Thursday, December 8, 2011
Rights
Lincoln argued that the Civil War was not possible and that the Confederate States seceding from the Union was impossible on the grounds that he felt that it was impossible to leave the Union. Fighting against an oppressive leadership and breaking free to form your own government. Sounds familiar right. This is what the South felt they were doing and it is exactly what the original 13 colonies did when they created the United States of America. Is Lincoln's faith in the Union blinding him from the fact that at any point a government can be toppled, just as was done with the American Revolution?
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It is important to understand that Lincoln's decision not to recognize the Confederacy, to speak instead only of opposing an insurgency or rebellion, reflects no incapacity or misunderstanding on his part. It was, rather, a very carefully calculated legal formulation. As he argues explicitly, for example, the analogy with the American revolution is weak, since the states did not pre-exist the Union but were created as such in its foundation.
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