The 1619 Project (in the New York Times Magazine)

[David Lockmiller]

Harry Jaffa Debate with Thomas DiLorenzo in May, 2002 (Source: Wikipedia subject “Harry Jaffa”)

Jaffa and Thomas DiLorenzo debated each other on May 7, 2002 in an event hosted by the Independent Institute. Each man made a statement followed by a rebuttal by the other, ending with questions and answers from the audience.

Jaffa's argument was divided into four sections:

Section Two reads: The Right of Secession Is Not the Right of Revolution: Jaffa distinguished revolution from secession. Revolution, he argues, is explained under the Declaration of Independence. It states, "Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends [the security of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness], the people have a right to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government [such] as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness." In contrast, the Confederacy claimed the right of secession, as the Confederacy believed that such a right existed under the Constitution. Jaffa argues that the Confederacy claimed secession instead of revolution because its rights were not being violated by the federal government. However, he also notes that the states that ratified the Constitution also agreed to adhere to the results of all elections and that by seceding from the Union, the Confederacy violated this basic promise.

Simply stated, Lincoln argued in the July 4, 1861 Message to Congress that the Southern states did NOT have a constitutional right to secede. See my post #16 on Thread titled “RE: Maryland constitutional questions after Fort Sumter.”

[Southern State politicians] invented an ingenious sophism, which, if conceded, was followed by perfectly logical steps, through all the incidents, to the complete destruction of the Union. The sophism itself is, that any state of the Union may, consistently with the national Constitution, and therefore lawfully, and peacefully, withdraw from the Union, without the consent of the Union, or of any other state. The little disguise that the supposed right is to be exercised only for just cause, themselves to be the sole judge of its justice, is too thin to merit any notice.

With rebellion thus sugar-coated, they have been drugging the public mind of their section for more than thirty years; and, until at length, they have brought many good men to a willingness to take up arms against the government the day after some assemblage of men have enacted the farcical pretence of taking their State out of the Union, who could have been brought to no such thing the day before.

This sophism derives much---perhaps the whole---of its currency, from the assumption, that there is some omnipotent, and sacred supremacy, pertaining to a State---to each State of our Federal Union. Our States have neither more, nor less power, than that reserved to them, in the Union, by the Constitution---no one of them ever having been a State out of the Union.

Jaffa makes no reference whatsoever to this critically important President Lincoln July 4, 1861 Message to Congress. Instead, Jaffa considered this violation of the Constitution as merely a “broken promise” by these states “to adhere to the results of all elections.”

President Lincoln effectively argued that there is no state “right of secession” from the Union of the United States.