The South

I affirm, should the southern states be allowed to secede.

Definitions:

Should: Provided by the 1822 dicitonary that the States would have been should denotes
obligation, duty or determination.

Framework: Judges. Dont be biased. Vote on who DEBATES the best in the
round. Judge this round as a blank slate. You shouldnt judge this on anything
that either side doesnt bring up on the table. Its called the burden of Proof. We
only need to be evaluating in this round if secession was legal itself. If you hear
the word slavery put your pen down. It is irrelevant.
 Rule of Law
South has the legal right to secede. The north, Lincoln, cannot stop this without
breaking his law, which would put the Union team into a bind. If they open their
mouths then you evaluate the point that Lincoln can only stop this illegally, and then
that gives states the right to secede and fight against the corrupt USFG under the US
constitution
This union was widely understood by both the states and the federal
government to be voluntary, and the Constitution was interpreted to reinforce
this perspective. At the same time, the founding fathers, particularly Thomas
Jefferson, recognized the states' right to secede. Although he did not advocate the
exercise of that right, he acknowledged that the entitlement remained with the
states and was a right that continued throughout the Constitution and the
Declaration of Independence. The concept of states' rights, which formed the
foundation of any right or entitlement to secede, was well-grounded in the
founding documents of the United States, although the entitlement to act upon
these rights remains a contentious issue. Further complicating the question of
states' rights is the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution, which states that the
powers that are neither delegated to the states nor prohibited from the states
remain the states'.

Abraham Lincoln, who was the USFG under definition, committed an illegal act. The
supreme court proves

Taneys ruling in ex parte Merryman criticized the Lincoln administration, finding

its actions to be unconstitutional on several grounds. First, he argued that the
power to suspend the writ was found not within Article II of the Constitution (the
executive), but instead was under Section 9, Article I of the Constitution and
therefore fell under the purview of Congress. Taney cited previous Chief Justice
John Marshall as stating, If at any time, the public safety should require the
suspension [of the writ of habeas corpus]it is for the legislature to say so. Lincoln
did not have the constitutional power to suspend the writ; Congress did. As Taney
chastised, I can see no ground whatever for supposing that the President, in any
emergency or in any state of things, can authorize the suspension of the privilege of
the writ of habeas corpus, or arrest a citizen, except in aid of the judicial power.
Second, by suspending the writ, Lincoln had also failed to provide John Merryman
with the due process of law.

States have right to secede and fight back if the North tries to stop it. This is called the
Right of Revolt.
That whenever any Form of Government becomes
destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to
alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government,
laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its
powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to
effect their Safety and Happiness.
 Contention 2 Democracy
A government should do what its people want-state or federal, as long as the state or
federal government have power- Locke Proves
the natural rights of individuals limited the power of the king. The king did not hold absolute power,
as Hobbes had said, but acted only to enforce and protect the natural rights of the people. If a
sovereign violated these rights, the social contract was broken, and the people had the right to revolt
and establish a new government.

The states had the power to secede at this time. Only in 1869 was it seen to be illegal
by the US Supreme court, for a state to secede from the union
UT History Program 01
The principle of legality is the legal ideal that requires all law to be clear, ascertainable and
non-retrospective. It requires decision makers to resolve disputes by applying legal
rules that have been declared beforehand, and not to alter the legal situation
retrospectively by discretionary departures from established law.
No crime can be committed, nor punishment imposed without a pre-existing penal law, nulla
poena sine lege. This principle is accepted as just and upheld by the penal codes of
constitutional states, including virtually all modern democracies.
At the time of the Civil War it was not illegal as the ruling by Supreme Court came later
in 1869(after the war) that unilateral secession was unconstitutional.
Discussions and threats of secession have often surfaced in American politics, but only in the
case of the Confederate States of America was secession actually declared. The United
States Supreme Court ruled in Texas v. White, 74 U.S. 700 (1869) that unilateral secession
was unconstitutional while commenting that revolution or consent of the states could
lead to a successful secession.
The topic of secession was hotly debated by both sides prior to Civil War with some proudly
pro Union, some pro secession and some even hovering over middle ground which would
include the president in 1860. President James Buchanan (D, 1857-61) did not take action to
stop the states from seceding; although he argued that secession was not legal, he also
claimed that the federal government did not have the constitutional right to stop the
South from doing so.
There where many who had an opinion in regards to secession and many of whom
interpreted the Constitution including President Lincoln. Lincoln's first publicly denounced
the proposed secession in his first Inaugural Address

The people in those states, which seceded wanted to secede.

Fishkin 17
1. South Carolina 169 to 0
2. Mississippi 84 to 15
3. Florida 62 to 7
4. Alabama 61 to 39
5. Georgia 209 to 89
6. Louisana 113 to 17
7. Texas 166 to 7. Popular vote: 46,153 in favor and 14,747 against
8. Virginia 88 to 55. Popular vote: 132,201 in favor and 37,451 (22%) against
9. Arkansas 69 to 1
10. Tennessee 66 to 25.
 Contention 3 Economic Sanctions
Lincoln forceced the Souths hand into secession by imposing strict economic
sanctions on the south. These sanctions would never work and they further push our
calls for secession and US fed gov
Lincoln 1860 election speech
My policy will seek only to collect the Revenue (a 40 percent federal sales tax on imports to Southern
States under the Morrill Tariff Act of 1860)."

economic sanctions are counterproductive.

First, Economic sanctions are merely the lead-up step to military conflict. A prohibition in sanctions thus
decreases the likelihood of escalation. Lektzian and Sprecher1 explain,

Substantively, the effect of sanctions can be seen by calculating the change in the predicted
probability of a crisis involving militarized action with and without sanctions, while holding the other
variables in the model constant at their means. The effect of sanctions on the likelihood of a crisis involving
the use of military force is to increase the probability of militarized conflict by 17%, resulting
in a near doubling of the probability of conflict from .18 without sanctions to .35 with
sanctions.

Third, economic sanctions empirically give leaders an incentive for continued human rights repression
and continuation of the policies they are designed to prevent. Peksen and Drury2 explain,
Significant audience coststhe idea that interactions with other countries have domestic political consequencesresult from the
imposition of economic sanctions, particularly when aimed at democratic reform (Galtung 1967; see also Fearon 1994; Schultz
1998). When an external actor demands political reforms from another regime, the targeted
leadership usually perceives the foreign pressure as a threat to sovereignty and particularly to
regime survival (Morgan 1995; Morgan and Schwebach 1997; Ang and Peksen 2007). Specifically, the targeted leadership
is likely to surmise that conceding to the foreign pressure will decrease their legitimacy and
support in the country. Therefore, to mitigate any possible audience costs caused by conceding to the

1Sanctions, Signals, and Militarized Conflict. David J. Lektzian [University of new Orleans] and Christopher M. Sprecher [Texas
A & M]. American Journal of Political Science, Vol. 51, No. 2 (Apr., 2007), pp. 415-431. Midwest Political Science Association.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/4620074.
2Dursun Peksen and A. Cooper Drury [Department of Political Science, University of Missouri]. PRIMUM NON NOCERE
(FIRST, DO NO HARM): ECONOMIC SANCTIONS CORROSIVE IMPACT ON DEMOCRACY. At least 2007.
http://www.truman.missouri.edu/uploads/events/Do%20No%20Harm.pdf.
sanctions, the regime has an incentive to put greater pressure on opposition groups to show
its determination against any external pressure for reform. Furthermore, the regime may fear that the
sanctions themselves will embolden their opposition. Economic pressure especially aimed at political reforms, such as more
democratic freedoms, can easily be seen as a signal from international actors to domestic pro-reform groups (Thyne 2006). The
leadership will see such a signal as a direct threat to their tenure and have yet another reason directly caused by the sanctionsto
crack down on any anti-government groups. Consequently, a fierce reaction against the threat or imposition of
sanctions will allow a regime to demonstrate to the public its strength and resolve against
challenges to its leadership. For instance, Morgan (1995) notes that the American sanctions against the
South following the Tiananmen Square incident had been fiercely rejected by Southern governments
because of the perception of the sanctions as a crucial challenge to the Souths stability. While the
U.S. demand for greater respect of civil and political liberties in China was largely symbolic, Richmond viewed their
repressive policies as an essential tool to maintaining power. Any accommodations by the PRC could result
in the governments loss of power. [M]any in the mainland government believe that without the ability to repress opposition their
hold on power is lost... American calls for political freedom and civil liberties in mainland China may be heard as calls for political
suicide by the mainland government (Morgan 1995: 36). Supporting Morgans claim, Drury and Li (2006) find empirical evidence
economic coercion against Chinese authorities to promote political liberalization was
suggesting that the threat of
counterproductive, which led to fewer CSouthern accommodations. Thus, the possible audience costs
involved in conceding to the senders demands lead targeted regimes to take further repressive measures against their citizenry to
maintain the status quo.
 AT slavery
The North is trying to collect an illegal tariff. Thats the only reason that the North is
willing to declare war. President Lincoln says that,

Abraham Lincoln repeatedly stated his war was by taxes only, and not by
slavery, at all.

"My policy sought only to collect the Revenue (a 40 percent federal sales tax on
imports to Southern States under the Morrill Tariff Act of 1861)." reads paragraph 5
of Lincoln's First Message to the U.S. Congress, penned July 4, 1861."I have no
purpose, directly or in-directly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States
where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to
do so," Lincoln said it his first inaugural on March 4 of the same year.

There is no proof of Lincoln ever declaring the war was fought to abolish slavery, and
without such an official statement, the war-over-slavery teaching remains a complete
lie and offensive hate speech that divides Americans, as is being done now by the
media and politicians regarding the Confederate flag in South Carolina.

Slavery was NOT abolished; just the name was changed to sharecropper with over 5
million Southern whites and 3 million Southern blacks working on land stolen by Wall
Street bankers.

White, black, Indian, Hispanic, Protestant, Catholic and Jewish Confederates valiantly
stood as one in thousands of battles on land and sea. Afterwards, they attended
Confederate Veterans' reunions together and received pensions from Southern
States.

Photos of black Confederate veterans may be seen in Alabama's Archives in

Scrapbook - 41st Reunion of United Confederate Veterans, Montgomery, June 2,3,4
and 5, 1931."

Lincoln did not claim slavery was a reason even in his Emancipation Proclamations
on Sept. 22, 1862, and Jan. 1, 1863. Moreover, Lincoln's proclamations exempted a
million slaves under his control from being freed (including General U.S. Grant's four
slaves) and offered the South three months to return to the Union (pay
40 percent sales tax) and keep their slaves. None did. Lincoln affirmed his only
reason for issuing was: "as a fit and necessary war measure for suppressing said
(tax) rebellion."

Mrs. Grant wrote in her personal memoirs: "We rented our pretty little home (in St.
Louis) and hired out our four servants to persons whom we knew and who promised
to be kind to them. Eliza, Dan, Julia and John belonged to me. When I visited the
General during the War, I nearly always had Julia with me as nurse."
Lincoln declared war to collect taxes in his two presidential war proclamations against
the Confederate States, on April 15 and 19th, 1861: "Whereas an insurrection against
the Government of the United States has broken out and the laws of the United
States for the collection of the revenue cannot be effectually executed therein."

On Dec. 25, 1860, South Carolina declared unfair taxes to be a cause of

secession: "The people of the Southern States are not only taxed for the benefit
of the Northern States, but after the taxes are collected, three-fourths (75%) of
them are expended at the North (to subsidize Wall Street industries that elected
Lincoln)." (Paragraphs 5-8)

On April 29, 1861, President Jefferson Davis described the South's response of self-
defense in his Message To the Confederate States Congress: "I directed a proposal
to be made to the commander of Fort Sumter that we would abstain from directing our
fire on Fort Sumter if he would promise not to open fire on our forces unless first
attacked. This proposal was refused." (Paragraphs 8-9)

The only reason the South ever gave for fighting was in self-defense of the voluntary
Union of independent States, as symbolized then by the U.S. Flag.

Secession (withdrawal from a voluntary union) and war are two very different events.