someone asked me a few threads back if I flew the flag. I don't, but I'd like to if the "world" were different. If I flew the flag, I'd be stereotyped as a racist dirtbag, even though nothing could be further from the truth.

It is certainly a shame that by flying a flag you're obviously fond of and proud of some people could infer that you are a "racist dirtbag," but I don't think that people drawing inferences from symbols is part of the "world" being messed up or anything. It has nothing to do with being "PC" or overly sensitive in the "modern world." People have inferred things from symbols for ages across all cultures. It's just human nature. Even animals can see certain things (colors, shapes, objects) and infer something from them. The problem with the "world" is that some ignorant, racist dirtbags stole your symbol and adopted it to stand for their hate-filled ideas. That such people should not exist is what we should be hoping was different about the "world".

[KWhit]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

The problem with the "world" is that some ignorant, racist dirtbags stole your symbol and adopted it to stand for their hate-filled ideas. That such people should not exist is what we should be hoping was different about the "world".

Outstanding point. You're right on.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by rkmsuf

what is there to be proud about...they lost.

I dunno. The people of Philadelphia seemed awfully proud of Rocky after he lost his first title match against Apollo Creed.

[WSUCougar]

A few comments:

1. The flag in question was a battle flag in a failed rebellion. You can call the Confederacy whatever you want, and this has been argued since the first day of its existence, but no matter how distasteful it may be, that's the reality. As such, the flag historically represents (on one level) rebellion in general and against the federal government in particular. Nothing changes that fact.

2. The entity that the flag represents was based upon the institution of slavery. Slavery was the root cause of its existence. Again, as distasteful as this may be, it is a historical fact.

3. The vast majority of 19th century white Americans were racist. The issue of slavery was largely an economic, societal, and political wedge driven between northern and southern societies - and not so much a moral one.

4. Southern "Lost Cause" historians had a huge impact in terms of how Americans viewed the Civil War and the Confederacy. This, American racism, and the overall backlash of failed Reconstruction policies led to a glorification of Confederate icons, including the flag.

5. Does pride in something (anything) trump any adverse effects that thing might cause?

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by WSUCougar

A few comments:


2. The entity that the flag represents was based upon the institution of slavery. Slavery was the root cause of its existence. Again, as distasteful as this may be, it is a historical fact.

I've been trying to stay out of this discussion, but i wanted to call-out this point that several others have echoed....

I think that Bucc (as far as I know, he most knowledgeable on the board in Civil War history) would agree with me here..

This is a MAJOR oversimplification... in fact, many historians of late have made the argument that slavory was a relatively minor part in why the South seceded and why the Civil War happened...

[WSUCougar]

Originally Posted by wade moore

I've been trying to stay out of this discussion, but i wanted to call-out this point that several others have echoed....

I think that Bucc (as far as I know, he most knowledgeable on the board in Civil War history) would agree with me here..

This is a MAJOR oversimplification... in fact, many historians of late have made the argument that slavory was a relatively minor part in why the South seceded and why the Civil War happened...

I would offer up myself as something of a Civil War historian, and I would strongly disagree with your assessment.

[rkmsuf]

Originally Posted by WSUCougar

I would offer up myself as something of a Civil War historian, and I would strongly disagree with your assessment.

do you consider yourself a "buff"?

[Klinglerware]

Originally Posted by rkmsuf

do you consider yourself a "buff"?

WSUCougar's grad school work in American Military History is certainly nothing to sneeze at...

[rkmsuf]

I've never understood that phrase. What exactly DO you sneeze at? Who sneezes at anything?

[WSUCougar]

Originally Posted by rkmsuf

do you consider yourself a "buff"?

No, I'm fully clothed.

[Subby]

Ah-choo.

[Raiders Army]

I thought the war was about taxation without representation? Didn't the North try to tax the slaves the South had and then they dumped a bunch of slaves off Myrtle Beach saying they wouldn't take President Lincoln's taxes? Therefore, the war was essentially about slavery, but more concerned with taxes.

The reason why the North won was because Lincoln was honest about the reason to tax slavery...much like certain luxury items today are taxed (alcohol, cigarettes, prostitution). Lincoln was so honest that when he was a little boy he cut down a cherry tree and was asked if he cut it down. He replied, "I cannot tell a lie. I cut down the cherry tree." Thus, he was forevermore known as "Honest Abe".

And yes, I consider myself a "buff".

[Buccaneer]

Originally Posted by Klinglerware

WSUCougar's grad school work in American Military History is certainly nothing to sneeze at...

I agree.

So much to respond to, but not right now.

[JW]

Originally Posted by Buccaneer

We had sorely missed your wisdom and reasoned historical perspective around here, JW. Welcome back.

Well, I'm not sure how reasonable I am, but thanks. The problem was that the forum for a while just got very juvenile in my opinion. I don't mean that in a bad way at all. It just seemed like it was mostly high school kids posting, and I just found little to interest me. Now I've come back and taken a look at some of the threads (instead of just looking for FOF and other game info) and found some mature and interesting (to me) discussions again.

[AZSpeechCoach]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

Lincoln was so honest that when he was a little boy he cut down a cherry tree and was asked if he cut it down. He replied, "I cannot tell a lie. I cut down the cherry tree." Thus, he was forevermore known as "Honest Abe".

Wow...my head just exploded.

I think you have your Rushmore Presidents confused.


edit: I hope I just missed the sarcasm...it's been a long day.

[Adamski47]

Originally Posted by GoldenEagle

Are people who fly the confederate flag worse than thieves?

http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~fof/foru...ad.php?t=24214

I've never tried to edit that message or delete it. I do not understand why you would think I am embarrassed of that thread. I've never stolen anything so before you start slandering my name check your facts. You don't know every story to be told. Go call your long distance relationship gf...that's what you should be worrying about in respect to thievery.

[WSUCougar]

Originally Posted by wade moore

This is a MAJOR oversimplification... in fact, many historians of late have made the argument that slavory was a relatively minor part in why the South seceded and why the Civil War happened...

Okay, let's discuss this further.

Would you agree that slavery was the economic foundation of the regions that became the Confederacy?

Would you agree that the institution of slavery had been a divisive (actually, perhaps the most divisive) issue in American politics since it had been danced around and finally shoved under the carpet at the Constitutional Convention?

Do you consider it merely coincidental that the two sides were divided between slave states and free states, with three very crucial border slave states in the mix?

What do you make of the multitude of statements by secessionists, Confederate leaders, including Southern ministers, who not only admitted that slavery was the foundation of the Confederacy but TRUMPETED the fact and regularly reinforced it to the Confederate populace?

As but one of many available examples, here's the Mississippi "Causes of Secession"

A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of the State of Mississippi from the Federal Union.

In the momentous step which our State has taken of dissolving its connection with the government of which we so long formed a part, it is but just that we should declare the prominent reasons which have induced our course. Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world.

Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin.

That we do not overstate the dangers to our institution, a reference to a few facts will sufficiently prove.

The hostility to this institution commenced before the adoption of the Constitution, and was manifested in the well-known Ordinance of 1787, in regard to the Northwestern Territory.

The feeling increased, until, in 1819-20, it deprived the South of more than half the vast territory acquired from France.

The same hostility dismembered Texas and seized upon all the territory acquired from Mexico.

It has grown until it denies the right of property in slaves, and refuses protection to that right on the high seas, in the Territories, and wherever the government of the United States had jurisdiction.

It refuses the admission of new slave States into the Union, and seeks to extinguish it by confining it within its present limits, denying the power of expansion.

It tramples the original equality of the South under foot.

It has nullified the Fugitive Slave Law in almost every free State in the Union, and has utterly broken the compact which our fathers pledged their faith to maintain.

It advocates negro equality, socially and politically, and promotes insurrection and incendiarism in our midst.

It has enlisted its press, its pulpit and its schools against us, until the whole popular mind of the North is excited and inflamed with prejudice.

It has made combinations and formed associations to carry out its schemes of emancipation in the States and wherever else slavery exists.

It seeks not to elevate or to support the slave, but to destroy his present condition without providing a better.

It has invaded a State, and invested with the honors of martyrdom the wretch whose purpose was to apply flames to our dwellings, and the weapons of destruction to our lives.

It has broken every compact into which it has entered for our security.

It has given indubitable evidence of its design to ruin our agriculture, to prostrate our industrial pursuits and to destroy our social system.

It knows no relenting or hesitation in its purposes; it stops not in its march of aggression, and leaves us no room to hope for cessation or for pause.

It has recently obtained control of the Government, by the prosecution of its unhallowed schemes, and destroyed the last expectation of living together in friendship and brotherhood.

Utter subjugation awaits us in the Union, if we should consent longer to remain in it. It is not a matter of choice, but of necessity. We must either submit to degradation, and to the loss of property worth four billions of money, or we must secede from the Union framed by our fathers, to secure this as well as every other species of property. For far less cause than this, our fathers separated from the Crown of England.

Our decision is made. We follow their footsteps. We embrace the alternative of separation; and for the reasons here stated, we resolve to maintain our rights with the full consciousness of the justice of our course, and the undoubting belief of our ability to maintain it.

[GoldenEagle]

Originally Posted by Adamski47

I've never tried to edit that message or delete it. I do not understand why you would think I am embarrassed of that thread. I've never stolen anything so before you start slandering my name check your facts. You don't know every story to be told. Go call your long distance relationship gf...that's what you should be worrying about in respect to thievery.

As I type this, my girlfriend is over my shoulder reading it. Go figure. We lived together for the past year or so and have been going to the same school (actually her school is 30 minutes away now) for the past three years.

You can not edit or delete the thread because it is locked.

You are the self-admitted scrub. There is also several other threads you have started that are related to getting free e-licences and cheating the system.

Personally, I think you are grasping for straws.

[WSUCougar]

GE, are you shop-lifting the pooty?

[ISiddiqui]

I just refuse to not honor my ancestors because they supposedly were treasonous as some here have said. Blood is thicker than water.

The problem with this argument is what about former Iranians who want to display the Ayatollah Khomenai, saying 'blood is thicker than water' and not because of the whole Death to America thing.

I wouldn't honor my ancestors that supported causes I consider repugnant.

[Adamski47]

Originally Posted by GoldenEagle

As I type this, my girlfriend is over my shoulder reading it. Go figure. We lived together for the past year or so and have been going to the same school (actually her school is 30 minutes away now) for the past three years.

You can not edit or delete the thread because it is locked.

You are the self-admitted scrub. There is also several other threads you have started that are related to getting free e-licences and cheating the system.

Personally, I think you are grasping for straws.

I think you are missing the point because I probably haven't explained myself enough. I'm not saying this to be macho or manly or anything but I do not care what people on a video game football site think of me. I am a name. I really really don't. I know that sounds harsh but it's the truth. I don't mean any disrespect to anyone not even you, but I just don't care. Why would I? None of my friends or family are part of this forum etc and I use it basically as my source for news (how sad is that?). I like to comment and answer a few questions here and there and for the most part enjoy the banter and wit I see everyday. I never look at names to see who posts what.

I know there is a huge community here that is very tight on this board and that is cool and for all I know you are the president. I do not need this forum to feel loved and to be quite honest, no one should.

That is my gripe. Just quit throwing things into a discussion that do not matter-that's all. I will just leave it at that as I've said my piece. This thread was simply about a dude I saw on the freeway who had a flag sticker on his car that made me sick. I wrote the message the way I did because that was how I felt. Plain and simple. I wasn't literally yelling at my cpu or anything, I wrote it hours later. Anyway, no one really cares so I'll just stop.

Now I am done with this thread because I'm sick of writing replies! See everyone around. Enjoy.

[Raiders Army]

Originally Posted by AZSpeechCoach

Wow...my head just exploded.

I think you have your Rushmore Presidents confused.


edit: I hope I just missed the sarcasm...it's been a long day.

I was trying for humor, not sarcasm. Obviously I failed.

[Bo Jackson's Hip]

Originally Posted by ISiddiqui

I wouldn't honor my ancestors that supported causes I consider repugnant.

Then in my best southern colloquialism (sp) "You just ain't like me, then."

[ISiddiqui]

Well what about my hypo. Say I had ancestors that were terrorists. If I honored them would you be saying the same things about blood being thicker than water?

[Buccaneer]

Going back 7 generations (which for most of us, would take you to the late 1700s), you would have about 250 direct ancestors. Counting spouses and siblings, that number goes up to well over 1000. With that much blood, one should always expect good and bad.

[AZSpeechCoach]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

I was trying for humor, not sarcasm. Obviously I failed.

I guess the rest of the thread made me unlikely to pick up on humor. Looking back on it, it is pretty funny.

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by WSUCougar

Okay, let's discuss this further.

Would you agree that slavery was the economic foundation of the regions that became the Confederacy?

Would you agree that the institution of slavery had been a divisive (actually, perhaps the most divisive) issue in American politics since it had been danced around and finally shoved under the carpet at the Constitutional Convention?

Do you consider it merely coincidental that the two sides were divided between slave states and free states, with three very crucial border slave states in the mix?

What do you make of the multitude of statements by secessionists, Confederate leaders, including Southern ministers, who not only admitted that slavery was the foundation of the Confederacy but TRUMPETED the fact and regularly reinforced it to the Confederate populace?

As but one of many available examples, here's the Mississippi "Causes of Secession"

Alright.. I went back looking for this because I realized I hadn't read any replies to my statements...

So... Let me start by saying I think I'm pretty clearly out-classed in Civil War History knowledge by you, so keep that in mind with my feeble attempts to remember what was discussed in my Civil War class in college...

I do not disagree with this statement:

Would you agree that slavery was the economic foundation of the regions that became the Confederacy?

And in the end, this may be a matter of semantics.. but... This is actually the beginning to my argument that in reality the disagreement was around the North's efforts to tell the South how they could and could not make a living. This was not just shown by the disagreement on slavery, but also by some inordinate taxes (unfortunately I'm at work so I do not have my Civil War books with me, but I believe the South Carolina Succession that triggered it all was a relatively immediate reaction to one of these new tax laws?), interstate commerce laws that benefited the North, and a perception that they had no control in the federal government (and by that same note were being controlled by Northerners who ran the federal government).

As to this statement:

What do you make of the multitude of statements by secessionists, Confederate leaders, including Southern ministers, who not only admitted that slavery was the foundation of the Confederacy but TRUMPETED the fact and regularly reinforced it to the Confederate populace?

I don't make much of this. Why did we go to war with Iraq? Not to get into a political discussion about that, but you could edit this statement for the War in Iraq and say:

What do you make of the multitude of statements by conservatives, Republican leaders, including the White House, who not only admitted that WMD was the foundation of the War but TRUMPETED the fact and regularly reinforced it to the American populace?

I think there are enough intellectuals that would agree that this it is at least questionable whether this was the true motivation. The fact that leaders who were trying to get the populace to support the war say that this is the reason, means little to what the real reason was. I do not disagree that the average farmer felt that Slavery was the reason for the seccession, but I do disagree that the leaders that actually made the seccession happen did it merely to keep slavery. If I had more time/resources I could find many leaders in private letters, journals, etc. that did not support slavery but supported the war (Robert E Lee for instance), what would you say to that?


It's possible this should be moved to another thread if you want to really get in-depth about this.. it is a topic I find interesting and has me sparked to pick up some more Civil War literature as it is by far my favorite piece of history to study, but I have done little with it since my last course on it 4 or 5 years ago...

[JW]

I thought this story about divisions in the Sons of Confederate Veterans would be interesting to those interested in this thread.

As for my own views, I think people today get too easily offended about too many things in America. We are becoming the nation of the perpetually offended. The best way for people who don't like public displays of the Confederate flag to combat it would be to ignore it. By focusing attention on it, you aren't going to make people stop doing it. You will just make them more determined. However, I do think the Confederate flag should come down from state flags and statehouses, etc.

I think there is nothing at all wrong with being proud of a Confederate ancestor. I have several, one who died at Antietam, one wounded and captured on the 2nd day at Gettysburg (cousins, if you will), and my great-great-grandfather who fought as a cavalry captain in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Alabama. I have a couple of Civil War prints featuring Confederate soldiers and the Confederate battle flag in my family room. I would never personally publicly display a Confederate flag, though. I think at this point in history it sends the wrong signal to too many people. But that is strictly a personal decision.

The causes of the Civil War are so complex, and the reasons people fought are so complex, that it is not possible to say Confederate soldiers fought for slavery, though some did. Lee, for example, thought slavery was morally wrong and that secession was a stupid idea, but he ended up fighting for Virginia and the Confederacy. And some slaveowners fought for the North.

BTW, I disagree with those who say slavery was only a minor part of the causes of the war. It was THE catalyst. It was the one question that everyone dwelled on in the years leading up to the war. But it was not the only cause.

Finally, I think when civil rights activists (or hucksters) focus their efforts on the removal of this or that flag here or there, they are doing absolutely nothing to improve the lot of minorities. If all the Confederate flags came down everywhere, it doesn't do a damned thing for poor minority communities. But these issues do draw media attention and funding to the hucksters.

Now to that article, which says a lot about the symbols of this particular organization.

http://www.nola.com/newsflash/nation...ylist=national

Southern heritage group faces division
7/22/2005, 3:29 p.m. CT
By ROSE FRENCH
The Associated Press

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Even as it comes together for its annual convention, the most prominent Southern heritage group finds itself a house divided between old-style preservationists and new leaders who see Confederate symbols as a political cause.

The Sons of Confederate Veterans has been taken over in recent years by a more confrontational wing — including some with alleged ties to hate and white-separatist groups — that wants to be more aggressive about responding to perceived assaults on Southern symbols such as the Confederate flag.

"It is becoming more activist, but it's in tatters," said Heidi Beirich, spokeswoman for the Southern Poverty Law Center, an Alabama-based nonprofit that monitors hate groups.

Traditionalists have accused the new leadership of racism and political extremism, saying a number of members have ties to the League of the South, which calls for another secession of Southern states, and the white-supremacist Council of Conservative Citizens....

[Easy Mac]

One of the guys from the group trying to make it into a separatist group is now the head of like the Charleston County school district and is on the Southern Poverty laws top 50 list or something like that.... got to love the South!

[wade moore]

Bumping for WSU to see since he appears to not check on the weekends...

[WSUCougar]

Originally Posted by wade moore

Bumping for WSU to see since he appears to not check on the weekends...

I did see your response, Wade, thanks. I'll try to respond a bit later when I have more time.

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by WSUCougar

I did see your response, Wade, thanks. I'll try to respond a bit later when I have more time.

NP.. I know I'm going to lose out in the end, but my knowledge will be better for it.

[WSUCougar]

Not sure this makes any headway or not, but here's a few more comments for discussion:

I do not disagree with this statement:

Would you agree that slavery was the economic foundation of the regions that became the Confederacy?

And in the end, this may be a matter of semantics.. but... This is actually the beginning to my argument that in reality the disagreement was around the North's efforts to tell the South how they could and could not make a living. This was not just shown by the disagreement on slavery, but also by some inordinate taxes (unfortunately I'm at work so I do not have my Civil War books with me, but I believe the South Carolina Succession that triggered it all was a relatively immediate reaction to one of these new tax laws?), interstate commerce laws that benefited the North, and a perception that they had no control in the federal government (and by that same note were being controlled by Northerners who ran the federal government).

Okay, I understand that you are in part agreeing with this point, but also (and please correct me if I’m misrepresenting you) your response regarding over-simplification of the issue was to my statement:

The entity that the flag represents was based upon the institution of slavery. Slavery was the root cause of its existence.

I am saying (above) that the Confederate States of America were founded with slavery as the defining component, and with slavery as the impetus for their creation. The issue of no control in the Federal government is indeed a crucial one, but that stems from the whole “economic differences” issue that divided North and South from the beginning. And those economic differences split out in large part based upon the institution of slavery. I think most of the other laws and issues are corollaries of this. You can’t ignore the fact that slavery dominated the southern economy and society. The line separating free states and slave states defined our nation’s political spectrum for a century (and some would say even longer than that).

As to this statement:

What do you make of the multitude of statements by secessionists, Confederate leaders, including Southern ministers, who not only admitted that slavery was the foundation of the Confederacy but TRUMPETED the fact and regularly reinforced it to the Confederate populace?

I don't make much of this. Why did we go to war with Iraq? Not to get into a political discussion about that, but you could edit this statement for the War in Iraq and say:

What do you make of the multitude of statements by conservatives, Republican leaders, including the White House, who not only admitted that WMD was the foundation of the War but TRUMPETED the fact and regularly reinforced it to the American populace?

I think there are enough intellectuals that would agree that this it is at least questionable whether this was the true motivation. The fact that leaders who were trying to get the populace to support the war say that this is the reason, means little to what the real reason was.

I’d have to say that you are comparing apples to oranges with the war in Iraq situation. Our current government made the decision for war in Iraq (and I don’t want to get into that, either) and explained it to the American public accordingly. In the 1860-61 southern states, delegates were elected to conventions to vote on secession. In some states – North Carolina, for example – there was significant sentiment among the citizenry not to secede. And some states – Virginia, for example – were less inclined to secede until Lincoln made it clear he did not recognize secession as anything but rebellion and intended to put it down. But if you’re suggesting that the powers-that-be put one over on the masses to sell them on war, I think that’s incorrect.

Certainly there was an elite class in the south who dictated much of the policy at the state level, and many of them were powerful advocates of both slavery and secession. They were the ones who stood to lose the most if slavery were to be abolished.

I do not disagree that the average farmer felt that Slavery was the reason for the seccession, but I do disagree that the leaders that actually made the seccession happen did it merely to keep slavery.

So you feel that Lincoln’s election – which was the final straw to most secessionists – in 1860 did not threaten them mostly in that manner? I’m not saying the causes and issues you’ve raised as alternates to slavery are not pertinent, but I am saying that they derive from slavery and its role as the economic foundation of the south.

Events throughout the first half of the 19th century merely put off the climactic battle over slavery that must eventually occur, one way or another. The Missouri Compromise of 1820, which establishes Missouri as a slave state but prohibits slavery in new territories north of Missouri’s southern borderline. The Compromise of 1850 and the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, which among other things allowed voters in new territories to decide by “popular sovereignty” on slavery. But the two political positions – pro-slavery and anti-slavery – can never be compatible, because support of one by nature threatens the other. By 1860 the writing is on the wall.

If I had more time/resources I could find many leaders in private letters, journals, etc. that did not support slavery but supported the war (Robert E Lee for instance), what would you say to that?

I think that’s irrelevant to the argument. I can also find many proponents of slavery that fought for the Union. None of which changes the fact that the CSA was founded upon the institution of slavery and that slavery was the root cause of its existence.

I think the inherent stigma attached to slavery compels people to look for other, more noble foundations for the Confederacy. Yet slavery was what divided the south from the rest of the Union. It is what was confronted our nation’s leaders from the very beginning.

[Fritz]

Originally Posted by rkmsuf

do you consider yourself a "buff"?

i would

[rkmsuf]

Originally Posted by Fritz

i would

no that was "a buff"


not buff

[JPhillips]

Let me add to WSU. These are just a few quotes fro secession commisioners. They all come from the fabulous little book Apostles of Disunion. If I had time I could pull dozens of these type of quotes.

Mississippi's commissioner to Georgia closed his statement with,
"Sink or swim, live or die, survive or perish, the part of Mississippi is chosen, she will never submit to this Black Republican Administration.
She had rather see the last of her race, men, women, and children, immolated in one common funeral pile, than see them subjected to the degradation of civil, political and social equality with the negro race."

Alabama's commissioner to Delaware said that Lincoln sought,
"the establishment of an equality of races in our midst."

Georgia's commissioner to Virginia stated the reason for Georgia's secession,
"This reason may be summed up in a single proposition. It was a conviction, a deep conviction on the part of Georgia, that a seperation from the North was the only thing that could prevent the abolition of slavery."

Prominent Southern orator John Preston Smith said in 1861,
"the conflict between slavery and non-slavery is a conflict for life and death."

[JW]

Maury Klein's Days of Defiance: Sumter, Secession, and the Coming of the Civil War is an excellent book about the events leading up to the war.

One quote from that book regarding a speech by Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens in March 1861:

The old Constitution, he asserted, "rested upon the assumption of the equality of the races....It was a sandy foundation." The cornerstone of the new government "rests up on the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that Slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition. This, our new Government, is the first in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral taruth."

Lincoln himself is quoted in his first inaugural address:

"One section of our country believes slavery is right, and ought to be extended, while the other believes it is wrong, and ought not be be extended. This is the only substantial dispute."


I believe that the people who actually took part in the events knew better than we did what the conflict was about. It was clearly about slavery. It is too simple to say it was only about slavery, but slavery was the issue that could not be solved short of war and that split the country.

But I also believe most Confederate soldiers did not fight to preserve slavery. The fought in defense of their states and homes, however misguided they might be. And I see no paradox in condemning those who advocated slavery while honoring the courage of my Confederate ancestors. After all, slavery was the law of the land in the United States of America until the Civil War changed that.

[kcchief19]

Related back to the very first post in this thread, I was behind a Silverado extended supercab with a confederate flag decal filling the entire rear window.

That wasn't what caught my attention. The attention grabber was the bumper sticker with a confederate flag on it with these words next to it:

Fighting Terrorism Since 1861

The only thing going through my mind was, "I don't think that flag means what you think it does. Or you really, really hate America."

[Toddzilla]

what better racism or treason?

[OldGiants]

Originally Posted by rkmsuf

what is there to be proud about...they lost.

Spoken like a true Patriot('s fan).


Me? I'm like Lincoln. Now that it's back in the Union I'm going to whistle 'Dixie' and take a drive down Monument Avenue (in Richmond) and look at the world's largest collection of second place trophies.

[miked]

The other day I was in Decatur and saw a truck with a big sticker that had the US Flag and the Confederate flag next to each other. It said, American by birth, Southern by the grace of God.

[ISiddiqui]

Originally Posted by Toddzilla

what better racism or treason?

[duckman]

[Crapshoot]

Nice, Duckman.

Me, my views haven't changed - its a symbol of a racist, repulsive government set up to defend one of the most vile institutions in our history. We don't tell German soldiers who fought in WW II that flying the Nazi flag is A-okay; treating the Confederacy as a bunch of honorable "good ol boys" doesn't fly either. Treat them as the adults they were.

[Dutch]

Originally Posted by Crapshoot

Nice, Duckman.

Me, my views haven't changed - its a symbol of a racist, repulsive government set up to defend one of the most vile institutions in our history. We don't tell German soldiers who fought in WW II that flying the Nazi flag is A-okay; treating the Confederacy as a bunch of honorable "good ol boys" doesn't fly either. Treat them as the adults they were.

You better ban the American Flag while your at it. Unlike the Germans and their crimes of the Nazi Era, we endorsed slavery long before the Confederates ever did and endorsed criminal action long after the Confederates were gone.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Dutch

You better ban the American Flag while your at it. Unlike the Germans and their crimes of the Nazi Era, we endorsed slavery long before the Confederates ever did and endorsed criminal action long after the Confederates were gone.

I agreed. And this should be our new flag:

[Dutch]

Makes the Confederate Flag seem more appealing, suddenly.

[molson]

Originally Posted by Dutch

You better ban the American Flag while your at it. Unlike the Germans and their crimes of the Nazi Era, we endorsed slavery long before the Confederates ever did and endorsed criminal action long after the Confederates were gone.

We also slaughtered Indians, withheld syphilis treatment for blacks in the name of medical experimentation, tortured prisoners, sponsored killings of civilians throughout the world, and so forth.

I still love America and am thankful I live here, but let's not go overboard on the morality trip.

[Crapshoot]

Originally Posted by Dutch

You better ban the American Flag while your at it. Unlike the Germans and their crimes of the Nazi Era, we endorsed slavery long before the Confederates ever did and endorsed criminal action long after the Confederates were gone.

Who the fuck said anything about banning it? Its a disgusting symbol that the state shouldn't endorse, but people are free to do what they want. I'm sure you can continue to fly yours Dutch - wouldn't want to change that for the world.