WaPo: School bus driver fired over Confederate flag

[Henry]

Well, Jeff Davis didn't believe he was bound by the Constitution, you know, because they didn't recognize Union authority. So technically, he didn't break any laws.

You mean, technically he broke all of them so who cares about the specifics?

My point is that the evil the South claims (and still apparently claims) that it was fighting against, it was in many cases practicing itself. Why? Because it was fighting a war.

Funny, I don't think Bush was extended the same line of reasoning. It was war. Things happen. It is only acceptable in hindsight. If you agree with the politics of that person. But hey, why bother with truth?

Bush wasn't fighting the same war. It wasn't even close. Had a third of the country declared independence, massed an army on our newfound border, and attempted to coerce even more of the country to side with them, I think I'd have cut Bush a little more slack.

However, if your point here is that Lincoln was not perfect and did not make every single correct decision, well, point taken.

[Predicto]

Well, Jeff Davis didn't believe he was bound by the Constitution, you know, because they didn't recognize Union authority. So technically, he didn't break any laws....

Well the CSA did not recognize the authority of the Union Supreme Court.

LOL. I have decided that I no longer recognize the laws of the USA. Does that make me correct... or delusional?

---------- Post added March-10th-2011 at 01:25 PM ----------

Bush wasn't fighting the same war. It wasn't even close. Had a third of the country declared independence, massed an army on our newfound border, and attempted to coerce even more of the country to side with them, I think I'd have cut Bush a little more slack.

Oh, I don't know. I think if we judge George W. Bush by 1860s standards, he comes out A-Ok. Of course, that's a pretty damn low threshhold.

[Teller]

Thankfully I have other skills besides driving a bus. I won't be out of work long.

[Predicto]

Thankfully I have other skills besides driving a bus. I won't be out of work long.

Maybe you can sell flags!

:poke:

[Chicken Fried]

OK, so which heritage?

The heritage of rebelling against the United States, and the Constitution, because you're worried that the evil feds are gonna take away your slaves?

The way it's associated with the KKK?

Or maybe the heritage of it being flown over the state capital of (Alabama?) to signify the state's support for segregated schools? (A heritage continuing to this day.)

One thing's a fact: Whatever heritage is being celebrated, it isn't American heritage, or else they'd be flying this flag:

Being proud of the South doesn't mean you can't be proud of America. You can still take pride in Southern culture. It doesn't have to do with seceding. Half the Southerners don't even know their own history. An American flag represents Southern culture, but also northern, mid-west, as well as that chunk of coast out west that is often included as one of the 50 states. The South is just different. It's a different bunch of people. They speak differently, have different customs, have different behavior, etc. I don't see why you get so upset about this.

[Henry]

Thankfully I have other skills besides driving a bus. I won't be out of work long.

:ols:

I believe we can now close the thread.

[Thiebear]

So you can yell God wanted you dead because America loves fags at a funeral.

But you can not have an ornament on the truck that takes you to and from your work.

I know its a private issue but it does seem a bit intolerent.

kinda like firing for an Hope sticker with the Presidents seal on it.

[Predicto]

Half the Southerners don't even know their own history.

Now this I can agree with.

[Henry]

Being proud of the South doesn't mean you can't be proud of America. You can still take pride in Southern culture. It doesn't have to do with seceding. Half the Southerners don't even know their own history. An American flag represents Southern culture, but also northern, mid-west, as well as that chunk of coast out west that is often included as one of the 50 states. The South is just different. It's a different bunch of people. They speak differently, have different customs, have different behavior, etc. I don't see why you get so upset about this.

Because for the first 200 or so years of this country's existence Southern Culture was thoroughly identified with a heavy dose of institutional racism? If Southern Pride and Southern culture means something different now, then perhaps it might be a good idea to not use as it's symbol a flag that was flown when that racism was so pervasive that the South was compelled to separate itself from the rest of the country in order to ensure it's continuance?

[Chicken Fried]

And why are you so proud of the South? Region to region and state to state it couldn't be more different. If you're proud to be from Richmond, just wear an "IHeartRichmond" shirt or something.

.

I hate Richmond half the time. I don't really like it to be honest. I actually don't live in the city either. The land around the major cities is what I take the pride in. You're right in that each region is different, but they're all part of a culture that's just different and that I like.

[TD_washingtonredskins]

Because for the first 200 or so years of this country's existence Southern Culture was thoroughly identified with a heavy dose of institutional racism? If Southern Pride and Southern culture means something different now, then perhaps it might be a good idea to not use as it's symbol a flag that was flown when that racism was so pervasive that the South was compelled to separate itself from the rest of the country in order to ensure it's continuance?

My boy's wicked smart!

[Popeman38]

LOL. I have decided that I no longer recognize the laws of the USA. Does that make me correct... or delusional?

Was secession used as a tool by the states, with regularity, before the Civil War?

[DjTj]

Was secession used as a tool by the states, with regularity, before the Civil War?

No.

[Chicken Fried]

Because for the first 200 or so years of this country's existence Southern Culture was thoroughly identified with a heavy dose of institutional racism? If Southern Pride and Southern culture means something different now, then perhaps it might be a good idea to not use as it's symbol a flag that was flown when that racism was so pervasive that the South was compelled to separate itself from the rest of the country in order to ensure it's continuance?

I find it sad that you associate 19th century racism with the South and somehow ignore northern racism. Northern racism was extremely bad during the war, and it's one of, if not the major reason that most northerners didn't want blacks to be freed right away. They expected the freed blacks would come settle up north and live in the same cities as them. If you want to ban the Confederate flag because of racism, then you also have to ban the American flag which of course we will not and should not do.

[Popeman38]

The Supreme Court ruled on secession and found that it was not something that a state could do on its own:

When, therefore, Texas became one of the United States, she entered into an indissoluble relation. All the obligations of perpetual union, and all the guaranties of republican government in the Union, attached at once to the State. The act which consummated her admission into the Union was something more than a compact; it was the incorporation of a new member into the political body. And it was final. The union between Texas and the other States was as complete, as perpetual, and as indissoluble as the union between the original States. There was no place for reconsideration or revocation, except through revolution or through consent of the States.

Considered therefore as transactions under the Constitution, the ordinance of secession, adopted by the convention and ratified by a majority of the citizens of Texas, and all the acts of her legislature intended to give effect to that ordinance, were absolutely null. They were utterly without operation in law. The obligations of the State, as a member of the Union, and of every citizen of the State, as a citizen of the United States, remained perfect and unimpaired. It certainly follows that the State did not cease to be a State, nor her citizens to be citizens of the Union. If this were otherwise, the State must have become foreign, and her citizens foreigners. The war must have ceased to be a war for the suppression of rebellion, and must have become a war for conquest and subjugation.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0074_0700_ZO.html

This decision was issued in 1869. The Civil War was 1861-1865. Apparently President Buchanan, and President Lincoln, viewed secession as legal. To issue a ruling after conclusion of the war and during reconstruction is a bit revisionist, don't you think?

[twa]

Pretty much agree about the private property, although I'm a bit stronger on the employer's right to tell him to keep it off school grounds and get rid of him if he does not.

Interesting to compare this to the Wisconsin threads and see if right-to-work advocates are claiming this guy should sue for being fired.

Right to work does not mean right to behave,dress or even speak as you wish.

Not a right to work issue,if anything it would be a 1st issue.

[Popeman38]

No.

Yes, it was.

http://www.slate.com/id/2109317/

But the legal situation wasn't always so clear cut. Before the Civil War, the legality of secession was an open question, and Southerners would frequently threaten that their states might ditch the fledgling nation.

[Bang]

This is an ancient hindu symbol for a lucky charm or a special object.

Fly it from the back of your truck and see how tired you get of having to explain that to angry people who refuse to do business with you, or worse.

And also note that all your explanations won't mean jack to them, because that symbol has been permanently associated with something else that most people find heinous.

(You'll also note that the freaks who DON'T find what it represents heinous will suddenly feel a lot more comfortable with you, maybe even consider you a friend simply based on what they perceive from your chosen symbol.)

Same as the confederate flag. Yay, you've got the right to fly it, and to you it means something else.

Nobody cares what it means to you.

~Bang

[DjTj]

Yes, it was.

http://www.slate.com/id/2109317/

No, it wasn't. Sure, some people talked about secession, and people still talk about secession today, but your statement is wrong.

Was secession used as a tool by the states, with regularity, before the Civil War?

Secession was never used by any state before the Civil War.

This decision was issued in 1869. The Civil War was 1861-1865. Apparently President Buchanan, and President Lincoln, viewed secession as legal. To issue a ruling after conclusion of the war and during reconstruction is a bit revisionist, don't you think?

The Supreme Court usually takes some time to get an issue and rule on it. Segregation was found unconstitutional after it had been going on for a century. DC's handgun ban was found unconstitutional after it had been enforced for decades. That's the way the courts work.

Lincoln obviously thought that secession was illegal, since he fought a war about it.

Here is what he said at his inauguration in 1861:

I hold that, in contemplation of universal law, and of the Constitution, the union of these States is perpetual....It follows....that no State, upon its own mere motion, can lawfully get out of the Union; that resolves and ordinances to that effect are legally void; and that acts of violence, within any State or States, against the authority of the United States, are insurrectionary or revolutionary, according to circumstances. I, therefore, consider that, in view of the Constitution and the laws, the Union is unbroken.

Before Congress later that year:

The States have their status in the Union, and they have no other legal status. If they break from this they can only do so against law and by revolution.

http://www.nps.gov/liho/historyculture/secunlawful.htm

Buchanan also addressed this issue in the 1860 State of the Union:

In order to justify secession as a constitutional remedy, it must be on the principle that the Federal Government is a mere voluntary association of States, to be dissolved at pleasure by any one of the contracting parties. If this be so, the Confederacy is a rope of sand, to be penetrated and dissolved by the first adverse wave of public opinion in any of the States. In this manner our thirty-three States may resolve themselves into as many petty, jarring, and hostile republics, each one retiring from the Union without responsibility whenever any sudden excitement might impel them to such a course. By this process a Union might be entirely broken into fragments in a few weeks which cost our forefathers many years of toil, privation, and blood to establish.

Such a principle is wholly inconsistent with the history as well as the character of the Federal Constitution. After it was framed with the greatest deliberation and care it was submitted to conventions of the people of the several States for ratification. Its provisions were discussed at length in these bodies, composed of the first men of the country. Its opponents contended that it conferred powers upon the Federal Government dangerous to the rights of the States, whilst its advocates maintained that under a fair construction of the instrument there was no foundation for such apprehensions. In that mighty struggle between the first intellects of this or any other country it never occurred to any individual, either among its opponents or advocates, to assert or even to intimate that their efforts were all vain labor, because the moment that any State felt herself aggrieved she might secede from the Union. What a crushing argument would this have proved against those who dreaded that the rights of the States would be endangered by the Constitution! The truth is that it was not until many years after the origin of the Federal Government that such a proposition was first advanced. It was then met and refuted by the conclusive arguments of General Jackson, who in his message of the 16th of January, 1833, transmitting the nullifying ordinance of South Carolina to Congress, employs the following language:

The right of the people of a single State to absolve themselves at will and without the consent of the other States from their most solemn obligations, and hazard the liberties and happiness of the millions composing this Union, can not be acknowledged. Such authority is believed to be utterly repugnant both to the principles upon which the General Government is constituted and to the objects which it is expressly formed to attain.

http://www.teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=946

[Teller]

Because for the first 200 or so years of this country's existence Southern Culture was thoroughly identified with a heavy dose of institutional racism? If Southern Pride and Southern culture means something different now, then perhaps it might be a good idea to not use as it's symbol a flag that was flown when that racism was so pervasive that the South was compelled to separate itself from the rest of the country in order to ensure it's continuance?

Personally, I don't think that most of the people who display that flag today see it that way. I think, for them, it's just a symbol of pride in a way of life, and something to rally around. I mean, when you get right down to it, there's no group out there that's more popular (and politically correct) to bash. Afterall, we all "know" that everyone south of NOVA is a stupid, inbred, tobacco-chewin, wrasslin- and racin-lovin dip****.

It's no different than any other group that's been persecuted throughout our history (real or perceived.) They all adopt a slogan, a flag or a symbol. If not the rebel flag, what would you have Southerners choose?

[DjTj]

t's no different than any other group that's been persecuted throughout our history (real or perceived.) They all adopt a slogan, a flag or a symbol. If not the rebel flag, what would you have Southerners choose?

White hoods? :dunce:

[Teller]

White hoods? :dunce:

Seriously though, per capita, you won't find more rebel flags than at a NASCAR race. And during my trip to the confederate capital for a race in 2009, there was a surprisingly diverse fanbase in attendance, and no issues.

[Bang]

If not the rebel flag, what would you have Southerners choose?

How about this one?

~Bang

[twa]

How about this one?

~Bang

I like it....not sure ya'll will when we subjugate you though.:pfft:

[Henry]

I find it sad that you associate 19th century racism with the South and somehow ignore northern racism. Northern racism was extremely bad during the war, and it's one of, if not the major reason that most northerners didn't want blacks to be freed right away. They expected the freed blacks would come settle up north and live in the same cities as them. If you want to ban the Confederate flag because of racism, then you also have to ban the American flag which of course we will not and should not do.

I hate to point this out, but institutional racism in the south continued well past the 19th century. Government-backed racism was rooted in southern culture until a little over 40 years ago. If things are different now, and I believe you when they say they are, that's wonderful. But again, if there is some special kind of pride in being a southerner today, why use a flag that was designed specifically for a time when the south fought a war against the rest of the country in order to keep their slaves? Are we moving beyond the past or not? What exactly are we proud of?

This isn't about the North. There's no widespread belief in 'Northern Pride.' There's no symbol that specifically represents a northern section of the country. If there were, we could debate it. But the guy in the article wants to fly Lee's battle flag, so here we are.