The Way One’s Mind Works …

Mike Lamb believes that my post discussing secession as a reasonable response offers members of the Southern Heritage Preservation Group an ideal opportunity to trap me … whatever that means.

However for their side, the enemy, he is a “great” historian.  It is for the sake of showing them ALL to be wrong, that their agenda, their teaching of revisionist history is wrong, and that such is destroying not only us but also others, that is the reason to confront him. Plus at the same time it exonerates our ancestors and what they claimed, fought and died for.

Uh-huh.

Was Secession a Reasonable Response?

A comment left today on this blog causes me to raise what I think is an interesting question: was secession a reasonable act?

I say yes.

Why?  Simple.  Secessionists made it very clear that their primary purpose in seeking separation and independence was the protection of slavery.  They well understood that so long as they remained in the Union, history was turning against them.  They understood that Lincoln’s reassurances that he would not attack slavery had nothing to do with the fact that slavery as an institution was more vulnerable with the presidency in the hands of Republicans than of Democrats (and, after Stephen Douglas’s waffling on the issue of slavery’s expansion, they were none too sure about the reliability of northern Democrats, either, which explains the walkout of the fire-eaters at the 1860 Democratic convention).

News and Notes: September 23, 2012

A tour across the net reveals news and views of note:

• At Civil War Emancipation, Don Shaffer weighs the impact of the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation and surveys what other historians said this week about September 22, 1862.
• At Yesterday … and Today, Bob Pollack offers his reservations about an 1885 interview with Mary Robinson, who was a slave of Ulysses S. Grant’s father-in-law.
• Kevin Levin marks the passing of Marc Ferguson, a blogger as well as a commenter on many blogs and discussion groups.