Quotes About Secession

From infancy, I had been accustomed to hear pro and con discussions of slavery and the American Civil War. Although the British government finally decided not to recognise the Confederacy, public opinion in England was sharply divided on the questions both of slavery and of secession.

Rely on no one. Depend on no one for your happiness. I am declaring my independence. I am establishing a republic unto myself. I am seceding from the human race.

In short, a government created by the Unionist portion of Virginia—a minority of the total population—purported to speak for the entire state, including the majority of the state that supported secession.

Lincoln was not keen on admitting West Virginia as it had "seceded" from Virginia—which was a state and Lincoln would never concede that it, and other "so called" Confederate states, had left the Union.11 So, supporters of West Virginia created a legal fiction that what became West Virginia, was really the authentic Commonwealth of Virginia.

There were of course many moderates in the South, including some of the most influential planters, who wanted to give the Lincoln government a trial, even after South Carolina seceded. Not that they doubted the right of secession. The question was rather one of expediency. But Fort Sumter and Lincoln's call for volunteers took the ground from under these middle-of-the-roaders. The issue now was whether to fight with or against secessionists, and this left no choice for most Southerners.

claims to abominate slavery and to regard secession as treason." "He will fight very well, sir," said General Scott, gloomily. "It is a matter of honor." "I see," said Lincoln, who plainly did not

I have white friends who have the Confederate flag on their license plates, and I have no issue with that if they see that as a matter of heritage. But I do not think it should ever fly over a state, city, county building, or school, for the simple reason that it represents secession from the Union.

c'est (...) l'un des paradoxes de cette guerre : le côté irréprochable du gouvernement de Colombo qui, dans les zones qu'il a perdues, et ne serait-ce que pour ne pas s'avouer vaincu et avoir à prendre acte de la sécession, continue d'assurer les services publics, de payer les fonctionnaires, fussent-ils désignés par les Tigres et à leur botte.

When Alabama seceded from the Union on January 11, 1861, Winston County seceded from Alabama, and every child in Maycomb County knew it.) North Alabama was full of Liquor Interests, Big Mules, steel companies, Republicans, professors, and other persons of no background.

The short-lived Confederate States of America was a signal event in the history of the Western world. What secessionists set out to build was something entirely new in the history of nations: a modern proslavery and antidemocratic state, dedicated to the proposition that all men were not created equal.

Many Afghan intellectuals in the United States believe that their country is best kept together. They are encouraged by the fact that no leading tribal or political figure there has called for secession.

It would slowly become evident that when they committed themselves at last to secession, not as a threat but as an accomplished fact armed for violence, the devoted men who wanted to preserve the Southern way of life had made a tactical error. The ultimate fate of their cause would be largely determined by what was done in Washington. Leaving Washington forever, they had fatally surrendered the initiative. Now their enemies would seize it.

the purpose of the legend was to foster a heroic image of secession and the war so that the Confederates would have salvaged at least their honor from the all-encompassing defeat.

The Southerners, he concluded, "seceded over one thing and fought over one thing, slavery.

While four slave states of the upper South had joined the Confederacy, another four (Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, and Delaware, which together became known as the "loyal border states") remained in the Union.

Tocqueville was correct in his rendition of how the Constitution was formed, but he likely never dreamed that an American president would ever send an invading army to kill some 300,000 of his own citizens in order to destroy the right of secession, a right that all of America's founding fathers held as sacrosanct and that was at the very heart of the American system of government.

Mr. Blair, I look upon secession as anarchy. If I owned the four millions of slaves in the South, I would sacrifice them all to the Union; but how can I draw my sword upon Virginia, my native State?

Secession, like any other REVOLUTIONARY ACT, may be morally justified by the extremity of oppression; but to call it a constitutional right is confounding the meaning of terms.

What happened in America in the 1860s was a war of secession, a war of independence, no different in principle from what happened in America in the 1770s and 1780s.

The secession of the Southern States, individually or in the aggregate, was the certain consequence of Mr. Lincoln's election.

Gorbachev's stance contrasts admirably with the policy of the sainted Abraham Lincoln, who used massive force and mass murder to force the seceding Southern states to remain in the Union.

He famously said of secession, a notion raised often over cigars and brandy, that "South Carolina is too small for a republic and too large for an insane asylum.

I gave up all idea of saving the Union except by complete conquest. Up to that time it had been the policy of our army, certainly of that portion commanded by me, to protect the property of the citizens whose territory was invaded, without regard to their sentiments, whether Union or Secession.

What happened in America in the 1860s was a war of secession, a war of independence, no different in principle from what happened in America in the 1770s and 1780s.