The Greatest American

As I see it the confederate Generals often acted with more honour than some of the Northern Generals. They did not fight and die to "own" someone to clean their shoes! They fought and died for issues they held dear to their hearts; they fought and died to protect what they saw to be their primary "national" interest; they fought and died to protect their loved ones from the northern armies.

Certainly they were not perfect, but some of those men do deserve to be among the list of Greatest Americans... where this thread began.

Maybe as a Brit my opinion doesn't count for much... but there you go.

 

That brings up another point. Can you be a Great American when you were fighting to NOT be part of America.

And your opinion counts for as much as any.

 

Wow so much debate.

Ok, first of all for all of you who say the main reason for the so called Civil War was slavery..... Why didnt Lincoln issue the Emancipation Proclamation BEFORE he invaded?Lincoln had ideas of sending many back to Africa. There were free Blacks who owned slaves in VA, LA . Why would a free poor dirt farmer from SC or GA go and risk his life so someone else could keep other humans in bondage?The state of IL , otherwise known as the land of Lincoln , had some interesting laws on its books after the War was over. It forbid Blacks from settling in many parts of the state. Look long and hard. You will find many ugly facts about that war.

 

I thought they were fighting for America, just a different version to the one the North was pushing.

Thanks DeeJay.

 

I was not commenting on the Norths motives.

I was commenting on the Souths motives. In particular the motives of the generals that fought for the south.

 

Just because Lincon did not do everything he could and everything he should have does not mean that the south did not want slavery and that the south did not try to secede and ultimatly cause the war over slavery.

 

That is like saying that the American Revolutionaries were just fighting for a different version of Brittan then the one England was pushing.


They were trying to secede from America and start their own country.

 

Ah yes, America's first civil war... I think you all call it the War for Independence or something, but it was a civil war strictly speaking.

Anyway, I think the two are very different. In the first civil war they were definitely looking to break away and form a different country.

In the second civil war they were fighting over forms of government.

 

I guess it depends on your point of view.

They had their own president (Jefferson Davis) and there own flag. That is a pretty clear sign that they were forming their own different country.

 

They were not fighting to NOT be part of America. They were fighting to not be a part of the Union and their sovereign nation was known as the Confederate States of America. The people of those states were Americans prior to the War of Northern Aggression, they were Americans during the war and they were Americans after the war.

Freely independent states entered the union and freely they should have been allowed to leave the union.

South Carolina Ordinance of Secession
AN ORDINANCE to dissolve the union between the State of South Carolina and other States united with her under the compact entitled "The Constitution of the United States of America."
We, the people of the State of South Carolina, in convention assembled, do declare and ordain, and it is hereby declared and ordained, That the ordinance adopted by us in convention on the twenty-third day of May, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-eight, whereby the Constitution of the United States of America was ratified, and also all acts and parts of acts of the General Assembly of this State ratifying amendments of the said Constitution, are hereby repealed; and that the union now subsisting between South Carolina and other States, under the name of the "United States of America," is hereby dissolved.
Done at Charleston the twentieth day of December, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty. (Source: http://www.civilwarhome.com/scordinance.htm) ​

 

secession
noun1. 2. the withdrawal of eleven southern states from the Union in 1860 which precipitated the American Civil War 3. formal separation from an alliance or federation


No amount of spin is going to change the fact that the southern states wanted to break away from the United States of America so they could continue the immoral practice of slavery

And the North by dening the Souths right to break away began the process of discontinuing the immoral practice of slavery. Therefore protecting the right of countless human beings to live without being owned.

The nation the south was trying to form was to be found on the immoral practice of owning people. The North was right to not allow an immoral country to form on their border.

 

Source for the above? Perhaps it is fair to say the secession precipitated the War of Northern Aggression however, the CSA did not ask the Union to invade their territories and start a killing war.

The CSA states entered freely into a Union of States. When the actions of this Union became opposed to the interests of these States they elected to withdraw from associating in this union.

Secede - To withdraw from fellowship, communion or association; to separate ones's self;... (Source: http://65.66.134.201/cgi-bin/webster/webster.exe?search_for_texts_web1828=secede)​

As to which was morally correct, it would seem like the nation that abided by the rule of law would've had the moral highground. The Confederate States had a strong argument for why they had the legal authority to secede. What was the Union's argument for invasion? Are you suggesting that engaging in the legal acts of slavery (though immoral) and secession provides sufficient onus upon which to invade a nation?

 

Sorry

Dictionary.com

WordNet[SIZE=-1]®[/SIZE] 2.1
© 2005 Princeton University

 

As you can see now by abortion. What is lawfull is not always what is moral.

That is what I am suggesting. The legal acts of slavery, were becoming slowly illegal. Half of the states did not like this and tried to remove themselfs because of it.

The North had a choice. Allow the states their right to remove themselfs and in turn have no control over them keeping countless people in bondage or take away by force the states right to remove themself and free humans that were slaves. The North choose rightly by infringing on the rights of the people in the wrong and giving rights to the people in bondage.

 

Here is a hypothetical situation that I think applies.

You are President.

Lets say that next year the US Supreme Court makes abortion illegal due to the killing of innocent life. The ruling says that babies are alive and need to be protected. The US Congress passes laws outlawing abortion and expect you to enforce the laws to protect human life.

New York State and California do not like it. They name Hillary Clinton as their president and state they are no longer part of the United States, and will continue with abortions. Would you protect their right to remove themselfs? Or protect the lifes of the babies they want to kill?

 

The Civil War was primarily a war over state’s rights, specifically whether or not a state could secede from the Union. Slavery, or actually the protest against slavery caused much of the animosity that fueled the war, but the war itself was over state’s rights.

Forty years before the Civil War started, Henry Clay, a U.S. senator from Kentucky introduced legislation called the Missouri Compromise. It prohibited slavery for all new states north of the 36°30' line. Then there was the Compromise of 1850. This legislation according the Wikepedia states:

It is easy to see that slavery did play an important part in the Civil War. The very institution and morality had been a constant topic since the United State’s beginning. However, the political cause was whether or not the Union was to be preserved or whether or not states could secede.

I think it is a very good thing that the South was defeated, and that the Union was preserved. In this day and age we need one strong country, not two that would have probably continued to bicker and fight for years.

 

In the last 50 years The United States government has instigated many foreign civil wars and encouraged the break up of many sovereign nations. It is time to apply our foreign policy to ourselves, dissolve the Constitution, and break up into 50 sovereign nations under the Articles of Confederation. Our possessions can chose to join or not. Each nation then applies for a seat in the UN.

 

But back to the origional question. I propose Warren Buffet as the greatest Christian American. He have several $Billions to the Gates Foundation and far as I know doesn't have a single building named or anything else after himself.