Author: Conrad Kalmbacher
Publisher: AuthorHouse
ISBN: 1481744143
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 263
Book Description
In Secession and the U. S. Mail: The Postal Service, The South, and Sectional Controversy, Conrad Kalmbacher tells the little known story of over fifty years of dissension between the Post Office Department and the South, culminating in the department's role in the events leading to secession and the Guns of April 1861. Severe reductions and retrenchment in mail service throughout the South and on Mississippi River steamboats during the administration of Postmaster General Joseph Holt, 1859-1860, angered southern senators and congressmen against the federal government. Deploring the postmaster general's policy, southern leaders called Holt "our bitter foe" who, "by a mere stroke of his pen" had curtailed mail service in the South "to such a degree as to render it no service at all." Because of this bitter anger, one Pulitzer Prize-winning historian characterized Holt's policy as "one of the less tangible factors leading to secession." Drawing on House and Senate documents, postmasters general reports, and Congressional debates, as well as personal letters, diaries, memoirs, and newspapers of the time, the author makes extensive use of primary sources. The book details how antagonisms between the Postal Service and the South had their beginnings early on in American history: "Continual debates questioned whether the South received its fair share of federal dollars for post offices and post routes. Southerners defended the maintenance of unprofitable mail routes in remote areas. Negro postriders caused resentment among Southerners. And years of controversy inflamed the South over the distribution of abolitionist literature through the mails." Today, when the role of government is a central issue in American politics, it is revealing to consider the ominous signposts of 1859-1860, as the Post Office Department - at that time the principal political agency of the federal government – became embroiled in overheated debate, partisan bickering, and failed compromise.
Secession and the U.S. Mail
Author: Conrad Kalmbacher
Publisher: AuthorHouse
ISBN: 1481744143
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 263
Book Description
In Secession and the U. S. Mail: The Postal Service, The South, and Sectional Controversy, Conrad Kalmbacher tells the little known story of over fifty years of dissension between the Post Office Department and the South, culminating in the department's role in the events leading to secession and the Guns of April 1861. Severe reductions and retrenchment in mail service throughout the South and on Mississippi River steamboats during the administration of Postmaster General Joseph Holt, 1859-1860, angered southern senators and congressmen against the federal government. Deploring the postmaster general's policy, southern leaders called Holt "our bitter foe" who, "by a mere stroke of his pen" had curtailed mail service in the South "to such a degree as to render it no service at all." Because of this bitter anger, one Pulitzer Prize-winning historian characterized Holt's policy as "one of the less tangible factors leading to secession." Drawing on House and Senate documents, postmasters general reports, and Congressional debates, as well as personal letters, diaries, memoirs, and newspapers of the time, the author makes extensive use of primary sources. The book details how antagonisms between the Postal Service and the South had their beginnings early on in American history: "Continual debates questioned whether the South received its fair share of federal dollars for post offices and post routes. Southerners defended the maintenance of unprofitable mail routes in remote areas. Negro postriders caused resentment among Southerners. And years of controversy inflamed the South over the distribution of abolitionist literature through the mails." Today, when the role of government is a central issue in American politics, it is revealing to consider the ominous signposts of 1859-1860, as the Post Office Department - at that time the principal political agency of the federal government – became embroiled in overheated debate, partisan bickering, and failed compromise.
Publisher: AuthorHouse
ISBN: 1481744143
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 263
Book Description
In Secession and the U. S. Mail: The Postal Service, The South, and Sectional Controversy, Conrad Kalmbacher tells the little known story of over fifty years of dissension between the Post Office Department and the South, culminating in the department's role in the events leading to secession and the Guns of April 1861. Severe reductions and retrenchment in mail service throughout the South and on Mississippi River steamboats during the administration of Postmaster General Joseph Holt, 1859-1860, angered southern senators and congressmen against the federal government. Deploring the postmaster general's policy, southern leaders called Holt "our bitter foe" who, "by a mere stroke of his pen" had curtailed mail service in the South "to such a degree as to render it no service at all." Because of this bitter anger, one Pulitzer Prize-winning historian characterized Holt's policy as "one of the less tangible factors leading to secession." Drawing on House and Senate documents, postmasters general reports, and Congressional debates, as well as personal letters, diaries, memoirs, and newspapers of the time, the author makes extensive use of primary sources. The book details how antagonisms between the Postal Service and the South had their beginnings early on in American history: "Continual debates questioned whether the South received its fair share of federal dollars for post offices and post routes. Southerners defended the maintenance of unprofitable mail routes in remote areas. Negro postriders caused resentment among Southerners. And years of controversy inflamed the South over the distribution of abolitionist literature through the mails." Today, when the role of government is a central issue in American politics, it is revealing to consider the ominous signposts of 1859-1860, as the Post Office Department - at that time the principal political agency of the federal government – became embroiled in overheated debate, partisan bickering, and failed compromise.
The Constitutional Origins of the American Civil War
Author: Michael F. Conlin
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108495273
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 351
Book Description
Demonstrates the crucial role that the Constitution played in the coming of the Civil War.
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108495273
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 351
Book Description
Demonstrates the crucial role that the Constitution played in the coming of the Civil War.
Secession, State, and Liberty
Author: David Gordon
Publisher: Transaction Publishers
ISBN: 1412833833
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 362
Book Description
The political impulse to secede -- to attempt to separate from central government control -- is a conspicuous feature of the post-cold war world. It is alive and growing in Canada, Russia, China, Italy, Belgium, Britain, and even the United States Yet secession remains one of the least studied and least understood of all historical and political phenomena. The contributors to this volume have filled this gap with wide-ranging investigations -- rooted in history, political philosophy, ethics, and economic theory -- of secessionist movements in the United States, Canada, and Europe. Is secessionism extremist, a dangerous rebellion that threatens the democratic process? Gordon and his contributors think otherwise. They believe that the secessionist impulse is a vital part of the classical liberal tradition, one that emerges when national governments become too big and too ambitious. Unlike revolution, secession seeks only separation from rule, preferably through non-violent means. It is based on the moral idea, articulated by Ludwig von Mises in 1919, that "no people and no part of a people shall be held against its will in a political association that it does not want. The authors cite the famed 1861 attempt to create a confederacy of Southern states as legal, right, and a justifiable response to Northern political imperialism. They note that this was not the first American secession attempt -- the New England states tried to form their own confederacy during the War of 1812. This evidence, they argue, begs a reinterpretation of the U.S. Constitution along secessionist lines. Further they believe that the threat of secession should be revived as a bulwark against government encroachmenton individual liberty and private property rights, a guarantor of international free trade, and a protection against attempts to curb the freedom of association. These straightforward, pellucid arguments include essays by Donald Livingston, Murray N. Rothbard, Clyde Wilson, Thomas DiLorenzo, and Bruce Benson, among others. If overgrown nations continue to decompose, as they have for the last decade, these authors believe it is essential that secession be taken seriously, and fully understood. Secession, State, and Liberty makes a vital contribution toward that end. This stimulating, thought-provoking collection is necessary reading for intellectual historians and political scientists.
Publisher: Transaction Publishers
ISBN: 1412833833
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 362
Book Description
The political impulse to secede -- to attempt to separate from central government control -- is a conspicuous feature of the post-cold war world. It is alive and growing in Canada, Russia, China, Italy, Belgium, Britain, and even the United States Yet secession remains one of the least studied and least understood of all historical and political phenomena. The contributors to this volume have filled this gap with wide-ranging investigations -- rooted in history, political philosophy, ethics, and economic theory -- of secessionist movements in the United States, Canada, and Europe. Is secessionism extremist, a dangerous rebellion that threatens the democratic process? Gordon and his contributors think otherwise. They believe that the secessionist impulse is a vital part of the classical liberal tradition, one that emerges when national governments become too big and too ambitious. Unlike revolution, secession seeks only separation from rule, preferably through non-violent means. It is based on the moral idea, articulated by Ludwig von Mises in 1919, that "no people and no part of a people shall be held against its will in a political association that it does not want. The authors cite the famed 1861 attempt to create a confederacy of Southern states as legal, right, and a justifiable response to Northern political imperialism. They note that this was not the first American secession attempt -- the New England states tried to form their own confederacy during the War of 1812. This evidence, they argue, begs a reinterpretation of the U.S. Constitution along secessionist lines. Further they believe that the threat of secession should be revived as a bulwark against government encroachmenton individual liberty and private property rights, a guarantor of international free trade, and a protection against attempts to curb the freedom of association. These straightforward, pellucid arguments include essays by Donald Livingston, Murray N. Rothbard, Clyde Wilson, Thomas DiLorenzo, and Bruce Benson, among others. If overgrown nations continue to decompose, as they have for the last decade, these authors believe it is essential that secession be taken seriously, and fully understood. Secession, State, and Liberty makes a vital contribution toward that end. This stimulating, thought-provoking collection is necessary reading for intellectual historians and political scientists.
Seceding from Secession
Author: Eric J. Wittenberg
Publisher: Savas Beatie
ISBN: 1611215072
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 290
Book Description
A “thoroughly researched [and] historically enlightening” account of how the Commonwealth of Virginia split in two in the midst of war (Civil War News). “West Virginia was the child of the storm.” —Mountaineer historian and Civil War veteran Maj. Theodore F. Lang As the Civil War raged, the northwestern third of the Commonwealth of Virginia finally broke away in 1863 to form the Union’s 35th state. Seceding from Secession chronicles those events in an unprecedented study of the social, legal, military, and political factors that converged to bring about the birth of West Virginia. President Abraham Lincoln, an astute lawyer in his own right, played a critical role in birthing the new state. The constitutionality of the mechanism by which the new state would be created concerned the president, and he polled every member of his cabinet before signing the bill. Seceding from Secession includes a detailed discussion of the 1871 U.S. Supreme Court decision Virginia v. West Virginia, in which former Lincoln cabinet member Salmon Chase presided as chief justice over the court that decided the constitutionality of the momentous event. Grounded in a wide variety of sources and including a foreword by Frank J. Williams, former Chief Justice of the Rhode Island Supreme Court and Chairman Emeritus of the Lincoln Forum, this book is indispensable for anyone interested in American history.
Publisher: Savas Beatie
ISBN: 1611215072
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 290
Book Description
A “thoroughly researched [and] historically enlightening” account of how the Commonwealth of Virginia split in two in the midst of war (Civil War News). “West Virginia was the child of the storm.” —Mountaineer historian and Civil War veteran Maj. Theodore F. Lang As the Civil War raged, the northwestern third of the Commonwealth of Virginia finally broke away in 1863 to form the Union’s 35th state. Seceding from Secession chronicles those events in an unprecedented study of the social, legal, military, and political factors that converged to bring about the birth of West Virginia. President Abraham Lincoln, an astute lawyer in his own right, played a critical role in birthing the new state. The constitutionality of the mechanism by which the new state would be created concerned the president, and he polled every member of his cabinet before signing the bill. Seceding from Secession includes a detailed discussion of the 1871 U.S. Supreme Court decision Virginia v. West Virginia, in which former Lincoln cabinet member Salmon Chase presided as chief justice over the court that decided the constitutionality of the momentous event. Grounded in a wide variety of sources and including a foreword by Frank J. Williams, former Chief Justice of the Rhode Island Supreme Court and Chairman Emeritus of the Lincoln Forum, this book is indispensable for anyone interested in American history.
Lincoln President-Elect
Author: Harold Holzer
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 141659440X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 643
Book Description
One of our most eminent Lincoln scholars, winner of a Lincoln Prize for his Lincoln at Cooper Union, examines the four months between Lincoln's election and inauguration, when the president-elect made the most important decision of his coming presidency—there would be no compromise on slavery or secession of the slaveholding states, even at the cost of civil war. Abraham Lincoln first demonstrated his determination and leadership in the Great Secession Winter—the four months between his election in November 1860 and his inauguration in March 1861—when he rejected compromises urged on him by Republicans and Democrats, Northerners and Southerners, that might have preserved the Union a little longer but would have enshrined slavery for generations. Though Lincoln has been criticized by many historians for failing to appreciate the severity of the secession crisis that greeted his victory, Harold Holzer shows that the presidentelect waged a shrewd and complex campaign to prevent the expansion of slavery while vainly trying to limit secession to a few Deep South states. During this most dangerous White House transition in American history, the country had two presidents: one powerless (the president-elect, possessing no constitutional authority), the other paralyzed (the incumbent who refused to act). Through limited, brilliantly timed and crafted public statements, determined private letters, tough political pressure, and personal persuasion, Lincoln guaranteed the integrity of the American political process of majority rule, sounded the death knell of slavery, and transformed not only his own image but that of the presidency, even while making inevitable the war that would be necessary to make these achievements permanent. Lincoln President-Elect is the first book to concentrate on Lincoln's public stance and private agony during these months and on the momentous consequences when he first demonstrated his determination and leadership. Holzer recasts Lincoln from an isolated prairie politician yet to establish his greatness, to a skillful shaper of men and opinion and an immovable friend of freedom at a decisive moment when allegiance to the founding credo "all men are created equal" might well have been sacrificed.
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 141659440X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 643
Book Description
One of our most eminent Lincoln scholars, winner of a Lincoln Prize for his Lincoln at Cooper Union, examines the four months between Lincoln's election and inauguration, when the president-elect made the most important decision of his coming presidency—there would be no compromise on slavery or secession of the slaveholding states, even at the cost of civil war. Abraham Lincoln first demonstrated his determination and leadership in the Great Secession Winter—the four months between his election in November 1860 and his inauguration in March 1861—when he rejected compromises urged on him by Republicans and Democrats, Northerners and Southerners, that might have preserved the Union a little longer but would have enshrined slavery for generations. Though Lincoln has been criticized by many historians for failing to appreciate the severity of the secession crisis that greeted his victory, Harold Holzer shows that the presidentelect waged a shrewd and complex campaign to prevent the expansion of slavery while vainly trying to limit secession to a few Deep South states. During this most dangerous White House transition in American history, the country had two presidents: one powerless (the president-elect, possessing no constitutional authority), the other paralyzed (the incumbent who refused to act). Through limited, brilliantly timed and crafted public statements, determined private letters, tough political pressure, and personal persuasion, Lincoln guaranteed the integrity of the American political process of majority rule, sounded the death knell of slavery, and transformed not only his own image but that of the presidency, even while making inevitable the war that would be necessary to make these achievements permanent. Lincoln President-Elect is the first book to concentrate on Lincoln's public stance and private agony during these months and on the momentous consequences when he first demonstrated his determination and leadership. Holzer recasts Lincoln from an isolated prairie politician yet to establish his greatness, to a skillful shaper of men and opinion and an immovable friend of freedom at a decisive moment when allegiance to the founding credo "all men are created equal" might well have been sacrificed.
Better Off Without 'Em
Author: Chuck Thompson
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 145161666X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 337
Book Description
The author of Smile When You're Lying describes his controversial road trip investigation into the cultural divide of the United States during which he met with possum-hunting conservatives, trailer park lifers and prayer warriors before concluding that both sides might benefit if former Confederacy states seceded.
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 145161666X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 337
Book Description
The author of Smile When You're Lying describes his controversial road trip investigation into the cultural divide of the United States during which he met with possum-hunting conservatives, trailer park lifers and prayer warriors before concluding that both sides might benefit if former Confederacy states seceded.
The Dynamic of Secession
Author: Viva Ona Bartkus
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521659703
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 284
Book Description
This book, first published in 1999, offers an explanation for the occurrence of secessionist conflict, based on a comparative study of numerous historical examples.
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521659703
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 284
Book Description
This book, first published in 1999, offers an explanation for the occurrence of secessionist conflict, based on a comparative study of numerous historical examples.
Secession on Trial
Author: Cynthia Nicoletti
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108415520
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 359
Book Description
This book explores the treason trial of President Jefferson Davis, where the question of secession's constitutionality was debated.
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108415520
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 359
Book Description
This book explores the treason trial of President Jefferson Davis, where the question of secession's constitutionality was debated.
Secession and Security
Author: Ahsan I. Butt
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 1501713965
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 505
Book Description
In Secession and Security, Ahsan I. Butt argues that states rather than separatists determine whether a secessionist struggle will be peaceful, violent, or genocidal. He investigates the strategies, ranging from negotiated concessions to large-scale repression, adopted by states in response to separatist movements. Variations in the external security environment, Butt argues, influenced the leaders of the Ottoman Empire to use peaceful concessions against Armenians in 1908 but escalated to genocide against the same community in 1915; caused Israel to reject a Palestinian state in the 1990s; and shaped peaceful splits in Czechoslovakia in 1993 and the Norway-Sweden union in 1905. Butt focuses on two main cases—Pakistani reactions to Bengali and Baloch demands for independence in the 1970s and India's responses to secessionist movements in Kashmir, Punjab, and Assam in the 1980s and 1990s. Butt's deep historical approach to his subject will appeal to policymakers and observers interested in the last five decades of geopolitics in South Asia, the contemporary Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and ethno-national conflict, separatism, and nationalism more generally.
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 1501713965
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 505
Book Description
In Secession and Security, Ahsan I. Butt argues that states rather than separatists determine whether a secessionist struggle will be peaceful, violent, or genocidal. He investigates the strategies, ranging from negotiated concessions to large-scale repression, adopted by states in response to separatist movements. Variations in the external security environment, Butt argues, influenced the leaders of the Ottoman Empire to use peaceful concessions against Armenians in 1908 but escalated to genocide against the same community in 1915; caused Israel to reject a Palestinian state in the 1990s; and shaped peaceful splits in Czechoslovakia in 1993 and the Norway-Sweden union in 1905. Butt focuses on two main cases—Pakistani reactions to Bengali and Baloch demands for independence in the 1970s and India's responses to secessionist movements in Kashmir, Punjab, and Assam in the 1980s and 1990s. Butt's deep historical approach to his subject will appeal to policymakers and observers interested in the last five decades of geopolitics in South Asia, the contemporary Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and ethno-national conflict, separatism, and nationalism more generally.
A Union Indivisible
Author: Michael D. Robinson
Publisher: UNC Press Books
ISBN: 1469633795
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 311
Book Description
Many accounts of the secession crisis overlook the sharp political conflict that took place in the Border South states of Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri. Michael D. Robinson expands the scope of this crisis to show how the fate of the Border South, and with it the Union, desperately hung in the balance during the fateful months surrounding the clash at Fort Sumter. During this period, Border South politicians revealed the region's deep commitment to slavery, disputed whether or not to leave the Union, and schemed to win enough support to carry the day. Although these border states contained fewer enslaved people than the eleven states that seceded, white border Southerners chose to remain in the Union because they felt the decision best protected their peculiar institution. Robinson reveals anew how the choice for union was fraught with anguish and uncertainty, dividing families and producing years of bitter internecine violence. Letters, diaries, newspapers, and quantitative evidence illuminate how, in the absence of a compromise settlement, proslavery Unionists managed to defeat secession in the Border South.
Publisher: UNC Press Books
ISBN: 1469633795
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 311
Book Description
Many accounts of the secession crisis overlook the sharp political conflict that took place in the Border South states of Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri. Michael D. Robinson expands the scope of this crisis to show how the fate of the Border South, and with it the Union, desperately hung in the balance during the fateful months surrounding the clash at Fort Sumter. During this period, Border South politicians revealed the region's deep commitment to slavery, disputed whether or not to leave the Union, and schemed to win enough support to carry the day. Although these border states contained fewer enslaved people than the eleven states that seceded, white border Southerners chose to remain in the Union because they felt the decision best protected their peculiar institution. Robinson reveals anew how the choice for union was fraught with anguish and uncertainty, dividing families and producing years of bitter internecine violence. Letters, diaries, newspapers, and quantitative evidence illuminate how, in the absence of a compromise settlement, proslavery Unionists managed to defeat secession in the Border South.